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Canadian Telcos Lobby Against Pick-and-Pay TV
silentbrad writes with an excerpt from the Financial Post: "BCE Inc., Rogers Communications Inc., and Shaw Communications Inc. which together control two-thirds of the $8.3-billion broadcast distribution market, are lobbying against the so-called 'a la carte' model that would allow customers to pick and pay for individual networks, arguing the change would have disastrous consequences for programmers, such as Bell Media and Shaw Media. 'A regulation requiring that all programming services must be made available to consumers on a stand-alone basis would have far-reaching ramifications,' BCE, whose Bell owns 30 specialty networks, said in a submission to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission. 'Undoubtedly, a market shake-out, causing many specialty services to exit, would ensue.' The three big players, led by BCE, have told the CRTC they support the status quo of 'tied selling,' or the practice of grouping weaker-performing networks in with a popular channels, versus a new approach to sell channels individually. ... In the race for subscription dollars, rates for TV services across providers have risen sharply over the last decade as the number of specialty channels, each commanding its own fee, has soared. Net costs to subscribers climbed another 2.6% in 2011, while average bills now hover around $60 a month."
Existing companies support existing profit structure? I'm shocked. Shocked I say!
I can watch ponies on youtube or netflix... haven't had cable since 2008.
Of course they lobby aginst it..
Nobody actually WANTS to pay for all those shopping, religious nut, cable access bullshit channels.
And yet someone has to pay for them. Because we can't just tell those channel execs 'your channel sucks and nobody wants it, we're dropping it'.
So they stay. And we all get to pay for crap we never wanted.
Why are the popular channels subsidizing poor-performing specialty channels? What's the logic in that? Why is the cable company carrying a channel that's not profitable?
Their argument rings so damn hollow it's ridiculous.
Forget ala-carte channels, much less bundling of channels. The future isn't even in ala-carte series, but rather ala-carte episodes. It is insanely competitive, but with unicast now feasible (and catching on rapidly, e.g. netflix), it cannot be otherwise.
I think the a la carte model is fine. I have been unplugged since 2007 (take that Anonymous Coward), and I have used a mac mini and a boxee box as my entertainment devices. I like the on-demand aspect. However, I do watch less TV because once I have finished the program I set out to watch I turn it off. I do not get sucked into the shiny program that comes on next.
Flexible bare-metal recovery for Linux/UNIX
There might be an avenue for continuing income in the future for providers that offer ala carte programming in the future. I've avoided getting cable or satellite, specifically because my needs are handled by OTA programming (news and sports) and Netflix (most of the rest of the shows I watch). I'd love it if I had the option to pay for just a few channels without duplicating the access I already have available to me, and the cable company would get subscription money out of me that they aren't currently pulling in. I don't think I'm even that unusual, among the younger end of the demographic.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
...a market shake-out, causing many specialty services to exit, would ensue.
The raisin de etre for cable tv is specialty service. All that non-sense about buying 'packages' is a way for the company to extort more money from customers.The channels have to put advertising in place to support themselves; They do not get that subscription money, and they wouldn't under a 'pick and choose' model anymore than they do now. But what it would do is force cable companies to disclose which assets are valuable and which are not, meaning those channels could then dictate terms to the cable companies, instead of the other way around; It would be an accurate way of figuring out how many people actually watch your channel, rather than relying on 3rd party services to provide that information.
So no. It wouldn't result in a market 'shakeout'.... and if it did, that's capitalism in action. Don't you support capitalism, oh great Cable TV executive with your very fancy hat? What you're really saying is your profits would be lower because you'd have to be honest about the numbers, rather than being able to use (achem) creative accounting.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
You can either pick and choose channels, which are expensive but allow you to get a lower bill if you are watching a limited number of channels, or you can choose from pre designed genre based bundles which come with a mix of good and bad channels but are generally cheaper than individual channels
You can also add individual channels to the bundles at the individual rates
Popular networks propping up to the weaker ones? This sounds suspiciously like communism.
media cartel if customers get to pick their own programming?
But telcos, what happened to free market competition?
Oh, you only use that line when it benefits you, got it.
