Leichtman: 540,000 Cable Subscribers Left in Q2

And while some may say 325,000 net loss for pay TV is small it also doesn't factor or in population growth. Pay TV would need to add about 250,000 subs per quarter just to keep up with population growth. So the loss is really closer to 600,000 not 325,000

Ok so using you're own numbers the US population grew by 2.26 million people. between 2010-2011. There are about 2.6 people per household( according to the US census ). So the number of households in the US in is increasing by 870,000 per year or 218,000 per quarter. It's been pretty consistent that at least 90% of US household subscribe to pay TV over the last 15 or so years. So of that pay TV should have been increasing by 196,000 per quarter just to keep up with population growth. But it's lost about 325,000 even taking into account the growth in subscribers of u-verse/FiOS. So that's a true loss of 520,000.

It's not just the pricing it's what you get for the pricing. Even if they cut the pricing in half is it still worth it? I think more and more people would say no.

Here's the irony. Traditional content makers want to kill off things like Netflix because they think cable/satellite is the only way to make money. Well guess what my son who has never been much of a TV watcher has been watching season 5 of Breaking Bad on AMC. Now you know why he is watching that? Because seasons 1-4 where available on Netflix. If he didn't have those first 4 seasons available he never would be watching it on TV now. I'm sure my son isn't the only person that has done that.

Cutting off cable is the last thing to go (even above internet). Phone is the first because it can be easily replaced. They are actually adding phone subs though (3 play bundling at prices of 2 play). That is to stop the bleeding they were having.

What nobody mentions is that there is a major competition for peoples entertainment budget, including the internet. I may spend 8 hours a day on the net, and 30 min watching TV, and 1 hour watching netflix. Then there is gaming, consuming on tablets, tweets, FB, (reading, mags, games), music, and just being. So out of my day 30 minutes of broadcast is not worth $60 when I actually watch more on Netflix for $8 and actually consume it more.

So what cable guys aren't saying is that steam, ipads, netflix, web are all siphoning business from them.

Economically speaking content falls under substitution (it's not really that unique and the model is from the 40's), and people are just substituting TV for other forms of entertainment. The water cooler is gone, so the social pressure of "conforming" is gone too.

I just had dinner w/ 3 groups of friends and the discussion of what we watched came up--six people. Maybe 2-3 people agreed upon ONE show (think it was batchelor) and THAT was it. 10-15 years ago that was different. If you missed Friends there was something wrong with you. Today nobody cares. I'm watching Miami Vice on Netflix.

Since cable is not innovating and raising prices, they are going to bear the shotgun that blows up in their face. If Aereo flies, it will blow up the cable model. Cable will have a hard time innovating because like Sony they are also in the content business and that means consumer unfriendly DRM. Take a look at Sony's latest earnings....

Cable can clamp usage for a time (imaginary caps), but there will be major backlash on that too and wifi and the like will go after them.

Cutting off cable is the last thing to go (even above internet).

...companies like Dish saw their first customer net loss ever.

The OTA signals around here are unusable, especially after the DTV conversion. My mother's cousin in Northampton (MA) tried various antennas (including amplified antennas, both with a converter box and newer digital TV) and could not get reception of the channels she got before the DTV switchover.

I tried picking up broadcast TV at my house and the signals are unusable as well as there is too much interference in the area (Springfield MA, urban area).

Anti sports people make me laugh, you make it sound like no one but a select few care about sports, which couldn’t be farther from the truth. I know sports are unpopular here for whatever reason, but you guys are the extreme minority. Baseball is America’s past time, Football is America’s obsession. The Super Bowl is the biggest TV event of the year, the Daytona 500 isn’t far behind. ESPN owns Monday night ratings with Monday Night Football. And here locally, 2 out 3 households are tuned to Buffalo Sabres hockey when they play with 19K people packed in the Arena during home games.

I already pay $288/month for cable from Time Warner and a $97/month to DirecTV. And that doesn’t include the fact that I subscribe to MLB Extra Innings and NHL Center Ice on cable and for the first time ever, I’ll be getting NFL Sunday Ticket on DirecTV. A few bucks more isn’t going to mean much to me as long as I get the content I want, the price is irrelevant.

It's not really cutting the cord if you are simply ditching their video services in favor of their "broadband" service. As long as we have to turn to them for Internet service they'll still get the money they want.

It's not really cutting the cord if you are simply ditching their video services in favor of their "broadband" service.
As long as we have to turn to them for Internet service they'll still get the money they want.
Caps are the key evidence here.

I dumped DirecTV in the spring and got a TiVo box. We now watch the local stations from the antenna and also watch a lot of shows via Netflix on the TiVo. I think the only thing I will miss is Monday Night Football.