Satellite (and cable) death spiral

[SavageSteve]

Legal streaming is cost prohibitive. It also doesn't make any sense. Why would you stream a Canes game if you HAVE to have a cable or satellite subscription anyway?

To get everything that I'd want to get, which I have through DirecTV currently, it would cost MORE and be so totally inconvenient, that I just pay for DirecTV.

In Nashville I have to use the Fox Sports Go app to be able to watch the Predators with DirecTV Now. One thing I've learned while streaming is that they, nor NHL.tv, or MLB.tv seem to care how many devices you are logged into and in different locations. Makes sharing an account an option perhaps?

 

[Bounces R Way]

Really no one to blame but themselves. They've gouged the public for so long and made it a nightmare to just pay for the channels you want. I'm 30 and almost no one I know other than the really well off(and even most of them) pays for television anymore. Their business model is antiquated.

 

[217 Forever]

Really no one to blame but themselves. They've gouged the public for so long and made it a nightmare to just pay for the channels you want. I'm 30 and almost no one I know other than the really well off(and even most of them) pays for television anymore. Their business model is antiquated.

I'm going out on a limb by guessing that most of the folks commenting on this thread are single men. Trust me, if you have a family with diverse viewing interests, one platform is a ton easier than trying to go with multiple streaming services. I've also been with Directv for so long that all it takes is one phone call per year to get anywhere from $20-$50 off a month for being loyal.

 

[Bounces R Way]

I'm going out on a limb by guessing that most of the folks commenting on this thread are single men. Trust me, if you have a family with diverse viewing interests, one platform is a ton easier than trying to go with multiple streaming services. I've also been with Directv for so long that all it takes is one phone call per year to get anywhere from $20-$50 off a month for being loyal.

Americans have a lot more options television wise. Canadians are stuck with 3-4 telecom giants that have monopolized and colluded to set their own prices. We pay more(more than any developed country in the world I believe) for an inferior product.

 

[Tawnos]

Americans have a lot more options television wise. Canadians are stuck with 3-4 telecom giants that have monopolized and colluded to set their own prices. We pay more(more than any developed country in the world I believe) for an inferior product.

Except for one place, everywhere I've lived has involved a choice limited to one cable company or either of the 2 big satellite companies.

 

[Kane One]

Americans have a lot more options television wise. Canadians are stuck with 3-4 telecom giants that have monopolized and colluded to set their own prices. We pay more(more than any developed country in the world I believe) for an inferior product.

This isn’t true. You may have heard of plenty of different American cable providers, however it’s restricted to a much smaller subset depending on where you live. Where I am in Brooklyn, if you want cable, it must be Optimum. For fiber, it must be Fios. I don’t know much about satellite since I hate it and it will never be a consideration from me.

 

[stealth1]

IMO the biggest reasons people are cutting the cord are, one is the price but the bigger reason is more and more people really don't watch tv much anymore. Gone are the days of people staying in for the evening and watching tv, especially the younger generation. Most of the people I work with that are in their 20's don't watch the news and the tv shows they do watch they just download or stream it. Instead of watching when it airs, they will download it later cause you know people are too busy now.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I'm going out on a limb by guessing that most of the folks commenting on this thread are single men. Trust me, if you have a family with diverse viewing interests, one platform is a ton easier than trying to go with multiple streaming services. I've also been with Directv for so long that all it takes is one phone call per year to get anywhere from $20-$50 off a month for being loyal.

*raises hand*

Wife and three kids. The two younger kids (4th and 5th grade) are FAR FAR FAR more interested in watching YouTube or playing PS4 than they are in watching a television show. I'd be completely stumped if I had to name the popular TV shows in their demographic, whereas TV shows were the common cultural currency when I was their age. And that's fine with my wife and me, because we're more interested in binging streaming shows than sitting around watching live television. Meanwhile the kids are already used to thinking of a "show" as the thing that YouTubers do in 10 minutes or less.

