Have you gotten rid of your cable tv service yet

[mdmc]

Poll question: Have you gotten rid of your cable tv service yet

In the Living Room, Hooked on Pay TV
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/In-the-Living-Room-Hooked-on-nytimes-185019863.html?x=0&mod=pf-family-home
It is a fantasy shared by many Americans: dropping cable television and its fat monthly bills and turning instead to the wide-open frontier of Internet video.

----------------------------
I figure most DU'ers are msm news junkies and would never be able to give up their cable. I've been able to do it for a couple years now..

[NoPasaran]

1. You can have my remote when you pry it from my cold dead hands

[Warpy]

2. I only got a dish 4 years ago, so the novelty hasn't worn off

Right now, I'm listening to Mike Moore on Link talking about the US corporate collusion with the fascists prior to and during WWII.

Net radio is all the radio I listen to these days, though, and I think as net TV matures, it might replace the dish.

Then again, I might go completely Luddite and sell the lot in favor of another loom.

[mdmc]

4. I find that the news is a huge stressor for me

DU use to act as a filter (back in the Bush days).. Now it is just as much of a stressor..

[Warpy]

8. News? Ugh.

I mostly use it for old movies, history, science, and the occasional mind numbing trash. I got out of the televised news habit 6 years ago and never got back into it.

[sendero]

3. I have satellite..

.. TV but I don't watch the news shows on it at all. Just movies and comedies for me. Don't need to shout at the screen which is what usually happens when I see a TeeVee pundit or talking head - every single story or opinion of consequence is lying spin.

[CBGLuthier]

5. dumped it two months ago.

Cable news sucks. The internet is the only news source you need. Not a sports fan so the allure of live sports, which is the only thing cable has, escapes me.

Use the Roku Netflix and beyond device, watch a lot of vimeo feeds, netflix instant view and a little bit of amazon on demand since I have $100.00 more a month for entertainment.

Eventually will either build a new home theater PC or find some other solution to pull in the Daily Show. It's the only cable show I still watch. On the internet.

[uncommon]

6. I consider it every month when I get the bill, but not ready to shake it quite yet. There is

something satisfying about flipping on the news before work in the morning.

[hobbit709]

7. If the things I want to watch were on the internet

I'd drop cable in a heartbeat. The closest thing to msm news programs I watch is KO's Countdown. I haven't watched CNN in years, I refuse to watch Faux, and I hardly ever even watch the local news.
Some of the things I want to watch are available on the internet-in 10 minute snippets instead of complete shows, some don't become available until a month or longer after it's on cable. As far as movies go, I might watch one or two new movies a year.

[ipaint]

9. Too much advertising,

If they want to pipe in back to back sleazy pharma, investment and lawyer commercials non stop they are going to have to pay me to watch.

[AsahinaKimi]

10. I would never trade my mouse for a remote control

eom.

[Statistical]

32. You don't have to. Plenty of solution to watch streaming content on a TV (w/ a remote). n/t

[AsahinaKimi]

47. Funny you should mentioned that..

I have been watched on Youtube old episodes of Bewitched and I dream of Jeannie. Wow, fun stuff!

[TheCowsCameHome]

11. No, and for what?

[eShirl]

12. got rid of it a few years ago. Just got a Roku box last month.

The sound is messed up on my computer, so I finally broke down and got a Roku box. It connects wirelessly to our router and wiredly to our TV, and we use it to watch Youtube, podcasts (mainly Countdown & Rachel Maddow), listen to internet radio, and Netflix instant watch movies ($8.99/month).

(Some great non-official Roku channels from a guy called NowhereMan - I originally got the link to this page from a post on DU a couple months ago http://thenowhereman.com/roku/ )

[Silent3]

13. I have a 110" screen

Youtube video looks crappy blown up to that size, even supposedly "HD" stuff. For news shows that doesn't matter too much, but for movies, science shows, and a few of my favorite sci-fi series, I enjoy having great sound and picture too much to settle for what you usually get from streaming internet video.

