Posted on 10/21/2015 1:51:46 PM PDT by Kaslin
RUSH: ESPN is in trouble economically, financially. ESPN just announced that they're gonna have to cut a minimum of 350 jobs. And the reason why is subscribers are abandoning cable. Many people do not understand how all of this works, the cable bundle. I mean, you understand that you have to pay a minimum amount per month to get a bunch of channels, the vast majority of which you never watch, but the channels you want are in that bundle, and you have to pay for the bundle.
So let's say you want your local stations, you want ESPN, maybe HBO. Fine. You've gotta buy 25 or 30 or maybe other channels that you never watch. Now, here's the thing about that. In a free market, these networks with no audience wouldn't survive. If you have network programming that nobody watches, then there won't be any ratings and you won't be able to sell any advertising and you won't be able to operate. If, however, the cable companies collect X-amount per subscriber as though they are viewers and then pay that to the network, then the network can stay alive and viable even though nobody may be watching it.
ESPN gets six dollars per cable subscriber every month. That's ESPN's gravy train. And when cord cutting begins, when people eliminate cable from their lives, then the number of people paying for the bundle, out of which ESPN gets six bucks per customer, that starts dwindling away, and ESPN's income dwindles away, and it doesn't matter how many viewers they have or not. This is the point, with the cable bundle it doesn't matter how many viewers a network has. In ESPN's case, it doesn't matter, because they're gonna get six dollars for every household that has ESPN in its cable package.
The interesting thing is 3.2 million people have cut the cord so far, 3.2 million people have cut their cable subscription, and that means that a good percentage of that 3.2 million people are no longer funding ESPN at six dollars a month. They are leaving cable for a bunch of market reasons. Many of them are Millennials, and they just simply don't want to pay for channels. They don't have the money. Young people can't get jobs; they don't have the money. They don't want to pay for things they don't watch.
They'd rather take the money they have and a la carte their way via streaming or whatever and watch it on their device. And maybe if they have AirPlay, project it onto a TV or something, but they don't want to pay cable. Well, 3.2 million people, many of them probably not even sports fans, that's gonna add up to a serious chunk of change. That's $250 million a year for ESPN. ESPN's in close to a hundred million homes. But if they lose 3.2 million subscribers, that's a loss of $250 million a year, and that's why they are cutting 350 jobs.
But here is the piece de resistance. This is what everyone needs to know. Bundled cable subscriptions serve as the foundation for Hollywood to own pop culture. John Nolte at Breitbart makes this point extremely well today. Hollywood does not have to generate audience in order to generate income. All they have to do is secure networks being carried by cable in a basic tier, or maybe next tier up, and they get funded by customers who never watch the network, or very few do, because they're not buying for these obscure channels that are all left left-wing rubbish, many of them are.
That's how they remain viable, that's how they remain in operation, without anybody watching them, people paying the cable channels, the cable companies. Every network gets a certain amount of money per subscriber. ESPN's the top at six bucks. Not every channel gets that. Some get 50 cents, 75 cents, what have you. But the scam of bundled cable is the foundation of Hollywood's money and cultural power.
Look at it this way. If Hollywood was not able to force people to pay for networks and programming they never watch -- MSNBC has no audience. MSNBC could not stay on the air if it weren't for cable bundles. CNN, ditto, folks. They don't have enough audience to be viable with just their audience. They couldn't survive without cable and these subscriber percentages that they collect.
The same thing with Comedy Central. Nobody watches Comedy Central. Not enough people watch Comedy Central to support it via advertising. Ditto MTV. But they all get a percentage of everything you pay monthly to cable to sustain them. And Millennials are leading the way, unknowing about this impact, in taking away some of that staying power.
i stated listening to Limgaugh in 1988 i believe...I was stationed there in the military....I remember before the 2002 election that Rush had a bone to pick with HW Bush....Ole man Bush invited him to the White House to sleep in the Lincoln bedrrom and you couldn’t melt suagra in his mouth after that. He was HW all the way...Clinton got elected even though there were many other candidatse far worthy.
Dole came along and he swung off his balls.
2000 came and tons of callers questioned why W. was being pushed down our throats....he twisted into a pretzel why we should vote for him.
After 8 years of Bush he finally admitted through a lortab haze why he supported him....and carried his water.
