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Anyone have Comcast out here? I'm up to $130/month for cable ($17 for HD/DVR)...After talking with a customer service representative to see why the price has gradually gone up...It's $85ish for new customers, then 6 months in it becomes $105ish...then 6 months after that it becomes $130ish forever.
This seems like a lot for just cable/internet, no? Any better alternatives out there that would be worth the hassle of changing?
Thanks!
That's comcast for you, although I have heard that verizon fios is just as bad after their 6th month starter trial expires. Your best bet is to just forgo cable completely and only pay for internet. Then get a netflix subscription if needed.
I don't even have netflix, just the internet yet I can watch what I want whenever I want anyway, with ZERO commercials. All you have to do is be semi-decent at using a search engine and you can find tons of free streaming websites for live sports and hosting sites for TV shows and movies. All for only $30 a month.
That's comcast for you, although I have heard that verizon fios is just as bad after their 6th month starter trial expires. Your best bet is to just forgo cable completely and only pay for internet. Then get a netflix subscription if needed.
I don't even have netflix, just the internet yet I can watch what I want whenever I want anyway, with ZERO commercials. All you have to do is be semi-decent at using a search engine and you can find tons of free streaming websites for live sports and hosting sites for TV shows and movies. All for only $30 a month.
There's still plenty of television programming that you cannot legally access for free.
I pay about $110 a month right now for Comcast Preferred TV tier and Blast Internet and use a CableCard (no charge) in my Tivo Premiere for HD DVR service. That is a promo price, so once a year I call them up and threaten to cancel and give my reasons and the agent will knock about $50 a month off my bill for one year. Rinse, repeat. Been doing this for awhile.
I looked at DirectTV and DISH and I would save money in the first year and not so much after that. Plus I would still need Limited Basic and Internet (its cheaper bundled with Limited Basic than with internet by itself) from Comcast.
There's still plenty of television programming that you cannot legally access for free.
Funny, every activity has a little "legal gray area" involved if you dive deep enough. If cable companies as well as the RIAA, MPAA and other dinosaurs refuse to adapt to technology, then I have no sympathy for them if they complain when everyone starts forcing them to adapt by doing things differently.
If cable companies were smart and stopped packaging a million overpriced channels together that you don't want, along with a million annoying commercials every 5 minutes selling crap you don't want, then maybe people under 30 who can use a computer would still actually buy programming from them.
If cable companies were smart and stopped packaging a million overpriced channels together that you don't want,
Some cable companies, at least small ones, would like to do that. Main entities to blame for this are the channel owners themselves. They're the ones that want to keep things bundled.
Funny, every activity has a little "legal gray area" involved if you dive deep enough. If cable companies as well as the RIAA, MPAA and other dinosaurs refuse to adapt to technology, then I have no sympathy for them if they complain when everyone starts forcing them to adapt by doing things differently.
If cable companies were smart and stopped packaging a million overpriced channels together that you don't want, along with a million annoying commercials every 5 minutes selling crap you don't want, then maybe people under 30 who can use a computer would still actually buy programming from them.
because noone would watch those other channels and it means less revenue for the channel owner.
If cable companies were smart and stopped packaging a million overpriced channels together that you don't want, along with a million annoying commercials every 5 minutes selling crap you don't want, then maybe people under 30 who can use a computer would still actually buy programming from them.
See, I doubt if that statement is really true. I think that 20 channels are 80%-90% of the fees, and the rest represent a relatively insignificant portion of your cable bill.
Hypothetically, if you were given a list of cable channels and their fees and told you could remove the ones you don't want, eliminating all the crap channels wouldn't make any difference. But some people would take the axe to the monster (ESPN channels). That would make Disney go crazy and jump the price by a huge amount. Other people would cut Fox News, or TBS or TNT.
My thoughts on this subject is that I can look at the financial report of Carmike Cinemas which is the 4th largest cinema circuit in the USA, although it is considerably smaller than Regal or AMC.
================
In their annual report of last year they give the following information (50 million ticket sales).
$6.85 Average admission per patron
$3.69 Film exhibition costs
$4.20 Other theater operating costs
Resulting in an average loss of $1.05 per ticket
From concession sales the Carmike corporation makes up the operating loss of $1.05 per ticket, and it pays for the cost of the candy, general and administrative expenses (front office expenses),severance agreement charges, depreciation and amortization, loss on sale of property and equipment, impairment of long-lived assets.
======================
Now the knowledge of what the film exhibition costs are compared to average admission doesn't make people insane. It doesn't mean that they run around screaming that they have to pay $6.85 while the studio only gets $3.69 per film. Most people realize that a business has overhead, and overpriced candy and popcorn sales are what pays the front office, the other business expenses and makes the company profitable.
Why would it make any real difference if a cable company revealed a summary cost of subscription fees and retransmission fees to networks over the last 10 years? I don't think they would suffer any damage to their business, and it might make some of their customers more understanding. If it was a summary cost, they wouldn't get in trouble with individual networks who probably want the negotiations sealed.
See, I doubt if that statement is really true. I think that 20 channels are 80%-90% of the fees, and the rest represent a relatively insignificant portion of your cable bill. ...
This doesn't actually matter to me, because for me it's much simpler: I have to watch a LOT of TV to justify it costing $40+ per month which is pretty much what the next tier up from basic makes it cost. And even then that package for some reason might be leaving out many of the cheap channels that I'd be more inclined to watch.
