Apple wants to offer television subscribers customized channel lineups

Apple wants to offer television subscribers customized channel lineups

Apple's anticipated full-fledged television set could offer Internet-based content subscriptions with customized channel lineups, if the company has its way.

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I've always said that, if content providers could find a way to charge me FAIRLY for the 10 or so channels I want, instead of forcing me to buy 300 more channels (in order to get those 10), I would drop Hulu and Netflix - both of which are painful to use - in a New York minute and go back.

It would be wonderful if they offered all of the channels that one can get in satellite or cable in custom packages - I'd love it. I don't need the 200+ channels I have, I would probably be happy with between 10 and 20. Sucks for me though =( Since my internet connection is rather lacking, there's no way I could have something like this - I don't even have enough bandwidth to have a stable HD stream from netflix, let alone if my wife wants to do something else online while I'm watching tv!

As good as this might seem, I have a very hard time understanding the reasoning as to why broadcast companies would be willing to drop air time to show only what people want. Letting people cherry pick what they want means a LOT of other channels/shows would not be benefit, and could be dropped in the future.

Also, I think it would make sense to make tiered options, say-
S10 for the 10 channels of your choosing,
$20 for 25 channels.
Or something along those lines.

Possible future Apple patent: Method whereby a user exchanges legal tender for access to only the content the user desires to access.

Since it's not technically or officially patented to charge a person money for something yet, why not?

All I need is Food Network and HGTV.

If I could get those through iTunes I would ditch my satellite service.

I wish Uverse just had an HD package only instead of having to pay for both SD and HD in order to get HD. But the first provider to give a la carte to HD channels has my money.

Honestly the inability to just pay for what I want was the largest factor in me ditching my cable. Just about everything is available on the internet anyway, and so it wasn't a tough thing to change.

I do get to cheat though. My condo building has an amazing media room, so if there is something I can't find online (sports), I can just hop in the elevator and watch stuff on the 70" TV down there.

The new 150 gig bandwidth cap that AT&T has started in my area, has made the idea of internet tv useless to me.
I have Netflix right now, which is a good price, but in the last month we went well over the cap and had to pay a 20.00 fee on top of our monthly fee.
So we are pretty much resigned to using only one service. In the future we will most likely pick either Netflix, hulu, or amazon. We try not to watch HD because we would hit our cap really fast.
Netflix was almost destroyed by the cable companies telling Starz and others what to charge Netflix. Netflix messed up themselves too, but they were also bullied by an antiquated tv system known as cable/satellite. People are demanding choice, but we are only being delivered packaged deals.

Wow... 150GB cap? OK, thats getting a bit ridiculous.

iggibar said:

As good as this might seem, I have a very hard time understanding the reasoning as to why broadcast companies would be willing to drop air time to show only what people want. Letting people cherry pick what they want means a LOT of other channels/shows would not be benefit, and could be dropped in the future.

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I don't know if this is true. Certainly in this transition period, many might end up lost, but in the end, I can see there being more professional content, not less.

Consider how many wonderful productions with literally millions of viewers that get canceled because they couldn't meet the expectations of a network for a particular time slot. In an a la carte format, content can be freed - to a degree - from the heavy weight of network distribution, and make a profit with far fewer dollars.

Joan of Arcadia is a good example. In it's final season, it averaged 8 million viewers per episode. Under a new paradigm in which people pay a buck an episode (just tossing numbers here), that could be $176 million for the season. Maybe that's small change to a network, but to the producers, actors and crew of a single show, it's a good paycheck.

Apple's "channel" idea may not be the perfect a la carte option today, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

Shikarnov said:

Consider how many wonderful productions with literally millions of viewers that get canceled because they couldn't meet the expectations of a network for a particular time slot. In an a la carte format, content can be freed - to a degree - from the heavy weight of network distribution, and make a profit with far fewer dollars.

Apple's "channel" idea may not be the perfect a la carte option today, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

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Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the argument and how you put it forward. The thing is that there will still be networks, it's just the method of distribution may generate more revenue for those networks than the old method. If you can show them how they will make more money (or lose less to piracy) you will be able to sell them on changing the content delivery method. That's how iTunes ended up "working" for the labels. Take everyone that would have stolen the song, and give them a simple and relatively cheap way to acquire it legally. Price it low enough that it's an impulse buy, and you will see the revenue actually increase.

^ Well, breaking down paradigms takes time. If my parents' inability to use Netflix and Hulu during a recent visit is any kind of example, we're not ready for 100% a la carte offerings anyway. But in my little hypothetical world, if Apple can convince the networks to go along with a la carte channel offerings, it'll be a worthy first step.

And with the first step made, I surmise the die will be cast, eventually leading to people subscribing to individual programs en masse. Once that second step happens, I can see a lot of independent productions competing against the network fare, which will either bring those networks down entirely, or force them to trim a lot of fat to survive.

Shikarnov said:

If my parents' inability to use Netflix and Hulu during a recent visit is any kind of example, we're not ready for 100% a la carte offerings anyway.

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HAHAHAHA. So very true sir. I had to walk my parents though Hulu while they were here recently. I almost just wanted to get cable back for the time being rather than continue on with the pain...