Cable TV In Free Fall As Industry Loses Another 1.62 Million Viewers
from the nice-knowing-you dept
It seems like only yesterday that cable TV executives — and the analysts poised to prop up their narratives to boost stock valuations — were busy insisting that the “cord cutting” trend was a “fiction” that would abate any moment now. It was the kind of thinking that helped justify their inability to adapt to consumer frustration and a quickly-changed market.
A decade or so later and streaming and alternative free video services (YouTube, TikTok) have effectively crushed traditional cable underfoot. The cable industry has lost 4 million subscribers in just the first six months of 2024 alone, as users increasingly shift to streaming, over the air broadcasts, piracy, or free video services. Last quarter alone saw another 1.62 million U.S. consumers cut the cord:
“This marks the tenth consecutive quarter of double-digit declines,” wrote analysts Craig Moffett. “It is becoming increasingly clear that there is no longer any floor.”
Back between 2010 and 2015 or so you’d hear cable executives constantly insist that they didn’t need to adjust on pricing or improve customer service because cord cutting was a trend that would just magically stop when Millennials started procreating (it didn’t). It was pretty broadly normalized to pretend that this very obvious market shift wasn’t actually happening; they’ve mostly memory holed that entire era.
Most major cable TV giants aren’t suffering too badly, in large part because most of the biggest ones (Comcast, Charter) still enjoy a lucrative monopoly over broadband access across vast swaths of the U.S. Most of the losses they’re taking on video can be compensated by charging users more and more money for broadband, either via rate hikes or weird nickel-and-diming efforts (usage caps, hidden fees).
But a growing number of broadband and TV providers are increasingly ditching offering cable TV themselves, instead shoveling their users over to streaming alternatives.
For a while there, new streaming services were also seeing a dip in subscriptions, but that seems to have recovered, with vMVPDs (virtual Multichannel Video Programming Distributors like Dish’s SlingTV or Google’s YouTube TV) adding 490,000 subscribers during the second quarter.
That said, many of the same executives who drove cord cutting through relentless price hikes and incompetence have migrated over to streaming, where they appear poised to repeat all the same mistakes all over again, having learned absolutely nothing from experience.
Filed Under: broadband, cable tv, cord cutting, disruption, streaming, tv, video
Comments on “Cable TV In Free Fall As Industry Loses Another 1.62 Million Viewers”
Uh
They have over 60MILLION subscribers. I think they will be OK.
Streaming is simply not an option for a lot of people.
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60m subscribers / 4m subscribers lost / 4 mo * 12 mo = 5 years == 0 subscribers
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It was 4 million over 6 months, which a linear extrapolation suggests would lead to the end of cable television around 2032. But that’s overly simplistic; in reality there’s probably gonna be a “long tail” for these things, and it could be around for decades. For example, cable radio seems to still exist in the USA, and I doubt most people have even heard of such a thing.
Of course, cable companies are allowing this to happen (as Karl notes: “a growing number of broadband […] providers are increasingly ditching offering cable TV themselves”). They used to effectively force internet subscribers to subscribe to television, and have mostly stopped.
I don’t know what to do with the statement that “Streaming is simply not an option for a lot of people”. Any form of live ad-supported television is basically not an option for people who didn’t grow up with it. The cable companies will be okay because of internet subscribers, not because of television. (One could also say that internet service is not an option for a lot of people, much as restaurants are not an option for a lot of people—but as long as there’s enough money coming in, it doesn’t really matter.) Anyway, a lot of “cable TV” services are already internet-based streaming, unbeknownst to the subscribers; it’s why they need to have “decoder boxes” (actually full DOCSIS modems) at every TV.
We’re not lost, we just got fed up of taking shit from companies that treat us like a captive market.
Learned nothing from the experience?
Seems like they learned how to make sure the check clears, and how to leverage their current title for an even better next one.
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Yeah, that’s such a bizarre interpretation on Karl’s part, considering how often people on Techdirt talk about executives “failing upward”. These are public companies, whose financial reports will tell us how much money the executives make. You can watch them getting higher salaries and bigger bonuses each time, especially when moving from company to company.
We could maybe say the companies don’t learn anything. The executives, though, have definitely learned to milk the companies—and, by extension, their subscribers and investors. They all sit on each other’s boards (not for free), so they can give each other raises. Some of these people would get tens of millions of dollars for being fired.
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And this is a bizarre way to split hairs. Y’all know exactly what he means.
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I really don’t. My best guess is that Karl meant the companies don’t learn, but it’s just a guess. Also: they do learn. They keep doing the same thing, because it keeps working, because they’ve learned to manipulate the regulators.
Graph
I’m not sure if this breaks the rules or not but there’s a graph at this website. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/comcast-just-lost-another-419-200706427.html
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And my username suggests, I’m dumm. The links in the article have the same graph.
Retro Cable Extravaganza Coming
It is inevitable that the kids, someday, will find cable cool and retro. Like vinyl albums and cassette tapes.
I am stocking up on coax and set top boxes. Call me on my landline in 2044.
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tape is not cool, shelf life sucks
My thought of the day:
People are still cord cutting. But the only people losing out are the cable service providers: the distribution networks and the ad networks have all latched on to the streaming services now, so they don’t care at all.
long tail vs cliff
The problem with long tail is they have huge expenses for content. That bill will cut that tail off pretty quickly when the margins come calling.