Sunday night's Oscar program almost didn't happen for millions of TV viewers in the New York City area, in the latest high-stakes battle between media giants over the cost of TV programming. Why are these battles happening now, and who will ultimately win?

If you happened to be one of Cablevision's 3.1 million subscribers in New York, New Jersey or Connecticut on Sunday, you missed some classic TV: a closeup of Academy Award winner Mo'Nique's hairy legs on Barbara Walters' Oscar special, Kathy Ireland's freaky posture on the red carpet and Neil Patrick Harris singing about why inmates drop soap. That's because ABC cut off the signal of its New York City station to Cablevision subscribers just after midnight on Sunday morning, in a dispute over "retransmission fees," the money the cable company pays for carrying local broadcast stations.

The red carpet showdown was not the first battle over these fees, and it won't be the last. Stung by the recession and the general -- and apparently permanent -- ebb of advertising dollars away from network TV, media companies are searching the ground for every revenue scrap they can find. And their expensive-to-make network programming is a potentially juicy source. Whereas they used to pipe that content to cable companies for little or no cost, they now expect to be paid for it.