Expect Comcast to lose their feces very soon.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    https://order.hbonow.com/

    HBO, without a cable subscription. I can only hope that this trend continues, but I also imagine that Comcast will lose their feces very soon. Only available on Apple devices for the first three months, but soon available on other devices as soon as the exclusivity agreement runs out.

    If this continues, and other premium programming starts being available without cable, Comcast will see their subscriber base dropping rapidly. I imagine that pirating of GoT and other shows will be dropping.



  • Hardly matters as long as Comcast has the high-speed internet monopoly in most areas they're in.

    I mean, sure I can bypass my cable TV subscription-- now how do I watch Game of Thrones? On 768 kpbs DSL? Hah!


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @blakeyrat said:

    Hardly matters as long as Comcast has the high-speed internet monopoly in most areas they're in.

    Yes, you have a point, but you made it yourself. I was talking about cable subscriptions, not internet. I know lots of people who only keep their cable subscriptions for shows on HBO and Showtime that they do not wish to do without. If you remove the monopoly on that content, they will likely drop cable, but keep internet.

    Add that to the fact that Comcast is already bitching about the increased load on their network from Netflix and wanting to blackmail them...and we can only expect that to increase.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @blakeyrat said:

    I mean, sure I can bypass my cable TV subscription-- now how do I watch Game of Thrones? On 768 kpbs DSL? Hah!

    Yeah, @ben_lubar will not be dropping cable any time soon. ;)



  • @Polygeekery said:

    If you remove the monopoly on that content, they will likely drop cable, but keep internet.

    Right; but I'm saying that doesn't matter.

    Go to Comcast's website (keeping in mind all the prices there are lies) and check the price of cable Internet alone. Now check the price of Internet + TV. Protip: the difference isn't very much. Why not? Because Comcast is already having Internet-only subscribers subsidizing their TV service. Probably because 1) there's no law against it, and 2) they already feel a sense of obsolescence due to cable cutters.

    This just means that gap will close a bit more.



  • I don't have cable.


  • I survived the hour long Uno hand


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @blakeyrat said:

    Go to Comcast's website (keeping in mind all the prices there are lies) and check the price of cable Internet alone. Now check the price of Internet + TV. Protip: the difference isn't very much.

    Or, in some cases, it can be more. When we moved in here, it was cheaper to get internet, cable and phone together than it was to just get cable and internet. That led to an amusing conversation between myself and the salesperson:

    "These numbers are available, do you have any preference?"

    "I don't give a shit, I am not even going to hook a phone up to it."

    "ooooooook?"

    @blakeyrat said:

    Why not? Because Comcast is already having Internet-only subscribers subsidizing their TV service.

    Yes, but that has to stop if enough people stop subscribing to cable TV. Loss leaders are one thing, propping up an industry is another. Right now it is value-added for the customer. With this, they will stop caring.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @ben_lubar said:

    I don't have cable.

    What do you do in your basement all the time then?

    Oh yeah, Dwarf Fortress...carry on.



  • Right now I'm downloading Source SDK 2007 so I can play a game.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @ben_lubar said:

    Right now I'm downloading Source SDK 2007 so I can play a game.

    See you in a week or so. ;)



  • I started the download yesterday and it says there's only 10 minutes left.



  • @Polygeekery said:

    Yeah, @ben_lubar will not be dropping wants cable any time soon.

    FTFB



  • @ben_lubar said:

    I started the download yesterday and it says there's only 10 minutes left.

    8 more minutes until the network hiccups and you start over...



  • Steam is pretty good at handling that sort of thing nowadays.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @Polygeekery's law #1: Any discussion on these forums will devolve to making fun of @ben_lubar's internet connection within 10 posts.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @blakeyrat said:

    Because Comcast is already having Internet-only subscribers subsidizing their TV service. Probably because 1) there's no law against it, and 2) they already feel a sense of obsolescence due to cable cutters.

    Anyone know how big the group of people not subscribing to cable is? It's always seemed like the sort of thing that millennial hipsters do, like not having a land line, but now I have 60 years old relatives doing that.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @boomzilla said:

    Anyone know how big the group of people not subscribing to cable is?

    Not sure if there are even numbers for that, but more and more people are doing it. When you look at just how much content on cable is filler, it is not a very good deal.

    @boomzilla said:

    It's always seemed like the sort of thing that millennial hipsters do

    Meh. Lots of people are doing it. We cut the cable (except Comcast internet, of course) 4 years ago, and I do nothing "ironically".

    @boomzilla said:

    like not having a land line

    I know very few people that have a conventional landline. I know a few people, myself included, who have a very low cost VoIP line. Almost no one I know of still has a conventional landline though.

    @boomzilla said:

    but now I have 60 years old relatives doing that.

    Yep, and that is the nail in the coffin. When retired folks start adopting trends, it is usually here to stay.


  • Garbage Person

    Virtually everyone I know either has no cable subscription or only has one for a particular show or channel.

    One of them only has cable for The Blacklist because they have no reception of the local NBC affiliate and can't do a rooftop antenna because apartments.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @Polygeekery said:

    When you look at just how much content on cable is filler, it is not a very good deal.

