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Cable Providers Still Have No Answer For Netflix As Cord-cutting Accelerates (bgr.com)
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from BGR about the rapidly shifting roles of cable companies and streaming media providers: While cable providers over the past few decades have grown fat off of exorbitant cable packages that overcharge and under-deliver, the rise of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Video are finally righting the ship and shifting the balance of power towards the consumer. Clearly, the cable industry is in the midst of a transition. Netflix in particular, with its ever-growing stable of original content, has proven to be a particularly painful thorn in the side of cable providers who are increasingly struggling to keep subscribers from cutting the cord. Now comes word via The Wall Street Journal that cord cutting isn't just on the rise, but is accelerating rapidly. Citing data recently compiled by eMarketer, the Journal relays that the number of households with cable 'will fall at an accelerating rate for at least the next four years, reaching a 1.4% decline in 2019, eMarketer estimates.'
That's only 3 years, and the pace is accelerating. They'd be really worried if they weren't also the guys who sell you broadband internet.
The people who should be worried are the cable-only content providers. When all TV content is available for streaming, will anyone watch the Travel Channel, or the Food Network, or the Golf Channel, or Court TV, or TNT, or any other similar networks? Why aren't we already talking about these shutting down in 5 years?
Actually, they are willing. They love that stuff.
Come on, man. I know reading the article is hard work around here, but the entire point of this story is that people are increasingly getting annoyed enough to cut the cord and so cable companies are losing customers at an alarming rate (at least from the cable company's point of view). Even if they're only losing a net 1% of customers per year, say, that's still a huge amount of lost profit both in direct revenues from subscribers and in the long run through diminishing ad revenues as well.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.