Nearly 1 in 3 U.S. Households Have Cut
the Cord, And Sports Won’t Save It
Observer,
by
Brandon Katz
Original Article
Posted By: DaddyO,
7/22/2020 10:14:42 AM
We’ll look back at the coronavirus pandemic as the era of great transition when traditional linear media entertainment platforms finally conceded defeat to the growing power of direct-to-consumer business. Roku, Inc. today announced findings from its annual cord cutting study, including new insights shared by U.S. consumers about how the COVID-19 pandemic is influencing the shift to streaming. Ironically, Roku has not yet signed streaming agreements with major new entrants such as WarnerMedia’s HBO Max and NBCUniversal’s Peacock, and yet its findings suggest an acceleration in the mass exodus of linear customers. The study found that approximately 32% of U.S. TV households do not have a traditional pay TV subscription
Reply 1 - Posted by:
LadyHen 7/22/2020 10:31:14 AM (No. 486888)
This is huge for advertising industry. I grew up with commercials. Dh and I could probably roll off a dozen classic ad campaigns from our childhood without thinking. How many toys did we see advertised that we requested from Santa? My kids have grown up are growing up WITHOUT commercials. I am happy about that personally. Ad agencies must be reeling. Too few fresh impressionable minds to indocrinate. And no sports won't save the networks. A lot of young folks don't give a rip about the traditional professional sports and even many who did have been turned off by the behavior of the players.
15 people like this.
Rush cited an interesting stat last week that 75 of the 100 most-watched television shows last year were NFL games. Major revenue impact if there's no season this fall.
9 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
tennisbum 7/22/2020 11:21:00 AM (No. 486953)
I still have cable but have looked at cutting the cord. I only watch less than two hands full of channels and not any of the alphabets. Like college football not any of the professional sports. The cables might be able to salvage people like me before we cut the cord if they would enable us to choose/select the channels we want and charge us only for those few channels. Obviously not going to do that. Most of the junk on the cable is not worth watching yet they think adding more channels with more junk will entice me to pay more money and stay with them. Really dumb people in charge.
18 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
MDConservative 7/22/2020 11:24:11 AM (No. 486957)
Advertising is omnipresent these days. One cannot escape. Look around you and you will see forms all around.
The commercials kids grow up with today are in the content delivered them, as well as the traditional ads. I hope parents are paying attention to the messages brought into their homes by popular programming featuring cute animated characters. To borrow a meme...We are all in this together.
3 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
Hard Nard 7/22/2020 11:33:30 AM (No. 486971)
Other than motorsports sports has little appeal for me. Was a hockey fan until they had player strikes two out of three seasons and killed it. ESPN has no motorsports and became too political so I care little if they suffer.
4 people like this.
I no longer have any interest in professional sports. The light came on for me. Watching grown men dress up and play games on TV is bordering on insanity.
13 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
swarfer 7/22/2020 11:59:25 AM (No. 487011)
I don't watch sports, cable TV news, talk shows, sitcoms, reality shows and HGTV. Figured out I didn't need cable and canceled after 35 years and went internet streaming. Lost some shows but gained a whole new universe of entertainment, mostly from Europe. I realize just how stupid, ignorant, classless, most US programing is.
14 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Bur Oak 7/22/2020 12:01:19 PM (No. 487013)
Sports won't help cable; sports helped kill it. Coming soon will be cuts in the prima donna athletes' pay. Of course this will be blamed on racism. Society will have a problem absorbing all the unemployed illiterate narcissists.
11 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
MMC 7/22/2020 12:16:35 PM (No. 487031)
Here are unintended consequences the Democrats didn’t see coming: parents taking back control of education of their kids, losing cable TV...
Hulu, YouTube, Direct Tv- pick and choose what is wanted.. lost advertising revenue-
Bye bye professional sports... you politicized entertainment- as the top 1%income earners and with high percentage of minority players benefiting of freedom to excel and earn buckets of money..
Good luck - no hard feelings.. reading and family time is much better!
4 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
WV.Hillbilly 7/22/2020 12:44:34 PM (No. 487059)
Sports is one of the main reason people are doing it. If you have cable at least $10 of your bill goes to ESPN. That's 5 times as much as the next expensive network.
Why pay for something you don't watch?
7 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
Strike3 7/22/2020 1:18:59 PM (No. 487095)
The cable and dish providers must be horrified over this development. All of that expense to build infrastructure and the ability to squeeze over a hundred bucks a month from each customer. It's all the result of hollywood's depravity and lack of ethics and talent..
6 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
LadyHen 7/22/2020 1:23:17 PM (No. 487102)
Exactly #11, absoluteky true. AND ESPN is Disney, bought and paid for. Money is fungible guys. Boycott one but not the other and you accomplish nothing.
3 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
jhpeters2 7/22/2020 2:00:01 PM (No. 487153)
I am thrilled. I had fully cut the cord 9 years ago. It wasn't easy back then. It did take know how and it had a learning curve. But look what has developed. Traditional entertainment sources i.e., network TV, movie studios and mega media conglomerates (Time Warner, NY Times etal and many more) are gasping for breath, pensions to fail will be next, then fire sales of assets - most hope a federal bailout will be forth coming. See ya newspapers (save the rain forest y'all). See ya Network TV. Hey media shareholders, short term profits and accounting tricks are killing you, just thought you would like to know. Say goodbye to Hollywood (Chinese buyers called you guys yet?) so get out while you can. For the rest of us we will spend our dollars purchasing or simply viewing for free - those things that we really care to see. Dumb as it sounds, but when did English speaking households have to be inundated with Spanish language stations, eh cable companies?
4 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
chase9365 7/22/2020 2:19:11 PM (No. 487185)
Cut the cord a year ago. Never looked back. Best thing I ever did.
5 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
jpdkas 7/22/2020 2:31:05 PM (No. 487218)
We cut the cord last year and use a streaming service, Philo ($20/mo). We did not want to fund ESPN, MSNBC, CNN, etc. with our cable dollars. We also erected an outside antenna and found ~38 local channels, with probably ~32 different programs (a few channels repeat the same programs). We updated our TVs and added the Tablo DVR. Our new configuration is more powerful, versatile, and flexible than our prior existing cable service. We opted for ROKU type TVs which have News Max and OAN available as part of their regular programming. We don't watch TV for our national news, however. We quit watching Fox years ago. We haven't looked back.
3 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
OhioNick 7/22/2020 2:53:20 PM (No. 487239)
Until the cable companies allow me to select my channels, cafeteria style -- so that I don't have to pay for garbage like MTV, CNN and even ESPN -- I will not fund the leftwing media outlets that despise people like me.
7 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
JimBob 7/22/2020 8:49:14 PM (No. 487582)
Being aware of the animated FECES on the Cartoon Channel, and the fascination children have with anything animated, I refused to have Cable TV in the house. I did get high-speed internet as soon as it was available.
I believe I made the right decision.
1 person likes this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
FunOne 9/12/2020 2:43:20 PM (No. 538673)
"And Sports Won’t Save It"? Sports contributed to it.
A lot of folks just can't tolerate the degrading rituals related to systemic racism and white privilege that have now been established. ESPN became more of a political channel than a sports channel years ago.
0 people like this.
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Sports are the only reason to watch, and when they 1) won't show it and 2) politicize it we have no other option.