Quote:
Originally Posted by ficbot
This whole discussion reminds me of what they were saying about television years ago. In the old days, everyone watched the big 3 networks and there was water cooler discussion at work the next day based on what people had seen. Now, with the proliferation of specialty channels, I could spend all my TV time on stuff nobody else at work cares about---for instance, I enjoy a lot of the sci-fi stuff and that has its own channel now, and my boyfriend enjoys animated shows, and that has its own channel, and my boss enjoys sports programs and so on. We all could have watched TV last night and seen completely different things. And that's *good* for business because it is allowing programming that might not have found an audience on the big 3 networks to find an audience through appropriate venues. The big 3 might consider 20 million viewers to be success; the biggest Canadian hit of all time was Canadian Idol and it had about 2.5 million---that was huge here. Different markets, different audiences, different distribution channel. Where is the harm?
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Exactly.
TV viewership has declined for the old-school Gatekeepers, the OTA broadcasters, and it has exploded for the Sat-casters. The specialty channels allow people to find stuff *they* like, not just what some NY glasstower exec thinks is harmless enough to bring in big generic audiences. Instead, targetted programming brings in targetted ads (for the ad-supported channels) or subscription fees or the ad-less ones.
We, the viewers get to have it *our* way and the content creators have distribution channels they never would've had if the networks hadn't been disintermediated. (How else could have foodies gotten *two* entire cooking networks to choose from?
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Even the broadcast networks have been smart enough to adapt and use their resources more effectively, launching their own alternative networks, so everybody wins.
And now things are getting even better with IP-TV sneaking in and disintermediating the Cablecos and SatCos. A la carte channel watching may finally be an option to consider besides the traditional bundle packages or even single-show subscriptions.
Tech disruptions only kill dinosaurs; adaptable business survive them just fine.
Good point there, Ficbot.
