IP Democracy: Just Offering "Family-Friendly" Tiers Not Enough?

The Denver Post has this article today on Comcast’s “family-friendly” tiers of video programming. Although the company denies that it did so as under political pressure from the FCC and “pro-family” interest groups, Comcast launched earlier this year a Family Tier which has 51 channels of programming include local broadcast and public access stations and children’s networks such as The Disney Channel and PBS Kids Sprout.

Now, however, those interest groups are complaining that the creation of this tier is not enough — they want Comcast to more aggressively market it. Jeez…I dunno. The article quotes researcher Bruce Leichtman who says there’s just little demand for these tiers.

Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group, says there isn’t a demand for family packages and that marketing such a product makes “little business sense” for cable companies. “Study after study shows that people want more. There’s not a groundswell of demand for this (family tiers),” he said “It’s coming from a vocal minority that’s backed by the government. They’re being forced to do this.”

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on May 1, 2006 1:18 PM to IP Democracy