The generation gap on this issue is large and it's increasing rapidly, especially for families with young children.

 

[NCRanger]

*raises hand*

Wife and three kids. The two younger kids (4th and 5th grade) are FAR FAR FAR more interested in watching YouTube or playing PS4 than they are in watching a television show. I'd be completely stumped if I had to name the popular TV shows in their demographic, whereas TV shows were the common cultural currency when I was their age. And that's fine with my wife and me, because we're more interested in binging streaming shows than sitting around watching live television. Meanwhile the kids are already used to thinking of a "show" as the thing that YouTubers do in 10 minutes or less.

The generation gap on this issue is large and it's increasing rapidly, especially for families with young children.

I have a 5th grader. We don't have a PlayStation or gaming system -- it's on the list when we become debt free (or at least reasonably debt free). She watches the food channels, movies, and occasionally some Disney dreck, but not often. Her YouTube watching is music. She's into rock and metal so probably not the typical 11 year old. She'd also rather cook or bake than watch TV, other than watch sports with me. She is also NOT getting a "device" until she's at least in 6th grade and is playing school sports, drama, clubs, etc.

I watch the local news or have it on when we're eating dinner, occasionally Fox News and CNN, a little CNBC, a little ESPN, and maybe the occasional movie. The only actual show I watch is Deadliest Catch and I have no idea why. I don't watch it live. I DVR it.

But I DO watch a TON of sports other than the NBA. NHL Center Ice and MLB Extra Innings are on auto-renew. I only miss a Ranger game if they're on the west coast, or I have another commitment. I try to watch all Hurricanes games that don't coincide with Ranger games. I try not to miss NC State football and basketball games. Summer, it's the Yankees and/or Cubs until I fall asleep. I generally won't miss a Liverpool game either, unless it's on when my daughter is playing or is Sunday morning (church).

 

[LadyStanley]

Except for one place, everywhere I've lived has involved a choice limited to one cable company or either of the 2 big satellite companies.

Verizon Fios, AT&T U-Verse in many large cities. So potentially five sources.

(My city/region is just over 2m population, somewhat isolated. Realistically only have one cable or satellite sources for TV.)

 

[LadyStanley]

Related. Sigh

Paywall

 

[Lions67]

I cut out the satellite almost a year ago. Picked myself up one of those fire sticks at Best Buy and grabbed myself a streaming subscription. Now I get all the sports I can ask for and I’m saving 80 bucks every month too!
Do I feel badly for this?... not really. The cable/satellite industry has been ripping us off for years now. I asked to just have a sports package and was told no. I have to bundle it something. Told them I don’t watch anything other than sports so bundling does me no good. Too bad they said.
Yeah...
Too bad for you!...
never going back now.

 

[Tawnos]

Verizon Fios, AT&T U-Verse in many large cities. So potentially five sources.

(My city/region is just over 2m population, somewhat isolated. Realistically only have one cable or satellite sources for TV.)

It's not just about the general metro area you live in. For example, when I lived in Charleston, one neighborhood I lived in was limited to Comcast and another neighborhood I lived in was limited to Time Warner (at the time).

U-Verse isn't available in the building I live in now, even though they are elsewhere in Charlotte. Hell, I had U-Verse in the one place I mentioned where I had more choice... that was less than 1 mile from where I live now.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I have a 5th grader. We don't have a PlayStation or gaming system -- it's on the list when we become debt free (or at least reasonably debt free). She watches the food channels, movies, and occasionally some Disney dreck, but not often. Her YouTube watching is music. She's into rock and metal so probably not the typical 11 year old. She'd also rather cook or bake than watch TV, other than watch sports with me. She is also NOT getting a "device" until she's at least in 6th grade and is playing school sports, drama, clubs, etc.

