[april15Bendovr]

Please join general chat on this topic.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/1530286/posts?page=13

[april15Bendovr]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/1530286/posts?page=13

[calrighty]

Cable industry won't do it.

[Kenton]

Good idea. Fifty bucks a month for five or six watchable channels is pretty bogus...

[frogjerk]

A la carte pricing urged for cable TV

This will be the death knell for Liberal TV. CNN, MSLSD, MTV, MTV2, LOGO, and all the other crap lib channels that get no ratings will die a well deserved death. Subsides from bogus cable "packages" will no longer keep the garbage channels from spouting their BS...

[stopem]

FANTASTIC!!!!

"A la carte pricing urged for cable TV Nov. 29, 2005 at 1:59PM Federal regulators are calling on the cable TV industry to let viewers pay for only the channels they want to watch.

Finally the Feds are doing something worth while! Hope and pray it happens.

[frogjerk]

The industry claims a la carte programming would raise costs and ultimately reduce the number of networks offered.

If I am charged more for FOXNEWS and nothing for CNN (Which will be off the air) I will be content. Ratings will actually be ratings, not BS, pumped up, TV Guide "The best shows your not watching" phony Nielson ratings. All of those horrible reality shows will have the proper stake driven through their hearts.

[Captain Peter Blood]

The technology is there and it can be done. I would love this so I could get rid of channels I never watch or intend to watch. I probably could cut at least 5 to 10 stations I have no interest in. Now the big question is will the cable company give me a better rate or charge me more for the Al LA Carte service???????????

[Constitutionalist Conservative]

I was writing letters to the editor over 20 years ago calling for the same thing, knowing full well that I was living in fantasyland to think the industry would actually do it. I still had to vent, though, at the outrage of paying about $20 a month for five or six channels. Well... it seemed like a lot of money back when I was a poor college student...

[Constitutionalist Conservative]

ultimately reduce the number of networks offered

This is a bad thing?

[kkalman]

Coming soon to a city near you: usdtv.com
It just arrived in Dallas. You get all the local channels
and about a dozen cables. No CNN but FOX yes.

[rattrap]

Yes please, I DON'T want my MTV.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Currently, viewers' only choice of cable TV channels bundled packages, the Wall Street Journal noted.

Which means that if I want the Military and other Discovery Channels, I have to buy an overpriced package that is full of junk channels that I don't want. I'm not paying an extra 30 bucks to get another 30 channels, 5 of which I will actually watch.

It seems to me that Discovery would have a basis for a formal complaint to the FCC, the logic being that people are passing up their channels because they're bundled in with package deals that a lot of people don't want. Therefore, the current market is hurting their ratings.

[Sans-Culotte]

A la carte was what I loved about my old C-Band satellite dish. I only ordered what I wanted, and it was cheap. If I could do that with my mini dish, I'd add channels while deleting some. As it is now, I have my favorites and my wife's favorites set up, and we ignore 80% of the programming.

[Hildy]

fifteen years ago I worked for the CAB: Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau....they'll never let this happen. Believe me.

[R. Scott]

Federal regulators are calling on the cable TV industry to let viewers pay for only the channels they want to watch.

How many people would pay to have all the shopping and infomercial channels? I would end up with around a dozen channels – not the couple hundred I currently have.

[mad puppy]

I can understand being frustrated with dish/cable and the extreme $$$ they charge, but, do we REALLY want the US gov't urging businesses to alter the way they do business? I'm curious what happens if the cable/dish companies tell them to kiss their a$$. Does the gov't just shrug their shoulders and walk away, or FORCE the issue?

Just unplug the damn thing. I've been waiting for 20 years for a 'package' that makes sense to me and so far, the only thing I'm paying for is the DSL so I can get to the Internet. Every time the wife & kids and I travel we get "hotel TV" and watch Monster Garage and the History Channel which gets us in trouble because we end up being late to stuff. We'd be a mess if that stuff was pumped into the house 24-7.

[NormB]

This would be awesome.

Imagine surfing 5-7 channels instead of skipping through tons of spanish speaking channels and shopping channels.

I don't believe it would happen but if it does I would be psyched.

[who knows what evil?]

FOX, FNC, the Weather Channel, and the WB. Ten bucks. I'm in.

[Zon]

I vehemently oppose government regulating how cable companies package or bundle their channels and services. I fully support cable companies offering customers a pay-per-channel option or any package or bundle.

[1Old Pro]

The industry claims a la carte programming would raise costs and ultimately reduce the number of networks offered.

It will force the crappy channels to compete. What good is 150 channels if I only watch 30 of them?