Don’t Adjust Your Set; They Are in Control

The blowup between ABC and Time Warner Cable last week highlighted several uncomfortable truths, among them that many people are addicted to “All My Children” and willing to publicly confess this to concerned-looking KABC-TV reporters.

More notably, the black hole temporarily seen in millions of cable households where Regis Philbin would normally appear underscores the clout wielded by cable operators and the gatekeeper role they play in determining which news and entertainment channels are received by roughly two-thirds of U.S. homes.

To recap the dispute for those who can survive 36 hours without the exploits of Erica Kane and her various ex-husbands, Disney wanted Time Warner to ante up for the Disney Channel as a basic service as well as less-established channels Toon Disney and the Soap Net, all in exchange for the privilege of carrying ABC’s TV stations. Deeming the rates Disney is demanding exorbitant, Time Warner yanked the network to prove it meant business.

Yet even before this corporate game of chicken burst into the spotlight, more subtle aspects of cable politics were already evident. Cable systems, after all, decide which channels to make available and where they are positioned--decisions that can vary literally from one neighborhood to the next.

You’ve no doubt experienced that little feeling of disorientation, whether it’s moving to a new home or simply picking up a remote control while visiting a friend’s house. Suddenly, the channels you are accustomed to watching are scattered everywhere. The movie you’re looking for on channel 6 is on 48, and the ESPN highlights you automatically punch up at 11 p.m. have inexplicably shifted from channel 3 to 64.

A couple of months ago, when The Times ran a story about a retrospective of “The Honeymooners” on TV Land, many viewers called to ask what channel number that was. Few understood that it depended on their community and local cable service. They just wanted to see the show and were pretty irritable about the lack of clarity in where or whether they could.

People who grew up with TV want to say “Channel 2” and know what that means. Older viewers generally identify broadcasters less with a “brand” (one of today’s favorite buzzwords) than the channel position they occupy in a particular city.

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In cable, however, the location of everything except those major channels is pretty much up for grabs. All cable networks lust after lower designations--locally, channels 3, 6, 8, 10 and 12--where viewers are more likely to stumble across them as they graze from one broadcast outlet to the next.

Still, if you’re looking for any consistency in which channels merit these slots--even on systems owned by the same company--forget it. Consider Nickelodeon, which airs on channel 6 in Pasadena, channel 32 in South Pasadena and channel 46 in Glendale, three systems within a few miles all operated by Charter Communications.

If you want your MTV, as the slogan went, try channel 27 on Adelphia in Santa Monica, 33 on Charter in Malibu and 96 on MediaOne in Los Angeles. That’s a lot of moving around without ever leaving the 310 area code.

This topsy-turvy alignment of channels creates a serious marketing challenge. It’s also one reason why broadcasters now feel compelled to constantly remind you who they are by adding those annoying little bugs in the lower right-hand corner, as if viewers are too dense to figure that out on their own. In point of fact, if people don’t know which network they’re watching, it’s often because they don’t care--extending their loyalty to programs, not channels.

Cable operators insist there is method in their apparent madness. Many organize networks by genre--grouping news, music and movie channels so viewers can find them more easily.

According to Jane Collins--vice president of research at Adlink, a cooperative venture of cable operators designed to more efficiently place advertising to more than 3 million L.A.-area viewers--channel placement decisions often reflect the tastes and demographics of a given area in terms of factors such as income and ethnicity.

“It’s a huge variance, because Los Angeles is so diverse,” she explained, pointing out that this tailored approach can benefit consumers as well as sponsors. Toyota, for example, might run ads for a minivan in one community and its higher-end cars in another.

“What it boils down to is putting on the right spot in the right place at the right time,” she said.

Collins also noted that where channels are placed tends not to overly concern children, teens and young adults, who are drawn to programming brands and quickly locate what they want to see.

“They get it a lot easier than the adults do,” she said. “Anyone born in the past 15 years has probably grown up in a cable household. They sit down and find Nickelodeon.”

The vagaries of cable logic nevertheless remain vexing to programming executives, especially those who started in broadcasting. Inured to being schmoozed by agents and producers, they now find themselves pleading with someone who once hauled wires around to carry their channel and allow their programs to be seen and appreciated.

Most cable subscribers have some experience with this attitude--the one that says, “We’ll show up at our convenience, sometime between the hours of 1 and 5, and you sit there like a lox waiting for us.” Just picture the guy with a tool belt in a suit and tie, and you’ve got the idea.

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Many major cable operators also own stakes in cable networks and thus have an incentive to promote those assets. So while professing their desire to put the consumer first, rest assured it will be a cold day in hell before Time Warner Cable turns the lights out on the Cartoon Network, CNN, TNT or TBS, channels owned by--you guessed it--Time Warner.

To be fair, cable systems must also grapple with the likes of Viacom, Fox and Disney, companies equally willing to play the bully in pursuing favorable terms for their channels--enlisting consumers to ratchet up pressure on operators to devote extra channels to ESPN and Fox Sports West, even though most of us can get by without 12 daily hours of beach volleyball.

What does all this mean to the average couch potato, who just wants to sit down after a long day and relax watching a game or movie? Only that corporate interests are being put ahead of yours, where channels turn up is about as predictable as a roulette wheel, and to find what you want to watch your thumbs, at least, will get plenty of exercise.

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Brian Lowry’s column appears on Tuesdays. He can be reached by e-mail at brian.lowry@latimes.com.