Smoothing down fears that 7 million consumers might cancel their pay-TV subscriptions this year once HBO launches its over-the-top subscription service, Parks Associates added a bit of context to its initial report. The gist? Don't panic…yet.

"A significant amount of attention has dwelled upon the potential for cord-cutting that an HBO OTT service might drive," wrote Glenn Hower, Parks research analyst, in a follow-up blog post.

Parks circulated a study in January that indicated 17 percent of the 10,000 broadband households surveyed for the report were likely to subscribe to an OTT service from HBO, once it became available. About half of that 17 percent, or just under 8 percent of the survey sample, said they might discontinue pay-TV services as well.

While noting that losing 8 percent of U.S. broadband customers--or about 7 million according to current subscriber numbers--would be "catastrophic," Hower said this is not likely to happen, for a number of reasons.

From the article "Parks on HBO cord-cutting worries: Don't panic" by Samantha Bookman.

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