ESPN loses 621,000 subscribers last month alone

doogie

Worst month in company history.

Trend is your friend! SEC SEC SEC SEC SEC SEC SEC...

http://www.outkickthecoverage.com/espn-loses-621-000-subscribers-worst-month-in-company-history-102916

PineapplePirate

Maybe if they actually wrote about sports instead of headlining stupid political shit they'd actually have people read their bullshit. Who the fuck goes to ESPN to read about the election and honestly who the fuck cares which players kneeled during the national anthem. I don't need 100 stories on the topic.

bananasnblondes

How will those people find our which Kardashian was at the Knicks game last night?

Fire_Marshall_Bill

Anything besides live sports that bspn has done over the past 10 years has turned to shit.

UWhuskytskeet

They lost 621,000 people that subscribed to a package that included ESPN. 0 of those people might have actually watched ESPN the month before.

The only thing that matters is ratings, which could be dropping too, but that isn't what's being talked about in the article. ESPN isn't selling spots to advertisers based on Grandma's cable subscription that happens to include ESPN, they sell it based on how many people actually watch their channel.

CFetters_Nacho_Lover

Fire_Marshall_Bill said:

Anything besides live sports that bspn has done over the past 10 years has turned to shit.

And even their live sports have issues with the dreck of announcers on all sports networks.

HoustonHusky

UWhuskytskeet said:

They lost 621,000 people that subscribed to a package that included ESPN. 0 of those people might have actually watched ESPN the month before.

The only thing that matters is ratings, which could be dropping too, but that isn't what's being talked about in the article. ESPN isn't selling spots to advertisers based on Grandma's cable subscription that happens to include ESPN, they sell it based on how many people actually watch their channel.

Not quite true...they get paid by the cable company per subscription:
http://www.whatyoupayforsports.com/numbers/

Long term ratings matter, but their $$ from cable companies is through subscribers, their money through advertisers is ratings.

UWhuskytskeet

HoustonHusky said:

UWhuskytskeet said:

They lost 621,000 people that subscribed to a package that included ESPN. 0 of those people might have actually watched ESPN the month before.

The only thing that matters is ratings, which could be dropping too, but that isn't what's being talked about in the article. ESPN isn't selling spots to advertisers based on Grandma's cable subscription that happens to include ESPN, they sell it based on how many people actually watch their channel.

Not quite true...they get paid by the cable company per subscription:
http://www.whatyoupayforsports.com/numbers/

Long term ratings matter, but their $$ from cable companies is through subscribers, their money through advertisers is ratings.

You're right, I did forget about that.

Fuck these TV contracts are really feeling like a house of cards. CFB could be majorly fucked in the near future.

doogie

I'm just relieved no schools floated stadium bonds based on projected future revenues

BennyBeaver

Helps Trump IMO

AIRWOLF

HoustonHusky said:

UWhuskytskeet said:

They lost 621,000 people that subscribed to a package that included ESPN. 0 of those people might have actually watched ESPN the month before.

The only thing that matters is ratings, which could be dropping too, but that isn't what's being talked about in the article. ESPN isn't selling spots to advertisers based on Grandma's cable subscription that happens to include ESPN, they sell it based on how many people actually watch their channel.

Not quite true...they get paid by the cable company per subscription:
http://www.whatyoupayforsports.com/numbers/

Long term ratings matter, but their $$ from cable companies is through subscribers, their money through advertisers is ratings.

Digital media disrupting the traditional cable business model is finally happening. Figuring out what's next for live sports in a world where "cord cutters" are becoming more and more common is the challenge for everybody involved.

We would have dropped our cable subscription by now if there was a good option for watching live sports on an a la carte basis.

I've got to guess that at some stage the bullshit bundling model will get broken. It will pretty much have to be.

doogie

*breaking

UWerentThereMan

One possible reason: ref ball.
Was at a sports book watching all the games and at any given time half the screens were of officials explaining calls.
It's turning into cspan

CuntWaffle

Good. It's a shit product.

It's like 50% sports and 50% political pieces to push some sort of agenda now.

alumni94

ESPN's product has been declining for a while. Too many women reporting on sports they clearly don't really know what they talking about.

TTJ

Fire_Marshall_Bill said:

Anything besides live sports that bspn has done over the past 10 years has turned to shit.

538 is damn good. A lot of the 30 for 30s are very good too.

Doog_de_Jour

AIRWOLF said:

Digital media disrupting the traditional cable business model is finally happening. Figuring out what's next for live sports in a world where "cord cutters" are becoming more and more common is the challenge for everybody involved.

We would have dropped our cable subscription by now if there was a good option for watching live sports on an a la carte basis.

I've got to guess that at some stage the bullshit bundling model will get broken. It will pretty much have to be.

It will be interesting to see what happens when the "bubble bursts" (as the article puts it) and all these sports stations will be forced to go a la carte. Bundled cable packages tend to prop up niche stations, so I wouldn't be shocked if channels like the Pac-12 Network would go away entirely (which is probably a good thing - most of their programming is filler in my opinion) or exist in some scaled back web-only version.

Kaepsknee

I wouldn't be surprised to see Disney come out with their own streaming service that they could offer post 2022 after the promise of not going over the top of the cable and satellite providers has no recourse if broken. That's what I would do if I were them.

UWhuskytskeet

salemcoog said:

I wouldn't be surprised to see Disney come out with their own streaming service that they could offer post 2022 after the promise of not going over the top of the cable and satellite providers has no recourse if broken. That's what I would do if I were them.

Comcast will just squeeze their data caps a little tighter if they smell more competition.

Swaye

#stadiumdefault surging in early voting

AZDuck

AIRWOLF said:

HoustonHusky said:

UWhuskytskeet said:

They lost 621,000 people that subscribed to a package that included ESPN. 0 of those people might have actually watched ESPN the month before.

The only thing that matters is ratings, which could be dropping too, but that isn't what's being talked about in the article. ESPN isn't selling spots to advertisers based on Grandma's cable subscription that happens to include ESPN, they sell it based on how many people actually watch their channel.

Not quite true...they get paid by the cable company per subscription:
http://www.whatyoupayforsports.com/numbers/

Long term ratings matter, but their $$ from cable companies is through subscribers, their money through advertisers is ratings.

Digital media disrupting the traditional cable business model is finally happening. Figuring out what's next for live sports in a world where "cord cutters" are becoming more and more common is the challenge for everybody involved.

We would have dropped our cable subscription by now if there was a good option for watching live sports on an a la carte basis.

I've got to guess that at some stage the bullshit bundling model will get broken. It will pretty much have to be.

THIS

People are getting pissed at the cable monopolies and extortion pricing. ESPN is the most expensive (non-premium) channel for cable carriers by a pretty wide margin. So now in our family we split costs - one person subscribes to Direct TV and shares HBO/ESPN Direct PW w/everyone else, another subscribes to the digital version of the newspaper we all read and shares PW w/everyone else, someone else subscribes to Hulu, someone else subscribes to Netflix, etc.

The only thing I don't get through this system is the fucking Pac-12 Network, which is pretty much where #MyDeadDucks will be the rest of the season.

Praise Allah for xrxs.net and AirParrot.