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buy 8 to 9 on Sunday night.” There's one salesman, one billing, one arrangement. If he's going to buy cable from 8:00 to 9:00 on Sunday night, at least in the early days he's going to have to go to a lot of different cable companies to place that order. And he might or might not get the kind of clearance that he could get by saying to CBS or ABC or NBC, “I want this hour.” It's much easier administratively to handle that; and less costly.
So I wouldn't sell conventional television short. It's just going to have to go through a tough adjustment period.
So you think it will last. You don't think the networks will disappear.
No. They might not be as popular, but let ABC and NBC and CBS build a very strong program schedule and they'll give cable a run for its money. There's another important factor to consider, and that is what Hollywood is going to do by making product available on a pay-per-view basis as against advertiser supported. But we keep talking about all these services that you're going to be able to get by cable--no question about being able to get it. Being able to pay for it--you know, are you willing to spend $100 a month to get a cable service? Of course not--when you can get a reasonably good service over the air, with news and some entertainment and some public service. You know, it isn't all that bad.
The cable people, up to the present time, have been a little piggish, a little, I think, thoughtless in terms of the way they've increased their fees.
Oh, I think that's true.
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