I watch the local news or have it on when we're eating dinner, occasionally Fox News and CNN, a little CNBC, a little ESPN, and maybe the occasional movie. The only actual show I watch is Deadliest Catch and I have no idea why. I don't watch it live. I DVR it.

But I DO watch a TON of sports other than the NBA. NHL Center Ice and MLB Extra Innings are on auto-renew. I only miss a Ranger game if they're on the west coast, or I have another commitment. I try to watch all Hurricanes games that don't coincide with Ranger games. I try not to miss NC State football and basketball games. Summer, it's the Yankees and/or Cubs until I fall asleep. I generally won't miss a Liverpool game either, unless it's on when my daughter is playing or is Sunday morning (church).

The common theme across a lot of testimonials is that people feel like they only really "need" cable for live events like pro sports and news. Granted that's probably connected to holding the conversation in a sports forum -- but I think it's a fair description of the value of a cable subscription these days. Most of the non-live content can be accessed through streaming services like Hulu for FAR cheaper. Access to sports is the hardest thing to replace after cutting the cord.

I wonder if the future direction is similar to that of newspapers. A big chunk of the sales value in a newspaper subscription is tied to the first few pages and the sports section. Most of the rest is "value added", designed to hook niche audiences on habitual reading. In the case of sports coverage, it sure looks like the future of the industry is stand-alone sites like The Athletic which are both cheaper and higher quality than a paper subscription.

If that business principle holds up for the cable industry as well, the future would seem to point to standalone sports networks that offer their own streaming subscriptions. If we assume $10-$20/month per network, most people could cobble together their own packages for far less than a cable subscription, and that would be the end of cable as a sustainable industry. The only thing preventing the dam from bursting is the current structure of national TV deals, which uses old-fashioned blackouts to keep streaming services in check.

 

[SCBlueLiner]

I often check the different streaming services packages and the one that is closest to offering pretty much everything my family watches is Hulu Live. The problem is Hulu Live does not have two major channels that I watch often, MLB Network and NHL Network. The moment they add those two stations, or another service offers the right combination including those two stations, the cord will be cut.

But for today, cable offers everything my family watches with the click of a remote. I completely understand how younger, single people don't have cable/satellite and instead stream everything. I'll just say that when you are older with a family you need a service that offers a wide range of programming with easy access. Easy access is a key here, unless you want to get called into the room every time your wife or kids want to change the station. I'm not kidding.

 

[SavageSteve]

The common theme across a lot of testimonials is that people feel like they only really "need" cable for live events like pro sports and news. Granted that's probably connected to holding the conversation in a sports forum -- but I think it's a fair description of the value of a cable subscription these days. Most of the non-live content can be accessed through streaming services like Hulu for FAR cheaper. Access to sports is the hardest thing to replace after cutting the cord.

I wonder if the future direction is similar to that of newspapers. A big chunk of the sales value in a newspaper subscription is tied to the first few pages and the sports section. Most of the rest is "value added", designed to hook niche audiences on habitual reading. In the case of sports coverage, it sure looks like the future of the industry is stand-alone sites like The Athletic which are both cheaper and higher quality than a paper subscription.

If that business principle holds up for the cable industry as well, the future would seem to point to standalone sports networks that offer their own streaming subscriptions. If we assume $10-$20/month per network, most people could cobble together their own packages for far less than a cable subscription, and that would be the end of cable as a sustainable industry. The only thing preventing the dam from bursting is the current structure of national TV deals, which uses old-fashioned blackouts to keep streaming services in check.

I agree that the current business models are dying before our eyes. However, the bridge to their new business models are the national tv deals with their future being in streaming to consumers without the intermediates and consolidation of content.