It's been around 10 or 11 years now since I stopped watching TV. The ridiculous monthly costs combined with the facts that 2/3 of the channels are uninteresting and those that are are filled with up to 40% commercial time, I just thought to myself one day "Why am I paying for this?"
Since canceling my cable, I chose to watch shows that I was interested in by on-line streaming or by just getting the DVDs, and that's worked out great so far. The added perk is that I'm not exposed to ANY commercials at all. The big Telco's have got to come to the realization sooner or later that embracing the more modern ways of media distribution is a lot more profitable and beneficial than constantly opposing them. They seem to forget that it is the consumer than "wants" the shows, and their job to deliver what the consumer wants, not what they think the consumer wants.
If they don't step into the 21st century soon, more and more folks are just going to do what I did and stop giving them any money at all. Personally... I think it was one of the best things I've ever done; I haven't a clue where I'd find time to sit in front of a TV nowadays.
...and someone with a monopoly shouldn't be allowed to force those wanting to buy the monopoly product to also buy other, lesser products. Obviously the law for pay TV doesn't work that way right now, but morally I think it should.
This should of course be within reason, assuming legislators can craft laws with reason. For cable-style channels, allowing a-la-carte selection by channel makes sense. Letting consumers choose by the television show on a given channel may not even by technically feasible. On the other hand, for internet subscriptions, selling by the channel or even by the episode might by possible.
In my opinion, a reasonable consumer-friendly compromise position would be:
1. Owners of a channel or set of channels with similar theme and content can market them as a bundle or as a la carte (e.g. ESPN with EPSN2 and ESPNU since content is often moved from one to the others).
2. The cable providers - or the consumers directly - can negotiate with the providers (with their wallets, if they must) to break up such similar-content channel bundles.
3. Owners are forbidden from bundling unrelated (by theme) channels. Disney can't force ABC Family on people who just want to buy ESPN. This applies equally to cable and internet subscriptions - there's not even a need to make special laws for the internet here.
4. Owners and cable providers are forbidden from forcing certain channels or channel bundles into certain tiers. Consumers have the ultimate right to select the theme-based channel bundles they prefer without having to buy any other "lower tier" bundles to get there.
5. Charging an exorbitant rate for a popular channel bundle is legal, of course. But throwing non-theme-related channels into the same bundle "for free" is illegal, unless those other channels are also free to anyone who wants them without the costly channel. In other words, Disney can't make ESPN $20 a month then provide all their other channels for free, unless consumers are allowed to drop ESPN and receive all the other channels for free.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
BCE, whose Bell owns 30 specialty networks
Who wants to bed all 30 of those networks are struggling because no one with a sane mind wants to watch them?
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
No one will care about those dozens of channels I bet. That's the whole deal: people don't want all those crappy channels.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
I'd feel more inclined to agree with Cable companies if it were not for their extremely aggressive rent seeking behavior. They only carefully crafted service plans that are designed to offer you either:
1. Complete garbage for the low tier price they're required to have
or
2. The same garbage, plus more garbage you don't want along with the handful of channels you might actually do want.
So, either you pay reasonable 25-30 a month for useless crap or 100. No middle ground. It's this type of shit that gets regulators involved. All premium TV providers do this, not just cable companies. Cable companies also enjoy a monopoly status (for cable access), granted by the local municipalities that regulate the land and facilities their transmission lines lay on. Thus, there is justification to regulate them in turn.
I say fuck 'em. They're not entitled to their abusive business model.
You don't get how it works. The HSN pays the cable companies to be distributed! They are profitable, they have money! They are perhaps the poster child for how it should be done.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
If you want me as a customer, you will implement à la carte service.
If you don't, I will continue to use streaming video and iTunes.
This is non-negotiable.
...laura
Most people right now are paying for five channels they don't want for every one they do. Thus, a 300% increase in the price per channel would still be cheaper unless you're one of the few people that actually wants every channel.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
I want a package with I can get things like Discovery, Syfy, and Cartoon Network, without subsidizing ESPN or any sports channel or religion channel..
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
OP's point is that instead of paying 5$ for 6 channels, of which you only watch 2, you'll be paying 4$ for each of the two channels you actually want. (hint: total 8$)
If we don't rectally shaft them with barbed implements rather than provide that for which they ask?
