With Tubi simulcasting the Super Bowl—and even one-upping broadcast by doing it in 4K—broadcast and cable have finally completed the sequence
📺 Broadcasters are now in full throttle pushing their streaming apps.
📡 Cable execs are openly admitting the system is broken.
🔗 Cable providers have become more flexible, adding streaming-only options, discounting high-speed internet and wireless to retain subscribers.
This shift shouldn’t have taken so long—and the cuts shouldn’t have been so deep.
The writing was on the wall. Even people outside the industry saw it with the Yellow Pages in the late ‘90s. We saw it again when newspapers collapsed from 2004 to 2008.
Will Broadcast and cable face the same fate? I hope not but they need to get to work
So, what happened?
1️⃣ Legacy Media Was Too Comfortable
💰 Old Revenue Models Were Addictive – Ad dollars & cable fees kept flowing, so urgency was low.
📉 Cord-Cutting Was Ignored – Seen as a niche rather than a fundamental industry shift.
2️⃣ Streaming Gave Consumers What They Wanted
▶️ On-Demand Viewing – No more waiting for scheduled programming.
📆 Binge Culture – Netflix trained audiences to expect everything now.
3️⃣ Tech Moved Faster Than TV
🚀 Netflix, Amazon, YouTube Were Agile – No bureaucracy, just innovation.
🧠 Better Data & Personalization – Algorithms kept viewers engaged, while TV stuck with one-size-fits-all.
4️⃣ Cable’s Self-Inflicted Wounds
📺 Too Many Channels – Bundles became a bloated, expensive turnoff.
📞 Bad Customer Experience – Contracts, high prices, and awful service (looking at you, Comcast) drove people away.
5️⃣ Live Sports Delayed the Inevitable
🏈 Sports Were Cable’s Last Defense – But once leagues embraced streaming (NFL+, ESPN+), the dam broke.
By the time legacy media fully woke up, it was too late.
Instead of competing with streaming, they played catch-up, launching their platforms and creating even more fragmentation.
My personal solution? I left broadcast & cable in 2017 for CTV and Streaming.
I don’t think this outcome was avoidable, but it could have been delayed—and legacy companies could have emerged stronger if they had played it differently:
Broadcasters should have worked together – Shared content, covered major events collaboratively, pooled resources...
Cable should have broken the bundle – Offered à la carte options, improved customer service (a 4 hour window for a service call does not work), and embraced partnerships instead of treating streamers as enemies.
They had the infrastructure, the audience, and the trust—but they waited too long.
Now, they’re finally adopting what they should have embraced a decade ago.
What do you think? Can legacy media save itself?
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