Saving TV

Only one model is working in the television industry right now. Cable networks target just those viewers who want what they have to offer. Broadcast networks want everyone. And the business of wanting everyone has never been worse. Meanwhile, cable—counting both basic channels and pay services like HBO and Showtime—now receives 55 percent of the total viewership. It may be time to perform an autopsy on network TV, which some have pronounced officially dead at age 60, the victim of a lifetime of big spending, hard living, and bad planning. Conversations about the future of television tend to vault way past next week or next year into a world where schedules don't exist and 10,000 programming options are all available at any moment, half of them fully inter­active. But in reality, the number of cable channels has topped out. And the number of households that subscribe to basic cable—about 65 million—hasn't budged for a decade. So before the death knell tolls, let's consider some ways broadcast TV might be reborn.

1) Accept the fact that niche is the new normal.

2) Know your brand.

3) Don't count on "flow" ­unless all your programming is aimed at the same audience.

4) Content counts.

5) When you say the TV season is 52 weeks, you have to mean it.

6) Don't break faith with your audience.

7) The notion that the "500-channel universe" is a pie being cut into ever-tinier slivers ignores the fact that the vast majority of what we watch fills the coffers of a small handful of megaliths, just as it always has.

8) Lowered expectations can be your best friend.