By setting up my TiVo to record practically everything I watch (I hardly ever turn on a TV to see "what's on now?") I've got all of the convenience of watching what I want when I want, easily skipping through the commercials. With some streaming video online, it's harder to skip around commercials than it is with cable TV plus a TiVO.

I don't use the big screen for everything. The projector for the big screen uses more power than a smaller LCD TV, and when I eventually reach around 2500 hours of viewing (I think I might be half way there) there's a $300 projector lamp to replace, so I save the big screen for stuff where I can more about the video and audio quality. But as long as I have cable TV to feed the big screen, it's also pretty nice to have cable for smaller screens too.

These days I watch Keith Obermann most of the time from a small TV parked in front of an elliptical rider while I sweat my way through an aerobic workout. I think that works better than trying to watch a laptop while exercising or figuring out a way to feed streaming video to a bigger (than a laptop) screen.

[SocialistLez]

14. We've been without for maybe a year...I forget.

It's not so bad.
We have super fast internet so I get my news on there and we can watch the local news and the national news on our local channels.

I just started classes so I don't spend a lot of time at home as I used to.

We have Netflix and we watch a lot of movies on the Wii.

[w8liftinglady]

15. I had to pick cable or internet-guess which one I went with...

[Arkansas Granny]

16. The last time I had cable was when my son was living with me and he paid for it.

I get the major networks, which I rarely watch, and 6 PBS channels. When I visit my son or my daughter and have access to about a zillion channels, I find very few of them are worth watching.

[XemaSab]

17. We had a snafu with the cable company about 4 years ago

They think we're disconnected, so they won't let us pay the bill and they insist we pay a reconnection fee.

However, we are not disconnected, so charging us a reconnection fee is a crock.

Maybe at some point they will realize that we have been getting free cable for years, but I prefer to let them wallow in their misconception that we're disconnected. :P

[eShirl]

18. ha!

At our old place, we didn't know that the livingroom and bedroom cable hookups were on separate accounts. (We only used the livingroom one, but had it disconnected for our entire last year there.) When we were moving out, I connected an old B&W portable to the bedroom hookup for the hell of it, and son-of-a-gun it was working!

[stuntcat]

25. heck yeah

free stuff :headbang:

[PJPhreak]

19. No cable in a year now,

I use unlimited 3-G.

Fastpass and Download Helper are my dear friends,Just watched the A-Team Movie...Great rainy Saturday afternoon stuff.

I get Rachel,Keith and Ed on Video Podcast every nite,AC 360 the same way.

To actually pay to see the "Spew From The Video"?

Naaaa.

[Liberal In Texas]

20. Haven't had cable since 2001. We can't justify the cost with how much

we would watch it. I try to catch Olberman and get it on-line, but that's about all that would ever be on if we still had cable.

It's amazing to me when I visit other peoples homes that they have the TV on 24/7 (it seems like) watching junk or "news". It drives me crazy to have to sit in a waiting room as a captive in front of a big screen TV with some "news channel" on.

TV has become the Great American Narcotic. I think people might be lost without it. They wouldn't know what to believe and they wouldn't know what to buy.

[TreasonousBastard]

21. How do you GET your high-speed internet without cable? For...

a hundred ten bucks or so a month I get cable, internet, and phone, without HBO and the other premium channels. For another 10 bucks I have Netflix, and when I get the Roku box I can watch most of the stuff I'm missing on Showtime, or just wait for the DVD. The phone company wants lot more for less.

So where do I go to get TV, cheap internet and phone without cable? You got a better deal?

And, out here local channels don't work too well, so how do I get PBS or "Castle"?

(There was a Times article yesterday about all the people who got cable back because the alternatives really suck.)

[jonnyblitz]

22. I haven't owned a tv in almost 3 years and still manage to

see everything i want to see, including series from HBO, SHowtime, etc. and pretty much for free except for the cost of internet access. whenever i am visiting family members and have a tv in the room i am staying in I either leave it off or leave it on MSNBC for background noise.

