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Moonves: CBS May Be Offered Via Direct-Over-Internet Subscription … and Showtime Too

Sep 18, 2014  •  Post A Comment

CBS Chief Executive Leslie Moonves told an audience at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Media, Communications and Entertainment Conference that some of his company’s top programming outlets may be headed for a direct-over-Internet subscription model.

Deadline.com reports that Moonves said there’s a “very strong possibility” that Showtime will be offered to consumers in an Internet subscription, adding, “and possibly CBS as well.”

The service might be “like HBO did with HBO Nordic. … And there could be some kind of offering direct to consumers here. It’s something we’re looking at,” Moonves is quoted as saying.

The story adds: “Asked about how it might be offered, Moonves said it could be [an] online service. But he added that ‘there are ways of going direct to consumer in different packages. … Maybe we make it easier for consumers to get Showtime without a lot of the other stuff’ — apparently referring to the pay TV bundle that consumers have to buy first in order to subscribe the premium network.”

“It all goes to the bottom line,” Moonves added.

les moonves

Leslie Moonves

3 Comments

  1. Just proves I would never, ever watch anything from CBS again. Give up OTA broadcasting and I give up on you.

  2. Pete, there is nothing in the article that says CBS was giving up on OTA. CBS gets millions and millions in affiliate fees and retransmission revenue. It’s hard to believe that they’d give that up. I think this is aimed at people who will be using PADs and phones to watch TV, or cutting the cable cord. It’s going to take a long, long, long time for the infrastructure to be built before OTA is a thing of the past.

  3. I would rather pay to watch Showtime & CBS than pay my cable provider for a bunch of stations I never watch. Of course it would have to be a lot cheaper than my current cable bill.

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