I'm certainly not a cable exec- just a realist. And I DO agree with you on the whole bit about monopolies, though I have zero faith the GOV will do anything about that.
If you think I'm putting words in your mouth, I'm sorry- that's not the intent. I just read your posts- apparently misinterpreting your posts- along the general line of thinking that implies cutting the cable can work for the masses. Apparently it works for your wants & needs right now and that's great. Others too have cut the cord and found alternatives good enough for their own wants & needs. I just don't see it working for the masses as it is currently working for guys like you. If the masses all get big savings by making such a switch, the machinery that keeps the new shows coming will feel the pain. The risk to make entirely new shows will go up considerably. And so on.
Subbing in someone like Apple as a new middleman in place of Comcast doesn't automatically translate to huge savings for us consumers- just a new middleman. And an Apple solution is still going to completely rely on a Comcast, etc pipe to work. So it's really like piling an Apple on top rather than substituting. I don't see how that can translate into big savings for the source of the money- us- EXCEPT in circumstances for select pockets of people- like perhaps you- that can be happy with the programming they can get that way.
I for one like live sports. Live sports don't work well with a Netflix or Hulu subscription. Some of it can be over-the-air but much of it is not run on the local channels. I don't expect al-a-carte ESPN or TNT channels to arrive for next-to-nothing. Instead, I'd expect pretty hefty premiums for the most desirable channels to make up for the cheaper pricing of the less desirable channels that "no one ever watches". The end goal will be to grow the average monthly revenue per household; else why should the rest of the chain even bother to try to adopt al-a-carte.
And how on earth did you assume I don't have to pay for broadband?
I don't pay cable for my 50Mbps connection, either.
...which reads to me that either you don't pay for 50Mbps broadband OR you're leaning on some entity other than a cable provider for it. If the latter- which now sounds like it- and that option has no money to lose on their cable business being replaced by some kind of al-a-carte fantasy model (as would be the case for many broadband providers such as Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Time Warner and so on), again good for you. Many of us don't have an alternate broadband choice like that.
I happen to be fortunate to have a whopping 2 choices for broadband fast enough to support an al-a-carte fantasy. The providers? Comcast or AT&T Uverse. BOTH have cable TV businesses running through that same pipe. If an al-a-carte alternative starting biting into their cable business while depending on their broadband pipes, I have complete confidence that broadband rates would go up to make up the revenue difference. Why wouldn't they? And the GOV isn't going to do anything.
So good for you. It sounds like you are in a narrow exception situation where you have a broadband provider who may not need to make up for anything in an al-a-carte scenario AND you are satisfied with what you can get via cord-cutting options available now. I wish that would work for me.
