If you are rooting against ESPN | The Boneyard

If you are rooting against ESPN

whaler11

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Month over Month Subscriber losses. October into November:

ESPN -621k
ESPN 2 -607k
ESPN U -671k
FS1 -355k
FS2 -591k
NBCSN -705k

Numbers don't include any incremental gains from Vue or Sling.
 
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People don't want to watch sports. Live or otherwise. I guess there are other forms of entertainment now?
 
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People don't want to watch sports. Live or otherwise. I guess there are other forms of entertainment now?
I think it's more that people are tired of having to pay all sorts of $ for cable packages. The sooner the networks and cable companies begin to realize the customer wants a more a la carte TV experience instead of pre-packaged garbage where you're paying for hundreds of channels you never watch, the sooner TV bleeding will get under control. There's no evidence people don't want to watch sports overall, they just don't want to watch sports in the mode that exists now.
 
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I would love to see if there is some type of correlation between the loss of subscribers as in terms of location, just to see if there is a link to areas that have been left out of alignment. When we were in the BE, I was a college sports nut. Now I could give two ts about college sports...
 
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I would love to see if there is some type of correlation between the loss of subscribers as in terms of location, just to see if there is a link to areas that have been left out of alignment. When we were in the BE, I was a college sports nut. Now I could give two ts about college sports...
As if ESPN cares what's going on in their own backyard. Let's pay the worst, most inept power conference $10 million more if they agree to do absolutely nothing. Hope those Bristol kunts go down hard.
 

dayooper

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I think it's more that people are tired of having to pay all sorts of $ for cable packages. The sooner the networks and cable companies begin to realize the customer wants a more a la carte TV experience instead of pre-packaged garbage where you're paying for hundreds of channels you never watch, the sooner TV bleeding will get under control. There's no evidence people don't want to watch sports overall, they just don't want to watch sports in the mode that exists now.

The cable companies exist to make money. If you think the consumer is going to save money in the long run, you will be sorely mistaken. Whether they increase the rates for all channels, or they jack up the rates for broadband, we will pay and, most likely pay more than we are now. Comcast and their like have deep pockets and will game the situation to their advantage.
 
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This is great news for the next AAC contract.
(Sarcasm on)

AAC needs to explore alternative channels like Twitter, Google, Apple TV, Amazon, and Hulu etc. AAC sticking with ESPiN will not work in the long run.

It would be nice if ESPiN and ACC go down together. If there is a way for CT residents to boycott ESPiN due to our current realignment situation, it would be great.
 
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The cable companies exist to make money. If you think the consumer is going to save money in the long run, you will be sorely mistaken. Whether they increase the rates for all channels, or they jack up the rates for broadband, we will pay and, most likely pay more than we are now. Comcast and their like have deep pockets and will game the situation to their advantage.
It's not necessarily that the consumer will save money net over a bundled package but the consumer will feel like they're getting better value for their money. The company trades a small overall discount to the existing consumer for attracting far more new subscribers.
 

Mr. Wonderful

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The cable companies exist to make money. If you think the consumer is going to save money in the long run, you will be sorely mistaken. Whether they increase the rates for all channels, or they jack up the rates for broadband, we will pay and, most likely pay more than we are now. Comcast and their like have deep pockets and will game the situation to their advantage.
This is both right and wrong.

You are right in pointing out that a shift to internet distribution does not change the media's ability to charge premium fees for certain high demand content.

However, what you do not mention is that the value of sports content is and has been inflated for some time by artificial demand. Cable bundling was the reason for that artificial demand. A great many cable subscribers never cared for most sports content, but had to pay for it anyway.

It's much harder to get those people to continue subsidizing content via internet delivery. There may be ways for the media to save some of this revenue, but that bubble, as a whole, has burst. And that loss of revenue will trickle down to college football perhaps more than any other sport.

The B1G and SEC will always make money, but in 20 years? In my opinion, this era of contracts, right now, represents the apex. Enjoy it while it lasts.
 
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I will enjoy it...in 20 years, I won't be here (stop already with the applause).

We are in the golden age of TV sports viewing. Watching multiple games on a HD big screen compared to when I would watch one game a week in grainy black and white on a 17 inch screen. In the year after I graduated from high school, there still was no football on Saturday nights.

When I was 20 (50 years ago), in the season, you could watch the eight national telecasts, along with a regional telecast in five select weeks set by the NCAA.

At a program like Southern Miss, or FSU, an athlete might not be on television in his career.

I am thankful for living in this golden age of TV sports...and whatever evolves in the future, I have faith that it will leave much to sports fans who enjoy watching on TV.

It sure as heck will beat the days when football games via radio was the southern football fans alternative to actually being at the stadium.
 
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I'm not rooting against espn so much, as I can't believe that such a successful enterprise buried their head in the sand as to what was coming.

The problem with streaming and making money off it, is,that they are going to have to charge the hardcore sports fan so much to make up for the cord cutters, that you may lose them as well. Espn's real problem is the money they have tied up in rights fees. I think they're locking up what they can with things like the ACC.

I think @WestCoastHusky is spot on in his post . The AAC should divy up their next contract across several spectrums. Sell a package of games to Espn, but don't go exclusively with them.
 

Mr. Wonderful

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I will enjoy it...in 20 years, I won't be here (stop already with the applause).

We are in the golden age of TV sports viewing. Watching multiple games on a HD big screen compared to when I would watch one game a week in grainy black and white on a 17 inch screen. In the year after I graduated from high school, there still was no football on Saturday nights.

When I was 20 (50 years ago), in the season, you could watch the eight national telecasts, along with a regional telecast in five select weeks set by the NCAA.

At a program like Southern Miss, or FSU, an athlete might not be on television in his career.

I am thankful for living in this golden age of TV sports...and whatever evolves in the future, I have faith that it will leave much to sports fans who enjoy watching on TV.

It sure as heck will beat the days when football games via radio was the southern football fans alternative to actually being at the stadium.
images
 
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I had a meeting this week, where the small talk leading into the meeting was about various strategies to debundle. Several Middle-aged, likely affluent executives talking about what they did to cut their cable chord. I think the pace is definitely accelerating.
 
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I keep spending more on cable all the time. At the end of a long week the last thing I want to do is figure out how to see stuff.
 
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I have Comcast cable and internet...and have Direct TV and cable internet.... two houses (Fla and NC)....with my TV, internet, and Verizon phones...it comes to $550 month.

I would be a guy who unbundles if I could still get what I want.
 

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