A La Carte Television needs to be brought up again

[willdav713]

In wake of the horrible Newton tragedy, and policymakers pointing fingers at guns, media, music, etc.

Now would be a good time to bring the discussion of A La Carte Television programming to the table.

This would further empower parents to choose what programming is best for their family.

Take the parents who work in the financial industry, in order to get CNBC you have to get MTV, BET, A&E, and other networks geared for mature audiences.

Or the single mother or father that want to watch ESPN, Cooking Channel, Food Network, and Broadcast News, along with Sprout, or Disney.

Don't get me wrong, the V-chip is great, but you actually have to know how to use those tools.

Now since the FCC allows cable cos. to encrypt, a la carte programming should be technically feasible. The price would go up in the short term but quality and more competitive programming would come out of it.

For the mature adults, they can watch what they want to watch, but all the rave on the hill is about revisiting the censorship issue.

Are they any cable networks experimenting with A-La-Carte?

What is the FCC's current stance on this issue?

Do you think it will be implemented?

 

[landtuna]

Back in the glory days of C-band sat TV there was ala carte. There was ala carte because there were hundreds of programming providers and the competition was fierce for subscribers. Today there are exactly two sat and usually only one local cable programmer. No competition and no reason for programmers to offer more subscriber-friendly pricing or selection.

Unless and until Congress/FCC mandates some form of ala carte or technology permits other competitors to enter cable-land there won't be any improvement.

People willing to pay $60-$100/month for a cell phone apparently don't consider the same monthly bill extravagant for TV.

 

[dave73]

It's feasible to offer a-la-carte, but the industry as a whole refuses to back it. The pay tv companies (cable, satellite, UVerse, & FiOS) would either see less revenue, or continue to claim that offering a-la-carte will make the bill even higher. The content providers are down to just a few, & they're also against a-la-carte. Their reason to be against it, is because less profitable channels will go off the air. In the case of ABC/Disney & their ESPN network, they'd see less revenue, because they would no longer be allowed to charge for every subscriber, whether they watch the channel or not. Since I rarely watch sports, I'd rather not pay for ESPN. I also don't want to be paying for TBN or Daystar, or any shopping channel. I'd rather pay for channels I would actually watch, & not for channels I'll never watch. Because of this, I've chosen to not have pay TV at all, & rely strictly on 2 outdoor antennas (1 for VHF & one for UHF, since I also chose to use separate band antennas over a combo antenna, which usually focuses more on VHF & less on UHF). My choices are limited, but I'll stick it out. I do use internet for some shows, but even those tend to be limited to some extent, & some shows not being available to non-pay tv customers. Cartoon Network.com's website is one that refuses to make full episodes of shows available, if you don't have a subscription to any pay tv service from satellite or cable. I know this, because you have to provide your account info in order to see the episodes.

I forgot that the government has refused to get involved, claiming that the industry must be the ones to to voluntarily offer it. Because of that, the industry will never offer it as long as they can get away with it. That's ok. I've overall done well without TV most of the time, & will probably will continue to do so, even after the FCC eventually does away with most OTA TV service, since they believe Verizon & AT&T should have the UHF frequencies that TV uses now, & leave the less desireable VHF (especially 2-6) for TV.