Friday, December 06, 2013

Unbundling the Cable Industry would Devastate the Crap out of It

Now this is what we call one change damaging an industry to its core.

In a report that attempts to quantify the costs of an à la carte pricing for cable television, Needham & Co.’s Laura Martin estimates that $45 billion of TV advertising would be at risk under such a change, along with 1.4 million jobs, $20 billion in taxes paid by such cable operators as Comcast (CMCSA) and Time Warner Cable (TWC), and $117 billion in market capitalization. And maybe you wouldn’t miss the Christian-themed Smile of a Child channel or Jewelry Television, but if you love any of those niche networks you could almost certainly kiss them goodbye for lack of financial support.

Yeah I noticed the other day that I only watch a few cable channels total. I watch HBO on Demand for Boardwalk Empire, Girls, and soon Game of Thrones and True Detective (which looks great.) ESPN and its various offshoots for College Football, Monday Night Football, NBA and College Basketball and SportsCenter. AMC for Walking Dead. Comedy Central for the Daily Show and the Colbert Report. Cartoon Network for reruns of the Family Guy and American Dad. BBC America for reruns of Star Trek Next Generation. And CNBC for Squawk Box and Mad Money. So 7 channels is pretty much the sum total of my cable viewing. If they let me unbundle my cable I would probably end up with 25 channels or so and end up dumping the rest.

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