Sen. Jay Rockefeller Hungers For Quality Propaganda

Senator Jay Rockefeller hungers for the day when he can control the quality of news through the regulation of cable and satellite television providers. He wants to pass a law that would force these “pay to view” venues to customize packages at a lower cost. However, the market is taking that step already and without the help of a legislative God like Mr. Rockefeller.


Cable providers have been losing customers for years, specifically to competitors like DirecTV and Dish Network; but those two alternatives have also become expensive. In today’s bad economy, people are looking to not only cut cost; they also want to cut the cord and at the same time customize what type of programs they want to watch. Gigaom describes what is happening in the industry:

But a funny thing happened in the second quarter, when, for the first time ever, IPTV and satellite subscriber increases didn’t make up for cable losses. Cable providers lost a total of 711,000 subscribers in those three months, and 216,000 of those households did not sign up with other providers, deciding instead not to pay for multichannel video services at all.


That’s a trend we see continuing, particularly as cable subscribers continue to raise their bills at an incredible rate. Comcast reported on its earnings call that average revenue per user (ARPU) increased by 10 percent year-over-year, ending the third quarter at about $130 per month. Charter’s ARPU also rose about 9 percent, to $126. And while Cablevision’s reported average revenue per sub didn’t grow as fast as the others, it’s now a whopping $149


All of which is why we think that the cord cutting phenomenon, which Comcast and Time Warner Cable deny is something that they’re seeing, is for real. From our point of view, expecting users to pay $125 to $150 a month, and continuing to raise those rates 5 to 10 percent every year, isn’t a sustainable business model. At some point, those users will find alternative, cheaper ways of getting the content they want, and now there are plenty of ways to do so.

Check out this video. The day is approaching when cable and satellite companies are becoming dinosaurs. Unfortunately, scheming politicians like Senator Jay Rockefeller will still try and control what we watch.

Source:  http://gigaom.com/video/big-cable-is-bleeding-500k-subscribers-lost-last-quarter/