Quote:
Originally posted by Carrie@Nov 5 2003, 02:23 PM
HBO suffering falling revenue due to satellite and cable? You must be joking. Since the inception of cable, HBO has expanded to have about 5 different channels or so and they're only getting bigger as they (wisely) break ground into niche programming. Satellite hasn't hurt them at all; on the contrary it's been a significant boon to them.
I do agree that the big 3 will continue to suffer falling ratings, but they won't be displaced as the main source of television entertainment for at least another 10 years. And in that amount of time, you'd better believe they'll come up with things that keep people coming back - just look at Survivor, CSI, etc etc.
The author makes a dangerously wrong assumption here - that the *majority* of people are middle-income and above with relatively high IQs who love and embrace technology. Oh how I wish that were true... but it's not.
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Gotta agree with you there Carrie - one of the "hooks" for us getting satellite in the first place was that there were several HBO's. The Discovery Channel group has done quite well for itself as well due in part to satellite and digital cable opportunities.
I also have to agree re: the Big 3 - we rarely watch network TV anymore except for certain sitcoms we enjoy, but even then those usually get forgotten if there's a cool feature on Discovery, the Travel Channel or the Science Channel. We also enjoy the Speed Network (lotta race fans in this house!) and are looking forward to the long-awaited (NFL Network - let's hope they don't F*CK it up!!!)... all of these specialty TV channels lead to more TV-watching, more advertising opportunities, more revenues and success for HBO, et al in the long run.
The Big 3? They are going to be left in the dust. If NYPD Blue and CSI are as "risque" as they are allowed to get - HBO/Showtime will win hands down. Can you imagine them trying to do The Sopranos, Six Feet Under or Carnivale on network TV? No way.
Interesting article though - however, I just don't happen to agree with the writer.