Why Can't We Pick The Few Channels We Want on Cable TV

and pay for those channels and only those channels? Seems like it should be an easy process in this digital age. Yet, here we are 40 or so years into cable TV and we're still forced to buy "packages" that are loaded with sports, mainstream media, shopping channels and other crapola...and that costs $80 a month if you get anything beyond basic cable.

If I had my druthers, I'd drop all the cable news channels and Faux (I could live without the Simpsons), the UPN, the WB, the eighty ESPN channels, the religious channels, etc, and go with a few stalwarts like Comedy Central, HBO, Travel, History, Food Network and Spike (my wife watches CSI reruns ad infinitum). I figure that oughta cost me about $10 a month, tops!

Cable TV packages suck.

Like Sundance or IFC. I love those channels and most everyone I know doesn't watch 'em at all. Plus there are others I like that could feel the ax such as Discovery or BBC America.

The less people that get channels such as these and others would find them gone because of no money.

I hate all the sports and shopping crap, but I can either suck it up or block them so I don't have to deal with them.

rather than being third-class to ESPN.

BTW - when I live in Vegas in 03-05, they kept raising the cable rates on Cox because of ESPN. They even ran TV ads stating that they were forced to raise the rates because ESPN keep raising their rates to Cox. I called Cox and asked why they were raising my rates as I never watched ESPN. I asked if I could get a *basic cable* package without ESPN. Their answers were "tough shit" and "no."

they would move to online distribution.

But, I totally agree. I also think I should be able to get one HBO, one Cinemax, one Sho, and one TMC for the price of my 12 HBO's that -- since they are all HBO -- show the same things at different times.

get the channels I want. Comedy Central and Animal Planet are the two biggies left off the packages. I haven't had TV in over a year because I refuse to pay that money for shitty packages, especially with no Comedy Central or Animal Planet.

On edit: the cable companies make us pay for packages BECAUSE THEY CAN.

Hell..That's as popular as 90 percent of the Cable Channels.
Damn..Who is/was your Provider?

... we had no Comedy Central on cable, which sucked because MST 3K was on at the time (this was during the early 90s). Fortunately I moved to VA just before CC cancelled it (and I taped about 80 episodes).

Also, no Cartoon Network (no ATHF) and no Sci-Fi, I don't think. They might have Sci-Fi now.

I've studied their "packages" and they design them very carefully so that there are always one or two very popular channels in each package. That's no accident.

If they went to a true "a la carte" system, most people would easily get by on no more than 10 or 20 channels. (or less). No profit margin in that!

follow.

Goes for internet hook-up also. Competition is starting to pop up here and there, and the price of the big guys will have to come down in order for them to compete.

of the Sunday paper that you want.

The newspaper has to print the whole thing, and sell it all as one unit, to make back their expenses. If people only bought one or two sections, they wouldn't contain enough ads to sustain the whole thing.

....why can't we have channels of stuff that intelligent folks like us would actually *want* to watch, instead of all that cookie-cutter reality crap and all? :shrug:

caters to the "least common denominator". The average American has less brains than a tree stump

This is not about providing you a service as much as making money for their shareholders, the owners of these enterprises. They only care about you as far as it remains profitable. Anymore than that, and you are considered a drain on profit that should be dropped. It's the same way with everything else in this country like, for instance, insurance. This is why they're screwing over so many Katrina victims because they had hurricane insurance but no flood insurance.

Greed...the new American Dream.

That's Brent Bozell's pro-censorship group.

Myself, I think it's an idea that could be made to work. Let people pay per channel, but then the cable companies could create incentives for people to buy packages of stations. So if you customized your cable lineup and paid per channel it would cost, say 59 cents a channel. If you got a package of 100 channels the price could be lowered to, say 29 cents a channel.

I think doing this would make it harder for the FCC to move into regulating content on cable, seeing as how the customers specifically chose to get those particular stations.

outsubscribing the *wholesome family fare* by about 100 to one...and that would just be in the Bible belt! :)

I'll bet The 700 Club would be out of biz if it was dependent on direct subscriptions.