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
Have you seen History channel lately? It's got nothing to do with History at all, unless you consider Pawn Stars and JAG returns to be historical.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
Most people will not want a dozen or more channels. The real end game will be a la carte episode/movies. Like amazon is doing on the ps3. The old stuff is free with prime the new stuff is pay per episode. I imagine some of it will be free/cheap with commercials. This will mean far more competition and will drive down prices in a huge way. This is what cable providers really fear.
", arguing the change would have disastrous consequences for programmers,"
So?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I'm afraid that I own the rights to the following business plan: Produce a crap product and convince some politicians that it must be bundled with more popular wares.
If the Canadian media companies insist on pursuing this line of business, they'll have to meet my licensing terms.
Have gnu, will travel.
If they have any sense they will raise the prices on the less popular channels before cancelling them. So the shit channels get cheap and the decent channels get more expensive? Hell, I'd pay $30 a month for only 10 channels if it meant not having to scroll through all the shit to find something interesting. If they try and charge $10/mo for each channel though, they'd have about 10 seconds before I pulled the plug. And if there are channels with literally hundreds of viewers, then either get a government grant or get cancelled. I expect my taxes to pay for other people's stuff, not my cable bill.
Paying for a channel is still too coarse. I would like to be able to purchase packages of specific shows.
Specialty channels in Canada fall into two groups:
1. The ones that draw subscribers. Think TSN and ones like that, which have content people actually go looking for.
2. The ones that are run on the cheap and show reruns of a small group of shows over and over again.
Group #1 would thrive under this model because they could charge more for those channels. If people can subscribe to TSN on its own, TSN can double or triple the price it charges the cable companies. They'll pass it along, and people will pay it because it's still no more then people were paying to get it before. The only difference is that a bunch of channel type #2 are no longer along for the ride.
Group #2 will suffer and many of them will die off, because they simply aren't worth paying for and won't draw subscription money if you need to pick them up seperately. What people don't commonly realize is that these channels make far more money from being in bundles then they do from advertising. It simply doesn't matter if you're watching them or not, so long as you're buying some other channel and they can be in that bundle you're still giving them money. That lets them save on content, because if nobody's watching they can pretty easily get away with constant reruns of bargain basement shows.
It would hardly be a tragedy to lose a bunch of thse channels. We have far too many as it is and they're starting to blend together and all show similar reality crap because it's cheap.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
So you're a content distributor/producer, and you have 3 "name" channels everybody wants and a bunch of low-rated specialty channels that show a ton of re-runs, "marathons" and a small handful of low-rated original niche programs ("Low Carb Househunter Pawn Star Bachelorette Bounty Hunters").
Of course you bundle everything, requiring cable/satellite providers to take the crap to get the in-demand channels.
In many cases, the crap channels seem *so* crappy you wonder how they even cover the overhead of technical production -- in many cases these kind of channels run 3 unique commercials for mail order products per hour and the rest of the time are promotionals for other programs on this and other channels.
I sometimes wonder if the bundling isn't about trying to make the niche channels profitable by getting them a wider audience, but a kind of land-rush, channel squatting to make sure they have a slots on every cable channel. This allows them to re-invent a channel (remember when Bravo was meant to be a 'serious' culture channel) anytime they want and automatically have a slot for it. And more importantly, especially for older cable systems, limit competition from new channels or other content packagers.
It makes less sense in a digital cable world where there's nearly endless spectrum, but it often seems to be the only rational reason for subsidizing a lot of crummy channels when that money might buy better leather for the executive jet.
I agree. This won't go the way people think it will. For proof, just look at season passes on Amazon Instant Video. They charge something like $2.35 an episode (in HD). Season seem to be around 22~24 episodes, so that is somewhere between $50 and $60 for a season depending on the show. Granted that I believe you "own" (in the sense the show will always be available to you in your video library) the show on Amazon instead of seeing it and having to buy the Blu-Ray when it comes out later, but it is still quite the mark up. If you only watch one or two shows and trust Amazon, then it may be worth it, but you are otherwise better off getting a cable package and the disks later down the road (TV seasons go on sale all the time).
