Comcast's Easy 80

Comcast has compiled a bizarro-world version of Nielsen ratings: It’s a list of the consistently 80 least-watched channels on its cable systems.

In other words, in a 300-channel universe, these are the bottom feeders.

The MSO worked up the so-called Easy 80 as a cheat-sheet to help individual systems deploying switched digital video figure out which channels would be good candidates for taking out of broadcast rotation. 

SDV works because at any given time of day in a particular neighborhood, dozens of linear channels go unwatched. To free up that wasted space, a switched digital video system sends a channel down only when a subscriber flips to it.

Comcast CTO Tony Werner explained the technology at the company’s May investor conference: The operator analyzed the approximately 300 channels it offers in one of its East Coast systems. Of the lowest-viewed 200 channels, a maximum of about 34 were watched at any given time. The total number of viewers for that group, Werner said, was equivalent to the 11th-ranked channel in the system.

With SDV, “you can stack channels up to infinity because the newer channels compete for viewers with others that are already in the lineup,” Werner said.

So which are the most ignored? Well, no one wants to concede that some channels don’t get more than a handful of viewers.

For example, Cablevision, as part of announcing it will have the capacity for 500 HD channels by the end of the year, readily acknowledged that it will use switched digital video to get there – but it declined to say whether any of the 15 HD channels from sister company Voom were in the SDV mix. Who knows? Perhaps some dude out there will be tuning into Kung Fu HD 24 hours a day.

Maybe it’s more polite to say that this programming caters to esoteric tastes (call it the "Long Tail 80"). It’s worth pointing out that the popularity of channels can vary even within the same city, as Time Warner Cable’s Austin division found. And of course, shows and networks fall in and out of fashion over time.

All the same, I’d be curious to see what’s on Comcast’s Easy 80. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to get a copy. Any guesses?