.....but I'm sure he'd outlaw the LOGO channel, too. :dunce:

of course, cable companies NEVER tell you this. However, I dont' know if this applies to 'basic' channels or just premium/pay channels (HBO, etc). i read this in Smart Money Magazine in an article about cutting your cable, internet and phone bills.

edit: Here's the paragraph.

"Want to lower that cable bill? A little-noticed federal laaw requires most cable companies to offer premium channels like HBO a la carte. So skip the packages you thought you had to buy. Savings: up to $30 a month."

What month was this in and do they have further references on their website?

try looking that up on the site. the article was called 'cut your internet cable phone cell bills 40%'

tia

dp

Try Google?

During the past month or so, there has been a lot of coverage in the media about the federal regulations that now require all cable operators to let customers order premium channels without subscribing to an expanded basic tier. The law’s exemption clause for companies whose technology was unable to meet these requirements expired in October. This means that cable customers can call their local cable provider and order HBO or Showtime without also paying an average of $30 for expanded basic service.


Innovista first raised this issue in our June report, "Create Customer Satisfaction to Build Loyalty and Boost Profits," when we recommended that cable operators approach this difficult situation proactively, and we suggested that they devise a strategy for offering all channels on an à la carte basis. We have since spoken to several executives at various cable companies to get their perspective.

More recently, we called a number of customer service representatives at each of these companies to inquire about ordering a premium network without expanded basic service. We reveal some of our findings below, and we discuss à la carte pricing for all channels and for premium channels only.


http://www.innovista.tv/itvmlpreview1202.php

to you and lildreamer below for the info and link.

dp

It used to have great shows -- implosion specials, building bridges/sky scrapers, cool science stuff, the junkyard wars series. Now it's all about re-dressing some slob or helping some couple find their house again amid all the crap they've accumulated.

:wtf:


Arghhh!!!! There is enough of this kind of crap on TV - I don't need to see it on one of the few stations that offered real educational shows.

TLC/History/Discovery were the REASONS I got cable in the first place (now have dish).. It makes me sad to see that crap pn TLC:(

are a few channels to chose from after a large majority went out of business..that would probably include the ones you want to watch.

Regardless- don't they make enough money from every single one of those commercials they repeat endlessly? Fuck them. I have better things to do with my money, and better things to do with my time than watch TV.

Kill your television.

to choose, thereby allowing them to dictate what speech you hear.

Years ago, Dish Network offered 10 channels (your pick) for $15 plus tax. They no longer do that, and we can't change the onex we picked, which is a pity. But it beats paying $30 for Faux News which we'd never watch. I have no idea how much longer they will offer that service.

a couple years ago, we originally had the entire 250 channel universe comcast had to offer but due to some financial difficulties we toasted it, and went to basic basic cable. Approx the first 20 channels on the dial and also a couple in the 60's, a weather channel and some other PBS off shott, plus CBC(Vancouver, we live in Seattle).
It was good enough for the time.
Then we got some extra $$ and my wife was interested in something HBO had coming on(Carnivale I beleive) So I looked at what they had to offer in order to get HBO and for an additional $15.99 we could get the HBO package on top of the original basic basic calbe which was running us $13+. So a grand total of $27.+ a month for our cable, no 24 hr news, no espn, no TBS, TNT, but all the basics we want, plus HBO and the on Demand service Comcast has to offer. We also get some a National Geographic, Science Channel, BBC America, Nick Toons for the kids and a few other channels we watch sometimes but not often.
So essentially we sort of got exactly what we wanted and at a great price...

and it's 42.99 where i live. :(

And i won't have CSPAN anymore :(

their built in propaganda channels, and the stations that nobody wants would go under. Can't have that.

I believe on their marathon (C-Span's) they said that they get .05/month per subscriber - that would be a lot of money to make up if it was a la carte. They don't do ratings so I'm not sure how many people actually watch.

I think we'd get a lot less selection or the rates for value channels like C-Span would just not be affordable.