| | Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin Have you all seen this Portfolio.com interview with Gerry Layborne - the former head of Oxygen? She lays into Martin pretty good. Here are a few gems:
"I've spent a good deal of time with Kevin Martin and the F.C.C. Kevin Martin just plain does not like cable. I don't know what it is exactly. He came in, and he had this idea to have a family tier. And we basically told him, "A family tier won't work. We've been offering families the ability to lock out objectionable programming. We make it available for free. We make it available easily. And we don't think a family tier will work." "That doesn't matter. We still want you to do the family tier." Okay, we did the family tier. And guess what? It didn't work. Then he was annoyed. In some ways, he would like to go back to the 1950s. He would like to have three networks that have Leave It to Beaver on it, but that's not where our country is. That's not what people want to watch. I don't know how much I want to say here."
Wow. Impressive. | |
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 | | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin said by NicholasG :
Have you all seen this Portfolio.com interview with Gerry Layborne - the former head of Oxygen? She lays into Martin pretty good. Here are a few gems:
"I've spent a good deal of time with Kevin Martin and the F.C.C. Kevin Martin just plain does not like cable. I don't know what it is exactly. He came in, and he had this idea to have a family tier. And we basically told him, "A family tier won't work. We've been offering families the ability to lock out objectionable programming. We make it available for free. We make it available easily. And we don't think a family tier will work." "That doesn't matter. We still want you to do the family tier." Okay, we did the family tier. And guess what? It didn't work. Then he was annoyed. In some ways, he would like to go back to the 1950s. He would like to have three networks that have Leave It to Beaver on it, but that's not where our country is. That's not what people want to watch. I don't know how much I want to say here."
Wow. Impressive.
People don't want to pay for channels they do not want. PERIOD! If I lock out channels I do not want to watch, I still pay for those channels. | |
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 |  james
join:2001-02-26
CWCville USA | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin I dont want to pay for the roads I never use in my area, why should I have to pay for roads that I never use?
Face it, you have two choices, spend $60.00 a month for all the channels, or spend 59.99 a month for the three channels you watch. Atleast if everyone gets all of the channels they might discover something other than Fox News, WCW wrestling and Friday night football. | |
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| | RadioDoc58ef2c0Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin For the most part, roads are paid via motor fuel taxes on the people driving them. You might want to pick a different example.
And $60/month for "all the channels" is not even close. Try double that.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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| | | james
join:2001-02-26
CWCville USA | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin Who cares what the tax is called? The fact remains that I contribute to the upkeep of every road in my area yet only use one side road and one main road.
It's a fine example as far as I'm concerned. Because if roads were only paid for by those who used them, the rarely used roads would cost huge amounts per driver, while the ones used by everyone would cost pennies. (Cost of road upkeep/number of drivers).
"But Cable channels aren't roads James!" you might say. You would be quite correct, but is it really so hard to imagine how much it would cost to get a channel that doesn't have much demand? For example local channels? I suppose rules could be put in place to share profits between the popular channels and the unpopular ones, but how long until the Cable companies ignore the rules or lobby to change them.
Oh, and regarding the "all the channels thing" I'm stuck in non digital land still, I think of "all the channels" as $50 for Chan 02 to Chan 75. I think of Basic cable as the $25 chan 02 to chan 40, The other tiers are all premium fluff that people should be able to do without if they want. I admit that someone else may see channels 41 to 75 as fluff that people can do without, so maybe if I had HBO and the movie network I'd see them as normal channels instead of premium ones. | |
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| | | | RadioDoc58ef2c0Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11
1 edit | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin said by james:Who cares what the tax is called? The fact remains that I contribute to the upkeep of every road in my area yet only use one side road and one main road. If that is all you use then proportionally speaking that is all you pay for. Someone who is on the road a thousand miles per week is paying a lot more in motor fuel taxes to maintain the much larger network of roads used by that person.
You just want to pay for the one individual road you use? Shall we block your access to any roads other than those to on the rare occasion you venture farther out? Maybe every road should be a toll road? How about a GPS which logs every inch of every road you travel and then you get a bill for your part of the upkeep of those roads, including the big hit every time there is a repair or resurfacing. And heaven help you if they decide to add a lane.
I'm no fan of channel bundling especially since the owners add limited-value channels to the bundles and then jack up the rates in the name of "diversity", but your model is unworkable.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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| | | | | james
join:2001-02-26
CWCville USA | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin said by RadioDoc:You just want to pay for the one individual road you use? Shall we block your access to any roads other than those to on the rare occasion you venture farther out? Maybe every road should be a toll road? How about a GPS which logs every inch of every road you travel and then you get a bill for your part of the upkeep of those roads, including the big hit every time there is a repair or resurfacing. And heaven help you if they decide to add a lane. That's my point, thank you.
What happens when the channel that you watch all the time has to raise their prices because you're the only person watching it? The same thing that would happen if we had to foot the bill for the road we live on. | |
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| | | | | | RadioDoc58ef2c0Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin In your world, you would (and should) be assessed the cost for your road. Is that what you really want?
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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| | | | | | | james
join:2001-02-26
CWCville USA | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin Wow, are you being serious? No really, you're coming across as someone who missed the point completely. I'm not fucking saying that roads should be billed a la carte, I'm using them as an example of what could happen to cable costs.
Jesus, you're usually on the ball RadioDoc, I'm somewhat dissapointed. | |
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| | | | | | | | RadioDoc58ef2c0Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin It's been a long week (and weekend) with too many numbers in it (year end accounting for three tax returns).
I re-read the entire subthread and realize now we are both talking the same side of this. My only excuse is that my brain was scrambled by the IRS...
I apologize. Sorry.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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| | | | | | | | | james
join:2001-02-26
CWCville USA | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin I still love you man. Have a relaxing weekend. | |
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| | | | | | | | | RadioDoc58ef2c0Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: Cable Companies Not the Only Ones Made at Martin There is a nice long Scotch waiting at the end of this last 1065... 
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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