For speculation sake, lets guestimate what that will be. I'm sure that the content providers won't charge as high a price as on Amazon, but it wouldn't surprise me if they didn't use it as a basic starting point. I could see them doing $0.50 per week for each local stations (so $2 per month), and $1 to $1.50 per week ($4 to $6 a month) per "cable" station.
If it is that price then for me I would need the local 4 networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, & FOX) at $8, and ten cable stations I regularly watch... somewhere around $45 to $60 per month. Isn't that what I pay now for 30 or 40 channels?
Vol~
I work for a major cable network- here's a hopefully better explanation of why we've stuck with the bundling model.
A cable channel gets its revenue from two main sources- cable subscription fees from the cable provider (~70%) and ad revenue (~30%).
Let's assume we have a cable channel that is currently bundled, and in 100% of households with TVs, with revenue of $100 million a year. We're getting $70 million from cable subscriptions, and $30 million from ad revenue.
Now let's say we switch to a-la carte, but 100% of households still want to subscribe at a price that leaves us revenue-neutral. The cable channel says "great! we're still getting $70 million from subscriptions and $30 million from ad revenue. Everybody wins."
But, let's say only 50% of households would be willing to subscribe, but they're willing to pay double the price because they love the channel. We're still making $70 million from subscription fees. However, we're now only in 50% of households, which means we're much less attractive to advertisers. We're not going to keep making $30 million from ad revenue, because advertisers often need a "critical mass" of households reached in order to make a deal. This isn't a linear relationship- 50% of households doesn't mean 50% of ad revenue, it could mean 0% because we don't have the scale to make an ad deal worthwhile for the advertiser.
So now we've only got $70-85 million a year, which means we have less money to spend on programming. Program quality suffers as a result, and so the next year maybe only 25% of households are willing to subscribe. We're now in a downward spiral.
TL;DR - unbundling has the unfortunate side effect of reducing program quality for specialty channels. Only the cheapest shows (ie, crappy reality shows) or the ones appealing to the lowest common denominator (ie, CBS's entire lineup) might survive in the long-term.
arguing the change would have disastrous consequences for their ability to scalp you
FTFThem.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
With my antenna and digital TV, I get about 10 channels for free. 90% of the programming is crap.
But I can pay $60/month and get 100 channels of crap? Oh boy!!!! Sign me up!!!
You are even better off signing up for netflix/amazon prime and watching the old seasons. Why would I care if I am watching last seasons episodes? It's new to me. Not sure about Canada, but here in the states lots of new stuff can be found on hulu and tv.com for free.
They tried to hide the quality of the channel by simply saying its your personal opinion of the channel, not the value of the channel itself.
So even if you don't like it, imaginary people do. Hence we're giving 28 channels for X amount is a GREAT bargin.
Even if you only watch two of them, other people watches the OTHER channels...so we're giving you VALUE.
No. No you're not. You're bundling cheap crap that people don't want in to justify your prices.
If you tried to charge 30$ for two channels, you'd suddenly seem 'expensive' for what you get.
So you try to hide that and just don't want to be exposed.
Tough shit.
I'd love if I could sell people things and force them to buy other crud, but when it comes to physical objects, can't get away with it as much.
"Ah, I see you wish to purchase this TV, well, the TV is decent, medium level TV, and I realize the price is for a higher quality TV, but look, you get this cheap
living room set that no one wants to buy, so you're getting a great deal really."
No, no I'm not, because I don't need another living room set, and it's worthless, I couldn't sell it if I tried.
lot's of carp channels that no one watches drives up cost just as much as people who don't want ESPN but may want HBO or other non sports channels.
Also there are people who want sports but not all the other crap like disney channels.
You can get Amazon on PS3 now?!?!?
When did that happen? I've not fired up my PS3 ever since I dropped netflix streaming (didn't want to pay the extra above my BluRay rentals)...but last time I looked Amazon wasn't available on PS3...?!?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I wonder how many of the channels that do make money kickback part of the profit to the cable providers? Above board or otherwise.
This Tuesday. You install it from the store or from the same video channels dialogue netflix is under.
Too cool!!!
Hey, thank you VERY much for the info!!
Have a great weekend!
