About 647 days ago Internet and Online Business | Video

Viewers Abandon Satellite and Cable TV

Pay TV companies lost 195,000 subscribers in second quarter.
Posted on August 11, 2011 by Minda Zetlin
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Viewers are leaving cable and satellite in droves. Hundreds of thousands of viewers are doing what our household has done and dumping their monthly cable or satellite service, likely in favor of streaming video.

That’s the word from the Associated Press, which examined cable and satellite companies’ quarterly returns and concluded they lost a total of about 195,000 subscribers in the second quarter of 2011. But wait! It’s even worse than it looks, because the AP’s study included Verizon and AT&T which may be losing TV subscribers but gaining mobile phone subscribers. GigaOm’s Ryan Lawler points out that these two companies’ offset the total loss with combined subscriber gains of about 384,000 subscribers.

In other words, traditional pay TV lost more than half a million subscribers in the last three months.

Read more at CNET and GigaOm.

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  • Dave

    Maybe if they would let subscribers have more selection in what channels they receive, and pay for, they’d lose fewer of them.  I’ll admit I don’t currently subscribe because cable is provided where I live, but I wouldn’t be in a rush to sign up.  Subscribers subsidize too many channels (shopping channels, foreign language channels, religious channels, sports channels)  that are of no value to them.  The last excuse I heard was that if these channels aren’t subsidized, they won’t survive.  My response is, if they don’t have enough viewers to be self-supporting, they don’t deserve to survive.

    Of course, customer service also has a role to play, but we hear that side of the story at least twice a week from one source or another.  I’m just trying to point out that that’s not the only problem these companies have.

  • http://twitter.com/BamInBlack Brandon Belland

    These companies should have hedged against this long ago by offering more/different services.  Pay by the channel “a la carte” style has been my life long dream regarding cable, but no one ever brought it to the table. They’re learning the hard way.

  • Grooveify

    We’ve used over-the air, discount movie rental and streaming video services for the last three years.  Better selections, reduced expenses, improved convenience and better image quality.

  • canant

    I think if more people knew how good broadcast digital is they’d quit paying even faster.

  • http://www.cabletvcompanies.org/ cable tv companies

    Very unique and helpful information for the satellite TV. Satellite Tv is very popular at this time. This post to know to how to popular the satellite TV.

  • P Miller

    One easy, cost effective way (esp. if you live in a metropolitan area) is to buy a Mohu Leaf antenna (read the great reviews) and a Roku or Tivo Box(or any other streaming box if you don’t have apps on your TV). Both Roku (no monthly fee) and Tivo give you access to a very large amount of streaming content, i.e. Amazon, Blockbuster, Hulu Plus, Netflix etc.
    The Tivo box enables you to record all the FREE content you get OTA with an antenna. There is a $20 a month fee for a Tivo box (a good interface with lots of features), but it’s far, far cheaper than cable/dish.