Verizon Pulls Sports From New HD Channel Bundle → Re: I enjoy sports...

Of course it's a rate hike. How else are the MVPDs supposed to pay for all those grossly overpaid pituitary giants? What's new here is that the sports addicts get to pay for it all by themselves, rather than making everybody else pay too.

That's the problem, I'm not a sports addict. But there are a few games and matches here and there that interest me and the providers are just testing the waters to break out all "specialty" programming into packages that they can then charge a premium fee for on top of the basic rate. It's only supported on here and other geek sites because it's sports.

If the providers get their way, we will get a-la-carte just like we've been asking for, and it will look like this:

$50 Basic Service (includes NBC on Comcast, Public Access, QVC, HSN, C-SPAN 1-3, and the Smooth Jazz channel)

+$5 Cable "Starter" Package (USA, TBS, TNT, etc.)
+$5 Local Channel Fee
+10 Sports Network Fee
+$5 Kids Entertainment Package (Nick, Cartoon Network, Disney, etc.)
+$5 History and Science Channels Package (History, Discovery, etc.)
+$5 Music and Specialty Channels Package (MTV, etc.)
+$5 Commercial Movie Channel Package (TCM, AMC, etc.)

Look at the bargains we get with a-la-carte!! It's now $90 for what we used to get for $50! What Savings...now can I sign up for a tiered data plan, too, so I can save even more money??

When dealing with telcos and their ilk, be careful what you wish for...

Unfortunately you can't just blame the sports networks. Many bundled channels are due to one company forcing their little watched and never wanted channels on the cable co. as part of carrying their more popular choices. Want MTV? Here's all of Viacom's channels to go with it. Look at their list of channels and tell me how many you actually watch? »www.viacom.com/ourbrands ··· ult.aspx

I'd gladly opt out of the Viacom package if it would save me $10/mo. So many people complain about sports networks... I don't want my MTV!!

I don't disagree. But rates are never going to drop, just the number of channels in the "basic" package will get smaller and smaller until we're paying the same rate for basic as we always did, and have to have a bunch of add-on packages on top of it that double the bill.

Opting-out of the Viacom package would never save you $10. You would get to pay the same rate as you always did, while no longer receiving Viacom. You'll pay the same and get less. It's the telco way. Meanwhile people who enjoy Viacom will have to pay more to get the same service they always did.

I'm not keen about MTV anymore? I say "Where's the music?"

That go's for every channel, So you wanna opt out say your fav channel pay $3.00/month extra ? what i thought.

More like
limited basic / line fee* comes with Local Channels let's say $15-$20
and then have theme packs after that.

Line fee is needed for HSI as well

If these companies do a-la-carte properly it wouldn't cost so much but they have no intention of actually doing things properly.