Print newspapers are gasping for air. Their market share is being devoured by digital outlets. It is a slow, painful decline. But here is the twist. The internet has not killed the 24-hour news channel. It just changed the game.
People still watch. They are not just killing time in airport terminals. Television remains the primary news source for a majority of Americans. A 2013 Gallup Poll showed 55 percent of the country gets current events from TV.
Look closer at that number.
- 26 percent watch non-specific channels.
- 8 percent tune into FOX News.
- 7 percent watch CNN.
These are not small numbers.
The competition is getting vicious. CBS tried to jump into the ring in November 2014. They launched a 24-hour news channel. But they did not waste money on cable infrastructure. It was online-only. The market is saturated. You cannot just throw a channel at people anymore.
How are 24-hour news channels adapting to the digital shift?
They have to. Running a dedicated news channel is expensive. Younger generations are ditching the TV set. They are glued to computers and smartphones. The future consumer might refuse to subscribe to cable entirely. They will stream everything from the internet.
Demographics are shifting fast.
In 2002, 80 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds called television their major news source. By 2010, that number plummeted to 52 percent. The internet jumped from 23 percent to 65 percent for that same age group.
Even the older crowd is changing. Americans aged 65 and older relied on the internet for just 5 percent of their news in 2007. By 2010, it was 13 percent.
Is this bad for traditional broadcasters? Maybe not.
The demand for instant news is intensifying. It is not dying. It is moving. Young people are reading online. They are streaming their favorite TV shows online too.
The data backs this up. Adobe, whose software powers most cable logins, reported a massive spike. Cable TV viewing over the internet grew by 388 percent in mid-2014 compared to the same period in 2013.
People are still watching. They just changed where they watch. The screen is different. The audience is younger. But the hunger for the news cycle remains.
Will cable die?
Probably. Not today. But the model is cracking. The viewership is drifting. And the cost of maintaining a legacy channel is rising while the audience shrinks.
We are left with a hybrid world. Streaming numbers are up. Traditional ratings are holding on by a thread.
What happens when the next generation refuses to pay for cable at all?
