The possible perils of pick and pay cable
Posted Feb 26, 2016 8:25 am.
Last Updated Feb 26, 2016 8:33 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Will pick and pay prove too good to be true?
Globe and Mail Reporter James Bradshaw took a look at what changes will be coming March 1, as cable companies start offering basic packages.
Consumers are being cautioned, when channels can be selected a la carte at the end of 2016, it might prove to be pricey.
However, Bradshaw tells 660 NEWS, what this ultimately will mean for the television industry, depends on how many people will choose to switch – and stay – with these new options.
“It can be really expensive to pick and pay for things, and it’s the sort of simple principle of a combo. If you go to a fast food chain, and you buy a burger, fries and a drink together, they cost a little bit less than if you buy them one at a time,”
It may also lead to survival of the fittest.
“Channels that have a really sort of obscure niche could be in jeopardy if they don’t have a large enough base of passionate fans paying the fees,” he said. “Channels that don’t have tent pole shows, that don’t have one big show that somebody thinks ‘I need to watch that,’ may also struggle in this environment.”
There also used to be something called genre protection; “That’s been lifted, so that means any channel is re-invent itself anyway it wants. The Oprah Winfrey network for example, won’t have to have educational programming anymore,” Bradshaw said. “It can now be all Oprah, all the time.”
Bradshaw’s story can be found in latest edition of the Globe and Mail’s Report on Business.
