The whole Fox vs Time Warner contracting mess was interesting to follow. For those who don’t know what happened: Fox demanded about a dollar per Time Warner subscriber while Time Warner was willing to pay 30 cents per subscriber.
What this shows is that content providers are getting power back as they are not solo dependent on cable providers delivering their content (and advertising) to viewers. Back in June I wrote a blog post that questioned how long we consumers are willing to pay for the convenience of watching content through cable versus the internet (link). Now it seems content providers have woken up and turned this up side down: how much are cable providers willing to pay to stay in the game. They can do so as virtually any program can be obtained through the content provider network, hulu.com or iTunes.
I am very curious to see how this all plays out in the next two years. One thing is for sure: during 2010 I will make steps to remove my 100+ USD per month cable contract and go to an internet solution. Thinking about a Mac Mini for that…. anybody any tips?