Pirate TV Services Are Taking a Bite Out of Cable Company Revenue (arstechnica.co.uk)

TV piracy services are being used by about 6.5 percent of North American households with broadband access, potentially costing legitimate TV providers billions of dollars a year, a new analysis found. From a report: Pirate services that offer live TV channels are apparently responsible for more downstream traffic each night than torrent downloads. Based on these figures, there may be 7 million US and Canadian subscribers to pirate TV services that generally cost about $10 a month, the report by Sandvine said. That amounts to $840 million of revenue a year. We don't know how many people using pirate services would purchase a traditional cable or satellite TV package if the piracy option didn't exist. But if all of those people instead purchased a legal TV package for $50 per month, that would amount to another $4.2 billion revenue a year for North American pay-TV providers, the report said.

Comments

From their article....

[Kiralan]

The number of cable and satellite TV subscriptions has been dropping for years due to rising prices and Internet-based alternatives, both legal and otherwise.

My conclusion: Charge fair prices, instead of soaking everyone while you can, and while the market will tolerate it. When the cost and inconvenience of replacing cable with internet alternatives and OTA (Digital antenna) becomes less of a deciding factor, more viewers will do so. Also, the younger generation wants portable media, not one bound to the cable box at home.

Re:Assumptions

[rogoshen1]

I know right?

"If you liked your grey-market TV package at $10, let me tell you about a GREAT deal! For the low, low price of $50 you can get exactly the same thing, with the added benefit of 13 religious channels, a Filipino-language cooking channel, and 75 home shopping channels! Trust me, you'd totally love it at $50. Because we; your poor, downtrodden cable company need your money. The legal expense needed to maintain a nationwide jihad against municipal ISP's and google fiber add up! Please, think of your cable company Subscribe today"

media to garbage ratio

[WolfgangVL]

A $50.00 cable package includes a ton of additional commercials. At this point it looks pretty close to 50:50 media/interruptions. I suppose all the sponsor breaks might be useful if your in the market for fast-food, trial lawyers and medication (with miles of scary side effects)

Honestly, I would consider buying back into a cable sub if they did away with all of the commercials. As it stands, cable subs are inferior products at half the asking rate on account of the commercials alone. No wonder everybody pirates like crazy.

I'd rather read a book.