Wow. Would the mouthbreathers on MSNBC survive? How about all those damn shopping channels? or freaking PAX TV. We have a satellite dish, partially for business reasons (subscribe to East Coast, Central, and West Coast networks, for instance). But if I calculated the amount of time spent watching each channel of the many, per annum, I'd say with confidence that 98% of the channels we get are viewed less than 2 minutes a year! So, could really reduce the clutter by eliminating all the dreck. Of course, the cable companies would hate this because suddenly, Nielsen (and competitors) would have much more importance than ever.
Don't know how realistic it actually is: the media corporations usually get their way (having gazillions of dollars does have benefits in our cash-and-carry political system), but I can day-dream, can't I?
WSJ.com - FCC May Endorse Cable a la Carte, In a Policy Shift
Federal regulators are on the verge of suggesting that cable companies could best serve consumers by letting them subscribe to individual channels instead of offering only prepackaged bundles.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin is expected to announce today at a Senate forum on indecency that the FCC will soon reissue its review of cable industry “à la carte” pricing with a wholly different conclusion. While the original report concluded that consumers would pay more for individual channels, the new one concludes they could pay less.“This report will conclude that à la carte could be in the best interest of consumers,” said an FCC official familiar with the revised report's contents. The report also finds that “themed tiers” of channels could be “economically feasible,” the official said.
This is of concern for the cable industry, partly because it opens a new front in the government's efforts to impose indecency standards on cable and satellite providers. Until now, the cable industry has resisted suggestions from Mr. Martin and some lawmakers to voluntarily offer à la carte choices or set up a “family-friendly tier” of channels suitable for children. By suggesting that consumers won't necessarily pay more for individual channels, the report calls into question the cable industry's revenue model.
Cable and satellite operators pay a monthly license fee to carry channels and pass along those costs to subscribers. The fees vary tremendously. Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN costs more than $2.50 a month per subscriber, while Time Warner Inc.'s Cartoon Network costs only about 15 cents.Many subscribers without children might drop such offerings as Viacom Inc.'s Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network. To make up that lost revenue, channels aimed at children could have higher subscriber fees. And since advertising dollars depend on potential viewership, the end result would be that many channels would have less money to spend on programming.
Or a contrary view would decry this FCC endorsement as yet another incident of creeping 'nanny-state', Christian-Talibanism.
Tags: Advertising, /anti-trust, /media
