YouTube Looking to Introduce Subscription Model For Your Favourite Channels

Smalltime cable TV channels may migrate to YouTube over time. Google, which owns YouTube, is looking to add professionally produced content to its site and it looks like these low-ranked cable channels could be an entry point. They are often bundled into packages with much bigger channels, but they get next to no affiliate fees from cable distributors and may therefore find it more profitable to go it alone with YouTube.

However, the YouTube route is also being looked at by large media companies who want to offer more specialized programming. They are looking to potentially acquire some of the video “channels” currently available on YouTube to help them break into this market. “The top network executives are really taking notice. They’re asking questions about who is doing well, about who is building a professional management team. And I think eyes are very much on this space now,” said Salar Kamangar, CEO of Google. Also, introducing a fee for the most popular “channels”, which are currently free is being considered. It’s always nice and welcome to start paying for something which was previously free, isn’t it?

Despite all this activity though, it looks like the cable industry is holding back new business models for selling TV services, since they insist on selling TV channels in bundles, which ups the price for consumers who may only want a few channels across perhaps two or more bundles, or indeed just one bundle with lots of channels that they don’t want. This practise has attracted the attention of the Department of Justice, who has now launched an enquiry into uncompetitive business practices by the cable companies.