    That's not how I look at it at all. It's based on what I use. Of course I only watch a tiny fraction of the stuff that's there, but there are only so many hours in the day, etc.

    @Weng said:

    Virtually everyone I know either has no cable subscription or only has one for a particular show or channel.

    I'm sure I know some people like that, but it's certainly not most of them. I'm never certain how much of a soda straw my view is. And I don't really know very many millenial hipsters.

    I think this sort of thing is definitely going to change the industry, along with what Netflix, et.al. is already doing. Not that I have a clue where it will all go, or even a particular hatred of cable companies.



  • @boomzilla said:

    Anyone know how big the group of people not subscribing to cable is? It's always seemed like the sort of thing that millennial hipsters do, like not having a land line, but now I have 60 years old relatives doing that.

    I have no idea, but as one anecdata point, I haven't had cable in, probably, 15 years. Back when I did have it, we hardly ever watched it — one or two shows a month — and it wasn't worth the cost. And, as we all know, I am far from being a millennial hipster.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @Polygeekery said:

    Yep, and that is the nail in the coffin. When retired folks start adopting trends, it is usually here to stay.

    @HardwareGeek said:

    And, as we all know, I am far from being a millennial hipster.

    ;-)



  • :P I'm not retired yet. I'm old enough, I think, to take money out of a retirement account without a tax penalty — if I had enough money in one to bother. I'll probably have to work, in some way or another, until I drop, and in a regular 8-5 job until they force me to retire in, probably, 10-15 years.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    I will also say that my wife has talked about signing up for this sometime in the summer. Unless we get another "Free HBO for six months" type of deal around then. Uh, actually, I think she was talking about HBO Go...it's not immediately obvious what the difference (and I don't particularly care).

    She wants HBO mainly to watch GoT. When we had it through FiOS, we also DVR'd a few of movies to be watched at our leisure. I DVR'd boxing whenever it came on. They have really good fights.

    We recently discussed dropping our TV service as a cost cutting measure at the height of our tenants dead beatery. That could happen again, but I think the actual likelihood is pretty low.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @HardwareGeek said:

    I'll probably have to work, in some way or another, until I drop,

    I'm pretty sure that in a few decades "retirement" will be looked at as a late 20th century fad.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @boomzilla said:

    I'm pretty sure that in a few decades "retirement" will be looked at as a late 20th century fad.

    My dad is 70 years old and still works 3-6 months out of the year as a consultant on earthmoving, mining and stripping/barrowing operations. He just says he wasn't wired to sit around all the time.

    Of course, he also says, "Fuck winter. I am too damned old to go out in this bullshit." I expect him to move to FL at some point...



  • @Weng said:

    Virtually everyone I know either has no cable subscription or only has one for a particular show or channel.

    The only people I know with cable have it because of the NFL.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @Polygeekery said:

    My dad is 70 years old and still works 3-6 months out of the year as a consultant on earthmoving, mining and stripping/barrowing operations. He just says he wasn't wired to sit around all the time.

    Mine just turned 65 and he jokes about how he goes to "work" on Wednesdays, where he plays in a weekly skins game at the country club (he plays about 3-4 times a week). My mom was a bit put out at first having him around the house all the time, but they seem to be figuring it out.



  • @Polygeekery said:

    HBO, without a cable subscription.

    Big whoop. They're asking WAY WAY too much.

    add HBO NOW to your Optimum Online service for only $14.99 a month.

    Yeah, I can get Netflix and pay half my Hulu Plus subscription, or get some anime streamer like CrunchyRoll.

    HBO can keep their exclusives.

    Let them see if there's enough GoT/TWD fans out there to prop these networks up to go solo. Want to watch both? They're from different networks, that'll be $30 a month.

    No thanks, I can get both them a year later, and have unlimited satirical comedy on YouTube for 1/4 the price.

    The main problem, TV-Networks/Hollywood-Movies want way too much money for their content.

    Cable fucked up content. You used to get only the shows you cared about, for free, every Saturday morning. Beat that Comcast.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @xaade said:

    Big whoop. They're asking WAY WAY too much.

    You are absolutely right about that, but at least now it is an option.



  • @boomzilla said:

    Anyone know how big the group of people not subscribing to cable is? It's always seemed like the sort of thing that millennial hipsters do,

    It's also what cheap old people do. The pictures on my magic box appear out of thin air - as they were meant to.

    No cable for 15-odd years.

    Yes very odd years.


    Upgrading internet and getting back the sports that have migrated off-air, might get me to change my mind.

    "Kids, get your minecraft off of my Internet!! I'm trying to work".

    :lawn:



  • @Polygeekery said:

    how much content on cable is filler

    They don't even try to hide it.

    40 music channels, including gospel and hippie-aural-beats.

    No, not music video channels.

    Just elevator music.

    Oh, you live in Texas, ok, 2/3 of them are in Mexican Spanish.

