What's keeping A-la-Carte from becoming a reality?

[yaz96]

What possible reason would you as a PROVIDER have for WANTING to unBundle channels that you own ?
All the other providers are required to accept the good with the not so good.

IF you decided to UnBundle said channels you would find channels that would cost $ 20 per MONTH EACH.

You would NOT be saving money in any way.

The providers have zero incentive to unbundle their channels. That is the problem. The predictions of gloom and doom and $50 bills for 5 channels are insane! Economics would not allow that! A la carte programming could be a viable reality where you would actually buy ONLY what you want. And keep in mind that at no point did I say we should abolish packages. When I go to McDonald's sometimes I want the #2 meal, sometimes I just want fries or a drink. I can even just buy the hamburger patty! Sure the bundle price is cheaper as a whole, but not if I just want the burger and a coke!

Why not give that choice to cable/satellite subscribers?

They will not UNBUNDLE because they make advertising revenue off of EACH channel.

Less channels equals less revenue. They are NOT going to do that.

 

[TNGTony]

Thus the first line in the second post quoted above.
I know the providers have no incentive. This is, IMHO is the problem. The vertical monopolies that giant mega-corps are allowed to have form an atmosphere on non-competitiveness that artificially inflates the prices of the channels as it is! It is a problem that USED to be addressed by regulation and law that has been softened to the point of being useless.

 

[robjlevin]

You keep saying that you know they have no incentive. So? Tell us how these programmers would be able to make money because that's the only incentive they have.

Regulation forcing ala carte? How would that work? The programmers would be forced to sell channels individually to MSOs? The MSOs would be forced to sell them individually to subscribers? Then what? Congress sets the pricing?

There's no way in the world that would work. Sorry, but ala carte may sound really good on the surface but in practice it's not viable.

 

[harshness]

lots more channels to choose from now

Alas, roughly the same proportion of them are from Disney.