[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Mad Max

I get that, but, OB's point has always been just what you said "The number of linear channels will decrease" I don't think he ever said that sport would be watched via catch up, Im pretty sure the majority will always watch sport as it happens, but linear viewing is most definitely decreasing imo.

Yes, I cannot see sport being watched by the catch-up method by most people, as live viewing is widely seen as the best way to watch sport.

To clarify my position, we are currently at the very beginning of the beginning of a major transformation that will take place. We are starting to see SD channels being taken off in favour of HD only channels on Virgin Media, and as people migrate to HD channel viewing on their big tellies, they will ignore the SD ones more and more. At the same time, on demand viewing will become more popular as it becomes the more convenient way of viewing your favourite programmes. When you want and without commercial breaks.

The smaller TV stations will start to suffer first as people watch more on demand and less scheduled TV, depriving them of much needed income. It's only a matter of time before the dominoes start to fall more rapidly, leaving only the big players. They will make the change as soon as it makes sense to them economically.

However with fewer people watching scheduled TV, there will come a point where the revenue received from advertising falls to a level where it is no longer profitable to broadcast programmes in that way. We know it would not take much to bring this about - look at the difficulties ITV was faced with just a few short years ago when advertising revenues dipped with the recession.

I have always said that this will happen in the longer term. According to my original prediction, this would be by the year 2035 or thereabouts. The BBC is planning on this situation arising between 2030 and 2038, so the Beeb now seem to be agreeing with what I said originally.

I have never said that these changes will happen immediately, and so the changes that are happening now in the US are of little consequence. I dare say that people are switching to those skinny bundles because not everything they want to see is yet available on demand, which incidentally is the big reason why I stiil subscribe to the scheduled pay TV channels.

I think it is highly likely that those who have recently taken out skinny bundles in the US, having first deserted the cable companies, are still subscribing to SVOD services at the same time. However, as companies adjust to demand, the matter will right itself and everything available on the skinny bundles will also be available on demand.

I believe (without doing the research) that the view expressed that people are going for the skinny bundles to watch sport has a grain of truth in it. People will always watch sport live, but in the future, they will watch sport by way of live streaming, which answers your question on this that you posed in your post.

There are many problems being experienced in streaming sports at present, of course - low or non-existent broadband speeds, buffering, picture break-ups, unreliability, latency, etc. However, these things will improve dramatically in the future, and by the 2030s, these problems will be well past us.

I hope this answers the recent posts on this subject.

---------- Post added at 10:01 ---------- Previous post was at 10:00 ----------

Originally Posted by muppetman11

OB has been quoted many times as saying only the terrestrial channels will survive which personally I don't see I believe pay broadcasters such as Sky , UKTV , Fox etc will continue with linear offerings although maybe fewer than they currently have.

Not if their advertising income by this method dries up, they won't.

---------- Post added at 10:10 ---------- Previous post was at 10:01 ----------

Originally Posted by denphone

OB's point was quite clearly that linear channels would go the way of the dodo which frankly is not going to happen in this world , the next world and so on and so on as yes some smaller channels will probably go but the main channels will not as MM says.

Not in this world, this minute, no. I have always said we are talking about the future, not now. The BBC believes it and now Sky and Virgin Media are fully embracing OTT viewing by their pronouncements and by their actions. BT are already ahead of the game.

When you see the major changes that will come about when Sky changes its method of delivery to internet protocol, you will start to see things falling into place. Five years ago, I would have thought that Sky would be dragged kicking and screaming into this new world, but they appear to have seen the light. Satellite, as well as transmitter broadcasting, will be a thing of the past in the future, but how far into the future is difficult to tell. Transmitter broadcasting is already disappearing in Europe, so that is likely to go first. Satellite broadcasting is expensive, so don't be surprised to see Sky pushing customers hard to change over to internet viewing for their Sky fare.