The idea of adaptive multicast means that instead of a service provider, like Comcast or Verizon, shooting all the channels down your cable line all the time, like they do now, you could specifically request only a few channels at a time (specifically just the ones being watched), allowing them to free up huge swathes of bandwidth. It also would allow for Internet providers to distribute television without having to use traditional methods, so if Clearwire, for example, wanted to distribute television, they could.