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People in other countries can get channels a la carte. In Japan, they're the equivalent of three to five dollars each. Now if you're a heavy TV watcher, you pay a lot, but those of us who watch maybe five channels in a year, it would be a DEAL.
I'd have no shopping channels, no fundamentalist channels, no sports channels, no kids' channels, no right-wing channels. I'd be fine with the Spanish channels, since I sometimes toy with the idea of resurrecting my Spanish and maybe traveling in Latin America, but I'd like cable subscribers to have the option of things like TV Japan or France 24.
When I expressed my anger at Al Gore for buying Newsworld International and turning into YouTube, I mean, Current, someone told me that NWI had very few viewers. Well, duh, the only place it was ever advertised was on its own broadcasts. Yet with content mostly from Canada but also from other countries, it was an amazing news source. It was the only news source I trusted during the initial stages of the Iraq invasion, because Canada didn't have any troops to "support." The same is true for Ovation, which showed wonderful historical and cultural documentaries, and even some performances, although its library must have had only about fifty films in it. It was never advertised.
I picked up an older (2004) issue of the New Yorker the other day, and it talked about how Rhapsody, Netflix, and Amazon had discovered that there was SOME market for everything. Even music/movies/books that were unpopular with the general public were eventually sought out by SOMEBODY. They had almost no stock that nobody had ever ordered. In their vast stock of choices, everyone could find something they liked.
Yet the TV networks are going in the opposite direction, filling what used to be their niche channels with endless "reality" programming. The last straw was when BBC America went all reality show and ANCIENT reruns (Benny Hill??), except for maybe two shows a week that you can watch without rotting your brain, and National Geographic went in for marathons of The Dog Whisperer.
On another board, people were complaining that TVLand no longer shows the variety of old shows that it once did, and I've already ranted about the deterioration of A&E, Discovery, Bravo, and the History Channel into channels for people who think that the Naitonal Enquirer is great literature. There are a couple of network shows that I can stand to watch if I happen to catch them, but I don't feel bad if I miss them. This is a change from 10 or 15 years ago.
Instead of appealing to diverse interests, as Rhapsody, iTunes, Netflix, and Amazon are, the TV networks are going for homogeneity, and not in a good way.
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