Reporter Austin Ahlman delves into the fate of live television in the midst of Fubo’s against the launch of a new Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Fox sports streaming service.

Since the launch of cable television, bundling has defined the consumer’s experience. Expensive program packages have always offered a mix of broadly desired and niche programming. The opportunity to buy a slender package of channels tailored to our individual interests has always been out of reach. It was impossible to get what you wanted, without getting what you did not. These bundling requirements have long been dictated by the programming giants like Disney, Warner Bros., and Fox, who control several of the key channels that distributors like cable companies need to offer in order to remain viable.

From the late 2000s to the early 2010s, several on-demand internet streaming services like Netflix, Disney+, and HBO Max, many of which are owned by those same programming giants, came about to offer cheaper access to narrower sets of content, though they rarely offered meaningful options for viewing the live programmatic content available on cable. Then, as more and more consumers sought to have their media delivered over the internet, the advent of live programmatic internet streaming services like Fubo and Sling TV helped recreate the experience of traditional cable. While those services initially innovated, offering slender and specialized live viewing experiences, in recent years they have suffered the same bundling issues that defined the cable industry.

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