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Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that the number of FAST (free advertiser-supported television) channels is exploding. No one is sure how many are currently up and running, but one research company estimates it to be north of 1,600.
As the latest bright, shiny objects, FAST channels are the space everyone wants to be in, including many local television stations. Don’t say OTT, that would be so old fashioned. The word FAST sounds more exciting.
And what content, you may ask, is available on those 1,600 or so channels?
To help answer that question, my son and I recently went through the FAST directory of a new TV set to find out how many channels were offered, what specific content was available, and how appealing that content might be to viewers. The set we used provided a handy FAST button on its remote, right between the buttons for Netflix and Prime Video.
Going through the cable-like directory, we counted a total of 326 continuously streaming channels. Twenty-eight were in Spanish and another 36 were dedicated to music or music videos, but that still left 262 English language channels, all featuring commercials that could not be fast forwarded.
Many of the channels were unwatchable, but there were a few jewels such as a Midsomer Murders stream that carries multiple seasons of Great Britain’s most popular crime drama. Perhaps it’s time to cancel that