I think that these behemoth conglomerates have taken notice of the crumbling print media empires and are preparing to morph into the next technologies with deals to allow streaming over fiber or 5G networks to their boxes directly to your device on their exclusive network. They will save billions of dollars by not having to send a trained man in a van to your house to get the dish or a cable box installed, by being able to send you a box that uses spectrum on their networks that is allocated specifically to media content. Even if they can retain status quo on prices charged, the savings on that would be huge. AT&T has essentially used DirecTV Now as a incubator to do this and even has reported sending up their last satellite to support the dishes a couple of years ago. I've used it on Apple TV's, Roku's, phones, etc. and it's been pretty rock solid most of the time with adequate bandwidth. Not so much when I'm at my in-laws farm. 5G will deliver speeds at 50 Mbps minimum (which is twice what a 4K stream requires) with latency that is comparable with fiber (4G latency is ~50 milliseconds , 5G is < 10 milliseconds, human eye takes ~10 milliseconds for brain to process an image) and be a viable alternative to the internet providers cord-cutters like me are all tethered to now. Once 5G is built-out enough, expect lots of push for AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, etc. to reassert themselves and perhaps kill NetFlix and even YouTube as we know it now in terms of delivering media content.

 

[217 Forever]

Someone help me out and tell me where I'm going wrong if I am. I'm a Devils fan in the NY/NJ area. Streaming services don't carry local sports stations like MSG Network so if I cut the cord I'd have to get NHL Centre Ice, except I believe that because I'm in the local market the Devils games would be blacked out would they not? If I'm right then I have to keep cable or satellite in order to see the games correct?

 

[Gardner McKay]

I completely cut the cord a few weeks ago. Honestly, I don't miss it. Not only did I cut the cord, I raised our internet speeds to 400 Mbps and still saved nearly $110 per month. Good riddance.

 

[LadyStanley]

NHL Center Ice is realistically for fans of non-local teams. They black out local teams and national games.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I agree that the current business models are dying before our eyes. However, the bridge to their new business models are the national tv deals with their future being in streaming to consumers without the intermediates and consolidation of content.

I think that these behemoth conglomerates have taken notice of the crumbling print media empires and are preparing to morph into the next technologies with deals to allow streaming over fiber or 5G networks to their boxes directly to your device on their exclusive network. They will save billions of dollars by not having to send a trained man in a van to your house to get the dish or a cable box installed, by being able to send you a box that uses spectrum on their networks that is allocated specifically to media content. Even if they can retain status quo on prices charged, the savings on that would be huge. AT&T has essentially used DirecTV Now as a incubator to do this and even has reported sending up their last satellite to support the dishes a couple of years ago. I've used it on Apple TV's, Roku's, phones, etc. and it's been pretty rock solid most of the time with adequate bandwidth. Not so much when I'm at my in-laws farm. 5G will deliver speeds at 50 Mbps minimum (which is twice what a 4K stream requires) with latency that is comparable with fiber (4G latency is ~50 milliseconds , 5G is < 10 milliseconds, human eye takes ~10 milliseconds for brain to process an image) and be a viable alternative to the internet providers cord-cutters like me are all tethered to now. Once 5G is built-out enough, expect lots of push for AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, etc. to reassert themselves and perhaps kill NetFlix and even YouTube as we know it now in terms of delivering media content.

You're likely right about this -- and note that the first push is coming from AT&T, which is less vested in the capital aspects of cable than the traditional carriers. The companies that didn't make this kind of move early are the ones that are in real trouble right now. Laying a bazillion yards of cable and doubling down on box-based technology tethered them to a business model which can ONLY make sense if they force their customers into costly, long-term bundled contracts. That's fine if you're a monopoly with all the leverage, not so much if people can stream competing services directly to their devices without any capital investment at all.

I expect AT&T will be one of the companies to come out on top of all this, if only because they were vested in the wireless/digital environment in the first place, and came into the media game with more forward-thinking products like UVerse and the DirectTV partnership. As an AT&T customer I'm fine with that, because that company has always behaved like they needed to compete for their customers... unlike the Comcasts and Time Warners of the world.