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
ESPN is nearing $5+ a sub it should go premium as well disney channel that used to be premium as well.
You too. If you end up in WNY you owe me a beer.
Though Canadians will easily recognize the conflict of interest, the service providers (cable/satellite) are also more or less the media providers (TV channels). For example, Bell Media owns many of the TV channels in the country, while Bell TV is one of two satellite providers; both are owned by BCE (aka Bell Canada).
"Undoubtedly, a market shake-out, causing many specialty services to exit, would ensue." Great quote; sounds like the satellite company is trying to help save those struggling TV channels. Except that the satellite company('s parent company) owns those TV channels!
This is just a huge money-printing machine:
1. Secure rights to TV programs already produced, conditional on CRTC approval
2. Ask the CRTC for approval to start a new channel with your "new" programming
3. Once you get approval, put the channel on your cable/satellite service
4. Heavily advertise new channel on all your other channels (at cost)
5. Bundle your channel with a whole bunch of other crappy channels and one good channel, making sure you can't get the one good channel without the other crap (often good to bundle another company's channels so they'll bundle yours)
6. Profit!
There's no ... step here.
One idea (that would never fly) would be that only networks that air a high percentage of original programs (not talking about "Canadian content", though I'm sure it'd get mixed in there) can be bundled together; if you're rebroadcasting another network's shows either on first airing or as repeats, you have to let your channel sink or swim in the free market. If you're actually benefiting society by producing a lot of new content I'd be willing to pay a small amount for that even if I have no interest in watching it, but if you're just a rebroadcasting money machine you can get off my lawn.
Today it is easy and cheap to get interesting shows from streaming providers/dvd. It is easy and cheap (for most people) to get news from Air (free) or from Internet (almost free). It is easy, cheap and fast(!) to get any information you want from Internet without spending hours in front of TV. So it sounds like that only people that really would subscribe to cable are people that like to watch crap and advertisements. Why should anybody deprive them from this? Let them do it. Let them have their own club. Everybody else can just pull the plug, save money and live better. I do understand that this is a habit that might be difficult to drop. But it's worth it! I've dropped my TV subscription when I realised that I do not watch it and my kid watches treehouse to much. And I've never had a second thought.
Cost more? Nonsense.
I could already dump cable now and pay less if only the streaming services carried enough content. That's pay per view prices.
You're just engaging in mindless pro-corporate fear mongering.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
U-verse is real bad as you need to buy starz and showtime to get MLB network, NBA tv, NASA TV, Investigation Discovery, Planet Green, Discovery Fit & Health, Centric, and others.
If I could pay $10 per channel for the ones I really want, I would probably still come out ahead.$5 per channel would be a total bargain.
OTOH, I know exactly what I watch. I can just query the database in the center of my PVR.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
SyFy (I pronounce it like 'sippy', but with f in place of p, as it's not SciFi): wrestling, ghost hunters, paranormal witness, fact or faked, etc.
Discovery: man vs. wild, pitchmen, dual survival, man/woman/wild, ghost lab, etc.
They're not already catering to the lowest common denominator? I admit, I like Survivorman ... but the other survival shows grate on me. And I might watch more of The Colony if they have two groups, both thinking they're the 'good guys' and the other group is a bunch of actors in there to harass them, but I'd rather watch Rough Science.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
I think you and GP have a bad assumption - that each channel will cost a higher amount by default.
The problem with that assumption is that I could actually choose in many niches. For example, do I choose History International, or do I get NatGeo? Telemundo or Univision? NatGeo Wild or Animal Planet? Does the missus want OWN, Oxygen, or Lifetime?
Price (and competition to provide the lowest) will of course figure into this greatly. Why? Because many channels know they have competition, and you can bet your ass that the popular niche channels which do not will begin to see some pretty quickly.
Also, a LOT of channels will begin dropping prices on their own (and demanding the lower price be passed on to the end-users) as they take a good hard look at their shrinking balance sheets and try to make it up in volume. The shopping channels will likely pay the cablecos just to be put in the lineup for free.
Long story short, it's not as cut-and-dried as you and GP think.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
who did not understand that?
It isn't evil; it's just bundling, and there is a reason for it.
