Discovery Communications, parent company of Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, and more, has purchased Revision3, which is a special interest video network that produces shows that people watch online. It is an odd, and perhaps, unexpected, partnership (of sorts) between Cable TV and Web Video, (which many see as opposing forces).
It wasn’t all that long ago that people were speculating that Cable TV was nearing its end. Personally, my husband and I stopped paying for Cable years ago. The cost was more than we cared to pay for it. We didn’t like the idea of being forced to pay for channels that we knew we would never have an interest in watching just so we could get access to the ones that we enjoyed. It felt insulting to pay for the service and then have to sit through a barrage of ads that interrupted the shows.
Instead, we were using legal online resources in an attempt to be able to watch what we wanted to watch when we were ready to watch it. Hulu used to give free access to a plethora of television shows, including entire seasons, for free. It also used to play recent episodes of shows that were currently airing, (but only for a limited time). Eventually, though, what a person could watch for free through Hulu dramatically shrunk, which was disappointing.
That didn’t make us rush out and pay for Cable, though. Instead, we got Netflix. It was less expensive than Cable, it didn’t make us sit through ads, and it let us watch what we wanted to when we wanted to watch it.
My husband and I haven’t hit the point where we have exhausted the resources on Netflix yet, but, I have heard that this is possible. This week, I got an email from Netflix informing me that they have created a Netflix original series called Lilyhammer. So maybe we won’t run out of stuff to watch through Netflix after all.
I find it interesting that Discovery Communications, which is one of the big Cable networks, decided to purchase Revision3. Is this a way for Cable companies to add “new blood” to what they can offer consumers? I’m unsure if I should expect some of what Revision3 currently offers viewers for free to appear on Discovery Communications, essentially behind a “pay wall” of sorts. Or, could it mean that the Revision3 website will soon require people to pay before they can watch the shows? Somehow, my experiences with Cable TV leaves me with little trust in this situation.