I heard a bit on the radio about some new network TV program and inevitably the conversation came up “what can broadcast TV do to compete with streaming services?” Some suggestions were mentioned, but no one addressed the elephant in the room: network/broadcast television has to play by different rules.

1. The FCC

Because these stations are broadcast over the air and anyone with an antenna can view the content it has to adhere to decency standards determined by 17th century Protestant settlers. No actual sex. Minimal vulgarity. Violence is tolerated, especially if it’s gun violence against “bad guys”, but nothing graphic.

2. Commercial Funding

These are private networks that are funded by advertisements. So the programming is broken up by blocks of commercials. A 60 minute programming block has 44 minutes of program and 16 minutes of advertisement scattered throughout. Beyond the annoyance to the viewer, the creators need to edit their program around these breaks, often sacrificing tension, or creating pointless tension, instead of allowing the story to unfold in a more natural fashion.

3. Different Politics

Points one and two lead to a different set of politics at broadcast networks. Your show’s success boils down to how many eyes are staring at the advertisements. That’s the network’s bread and butter. They aren’t interested in creating interesting content and growing an audience for it. They want immediate results.

 
Streaming services deal with none of this, at least not at this extreme. There’s no standards they need to adhere to, but they do self police. Netflix isn’t streaming hardcore pornography, but they do stream a lot of graphic violence and plenty of straight up nudity and vulgarity.

They are funded by subscriptions, which ebb and flow based on the quality of their content, but they can afford to make a show and let it find its audience naturally, rather than creating a few episodes and then canning it because subscriptions didn’t increase by some made-up percentage. People subscribe to watch The Crown and then see The Witcher and think “This must be some wholesome Grimm fairy tale show, like Once Upon a Time, I’ll check that out next!”

What Can Networks Do?

Either change the rules, or die a slow death.

Safe, predictable, and advertisement-centric content isn’t going to come back into fashion. You can find content suitable for children or sensitive adults on streaming services, in addition to finding challenging and mature content.

This isn’t a generational thing, where old people are going to cling to network TV and forgo streaming services. Plenty of people in their 60s and 70s have zero problem using a smart TV or tablet to watch Netflix, Amazon, or Hulu. Getting internet and streaming services gets more accessible by the year. The main limiting factor is cost, which is already a factor even for broadcast TV since they moved to digital. It used to be as easy as just buying a TV and using rabbit ears to pick up M.A.S.H. Not anymore.

The people have spoken. They want interesting shit to watch. They want programs that are ideas first and methods of generating revenue second. Not the other way around.

Networks need to change or die.

I vote for for them die.