Deals.Woot

I think, overall, yes it is a dying format. However it's gonna be quite some time before it dies out because the death throes of a large, entrenched, infrastructure can take quite some time (and be pretty damn vicious).

Also consumers will have to be happy with fewer channel selections and fewer niche channels since subsidies from large channel packages typically help pay for those. Not that they can't pop up again, but they'll essentially have to go away and be reborn - depending on the a la carte model that pops up.

I'm not an Apple fan by any means, but I really think it's going to take somebody like them to come out with their own a la carte system before anything really takes hold.

More like a format that needs to die... Unfortunately cable providers are also ISPs (and content rights holders in the case of Comcast) and will do as much as they can to keep you from saving money and streaming only what you want.

It won't go away until all you old folks stop paying for the damn, worthless, overpriced, garbage service!

/rant of a young whipper snapper

Our household uses a ton of streaming, but we also have three (!) DVR's so we can watch current shows and get my fill of Discovery HD, etc.

With that being said, what about advertising? I know there are some advertising spots online via some formats, but nothing like cable. Will this have an impact on entertainment costs?

I hope not. If it does, will we still get original programming from what are now cable networks? Most of the original programming I watch is not from the "big 3". Right now 99% of streaming is a re-use of material produced for broadcast or theatrical release. If broadcast and theatrical release die out, I find it hard to imagine a like amount of original material being produced for the streaming market.

I doubt it. I've heard this before but it still is around and doing well (or seems to be).

There will always be "another deal" where you shift from one to another.

I had kicked cable for over a year when I was living in Utah did the same thing got an attena to get me the local networks and built myself a media pc that recorded it just like a TIVO box.

But then I moved to montana... No one seems to be interested in doing a good attenna broadcast so I am out of luck. Bought cable used it for 4 months and cut it off again. I can't stand paying for it.

In order to truly get the shows I am missing I probably need to spend as much as I was spending on my cable to get them from itunes or wherever ... so now I am thinking about going back .

Netflix/ Amazon Video neither one have fresh just aired stuff for free. Hulu only has certain networks ...

Anyway I can find things but I hate having 4 diffrent sources to find the content if there was "one ring to rule them all" I would be happier. But I guess there is buy cable ...

Until that happens it wont go away. But I am totally on the down with cable bandwagon.

I wanted to drop them like a bad habbit but my reception is horrible (1 sometimes 2 channels) and I can't use sat with a cable card which means my TiVo would be worthless so I dropped down to the basic $13 package and Netflix streaming which has worked fine for us.

@shrdlu: http://www.amazon.com/Paper-Thin-Leaf-Indoor-Antenna/dp/B004QK7HI8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325784821&sr=8-1

This one. The 4 major channels that come in are crystal clear. I highly recommend it if that's all you want because this thing is tiny and can easily be hid behind something (like a painting).

I think it will end up somewhere along the lines of home phone lines. People still buy home phones even though everyone in the house has a cell phone. No one really knows why they keep them, it's just one of those things that you have.

Though I would like to be able to pick and choose which channels I subscribe to, the technical difficulties that revolve around supplying a unique service to each customer is immense. VS. the current system of sending all channels and just programming the receiver to one of a few select packages.

It's cheaper and easier to manage 1,000,000 customers on 4 different channel plans than 1,000,000 unique customers with 1,000,000 unique channel plans.

nah. Network TV maybe, but cable is thriving. The problem is there is way too much and like one of the other posters said, they need a la carte. ESPN is one of those packages on cable (like $3 of your bill goes to them alone), but I'd kill that channel in a second.

Now if I can only have HBO GO w/o having cable. That was the only smart move by premiums in a while: the need to keep the cord to get something.

@psumek: I'd say the opposite. Network TV's never been better. The picture quality alone says that. Broadcast TV can dedicate 20MBps of picture quality to one channel. Cable takes that same signal off an antenna and crushes the life out of it before sending it over the wire.

If you ever get the chance to have two HDTV's side by side - hook one up to cable and one up to an antenna and tune both to the same local channel. You can tell from 20 feet away which one is the cable feed.

@czarkingkaiser The automation of billing is part of the problem. Again, currently you don't have 1,000,000 different bills with different services. You have 1,000,000 services with essentially the same bill with a few things that have been custom edited. They screw up bills all the time because of the few unique changes. Imagine how it will be if not just your bill, but your service is unique.

Also, TV programming doesn't necessarily function the way the general public thinks it does. Lets take Dish Network. They have unique contracts with the owner of every "channel". For instance, they have a custom contract with ESPN/ABC/DISNEY (all owned by Disney) to be able to offer their channels.