Your favorite shows are coming to you…. a la carte? Or even… online? I
personally wouldn’t mind seeing this happen for a couple reasons. The number one reason, of course, is the
$150 that Time Warner wants each month and I don’t even get the premium
channels! You could say I could just
do away with cable altogether and watch Netflix. I would do that but I’m also an avid sports
fan and right now I have to watch it on TV. It’s sad but true that my only source of entertainment
comes from my TV - especially during the nine months that I’m considered a full-time
student in addition to working a full-time job. I just really hate that $150 cable bill, especially because it keeps going up!
Another reason is all the advertising that I can do
without. Chapter 7 of Socialnomics titled
“Adjust Shows Based on Fast-Forward Behavior” talks about Hulu and its insight
into the “less is more” concept of advertising. In fact, by September 2008, Hulu was the
sixth most-watched video-content provider on the web. Incidentally, I watch my favorite soap on
Hulu after it was cancelled by ABC in September 2012 and an independent
producer purchased the rights to the show and its cast and is done entirely online. At this time I utilize the free version of
Hulu but it does have more commercials than their premium option which has very
limited advertising. Apparently, Hulu
offered the option of how you would like to receive your advertising – all at
once or broken up – and they also provided you with the length of the
commercial you were viewing which gave users more control. I guess advertising is still needed but I
like the fact that we as viewers could control how we received the information.
A big reason that I’d like to see cable TV providers offer
an a la carte package is: I seriously
only watch maybe 5-7 channels of the more than 200 that I am offered. There is so much waste here for me because
I have the availability of all these channels that I don’t watch EVER and I
have to pay this big bill! So what do
the rest of you think – do you want to be given more control over your TV
viewing and how you receive it?
I enjoyed your blog. I agree, its sad that we as the consumer have to pay so much for something we only use very limited. I have my favorite channels that I watch regularly and do enjoy certain sports as well. However the other 170 channels are just extras.
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