The standard 99¢ price for songs proved a strong catalyst for sales, and the ease of use and consistent quality of the tracks made it a very popular alternative to P2P file sharing. Evidence has shown that attempts by record labels to charge more for some songs haven’t generated the expected increases in revenues, and may have been a factor in decreasing sales.

Ultimately, by not embracing online distribution and offering prices that consumers find reasonable, TV content producers run the risk of repeating the same mistakes that left the music industry scrambling to keep up with consumers that had moved to getting content online. Cable and broadcast will still be around for a long time, but it would be unwise to count on those models lasting forever.