Almost 7 years of Obama he has finally rid himself of the GOPe.....it has been a long road for him...I have been steady and right the whole time....You wanna say say Rush is a Guru of politics...I say BS...been ahead of his societal evolution for years....not ahead of me...your choice to keep on listening daily....Maybe Rush has seen the light.
ESPN is on Sling tv.
ESPN is on Sling tv.
I have Roku. Picture quality is excellent on big screen.
Do yourself a favor and just find a quiet, small, used mini-tower computer w/ HDMI output and a Blue-ray capable DVD... Mine is an Acer from the Vista era... Buy a wireless nic for it (if you have to), or wired, to connect to your router to get to the internet, and a wireless keyboard... If you have a monster big-screen, you might have to upgrade the vid too (maybe a 2g card), though mine is a 4 footer, and works fine off the stock video... You are all set. You can still get to netflix, Amazon, etc... but anything you want is already freely available on the net.
I am about 4 months free of the cable now, and I will never go back. My outfit cost less than 100 bucks, saves me 70 bucks a month, and requires *no* subscription beyond the internet itself.
Quality is excellent, and normally streaming signal is too (on hi-speed cable)- If the stream gets slow, just start whatever you are watching, pause it, and walk away for 10 minutes to let it load up a ways... Same with movies... But generally, that isn't very necessary. The only thing that sucks is outage - Used to be that if the internet went down I could watch the tube, or visa-versa. Now, if it goes down I have nothing... So I am building a movie library to resolve that problem.
Thanks for the advice. I have heard of Roku.
We had cable, got over 200 channels just to watch Turner Classic and about 4 others. Dumped it. Got Netflix via ROKU. Only think we miss is Turner Classic. Sure wish they’d stream.
Thanks for the info. I will check into this as well.
Is that all you got?
It’s been a long process for me...
I was a “cable slave” from 1991 to 2001 until I got hooked on watching curling, cricket and international badminton. local cable TV had zip/zero/nada for coverage other than a very rare 2am highlights (if that).
Dumped cable and bought a “grey market” Canadian dish (2001-2011) and was much more happier. Years later, I got fed up with the increased costs and outages...dumped that too.
After bumping up my internet speed (plus getting a wireless router and dedicated mini laptop) I realized I can turn my TV into a large internet display! I also ditched the phone line and purchased an OOMA phone. My COX bill got cut in half!!!
Most of my entertainment comes from Netflix (20%) Hulu (10%) and YouTube (70%). The last time I watched network TV was the 2014 NCAA Final Four Championship.
YOU don’t. Some people need entertainment in this dismal world.
Thats pathetic.
I am housebound with medical issues after a lifetime of being extremely active outdoors. Don’t tell me people ‘need’ a freaking dish/cable. I get along just fine without one and have no intention of buying rope to hang myself with.
You don't need internet either, but it looks like you have it. Who do you give your cash to for that?
Yer real judgmental.
I’m happy to hear you are fulfilled in your leisure time and sorry to here about your health problems. Take care.
What else are you willing to justify?
Here’s a hint. It’s not a dish/cable company. In fact, it’s not a company that openly pushes anything political at all.
Doesn’t change the truth of the matter does it? Nope.
Yeah, I suppose I don’t love America enough to not watch TV because most TV people are liberal.
And you don’t love it enough to eat nothing but stuff you grow in your backyard. And what about your computer, does your ISP give to liberals?
Godspeed in your efforts to get people to drop tv, best of luck. But harshly chastising everyone who won’t go along with your POV is kinda a **ck move if you ask me, and not very persuasive. Whatever, God bless you and please get well.
I have a 65” set and Amazon Prime. So I have Fire TV and access Netflix through my Fire TV unit. I have a cap on my internet usage of 350 gigs a month, which I only ever busted the first month of service. Downloading all those Dexter episodes to my DirecTV DVR racked up the gigs. Since then, I never come close to the cap.
The streaming is HD and excellent quality 99% of the time. My internet is 20 mps download and 5 mps upload. A lower bandwidth might increase the occasional compression degradation while a little higher might be perfect.
Hey people can do whatever they want. The fact is, tithing to Dish/Cable directly supports liberal propaganda. And it also goes to elect liberals.
If your entertainment is more important to you than that, so be it.
What’s the name of the company? I’d like to check them out? Maybe I could do business with them.
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