Simple example (from the newspaper days)
Alice values the fashion section at $0.20 and the sports section at $0.10.
Bob values the sports section at $0.20 and the fashion section at $0.10.
If the publisher prices both sections at $0.10, he sells 4 sections and makes $0.40.
If the publisher prices both sections at $0.20, he sells 2 sections and makes $0.40.
But if the publisher bundles the two sections together and prices the bundle at $0.30, he sells 2 bundles and makes $0.60.
Same thing if you're ever in New Orleans.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
If the cable companies can prevent a la carte, then I want a law that makes them pay me for the time I spend after watching a show that looked good, but turned to crap before the end.
(Actually, I canned cable for OTA and Hulu years ago, but hell, I'd pay $100 or even $200 a month if there was a time refund guarantee)
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
They won't allow a la carte because it'll save consumers too much, since they're realizing that all these new "channels" these companies offer nowadays are just showing the exact same shows as another one but in a different order.
So in other words, these guys want people to pay for crap they don't want. I'd LOVE to get cable channels, but only the ones I want. I'd nix most channels and have locals and only 8-10 others. Reality-show channels? 50 news channels? ESPN 1 to 249? Christ. It's like if Wal-Fart decided to tell their customers, "if you come to our store, you have to buy EVERYTHING WE TELL YOU TO, even if you don't want it."
You want to know how to help your kids? LEAVE THEM THE F*&K ALONE. --George Carlin
sort all the channels into "bands" beginning with "Stuff we have to cover or the FCC/FTC would vivisect us" and then layers of stuff ,expensive stuff, niche stuff ,expensive but niche stuff, stuff thats just Odd but we need channel count and then PPV stuff in each layer.
as a subscriber you get to pay for channels either by paying X% of a channels "bundle" (to be set at no more than Cost of that pack divided by number of channels in pack times 1.3) or just getting that bundle
or
trade channels from other bundles in that "layer" or more "expensive" layers
all the math of course should be make the cable bill the same or lower
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
This is true for some stuff. But, are you interested in watching the Super Bowl from three years ago?
You do realize that the Super Bowl can be watched live, for free, with rabbit ears hooked up to your TV? Since you claim to have a 60" TV, I would be extremely surprised if it didn't have an ATSC tuner, and couldn't do 1080p (though most OTA HD is 1080i.).
I'm in Canada, and I can pick up NBC and Fox in HD, from a tower in upstate New York (I also get PBS, from Watertown). I have a hard time believing you wouldn't be able to do that yourself.
Anyway, it's only a few minutes in a one hour episode so, it's worth BUFFERING.... BUFFERING... 30 seconds of watchable video BUFFERING...
You also need a better Internet provider. I have no problem watching streaming video on my 12meg DSL connection. I'm able to watch HD video from the station sites of just about everything I actually watch.
Sounds like you need a better internet provider. A mac-mini can be easily placed in a cabinet. That is the simplest, but anyone reading slashdot should have no trouble setting up a mediacenter pc.
In the race for subscription dollars, rates for TV services across providers have risen sharply over the last decade as the number of specialty channels, each commanding its own fee, has soared.
There's the real problem right there. The cost keeps going up. So, reduce the overall cost to the consumer, and we won't care if you "bundle" other channels. Get the specialty channels to reduce their fees, or to be included in "bundles" and so long as the overall monthly cost is kept low, the other channels can ride along.
What I fear is everything becoming "specialty" - or charging like it - can you imagine paying $10/mon PER CHANNEL? e.g for SyFy - $10, Discovery - $10. Food network - $5. But that's basically what a la carte will do - eventually each channel will cost $5-$10/month, with "bigger" ones (HBO, Showtime) being $12-$15.
So, for just a FEW channels, the cost is MORE than it would be now:
SyFy $10
Discovery $10
HBO $15
Food $5
ABC $5
NBC $5
CBS $5
FOX $5
CNN $5
COMEDY $5
TBS $5
USA $5
-----
$80/month!
So, PLEASE, let's just go back to one flat rate per month for EVERYTHING - and let's keep it to say, $75/month. Any more for 'tv' makes me just want to kick the thing out on the curb and go back to playing card games, reading, etc.
