Only, we're not paying $60 for 15 channels we want now. We're paying $60 for 1-2 shows each from 200 channels (most of which we don't want). Channels had themes, and what people meant by a la carte was being able to get the themes they wanted.

Personally, I'd prefer to see every service have access to (pretty much) all content and then compete on quality/price/etc... kind of like how music tends to work nowadays.