This article seems to conflate TV networks and cable channels with the programs they produce. Few if any people actually watch everything on a channel, and I imagine few people would actually want to "subscribe" to just ESPN. The success of paid online sports streaming however, suggests plenty of people are willing to pay a lot to watch just the sports and shows they want.

And of course it reveals how socialistic the current TV model is: millions pay small fees for each channel yet never watch them, so niche programming is subsidized.

What would happen if TV shows were all produced on demand? The most popular shows would thrive, and the least popular would die or drastically cut costs to remain profitable.

TV is heavily ratings driven already - a network TV show can't survive without being broadly popular enough to support itself through advertising revenues.

If anything, I suspect that on-demand would benefit niche content with cult following; would Firefly have been cancelled if the rabid Whedonites had some mechanism to pay $10/month to keep watching? Currently there's no way to trade size of audience for intensity of audience; in that way it's an inefficient market, which a more direct and less "socialistic" model would fix.

Yeah, I really wonder if the long tail of passionate supporters can support the cost of big-budget TV production. I guess the experience of someone like Louis C.K. suggests it's possible for a someone to make a lot of money without the traditional distributor in the middle, but the big question is: would niche content attract a cult following in the first place without first having some broad exposure? Would Firefly have found such a passionate audience if everyone had to pay up to start?

I think we have an existence proof of what would have happened to Firefly in that case because roughly the same people made Dr. Horrible and released it directly on iTunes, and it did very well.

There's definitely a bootstrapping problem: Joss had to make a name for himself on network TV with Buffy first. I don't think we'll ever get away from some kind of editorial model where someone makes a bet on new talent, and the audience makes some kind of commitment (financial or attention) to watch the things they select. But I do think this will increasingly be about finding new talent, and that established talent will be able to cut the studios out.