It's not just Amazon - same thing on Xbox as well, with whatever its built-in video service is called - pay per episode or per season, whichever you prefer.
And yes, I'd imagine that telcos hate this with a passion. I haven't had a cable subscription for over a year now - largely thanks to Amazon.
s/Elsevier/Canadian telcos/g
That means though, that people are paying $X for a specific channel, and a bunch of channels they don't want. Logically, most will be happy to pay $X just for that specific channel. The cable company will charge the same amount for the channel as they did for the package, but lose the few customers who also wanted the extra channels.
In some cases bundling things can be illegal.
Tying is when you have enough clout in one market that you can use it to muscle another market by requiring people to buy your crapware to get the good stuff.
Suppose you had a monopoly on bread sales and you want to expand in the vegetable market by pushing your tomatoes. You just bundle your tomatoes by piggy backing it on your bread by saying that customers don't get bread unless they buy your tomatoes.
In this case, cable networks have a lot of crappy stuff they want to shovel down our throats, and they know the only way they can get away with it is by forcing you to take it with the good stuff that you DO want. Also the reason why you have to buy whole CDs with 9 crappy songs to get the good one.
The real answer is that you're not the customer. You're the product
If I'm being billed, I'm a customer.
Maybe I'm not a priority, but I'm still a customer, and if I don't like what I'm getting for the price, then they lose me as a customer.
And if I'm also a product, they lose that too.
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
Or at least, it's dying, thanks to the internet.
Cable companies are losing customers in *droves*, and AFAIK newspaper readership has also dropped dramatically. It's called adapt-or-die... and consumer choice means new balance to the equation.
Alice wants fashion. Bob wants sports. Guess what, now they *both* go online instead of paying $0.60 and the newspaper gets NOTHING. Similarly the cable-co's
Or... they can adjust the packages to make it attractive to the millions of people that otherwise won't bother. $2/channel * 10 channels * 1,000,000 people is still more than $40/overall * 100,000 people... a lot more.
Rather than going for the set-price, go for volume in happy customers.
Every subscription to our overpriced package comes with a free mercury enema, a $5 coupon for a bikini wax at Dan's house'o'duct-tape, and a bonus DVD "the sex life of the Royal family (1950)"
It's added value! Can't you see it!
Instead of having "tiers", have "packages" that you buy by type.
So all the sports channels (including the expensive ones like ESPN) would go in a "sports pack".
All the documentary channels (Discovery, History, National Geographic etc) would go in a "documentary pack"
All the kids channels (Cartoon Network, Disney, Nickelodeon etc) would go in a "kids pack"
All the music channels (MTV, Country Music Channel etc) would go in a "music pack"
Citation? Simple market forces. See also computers, telephones, Internet service providers (once you have more than one choice), and damned near any other product or service in which competition either exists or has arisen.
Seriously? You need a citation for Economics 101?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
A few years ago a Rogers representative called me. She informed me that a special promotion was under way. I could get a discount on digital service (half off?) for a year. She said that Rogers was going to go all digital soon anyway so I shouldn't miss this promotion.
I signed up. As part of the offer, I received a digital convertor (my TV, although HD, was analog). The convertor was rented.
Rogers didn't go all digital.
A bit over a year later my nephew was visiting. He asked if he could watch a "Pay per View" event. I agreed. He then asked where the digital box was. Someone had disconected it, sometime (it was broken). No one in our (immediate) family had even noticed.
I then cancelled our cable TV service.
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
I think they're going to mega QQ all over this.
I'm tired of companies demanding that their old profitable business model remain so throughout all time.
Times are changing, they need to change too or go out of business, like any other business with a business model that doesn't work.
I'm kind of late to the party here, but in Manitoba this certainly seems to work.
MTS provides both specific theme bundles as well as individual channels (though, admittedly, not all channels are available individually) and it doesn't seem to have killed Shaw (Rogers isn't available here and I don't think I've seen Bell providing cable).
Then again, we're out west, not part of the central area that actually gets cared about.
Forget 'a la carte' channels. I want to only purchase the individual shows I want. Once I can pick my shows and have them on demand when I want plus past airings... I will then consider handing the cable company more money. For now, they get enough money from me for Internet service.