Broadcasters’ woes could spell trouble for free TV

[RC]

Published December 30 2009
Broadcasters’ woes could spell trouble for free TV
And trouble could mean higher bills
For more than 60 years, TV stations have broadcast news, sports and entertainment for free and made their money by showing commercials. That might not work much longer.

By: Andrew Vanacore, Associated Press

NEW YORK — For more than 60 years, TV stations have broadcast news, sports and entertainment for free and made their money by showing commercials. That might not work much longer.

The business model is unraveling at ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox and the local stations that carry the networks’ programming. Cable TV and the Web have fractured the audience for free TV and siphoned its ad dollars. The recession has squeezed advertising further, forcing broadcasters to accelerate their push for new revenue to pay for programming.

That will play out in living rooms across the country. The changes could mean higher cable or satellite TV bills, as the networks and local stations squeeze more fees from pay-TV providers such as Comcast and DirecTV for the right to show broadcast TV channels in their lineups. The networks might even ditch free broadcast signals in the next few years. Instead, they could operate as cable channels — a move that could spell the end of free TV as Americans have known it since the 1940s.

“Good programing is expensive,” Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corp. owns Fox, told a shareholder meeting this fall. “It can no longer be supported solely by advertising revenues.”

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/146000/

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I can't imagine why he'd think this way, what with all the money he is losing. :sarcasm:

[ixion]

1. got rid of cable about 7 years back now...

and have never missed it.

The broadcasters can go pound sand. I'll buy my DVDs directly from the production company, or watch clips on the net.

[Octafish]

2. Hasta la vista, Baby.

Few things in life would make democracy happier
than the collapse of ABCNNBCBSFixedNutNoiseworks,
let alone the demise of Corporate McPravda.



"Ets like-ch a drimm verlt, kam terue."

[Tesha]

3. Shit happens, even to nasty Capitalist Media Monopolists (once in a great while).

I've claimed for several years that "broadcasting" would soon
be recognized to be dead; the availability of broadband Internet
everywhere is rapidly making it possible to watch whatever you
want to watch whenever you want to watch it.

Why stay in and stay up late one night of the week just to
see NCIS or American I'm-dull when you can simply cue
it up on your computer any time you feel like watching it?
It will still come to you with the same insipid commercials
and there's no need for the media outlets to maintain any
physical state-side presence to run TV studios, transmitters,
and the like.

'Sucks for the Bubbleheaded Bleach-Blonde who Comes on at Five,
but sometimes capitalism bites them, too. Maybe they should
have had even a single scrap of integrity rather than submitting
totally to their corporate masters?

(BTW, DVDs and BluRay discs will die as well, killed off by
the same broadband network.)

Tesha


Tesha

[Tesha]

4. Our local TV stations (and NAB) are whining on the air, urging us to save their asses.

http://www.nab.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Home

Sure, I'll get right on it, just as soon as you return
real news to the news programs instead of ignoring
*EVERYTHING* real and important in favor of the latest
murder-and-mayhem.

:rofl:

As someone said above, "Hasta la vista, baby!"

Tesha

[bemildred]

5. "Don't let the door hit your butt on the way out." nt

[applegrove]

6. There is a fight going on between local stations and cable networks in Canada. Basically

the local networks want the cable companies to pay to use their signals in their packages. Battleling commercials are on the TV.