So many channels, so few good ones.
I was going to write about the new sketch show The Whitest Kids U’Know, which premiered last night on Fuse, but I found the whole thing far too baffling to comment on at this point.
Instead, there’s a wire story making the rounds this morning that struck me as quite interesting. According to Nielsen Media Research the average US home gets 104 channels which is up from 61 in 2000 and only 33 in 1990.
More interesting, however, is that only 15% of the available channels were actually being watching with any regularity, compared with 22% back in 2000. Basically the options have increased, but people’s television destinations have remained the same.
This then raises the whole question about à lá carte cable, and if we’d all be better off purchasing the channels we want instead of these massive cable or satellite packages . Personally, I’m against the à lá carte model because the “bigger” networks would have inflated costs and when all is said and done you really wouldn’t be saving any money and you’d have access to less information (even if you don’t utilize that information currently). Still it’s interesting to think about.
Would you rather pay for each channel you watch, and if so what channels would those be?
My list is available right after the jump…
In the order in which they appear on Time Warner Cable NYC
- CBS
- NBC
- FOX
- ABC
- TBS
- CNN
- The CW
- PBS
- VH1
- MTV
- Cartoon Network
- SportsNet NY
- ESPN
- FX
- Bravo
- Comedy Central
- Food Network
- HBO
- Showtime
- IFC
- Turner Classic Movies
- BBC-America
Now I also watch The Travel Channel and A&E and ESPN2 and MSNBC when something interesting is playing, but not regularly enough to purchase those channels under the given parameters.
That’s 22 channels, or roughly 21% of the 104 channels I and apparently most of America have access to.
March 22nd, 2007 at 1:08 am
I’m the part of America that gets like… seven channels. Maybe 8? I don’t know. I just don’t pay for it.
And I work for a major network! Blasphemy.