So, to me, the way the options line up is all or nothing. And given that, I choose nothing, because I don't watch nearly enough to justify the extra expense of all.
Internet, on the other hand, I can justify at around $50 because I use it all the time.
This doesn't actually matter to me, because for me it's much simpler: I have to watch a LOT of TV to justify it costing $40+ per month which is pretty much what the next tier up from basic makes it cost. And even then that package for some reason might be leaving out many of the cheap channels that I'd be more inclined to watch.
So, to me, the way the options line up is all or nothing. And given that, I choose nothing, because I don't watch nearly enough to justify the extra expense of all.
Internet, on the other hand, I can justify at around $50 because I use it all the time.
This is a hard decision for me. I don't watch much TV, but I want to see the few quality shows I do enjoy. Watching TV on the internet isn't a realistic option because the current season is often not available. Add to the mix that I do have family members who watch TV more than I do. I've come to the conclusion that it might be best to dump the internet instead of the TV. I spend way too much time on the internet anyway. My big problem is that I'll miss being able to quickly look up information, like phone numbers, recipes, product comparison, shopping. I might consider going back to dialup. Between Verizon cell phones and Comcast bundle, I'm paying over $400 and I think that's disgusting. I've been talking about making a change for months. I want to make a decision soon.
Hopes - I wonder if you can negotiate a package with Verizon for Cell Phone and Triple Play Services to get a more well rounded number and everything in one bill. I'm shocked if Verizon doesn't offer something like this, I have heard that Verizon FiOS and Verizon Wireless are still treated as "2" separate divisions/companies, which I think is just to make more money for Verizon rather than doing what right for the customer. My Parents pay ~300$ a month to Comcast to get what they call the Complete package, includes - All Digital, Premium, and Sports channels, MultiRoom DVRs (6 HD Digital Boxes all with DVR), Home Phone, Internet, and Home Security. They had to sign a contract but something like this I think is a good deal.
Anyway if anyone is paying attention to the CBS/Time Warner Cable feud here in NYC and other markets. I think we are starting to see dynamic shift in Pay-Tv services. TWC on its last quarterly earnings call reported a NET LOSS of ~1 million subs (Cord Cutters) along with Comcast, COX, and DirecTV. People are tired of being wallet raped by being forced into paying for a gazillion channels they don't watch and the Distributors (Cable, Dish) are noticing this of course. Example - My 78 yr old grandmother is forced to pay for the Preferred tier of Digital Cable with Comcast because she loves her Encore Westerns. She doesn't watch a single other channel in that package, but is forced to pay 20$ extra dollars and get 100 extra channels that are meaningless to her. It's getting harder and harder to force these insane TV packages down people throats with acceleration of Internet enabled Media.
On the other side of the coin because we now have various other ways of consuming media, no longer are we trapped in a box of watching scheduled tv (watching a specific program at a specific time), the Media/Content Owners/Creators have to force Channel packaging on the consumers/distributors in order to continue drawl water from the well. Content Owners (CBS, Disney, Fox, Comcast, Time Warner, Viacom, Liberty) are losing Ad-Revenue big time because of evolution of how we consume media (DVRs, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, OnDemand, HBOGO type Apps, Smart TVs) no longer are we forced to be home at 8pm on Thursday nights to watch Friends, Seinfeld, Will and Grace, and ER, and the Advertisers know this and they're not paying the $$$$$ they once were for space during first run programming. There is programming in which we still prefer to watch live like Sports, which is why Disney (ESPN) and the NFL are able to make a killing in this Space as they're still able to maintain those ad-buys.
This all leads to content owners like CBS to think of ways to squeeze more $$$$$ out of repackaging their products to the Distributors (Cable/Dish)... What CBS Corp. wants to do is Package CBS, CW, and Showtime as one price to the Distributors, and the Distributors see 2 problems with this and rightly so CBS and CW are obtained for Free when one doesn't have Cable/Dish so why is it fair that the Distributors must now pay higher fees for these "Free" Broadcast Channels? and Showtime is a Subscription service (Paid for individually by the consumer) so its like CBS Corp would be double dipping in a sense getting revenue from both the Subscription and Packaging. I think TWC is right to fight this, understand they're NOT fighting for the good of the consumer, they're fighting because they're losing subscribers because of these tactics. Also understand that if we the consumers didn't pay for bundled packages a lot of these channels couldn't survive, seriously think about it channels like CSPAN would kick the bucket.
Make no mistake this is a game of Chicken, and the Media World is glued to how this plays out, because this will be a defining moment in how we go forward in Pay TV services. If CBS is successful in getting higher fees out of TWC, mark my words all Content Creators will follow suite (Fox, Disney, Time Warner, Comcast, Viacom, Liberty). If TWC is successful in negating the higher prices paid, this will be the catalyst for a restructuring in how pay for TV. Evolution will soon have it to were all of our media is pumped via the Internet and Broadband connections. The Cable Boxes will fed not by Coaxial Cable but by an Ethernet cable to your Router.
Note: Time Warner Cable is no longer a subsidiary to Time Warner Corp.. Comcast is the lone player that is on both sides of the coin in this battle owning Distribution (Xfinity) and Content (NBC Universal)
Last edited by Blackbeauty212; 08-19-2013 at 06:21 PM..
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