• by J. Max Robins , Featured Columnist, December 2, 2015

As I slowly came out of my post-Turkey Day L-Tryptophan haze, and looked back on a day of big gatherings (around the table, and around the set and smartphones), I realized that a bunch of things have happened in the last couple of weeks that screamed one important thing: Namely, that we are in one of those critical-mass phases of the TV Everywhere universe.

In quick succession, a major broadcast network, Fox, has said, “no mas!” to the ritual of issuing overnight ratings, proclaiming what anyone with half a brain has known for years: Those numbers are meaningless. All the worthless horse-race hype of overnights sent to journos was a game Fox would no longer play. It’s now a world where the vast majority of the audience creates its own prime time, whether through DVR or one of the myriad streaming services.

On the heels of that event, I read a survey from Clearleap, a video technology company that counts HBO, Scripps and A+E Networks among its clients. That study said “streaming services penetration” — a phrase I have to admit sounds more than vaguely pornographic — is nearly on par with the 79% of people who have cable. That penetration counts the number of people using Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, et al.

Let’s assume, correctly, that numbers such as these put fear into the hearts of cable honchos coast to coast, especially given that “Millennials are leading the over-the-top revolution.” According to the study, more than 70% of viewers between the ages of 18-29 use at least one streaming service, while only 64% are cable subscribers. In addition, the survey found that more than one-quarter of Millennials have never subscribed to cable. Frankly, I’m surprised that number wasn’t substantially higher.

And that’s only part of the tale of why those cord-cutters and cable-nevers numbers will climb by double digits in the coming years. Case in point: After Black Friday sales were tallied, the second-biggest selling item on Amazon was the Jeff Bezos behemoth’s own Fire TV device for streaming video. The three iterations of the Fire TV were only exceeded in popularity by another Amazon device, its entry-level 7-inch Fire Tablet that had been reduced in price for Black Friday from $50 to $35.

Fire TV models, ranging from $39.99-$99.99, are but some of the many low-cost devices out in the market to entice Millennials to keep saying cable-never, or to cut the cord. To the rest of us — the out-of-the-prime demo — there are better and better ways to do likewise. Watch closely and see sales soar this Christmas for inexpensive over-the-top gadgets like the second generation of Google’s $35 Chromecast; feature-laden streaming devices, such as the $199 Roku 4; the $199 Apple TV; and TiVo’s $299 Bolt. They’re all certain to be wrapped with care and placed in the light of the Menorah and underneath the Christmas tree.

Clearly, Liberty Global chairman John Malone, the King of the Cable Cowboys, has been paying attention to the seismic shifts happening in the TV Everywhere landscape. Malone recently sat down for a rare interview with his biographer, MultiChannel News and Broadcasting & Cable editorial director Mark Robichaux.

As savvy as anyone I know in the TV Everywhere ecosystem, Malone acknowledged that this is sea-change time in unknown waters. “Over-the-top will continue to grow and succeed and be experimented with,” Malone said. “In some cases, the services will be supplemental to some other package — and in some households, it’ll be replacement.

“And the bottom line is, connectivity is here to stay, both stationary and mobile. The question really is, who can provide it in the best way?”

Good question. Maybe this holiday season will provide an answer. And after all the wrapping paper is tossed, and the presents given, I believe it’ll look like streamers -- both providers and viewers -- will have gotten most everything they wanted. And cable? It could be getting a lump of coal.