Why Is Cable Television Slowly Dying Out?

Remote Control and Smart TV

Though cable TV services and the telecom industry are still present in an average household, the fear of it going cannot be overlooked. OTT services are the new source of entertainment and have been trending for a while and don’t look to go out of style. Cable service providers like spectrum have a great range of channels such as spectrum channel guides to look through. However, the prices of streaming services are significantly lower than cable services and the OTT services are self-paced hence can be watched anytime, anywhere at your convenience.

In this article, we are going to discuss some key aspects that can or may not affect cable TV services – the causes why it is slowly dying it – if it is – let’s dig in further:

  1. It was in the 1980s when Cable Television was introduced in America. It brought an innovation in the industry and turned out to be a source of high-quality visuals provided to set-top rabbit ears. Nowadays, Television signals are in digital form so everyone can have access to watch high-quality television programs. When it comes to cables, it offers low bandwidth and hence provides a low quality to the users.
  2. In comparison to the inflation rate, the cost of Cable TV has been increased thrice ever since, and there are many reasons behind it. Let’s check those out.
    1. It is because the media companies have increased their rates.
    2. Cable companies hold monopolies in the areas.
    3. A group of people (labor) has to replace or upgrade the lengthy cable wires, expanded to several kilometers. It is expensive. This group of people is electronic technicians.
    4. Companies have to hire several electronic technicians for this purpose.

However, it wasn’t a great business decision because you increase the prices to extreme levels to pay your employees.

  1. To make Cable TV subscriptions affordable for everyone, they introduced different levels of packages tailored to meet the needs and fit the budget of all kinds of consumers. The first and the cheapest package was on an old type-c band satellite. This package was free in most cases. In the second level of packages, people were served with few channels. And it was seen that 9 out of 10 people didn’t find a single channel of their choice. The third package was a premium package that was costly but included all the channels that people want. The first two packages didn’t go great because people want everything of their choice. And the premium package was expensive so, a poor man couldn’t afford it.
  2. Furthermore, the internet emerged and offered the channels exactly that most people prefer to watch. Moreover, it allowed people to watch the content of their choices like Netflix and Hulu.
  3. Then, studios were established to make a direct relationship with their audience to sell their services. (Right now, there is only CBS, but more will come soon).
  4. There were three main broadcasters, but cable TV channels which include TNT, USA, and TBS displayed content similar to that of the broadcasters. Not that these three are the most famous TV channels. Here is an example of what the USA displays: It shows content related to Law, Modern Family, SVU, etc. It doesn’t mean they always cast copied content. These channels cast maybe two shows that have unique content. But showing few shows doesn’t make a network, except for SyFy.

Final Thoughts

We have concluded the most possible reasons why is cable TV slowly dying out in the above discussion and have tried to walk through why it is taking place so. We think that there are numerous other reasons behind it as well. And we believe that you might know some of those reasons, if not all. If so, then don’t forget to share your views in the comment section.

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