[Upton]

23. I've got DirecTV

and I'm not giving it up for anything..

[stuntcat]

24. I heart TCM and AMC

We only turn the tv on a few hours a week. I know it's wasting money but my husband can't give it up, even though he watches his shows on his computer lol The tv's combined with our computer, so we'd be paying it anyway probably.

I don't have any shows.. except sometimes Andy Griffith on TVLand :blush: and maybe once a week I watch Turner Classic Movies or AMC. They play whole movies with no commercials. and PBS's Brit-coms are funny but I mostly forget to watch.

The commercials on tv freak me out with how stupid they are. If that crap works on people then I know I'm correct in being scared of all humanity. That's the first reason I stopped watching, that was 2001.

[JustAnotherGen]

29. Me too!

:rofl: I'm also in Central NJ so I get a few different PBS stations from NYC down to Philly - (which I love), and have an international package so I get a French and Italian station. I also get Euronews out of Lyon Fr, and two different BBC's. And I'm addicted to Ed, Rachel, and Keith and soon to be - Lawrence.

But - My internet is a Mi-Fi - so for me it would eat up my data plan if I were to start downloading tons of movies and tv online.

[cbdo2007]

26. With Netflix I don't have time to watch anything else.

Literally, thousands of movies instantly streamed to my TV.

Thousands of hours of TV shows streamed instantly to my TV.

Not to mention everything I can watch for free online at Comedycentral.com, CBS.com, VH1.com, MTV.com and so on and so forth.

[johnlucas]

27. I'm dangerously close

I start to resent that cable box on the side of my TV more & more each & every day.
It's my most useless bill.

I got cable for the first time 16 years ago mainly for 2 things: Pro Wrestling & Cartoons.
Wrestling sucks now & even the cartoons ain't as good as they used to be.

Most of the time my TV's turned off & that's saying a lot for a guy who used to watch TV all the time since I was a kid.
I was a toddler reading the TV Guide for God's sake!!

Comcast is a poor service plain & simple. They're a monopoly & they are not forced to improve.
By the end of the year if not sooner I'm gonna make a final decision on this cable thing.
And chances are things point to quitting it.
John Lucas

[L0oniX]

28. With Netfix and Hulu with my PS3 who needs cable or sat anymore?

[TransitJohn]

34. Sports fans.

College football season is about to start. That's why I haven't canceled yet. January.

[Statistical]

35. OTA HD for the win (although selection of games does vary by geography). n/t

[TransitJohn]

50. Yeah, sure, if I wanted to wach SEC or Big 10 games

I have very little interest in them.

[FedUpWithIt All]

30. We've had less than one year of cable in the last 10+ years.

Don't like the way it makes my family feel.

[Statistical]

31. Yes and (in hindsight) it was easy. Cable costs $1,223,828.16* per lifetime (thats not a typo)..

I only wish I had cut the cable a decade earlier.

Today I have:
OTA antenna (a real one in the attic)
HD TIVO
Netfix and/or RedBox
Hulu
Pandora

That is all the content I need and it costs next to nothing. Previously I was using Netflix ($12 per month) but even that is optional.

* $1,223,828.16 assumptions.
Persons is turning 18 years of age today, will live to be 74 (average life expectancy). Cable currently costs $68 per month and will increase annually at rate of inflation. 3% inflation assumed. Instead of purchasing cable person invests the monthly cable price and earns an average of 8% yield over next 56 years. Value at age 74 is $1,223,828.16. Inflation adjusted that is $233,795.34 in year 2010 dollars.

The expected lifetime cost (including time value) of cable is roughly quarter million dollars in inflation adjusted dollars.

[Silent3]

38. Where can one get a reliable 8% return...

...on savings these days? My 401(k) has LOST money over the past decade. If I'd put that money into safer investments, I'd have maybe had 1-2% return per year (which in retrospect doesn't seem so bad, but hindsight, 20/20, yadda yadda).

