Former network programmer cuts cord

For Garth Ancier, it’s about the portability

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – For decades, Garth Ancier decided what you would watch, and when.

As the head programmer for NBC, Fox, Turner, BBC America and CW (then known as WB), Ancier put Bart Simpson on Sundays and The West

Wing on Wednesdays, gave Anderson Cooper his prime-time time slot and, in a move that actor Seth Rogen will never forgive, canceled Freaks and Geeks.

So when Ancier says he finally cut the cord on cable, you take notice.

Ancier just ditched his $145-amonth cable package for $40-a-month YouTube TV, which offers live TV and access to 50 channels, as well as subscriptions to Netflix, Hulu, CBS All Access, HBO Now and Showtime. Even with paying more for faster Internet, he figures he saves about $40 a month.

For Ancier, it’s the ease of finding shows and the portability. “I love that I can watch all of this anywhere on any device,” he says.

Some 22 million people ditched cable and satellite TV in 2017, up 33% from 2016, researcher eMarketer says. Accelerating a trend that’s pushing companies such as Fox and Disney to start their own streaming services, viewers swapped cable bills for an amalgamation of Netflix, Hulu and Internet subscriptions, connected to their laptops, tablets, phones or TVs.

Making it easier for some cord-cutters, the pay-TV companies themselves got in the game in a big way last year. AT&T’s DirectTV Now kicked off the offerings of “skinny bundles,” with cable TV alternatives offering fewer channels and a lower monthly fee, to watch Internet-based programming. DirecTV soon was joined by SlingTV, YouTube TV and Hulu Live TV.

YouTube and Hulu added more functionality by adding the broadcast TV networks, making the cutting-thecord concept an easier sell. Before, when consumers ditched cable for an Internet service and wanted to tune into one of the legacy broadcast networks, they were asked to buy an antenna and connect the old-fashioned, precable way. Now, all viewers need is an Internet signal and a streaming player such as Roku or Amazon Fire TV, or a smart TV.

For Ancier, 2018 was the year when an offering such as YouTube had enough channels (it recently added the Turner collection of CNN, TBS, Cartoon Network and TNT) to the lineup to make it so he wouldn’t miss anything without pay TV.

Ancier, now an industry consultant, acknowledges the irony of the network programmer ditching cable but says it makes sense. If he liked to program shows then, why wouldn’t he want to program his own schedule at home?

Besides, “this is how people watch TV today,” he says. “It’s a different era now.”

JEFFERSON GRAHAM/USA TODAY “This is how people watch TV today,” former network programmer Garth Ancier says. “It’s a different era now.”