...while the industry says smaller channels would die in an a la carte system.

Isn't that what's known as a "free market"?

I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't want the MTV-NICK KidzBop Station!

Why don't they just charge you an exorbatent monthly fee and then you can pick whatever channels you want and get them for free. Then you won't get the ones you wont want.

I can't stand it when people think they should be able to order just the 3 channels they watch and pay $6/mo for cable. It just doesn't work that way. The cable companies couldn't afford to stay in business. It's like saying I should only have to pay $5 / mo for my cable modem rather than $40 because I only use 1/8 of the bandwidth given to me. Or that my local car dealership should offer cars in pieces... why should I have to pay for the back seat if I routinely carry only one other person in my car.... etc ... etc...

I agree with cscx and also the people that want ESPN and now get it in a package for $8 that includes say, golf, ESPN classic, fox sports and a lawn bowling channel (dunno) the total of all viewers for that package bring the cost of ESPN down.
If you broke out the package ESPN would have less viewers and the cost for the one channel would be more than the packaged deal.

This is not the cable companies doing this - the affiliates ppush for these packages

cscx: well, then perhaps the cable companies need a better way of operating that will allow them to stay in business but still allow customers to get what they want.

Frankly, I just want CBC, CBC newsworld, CTV, Global, the Documentary channel, the Independent Film Channel, Bravo, Showcase, and CPAC. But this isn't possible for under about $40 a month. GRR.

Fortunately, CPAC shows their programming schedule on the interent, so all I have to do is pay nothing at all and get the basic CBC and CTV, and download the shows I don't get off the internet. It kind of sucks, but I can live with it.

/dreams of a day when I can just get download the tv shows I want for a fee.

Even worse, where I hail from (home is fredericksburg, VA), the cable company (Adelphia) keeps adding channels and passing over good channels.

I remember back when I used to actually watch MTV, back when the bait-n-switch was in full swing and they were moving all the music videos to MVT2, Adelphia had a viewer's poll where they asked what channels people want added. The Travel channel and food network got added over MTV2 and ESPN2.

Oh, did I mention that it's FIFTY FREAKING DOLLARS for cable TV from adelphia? You can get more channels from direct TV for $34.95/month, and to be honest with you, DirecTV has less outages than Adelphia. They always have these "Anti-Satelite" commercials about how satelite goes out when ever it's cloudy... it has to be a hurricane to make DirectTV go out, but adelphia goes out whenever there's a lightning srike in 10 miles. Which is to say, every week.

~Wx

Maybe a minimum-channel requirement would work better than the "bundling" people are forced to endure.

Say, you have a plan in which you can pick 10 channels, 20 channels, or 30 channels.

McCain deserves a HERO tag.

I'm all for and "a la carte" menu. That's how you weed out all of the crap and get to the stuff that matters. It's basic economics. Plus, I only really watch about 4 or 5 channels anyway.

Oh, yeah, another thing... what's all this about subsidizing less popular channels? I thought that well over 80% of a station's money came from advertising, NOT from subscription. I thought that we pay for cable because of the lines themselves, and the cable company which offers you access to the channels.

Or, why does CBS broadcast for free if you've got bunny ears?

cscx,

It's a bit more complicated than that.

Say a cable company wants to offer ESPN to their viewers. Well, the company that owns ESPN also owns a couple of not-so-popular networks. They tell the cable company that, if they want ESPN (which any sane cable company will have), they have to purchase the other not-so-popular networks.

The cable companies know that, given the choice, consumers generally aren't going to opt to subscribe to the not-so-popular networks. So, they bundle the packages together and give the consumers an all-or-nothing option. Essentially, the large corporations that own extremely popular networks like ESPN are using their position of power to force cable companies to carry networks that wouldn't survive on their own.

An optimal model would be one where the consumers got the option to subscribe on a per-channel basis. If not enough people subscribe to Lifetime (just an example), then Lifetime would be cancelled. The cable companies and the companies that own the networks would only produce and provide the channels that the people want to watch.

It's an amazing concept, I know, but it's worked well in other industries.

Your analogy of the car is flawed, by the way:

1)A backseat is an integral part of a car. HGTV is not an integral part of ESPN. Ordering a car without a backseat would require the factory to make a change in the automated assembly line. Ordering ESPN without HGTV doesn't require any special work on the part of ESPN's parent company.

"When I go to the grocery store to buy a quart of milk, I don't have to buy a package of celery and a bunch of broccoli," McCain said. "I don't like broccoli."

Yeah, but you have to buy milk in a pint, half gallon, or full gallon, even if you only want 3/4 of a gallon. And you can only choose from Skim, 1%, 2%, or Whole milk, even if you prefer a 1.5% fat percentage. The cable companies aren't asking you to buy cable and broccoli...