    Then there's that PBS channel that just taught my daughter this lovely story:
    A squirrel in the tree worked hard to collect food, and a hungry wolf showed up. The wolf asked for food, but the squirrel had worked too hard and couldn't support them both, so he said no. The wolf hit the tree so all the food fell out and ate it all.
    Lesson: The squirrel should learn how to share.

    Wife said, that's a ripoff of a Chinese story, and they got the lesson all wrong.

    Fucking hippies.



  • Since everyone seems to be giving anecdotes, I don't have cable for a few reasons. One is that, not too long ago, I was a grad student and so I considered it expensive, and I didn't even have a TV at that time. But another reason is that... I'm afraid I would waste way too much time watching stuff if I actually were to get it.


  • BINNED

    @boomzilla said:

    Anyone know how big the group of people not subscribing to cable is? It's always seemed like the sort of thing that millennial hipsters do, like not having a land line, but now I have 60 years old relatives doing that.

    The only reason I have cable is football. I think I may have turned on the TV since the Super Bowl but I'm not sure.



  • @Weng said:

    can't do a rooftop antenna because apartments.

    I've had pretty good results getting digital OTA with an indoor antenna in my apartment. Depending on your friend's location, he may be able to get away with just using a paperclip.


  • Java Dev

    I've lived here for 7 years now and never had cable. The first ~4 years, I had DSL (16Mbps down, 1Mbps up) and over-the-air digital TV. Since then I've had fiber (50Mbps symmetrical) with IPTV.

    The IPTV is mostly a it-doesnt-come-without thing - I rarely watch TV, though I like having a landline - the one thing modern smartphones suck at is the actual pone thing.



  • @Polygeekery said:

    I was talking about cable subscriptions, not internet.

    Cable companies have a "revenue per household" number that they need to meet in order to afford their infrastructure and take appropriately-sized money baths. If cable revenue goes down, then Internet prices must rise. Since 90% of the US has no other way to get a connection fast enough to watch HD streaming services, HBO over the Internet is only useful if you have cable Internet. As long as Comcast can re-sell HBO at a lower price than it will retail at, it will always be cheaper to get it from Comcast, even if it eventually turns into an Intenet+streaming bundle.



  • Gigabit municipal internet service. Get on it, people.

    If it requires changes in the law, change the fucking law.



  • @riking said:

    Gigabit municipal internet service. Get on it, people.

    Then this will happen...

    City Gov't: We're going to build municipal Internet.
    Comcast: If you do and you take half of our customers, then we'll have to double our prices. Then all the voters that are not in range of your network will vote you out because you made them switch to DSL.
    City Gov't: OK, never mind.
    Comcast: ((Whew, they bought it)). While we have you on the phone, could you also make sure to make it illegal for an independent group of residents to form a cooperative and buy Internet access in bulk. If they do it, we'll raise our rates and blame you for that too.



  • @Jaime said:

    form a cooperative

    Like they did with cell phones?
    Like they got the backlash?
    Like cell phones just did away with the family requirement...

    Like they did with circles?
    Like every competitor did with bigger circles?
    Like they eventually made calls free?

    Sometimes capitalism wins.

    All you need is two or three competitors.

    Problem is Comcast doesn't have competitors in the speed department.

    The solution is not having Comcast sell to a middle man. We did that with electricity in Houston... not good.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @xaade said:

    The solution is not having Comcast sell to a middle man. We did that with electricity in Houston... not good.

    If they do, I would not recommend sinking all of your 401k in to it. If they start that in California, things could get ugly again.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Polygeekery said:

    "I don't give a shit, I am not even going to hook a phone up to it."

    It's weird how they do that--TWC pushed me hard to add phone service to my cable+internet bundle, to the point of not raising, or perhaps even actively lowering the price, even though I told them I wasn't going to hook up a phone. When I got tired of not paying for something I wasn't using and canceled it, they started calling me to get me to add it back. "Don't you want the comfort of a landline?" No, not really, I already have 3 cell phones, and what you're offering isn't a landline.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @xaade said:

    that's a ripoff of a Chinese story, and they got the lesson all wrongchanged the lesson to promote socialism.

    FTFY 😉



  • @FrostCat said:

    FTFY 😉

    Um....

    They changed a story from socialists, to make it socialist.



  • @Polygeekery said:

    That led to an amusing conversation between myself and the salesperson:

    "These numbers are available, do you have any preference?"

    "I don't give a shit, I am not even going to hook a phone up to it."

    "ooooooook?"

    That's amusing? It must be one of those "you had to be there" stories.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    Dick.



  • @Polygeekery said:

    Dick.

    Par for the course here, I would think.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    Tœůčhə


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @IngenieurLogiciel said:

    Par for the course here, I would think.

    Too bad you couldn't work some pendantry in there.



  • @FrostCat said:

    Too bad you couldn't work some pendantry in there.

    On other forums, pedantry and dickweediness are frowned upon.

    Here I get called out if I don't have enough of one or the other.

    Obviously, I am still too new here. I'm sure one day I'll learn and make a post worthy of those badgers and pedantic dickweed admirers everywhere.

    Also, it's pedantry, not pendantry.


    Let them eat whooshes. -b


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