What I think would be interesting would be the ability to pay to not be the recipient of advertising.
For example, I like NCIS on CBS. Its about the only show I watch regularly now that The Unit is pretty much gone. 1/3 of the hour I spend watching it is commercials for products I don’t or won’t buy. I’d pay a small fee to be able to see the show(s) I like without advertising - and its probably more than what CBS gets in ad revenue when they divide it across the number of viewers.
Likewise, I’d subscribe to some web sites that are currently free if I could see them without ads.
I feel the same way.
I like to rent serialized TV series on DVD — 24, Lost, The Wire, Sopranos, etc. It's great to be able to see them without interruption — or without the extremely annoying and distracting little promos at the bottom, or credits that are superimposed on the first 15 minutes of the show.
I also record programs, so that I can fast-forward through commercials. This isn't exactly “free” — because of the cost of the recorder, and my time setting it up, etc. Also, it doesn't get rid of the promos, etc. that are embedded in the program.
I've read somewhere that the value of all TV advertising works out to about $300/household/year. That would be a very reasonable price to pay to be ad-free. Unfortunately, a lot of people wouldn't pay — so we're stuck with the advertising. Now that there is no practical limit to the number of channels, perhaps networks could offer premium (viewer-pay) channels with the same programming, at the same time, as the regular “free” advertising-funded channels.
That’s why advertisers hate DVR’s-—viewers simply record their shows and then fast-forward through the ads.