The Great TV Unbundling Has Begun. But Be Careful What You Wish For

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The distant dream of a la carte television has never seemed closer to reality.

On Thursday, just a day after HBO said it would launch a new online streaming service that doesn’t require a cable TV subscription, CBS announced the launch of CBS All Access, a service will let users watch unlimited CBS content, including some live television, on multiple devices for just $5.99 a month.

It’s still too early to proclaim the death of the traditional cable TV bundle. And yet, the two announcements signal a drastic shift in the way both cable companies and networks—so often adversaries of internet TV services like Netflix and Aereo—now view the changing television landscape. Tech savvy consumers and cord cutters have been urging these companies to unhinge themselves from the traditional cable package for years. But now that they are, the question is: are consumers really ready for it?

If content providers continue to launch their own platforms, as HBO and CBS have done, the future of internet TV will not just be unbundled. It will be deeply fragmented. That could threaten the very companies that pioneered this space to begin with—and make it more difficult and more expensive to get everything you want to watch.

If this trend continues, these networks—wanting to build their own audiences—may begin to pull their content from places like Netflix. That could be dangerous, if not deadly, for a company that is already struggling to retain its dominance. Netflix shares plunged after its earnings report Wednesday, which showed slowing subscriber growth. Though Netflix CEO Reed Hastings blamed the slowdown on Netflix’s recent price hike, it could also be a reflection of the fact that Netflix is no longer the only game in town for finding content online.

Now, competition is about to get even stiffer. It’s no wonder, then, that Netflix has been doubling down on original series and movies in recent years, in an effort to gain some much-needed control over its content.

Meanwhile, cord cutting consumers may face some unintended consequences as a result of this shift. Suddenly, consumers won’t be just paying $8.99 a month to get all the shows and movies they want on Netflix. They’ll be forking over sums to a variety of players, a fact that some proponents of a la carte television have already begun griping about.

Make no mistake, that day is still very much a part of the future, and cable companies, networks, and over-the-top providers still have plenty of time to change course. Even CBS All Access comes with some limitations: live streaming will only be available in 14 markets and, according to The New York Times , NFL games will not be available on the service. But, given that some of internet TV’s staunchest opponents are finally coming around to the idea, this future is not so far away. It just might not be the future many of us hoped for.