If I could really make a quarter of a million (inflation adjusted) by not spending the inflation-adjusted equivalent of $68 per month over a lifetime, I should already be a multi-millionaire now, at 48, if I had been cooking at home more instead of eating out so much over the past three decades. :)

[backscatter712]

33. 500 channels and nothing's on. I don't do cable TV anymore.

Even the MSM cable news has turned into a wasteland. The only things worth watching is Daily Show, Colbert, Olbermann and Maddow, and I can watch those online.

And damn, it feels good to not fork over a couple bucks or so a month of my cable bill to FOX News. They can spew their propaganda on someone else's dime.

[brooklynite]

36. For everyone who wants to "stick it" to the Cable Industry and watch on the web...

..more power to you if --all-- of the programming you want is available on line (many of the shows I enjoy are only available in limited quantity, if at all); however, remember that the actors, directors, technicians and productino staffs aren't working for free, and adv ertising doesn't cover all the bills. Someone has to pay for new production.

[dccrossman]

37. Didn't vote in the poll, since I'm in transition

Didn't vote in the poll, since I'm in transition.

Just moved my home broadband service to ClearWire 4G (added their on-the-go service as well)

Using Windows Media Center - Internet TV; Netflix; Zinc.tv; clicker.tv; Hulu; staying completely legit, there are a lot of torrent sites out there, but I'm planning to avoid them if I can

Changed phone over to Vonage (need to park the number until all my financial accounts are keyed off the cell phone)

Will fire Comcast at the end of the month. (That's gonna be AWESOME.)


The most difficult part for my family has been kids programming. A few shows in particular that my 7 and 2 year olds enjoy: Phineas & Ferb, Ni-hao Kailan, & Fresh Beat Band. There's a few of each of these available on the web, but I figure I'll just buy a season of each via iTunes or Amazon on Demand using less than one month of savings.

Total savings for my family, monthly: $70-$100, (figuring in the cost of Clear + Vonage Lite + Netflix) then I shell out an extra $30 per month for the on-the-go from Clear getting bundled in. That's helpful for work and I'll claim it on my taxes.


There is a downside, you do need the capital to buy a computer or a Blu-Ray player with built in Netflix or a Roku player. That cost can reasonably range from $100 to $600.


Just my 2 cents.

[area51]

39. Gotten rid of?

How about never had it in the first place? :evilgrin: :bounce:

[mdmc]

40. yes!

:kick:

[pampango]

41. Gave it up last January. No desire to get it back. n/t

[Greyhound]

42. It's quite freeing. Whenever I want to watch something, anything, I just go find it

and watch it. The younger the person, the more likely it is that this is being done. Like the recording industry, they better wake up and figure out how to use this technology before it makes them completely obsolete.

Disclaimer; I don't frequently want to watch the video.

[NeedleCast]

43. I dont care about the news so much as losing sports, Sci-Fi, Comedy central

and a number of other channels that entertain me.

[northernlights]

44. can't get rid of something I never got to begin with nt

[Name removed]

45. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Silent3]

46. In the World of the Future...

...(when we finally have flying cars) I doubt there will be any distinction between cable TV and internet service. We're still a ways away from anything like that, but once we have the right infrastructure to support the bandwidth that would be needed, I suspect nearly all video content, and likely nearly all music as well, will be available for instant streaming, with no real need for the current "channel" concept.

If you have internet access that might be all you need for viewing anything, "cable TV" no longer being a separate entity. With net neutrality under threat, however, you might have to pay for different tiers of access to get all of the content on the internet, or to get some content quickly instead of slowly -- instant streaming of a movie or of a live performance, say, vs. a slower-than-real-time download of the same thing, only available after a portion is buffered or the whole thing transferred.

What I'm not crazy about in this World of the Future is that content providers might cease to sell content -- they may only want to lease temporary pay-per-view access to many things. DVD and Blu-ray will likely go the way that CDs are going now. We can hope that hackers will hack through that kind of iron-grip content control, but viewing/listening hardware might be so tightly locked up so that it will take a determined hacker to work around content access restrictions.

