Cable TV's Password-Sharing Crackdown Is Coming (bloomberg.com)

Charter Communications' CEO, Tom Rutledge, is leading an industrywide effort to crack down on password sharing. It's a growing problem that could cost pay-TV companies millions of subscribers -- and billions of dollars in revenue -- when they can least afford it. Bloomberg reports: Cable and satellite carriers in North America have lost 3 million customers this year alone. But the prevalence of password sharing suggests many of those customers, and possibly many more, are watching popular shows like "The Walking Dead" for free, robbing pay-TV providers and programmers of paying subscribers and advertising dollars. Most pay-TV companies only require users to re-enter their passwords for each device once a year. During contract negotiations this fall, Charter urged Viacom Inc., home of Comedy Central and MTV, to help limit illicit password swapping. The cable company wants programmers to restrict the number of concurrent streams on their apps and force legitimate subscribers to log in more often, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified discussing private deliberations. ESPN, meanwhile, has reduced the number of simultaneous streams that it allows on its app to five from 10 and is considering cutting that to three, Connolly said. ESPN wants to work more closely with distributors to validate subscribers when there are high volumes of streaming on its app outside the cable company's territory.

Comments

Thanks for pushing me back to reading!

[Anonymous Coward]

With every passing year it becomes more of a pain in the ass and more expensive to "consume content". I cut the cord almost ten years ago and now only pay for my DSL connection and Netflix. I would never in a million years pay for multiple streaming packages and/or cable tv or satellite tv.
Never...

If anything, this amalgamation of absolute fucking crap that continues to roll downhill, masquerading as the current content consumption paradigm, has me watching less "tv" and reading more.

Thanks!

Re:So what the article says is

[Anonymous Coward]

We need a law to prohibit all terms in a contract not specifically related to the acquisition and distribution of said content. Problem solved. How many times a app requires someone to reauthorize really? I would assume they were talking Netflix...

Why the hell is this a problem for government to solve?

WTF do you want? The fucking logon police?

Talk about overweening statism...

If a company wants to charge for their content, let them figure out how to prevent users from sharing logins.

Didn't Netflix solve this?

[networkBoy]

$n.nn for two screens $n.nn + $5 or so for 4 screens.
Seems pretty dang simple to me.
Rather than trying to police the mess that is "is this a shared PWD or is this a mobile user or is this a legit user that moved their cable box for the night?" they just limit concurrent streams to whatever you've paid for.

To paraphrase Princess Leia

[Yaztromo]

The more you tighten your grip cable companies, the more customers will slip through your fingers.

Yaz

Solution: DVD rental

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix DVD catalog is VASTLY bigger than the streaming catalog. It has almost every movie ever made. In addition, you can rent a DVD, watch it, sneakernet it over to your buddy, who watches it. Then post it back to netflix. No password needed.

The only significant drawback is that you might have to wait a few months for the newest TV series to appear on DVD - unless you can pick them up on broadcast. Just think of it like if they had come out a few months later. In some ways that is nicer, because you can binge them if you want without waiting a week between eps.

Smart move in Russia

[TimothyHollins]

Sounds like cable is about to shoot itself in the foot.

Meanwhile, Netflix doesn't complain about shared passwords, even allows users to set up multiple profiles on each account so it's easier to share.
I hope netflix has enough bandwidth to absorb all the new customers that are about to join up.

First Cox starts doing bandwidth caps

[rsilvergun]

with overage charges and now this. It's funny that they had 8 years to do these things and restrained themselves and for some reason in the last year or so they've gotten a lot bolder. I wonder if something happened about a year ago to change their outlook on customer service and how much they can get away with...

Re:Brilliant strategy

[Ranbot]

Nope. I don't have a "naive fantasy" that I am "sticking it to the man," that's just your strawman argument. I have no problems at all being part of a normal market economy. I am paying Netflix for 4 streams whether I use them or someone else does. No other rationalization is needed. A streaming service is able to reduce the number of available streams to subscribers and/or put better restrictions in place on sharing as they feel it is necessary. It's no different than a software company choosing whether or not to put DRM on their software or telecoms restricting tethering, they are weighing profits vs satisfaction of customers. If Netflix changes things so my wife and I can't share as easily, then us and our respective parents will decide how we all want to spend our money, like people in a normal market economy do. Coincidentally the original article is about networks wanting to reduce number of streams to try to get more subscribers. So, a real life example of what is described in the article [and the icing on the cake is contrary to popular generational stereotypes it's the baby boomer generation parents coasting on their children.]

Re:Hahaha no.

[gfxguy]

I won't buy the disc. I won't pirate it, either, but when AMC makes $1.40 per subscriber that can DVR every show on AMC, paying $25.00 for a season of The Walking Dead is absurd. Instead, they get nothing from me except what Netflix pays them, and I watch the full season when it becomes available there. I'm a patient person, and don't give a crap about spoilers, and I have plenty of other shows to watch in the meantime.

Re: So what the article says is

[nitehawk214]

Cable companies: "We need to government to protect us from our theiving customers." Also cable companies: "But government regulation is bad! We must end net neutrality!"