The best jokes have an element of truth to them and earlier today I came across a comic that was a great example.

Source: Hoppy_Doodle @ reddit.com

It’s surprising how true that is. Many of us have been cable TV free for years and were content paying a monthly internet bill along with Netflix and maybe one or two additional subscriptions. Now it feels as if there’s a new streaming service launching every few months with the costs adding up to be equivalent to a traditional cable TV bill.

This is magnified with the new services pulling their content from Netflix - Disney pulled their content and NBC is pulling a variety of shows as well. At what point are people paying $10/month to watch a single show?

I like to joke that a future consumption model is to rotate these services monthly and catch up on shows every few months. That way I’m paying a single monthly fee but get the content from multiple services - all I have to do is wait. For those that do want to watch a single show I do expect privacy to make a comeback - it’s difficult to justify paying a monthly fee for a single show.

This reminds me of the famous Jim Barksdale quote: “There’s only two ways I know of to make money– bundling, and unbundling” and it looks as if we’re approaching the unbundling cycle.