If I've said it once, I've said it at least one time:

It can't be that hard for the cable companies to offer me the Nubile Young'n's, Asian Spice Network, Swarthy Sex Goddess TV, Skinimax (only after 1AM), Nekkid Kuntry Gurls, and Nickelodeon package. Joint me in my petition, won't you?

I will also consider an optional nothing-but-informercial channel, as I too have a ridiculouly hard time doing ridiculously easy tasks, and appreciate seeing my real-life drama ironing my clothes, emptying the trash, etc., brought to life in the flickering glow of the box I worship.

/serious note: "When I go to the grocery store to buy a quart of milk, I don't have to buy a package of celery and a bunch of broccoli," McCain said. "I don't like broccoli." - what is it with Republicans and broccoli?

I agree with cscx 'n' Stompn_Tom's posts. I'd like to add that they cable companies shouldn't have a-la carte menues. Rather, they should have more options of predefined mix-n-matches.

Package A:
[basic cable]

Package B:
[basic]
[news package
MSNBC
CNN
FOXNews]


Package C:
[basic]
ESPN
ESPN2
CourtTV

Package D:
[basic]
TLC
Discovery
History Channel

Package E:
[basic]
TLC
ESPN
[news package]

Package F:
[basic]
History Channel
ESPN
[news package]


You don't quite get ala carte, but you don't have to take 20 crap channels just to get the anchor channel that you like.

Each one could have some of the fluff channels [Home & Garden, TRIO (which is pretty damned good), Bravo, other stuff...

TV sucks.

Why is everyone so worked up about cable companies not offering ice cream with their services?

If you could actually choose what channels you get, I might actually get cable. As it is, I'm not paying $40 a month for Cox Cable when 90% of the core channels I'd never watch.

The Broccoli Channel?
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

i agree.

not paying for a bunch of stuff you don't want is just insane.

where does it stop? not voting for the least crappy politician?


not selling out of date/tainted product to consumers?

it's a madhouse!! a maaaaaaaaaaaaadhouse!!!

P.S.your dog is still ugly.

Amen, Quail. I don't even have cable. Screw religion, television is the opiate of the masses. I can get news if I want from the networks, the sporting events I care about are on the networks, my life will go on if I miss The Sopranos. That fifty bucks a month I save can get me some pretty good porn si---er...news subscriptions.

Isn't the "some of this stuff is so unpopular that it has to be subsidized by consumers" the same argument used by National Public Radio and the National Endowment for the Arts?

The most desirable services prosper and the less desirable ones fall to the wayside...isn't that how our economic system works in this country?

bobbette

/dreams of a day when I can just get download the tv shows I want for a fee.

I hear you. I can't justify forking over $50+ a month for 200 channels of nothing to watch.

A lot of smaller stations are already experimenting with livestreaming feeds, which I support 100%. FashionTV has an internet feed, as do a lot of European TV stations. Not much, but it is a start.

Pay per view could be easily implemented via the internet (mind you, it'd probably give half the routers on the eastern seaboard a heart attack). Subscribe and log in to the station of your choice.

Cable TV companies are some of the biggest price gougers. I'd love to see them go the way of the dodo.

Package G:

The problem isn't that they package - teh problem is the packages are based on "how much are you willing to pay" rather than "what are your interests".

I've already got more sports channels than I want, but the sci-fi channel and most of the documentary channels are in a bracket I can't afford. Really, at the basic level all you get is soaps, news, and sitcoms, and I honestly would like to say: no, everyone does NOT love Raymond.

I'm all for a la carte programming even though one of my favorite channels, TechTV (cause I'm a geek), might go away as a result. Cable rates are just way too high now. Here's all I need:

Comedy Central
Discovery
TechTV
Scifi
Food
Fox

Why should I be paying an arm and a leg for 6 channels?

I hope they do this. I will pay ~$5 for comedy central. Thats the only cable station that I want.

Oh, I'm sorry. BET would die? You mean viewers don't like watching Boomerang and 4-year-old "Comic View" episodes on rotation every three hours?

Get programming people actually watch, and you can have our money.

When's the last time you watched Lifetime?

If a true "pick your channel" system goes into effect, do you know which stations will get destroyed? Most of the good ones. We'll be watching reruns of Friends, Sienfeld, and Everybody Loves Raymond until the end of time. Useful stations like Discovery and The History Channel go away. Sports and sitcoms will rule the airwaves. The quality of programming on the smaller stations will go to crap, since they have no budget, and TV becomes more useless then before.

