Cord-Cutting Isn't All Bad News for Cable-TV Networks
- Nielsen reports two straight months of pay-TV additions
- Data may reflect adjustments rather than actual growth
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The bleak picture for the cable-TV industry looks a little less dire now that researchers are getting a better handle on sign-ups for online television packages like Sling TV and PlayStation Vue.
Internet-based, cable-like services now have at least 1.3 million customers and are still growing, according to data released this month from Nielsen, which began counting such subscribers in January. With those subscriptions, the total number of households with some sort of multi-channel TV service, online or via cable or satellite, reached 97.6 million this month, up 68,000 from the May estimate, Nielsen said. That’s on top of growth of 261,000 subscribers from April to May.