Subscribers of Time Warner Cable may watch “SpongeBob SquarePants,” “Dora the Explorer” and Jon Stewart vanish tonight at midnight if the cable company does not come to an agreement rapidly with one of its major suppliers.

 

Viacom Inc. announced that it would withdraw its programming, including Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central and 16 other channels, if a new contract was not established until 12:01 a.m. on Thursday.

 

Philippe Dauman, chief executive of Viacom, explained that the stalemate came as a result of unsolved negotiations and accused Time Warner Cable of not cooperating. Viacom’s two-year contract with Time Warner, the nation’s second-largest cable operator, which has approximately 12.3 million subscribers, expires at midnight.

 

According to spokesman Alex Dudley, a vice president at Time Warner Cable, Viacom requested fee increases of between 22 percent and 36 percent per channel, a growth that could add to customers’ cable bills. On the other hand, a spokeswoman for Viacom, Kelly McAndrew, said that the demanded increase was in the very low double-digit percentage extent.

 

Viacom explained the increases would not affect subscribers, as they would only have to pay an additional 23 cents a month. The company said that Americans spend a fifth of their television time watching Viacom programs and that the fees represent less than 2.5 percent of the Time Warner cable bill.

 

The disagreement between the two companies was also caused, however, by the fact that some of the most popular Viacom shows are rerun on Web sites where the media giant grosses advertising revenue that it fails to share with Time Warner, according to Alex Dudley.

 

The channels that would be affected by the expiration of the contract between the two companies are: Comedy Central, CMT: Pure Country, Logo, Palladia, MTV, MTV 2, MTV Hits, MTV Jams, MTV Tr3s, Nickelodeon, Noggin, Nick 2, Nicktoons, Spike, The N, TV Land, VH1, VH1 Classic, and VH1 Soul.