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posted by martyb on Tuesday May 02 2017, @02:47PM   Printer-friendly
from the cheaper-circuses dept.

ESPN, which laid off 100 people this week, has a multitude of problems, but the basic one is this: It pays too much for content and costs too much for consumers.

That didn't used to matter because, thanks to the way the cable industry "bundled" channels, cable customers were forced to pay for it even if they never watched it. Now, however, as the cable bundle slowly disintegrates, it matters a lot.

[...] But it's a pipe dream to think that ESPN will ever make the kind of profits ($6.4 billion in 2014) that it once did, for two reasons. First, as is the case with so many other industries, the internet has both shined a light on the flaws of the cable model and exploited them. What was the main flaw of the cable model? It was that consumers had to pay for channels they never watched.

And now they don't.

It turns out that there were lots of people, including sports fans, who resented having to pay for the most expensive channel in the bundle. The popularity of streaming led to "cord cutting," but it also caused cable companies to begin offering less expensive "skinny bundles," some of which don't include ESPN.


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  • (Score: 2) by fraxinus-tree on Tuesday May 02 2017, @03:56PM (3 children)

    by fraxinus-tree (5590) on Tuesday May 02 2017, @03:56PM (#502913)

    Even porn disappoints these days. Because of just the same reasons.

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  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday May 02 2017, @04:36PM (1 child)

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday May 02 2017, @04:36PM (#502938)

    What? I don't believe it. GIF or it didn't happen. Even a pr0n version of "panel discussion on global warming" could be somewhat on topic "Things are really heating up in the studio today, ha ha ha".

    • (Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Tuesday May 02 2017, @07:08PM

      by Aiwendil (531) on Tuesday May 02 2017, @07:08PM (#503053) Journal

      Have you watched playboy channel the last couple of years? Last time I did they had a friggin' talkshow with three people (1M, 2F) and one of the females was topless and the topics was boring (something about trends and fashion).

      Seriously - it wasn't even artistic or sensual - it was essentially any boring low budget talkshow that tried too hard.

  • (Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday May 02 2017, @06:15PM

    by LoRdTAW (3755) on Tuesday May 02 2017, @06:15PM (#502997) Journal

    I can agree with this. I was talking with a few friends about this recently as well. It's either casting couch or horribly overacted crap with fake moans. Some of the more amateur casting couch stuff is good. Though, a majority of the stuff I like to watch is actual people having sex they recorded themselves using a phone. Thats real life.