I don't care particularly about physical media like Blu-ray per se, but I hope to be able to continue to have a personal library of some of my favorite stuff, stored on some sort of local storage so I can view it anytime I like, without having to ask the copyright holders and their distributors if I can pretty-please watch or listen to my stuff again.

[LWolf]

48. I never watch tv news.

I keep my cable, though, because it's bundled with my high-speed internet. I don't get many channels.

[Bluerthanblue]

49. I only had cable for 6mos. in 1987-

:shrug:

[mdmc]

51. ..

[mdmc]

55. 1

[Change has come]

52. I gave up dishTV in February.

That shit was costing me close to $80.00 for the 7 or 8 channels I watched. I stopped watching TV news (especially CNN) directly after the 2004 election, So I had already kicked my TV news addiction. I occasionally watch KO or Rachel online but even they seem compromised by what their sponsors or TPTB will allow. The only thing I really miss is NFL coverage. I'll either renew my Sirius-XM subscription or find a free alternative.

I do not miss television commercials! :woohoo:

[PBS Poll-435]

53. Can't live without True Blood & Leverage

Plus the *new* Newlywed Game.


:shrug:

[EmeraldCityGrl]

54. I'm hooked on True Blood, Weeds, Big C, and Bill Maher.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

56. Did it years ago. I couldn't be happier. nt

[KansDem]

57. Got rid of cable in 1996

Haven't missed it yet!

We do still have a TV and a DVD player. We watch movies and documentaries.

[DailyGrind51]

58. I never had cable TV service! "If it ain't free, it ain't for me!"

[TK421]

59. We can't get rid of Comcast...Fios is not in our area

we need the cable/internet connection here for two roommates who are online gamers ( Starcraft, World of Warcraft etc. )

Other than that, I frigging HATE Comcast with the fire of a thousand suns and would much rather have had DirectTV ( I had it before and liked it ) only for the cable service I got

[Drale]

60. Theres still good stuff on Cable

you cant let one channel ruin other good shows, I have fox locked out so even if I go over it it comes up as a blank channel.

[NickB79]

61. Everyone here needs to check out their local libraries too

Right now from our library I have rented for 7 days:

Inglorious Bastards
The Astronaut Farmer
The first two seasons of Star Trek: DS9
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Day the Earth Stood Still

And that's just what I grabbed the last time I was there a few days ago. There selection is excellent. Between that, Hulu, Fancast, Netflix, local channels (which mostly suck), and library CD's we have little need for cable TV anymore.

[Morning Dew]

62. Dumped my cable in '98

And haven't missed it.

Now, I am moving into a new place and Direct TV comes included in the rent.

Should be interesting.

[Better Believe It]

63. Many left cable and went to the dish. Without that option in the poll the results will be

misleading.

[fishwax]

64. well, I *could* give up my cable, but I have no desire to do so

"I figure most DU'ers are msm news junkies and would never be able to give up their cable."

[InvisibleTouch]

65. Haven't had cable in nearly two decades.

Every now and again, there's something I'm sorry that I don't get to watch. But overall, I don't miss it.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

66. You need an "Other"

I dropped everything except the "basic-basic" option (local channels, 1 CSPAN, CNN, TBS, WGN, and public access only), because this is cheaper than Internet alone.

I don't miss it. Netflix and imported DVDs keep me happy.

[Curmudgeoness]

67. I dropped cable Labor Day weekend last year, so I am clean

for one year now. I just got a little box and antenna, not a lot of choices, but I get by. And I now have time for this waste of my time, oops, I mean this is now a big source of my news.

[proud patriot]

68. I have cable TV , but it's a small local company

not one of the big corperations

[Caretha]

69. I haven't had

cable or Dish TV in 15 years...amazing, I've survived and stayed informed. It really isn't a big deal.

[Codeine]

70. Meh. I'm a reader, an internet user, and a game hobbyist,

but I still enjoy television. ATT Uverse has been worth the cost in my opinion.

[salin]

71. live in an urban area - so get non-cable signal... still watch tv just not cable

and have survived.