The rout of media companies went into its second day today as investors begin worrying that maybe cable TV is on its way out due to all the cord cutting of the past several years.  Viacom lost 14 percent, Disney was again down, this time almost two more percent, and the entire media index is down again more than another two percent.  All told, the Dow sold off to the tune of 120 points.  Is it justified?  Is cable TV really on its way out?  In the past ten years, the number of U.S. cable subscribers who have "cut the cord" is still well under 10 percent, besides which - where are the cord cutters getting their programming from?  From the Internet and streaming services, of course.  And who owns most of the broadband Internet gateways and streaming services?  The cable companies, of course.  So really, the revenue is just going out of one pocket and into another.  The whole thing started yesterday with Disney, but what the market is not considering is that Disney is so huge that the relatively modest losses they've forecast for their cable TV operations is still a drop in the bucket in the big picture.  No, the cable industry is going to be around for a long time and today's rout is just more of the same hysteria we've been seeing for several years.  The day's good news is that with 75% of S&P companies now reporting in for Q2, earnings forecasts have now been adjusted to a plus 1.6% (compared to negative numbers a few weeks ago) and the all important revenue picture has been moved up again from a minus 3.9% to now a minus 3.4%.  At 7.8 billion, volume was quite a lot higher than recent averages so it definitely was a genuine rout.

For a non-Wall Street perspective on the significance of today's rout, I submit the following:
Media Stocks Meltdown: Why Wall Street is Making the Sector Suffer | Variety

Media stock selloff leaves Wall Street bruised

BY NOEL RANDEWICH

DJ:    17,419.75  -120.72     NAS:      5,056.44  -83.51           S&P:  2,083.56  -16.28

REUTERS/LUCAS JACKSON

Wall Street ended sharply lower on Thursday as weak earnings reports from media companies stirred fears that more viewers are ditching cable TV, dragging the sector to its worst two-day loss since the financial crisis.

The selloff was compounded by nervousness ahead of key jobs data on Friday that could provide clues about the timing of the first Federal Reserve interest rate hike in almost a decade.

Viacom (VIAB.O) fell 14.22 percent to its lowest in almost four years after reporting lower-than-expected quarterly revenue due to weakness in its cable TV business. Walt Disney (DIS.N) was off 1.79 percent and down for a second session after it lowered profit guidance for its cable networks unit on Tuesday.

The S&P 500 media index .SPLRCMDIA lost 2.12 percent and notched its biggest two-day fall since November 2008, with Time Warner (TWX.N), Comcast (CMCSA.O) and CBS (CBS.N) all in the red and Twenty-First Century Fox (FOXA.O) down 6.4 percent.

"All the media stocks are down and it seems people just want to get out of the sector at any cost and take any loss," CLSA analyst Vasily Karasyov said.

Viacom's results and Disney's warning put the spotlight on a trend of viewers shifting from cable TV to Internet-based services such as Netflix (NFLX.O), which rose 2.21 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI fell 0.69 percent to end at 17,419.75 and the S&P 500.SPX lost 0.78 percent to 2,083.56. The Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped 1.62 percent to 5,056.44, its biggest one-day tumble since early July.

Eight of the 10 major S&P sectors were lower, with the health index's .SPXHC 2.09 percent fall leading the decliners. Allergan (AGN.N) fell 5.1 percent after the Irish drugmaker reported a second-quarter loss.

In other earnings-driven stock moves, Tesla (TSLA.O) fell 8.88 percent and Keurig Green Mountain (GMCR.O) slumped as much as 29.75 percent after reporting disappointing numbers.

Investors were also jittery ahead of the release of U.S. non-farm payroll numbers, which are expected to have risen by 223,000 in July, matching gains in June.

The Fed has said it will raise rates only when it sees a sustained recovery in the economy.

After the bell, Zynga (ZNGA.O) fell 6 percent after it posted a disappointing quarterly report.

With about three-quarters of the S&P 500 companies having reported, second-quarter earnings are estimated to have increased 1.6 percent while revenues are projected to have fallen 3.4 percent.

However, valuations look stretched. The S&P 500 is trading at a 25 percent premium to its historical median price-to-sales ratio, Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at BMO Private Bank said in a note to clients.

In Thursday's session, declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a rate of 1.47 to 1. On the Nasdaq, that rate was 2.46 to 1 favoring decliners.

The S&P 500 index posted 18 new 52-week highs and 44 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite saw 64 new highs and 169 new lows.

About 7.8 billion shares changed hands on all U.S. exchanges, well above an average 6.77 billion in the past five sessions, according to BATS Global Markets data.