I'm fairly conservative, so I tend to like the "vote with your dollar" method. But this is an area that needs some regulation. Almost overnight, a full "Walmart effect" would occur. People will pick their 15 stations or so, and leave off ones of practical value. I tend to like having variety on television. With a "pick your channels" method, variety dies.

Khellendros
You've just explained why the arts need government funding. Well done.

ugh. that isn't meant to be a threadjack. Please ignore or delete as j00 see fit.

jjorsett,

Isn't the "some of this stuff is so unpopular that it has to be subsidized by consumers" the same argument used by National Public Radio and the National Endowment for the Arts?

Well, that's the basis for pretty much the entire government. They realize that, given the choice, many people will not pay for programs that are socially necessary. So, they tax us to pay for it.

But, this shouldn't be done in the private sector. The private sector, going by the free market principles, should provide goods according to demand. Let me try explaining it another way.

Disney owns ESPN, Lifetime, and Soapnet. Let's say that Disney spends $1 million per year producing each channel (I know the numbers aren't realistic) They decide that they need to bring in at least $3 million per year. What they realize, however, is that if the allow cable companies to purchase only the channels they want, the cable companies only purchase ESPN and Lifetime because not enough people want to see Soapnet to warrant the cable companies spending the $1 million to buy Soapnet.

So, instead of doing the logical thing and abandoning the product for which there isn't enough demand (Soapnet), they use the popularity of ESPN and Lifetime to force the cable companies into purchasing Soapnet, as well.

I guess I can't say that I blame the network companies. They have the power to force cable companies to purchase networks they don't want. If I had the power to force people to buy a product for which there was insufficient demand, I would too.

Stompn_Tom That would be nice if I could get a sports package, a tech package, and a science package. The problem is illustrated in the third paragraph of the article. To get Discovery, in an area, the buyer would have to get "MTV, FX, MSNBC and 33 other channels."

If they would allow us to generate our own packages, that would be great. As it is, I've got 100 channels and watch six... SIX! I don't want the other 94 channels. However, if I got to choose specialty packages, say a sports package that cost $12, and a Discovery-Tech package that cost $12-18, and the local channels for $6, I would be happy, I would be getting the channels I want, they would be selling multi-channel packages like they want. And perhaps the unnecessary channels will die out, as they should, in a free-market society.

JimRob,

The most desirable services prosper and the less desirable ones fall to the wayside...isn't that how our economic system works in this country?

Yes, and it generally works until a company becomes so large that it is able to use its power to force people to buy unwanted products in order to get the desired products.

In fact, IIRC, Microsoft had a bit of a legal tussle a couple of years back over the exact same thing.

NPR is socially necessary?? Not in the real world.

The Disney channel needs to go back to being a subscription channel.
Their commercial announcers sound like they're on cocaine or something.
Very farking annoying.

/end rant

Well i read most of the crap on here, and the problem with giving people channels ala cart is that the work involved in blocking one station out, v.s. adding another station from a package.

Can you imagine the chaos of having 150 channels, and having to let people pick and choose from those channels. The work for the cable companys would be tremendous to say the least.

Plus the fact that the "analog" channels would be impossible to do with this. Take for example portland here, espn and hgtv are both analog channels, which have to be blocked by a filter put on at your telephone pole. Can you imagine if you only wanted 5 channels out of the 70? thats 65 extra "traps" added on, each at 2 inches and an aprox diamater of an inch, to your line. The cost for the cable company would be insane, to say the least.

/worked for a cable company,
//hates the facts,
///lives with it.

My cable company offers "a la carte" cable channels, kind of. They have "theme packages" and you choose those packages you want. In theory, they sound good. You have a "sports" package, a "science" package, etc.

But then they try things such as "tech tv is only in the sports package". Waahhh? I'm a geek, I do not want to pay for 10 sports channels to get tech tv. That makes no sense.

So if I wanted to get the channels I want to watch, I'd have to pay an arm and a leg and pretty much subscribe to all packages.

I canceled and went back to basic analog cable. I don't get "Discovery Science" but I still get my sci-fi channel.

However, to offer a la carte programming, you need a digital cable box or some type of addressable converter... and people will then biatch about having to pay the few bucks a month to rent the box.

Most people in the US have just basic cable hooked to a cable ready TV, and this just isn't possible with attaching filters on the coax line.

In other words, in order to offer a la carte programming, many cable companies would need to seriously upgrade their infrastructure. Unless you live in places like NYC, where Time-Warner made cable boxes a requirement since the early 80s to crack down on cable theft. The NYC cable system has been modernized since the 80s.

IDontKnowWhyITri: That's for analog tv though.

IDKWIT,

If I had to subscribe to digital cable to get an a la carte menu, I would in a heartbeat.