Someone help me out and tell me where I'm going wrong if I am. I'm a Devils fan in the NY/NJ area. Streaming services don't carry local sports stations like MSG Network so if I cut the cord I'd have to get NHL Centre Ice, except I believe that because I'm in the local market the Devils games would be blacked out would they not? If I'm right then I have to keep cable or satellite in order to see the games correct?

I think you're right about that. I'm currently trying to figure out if it's possible to get around this issue with Sling or Hulu, which offer local stations. What's not completely clear to me is whether those stations are forced to black out local games.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

You're likely right about this -- and note that the first push is coming from AT&T, which is less vested in the capital aspects of cable than the traditional carriers. The companies that didn't make this kind of move early are the ones that are in real trouble right now. Laying a bazillion yards of cable and doubling down on box-based technology tethered them to a business model which can ONLY make sense if they force their customers into costly, long-term bundled contracts. That's fine if you're a monopoly with all the leverage, not so much if people can stream competing services directly to their devices without any capital investment at all.

I expect AT&T will be one of the companies to come out on top of all this, if only because they were vested in the wireless/digital environment in the first place, and came into the media game with more forward-thinking products like UVerse and the DirectTV partnership. As an AT&T customer I'm fine with that, because that company has always behaved like they needed to compete for their customers... unlike the Comcasts and Time Warners of the world.



I think you're right about that. I'm currently trying to figure out if it's possible to get around this issue with Sling or Hulu, which offer local stations. What's not completely clear to me is whether those stations are forced to black out local games.

YouTube TV doesn't black out anything.

In New England we get NESN and NBCSports Boston.

Watching the Sox and Bruins on NESN and Celtics on NBCSN is the same as with regular cable. No black outs or missed games

 

[YEM]

I completely cut the cord a few weeks ago. Honestly, I don't miss it. Not only did I cut the cord, I raised our internet speeds to 400 Mbps and still saved nearly $110 per month. Good riddance.

moving at the end of next month and I can't wait to cut the damn cord
I also have the new digital version of bunny ears and get about 20 channels with that [all the networks, etc.]

 

[Sam Spade]

Most of them are available to double as your Internet Provider though. So I reckon they figure they'll just offset the cable losses by charging more and more for your premium hi-speed internet connection?

I definitely agree with this.

I moved in 2015 and decided no more DTV. I was paying around $140, with no special channels PLUS paying Verizon $50 for internet access.

SlingTv (all streaming) was newish but I went with it and really enjoy it the ala carte feature it offers. Right now I am at $45 dollars for 50/50 speed internet, $25 for Sling (Blue package), which offers CSNBC so I get all the Capitals games. I also went to WalMart and bought a $35 mid range antenna that sits unnoticed on top of my tv for $35. It picks up D.C. and Baltimore so I get to watch as many as four different NFL games on Sunday, which is a nice benefit.

Total for my stuff $70 a month.

Now when the internet provider starts jacking up the price I will simply partner up with my neighbor, get quantum speed and we will split the bill. We have already discussed it. I know this doesn't work if you live in a rural area but I know tons of people that do this already, wifi extenders work and are like $40.

Corporations are smart, the people are smarter.

 

[SavageSteve]

Someone help me out and tell me where I'm going wrong if I am. I'm a Devils fan in the NY/NJ area. Streaming services don't carry local sports stations like MSG Network so if I cut the cord I'd have to get NHL Centre Ice, except I believe that because I'm in the local market the Devils games would be blacked out would they not? If I'm right then I have to keep cable or satellite in order to see the games correct?

Looks like they have MSG Go for this purpose. With DirecTV Now, I use Fox Sports Go on my Apple TV or Roku with my provider login from DirecTV Now to get Predators games in Nashville.
MSG Networks to Live Stream NHL Games I looked at MSGGO.com and it looks like Fubo TV will allow you to stream games on MSG Go. There is a 7 day trial, so maybe try it out in October?

 

[AtlantaWhaler]

It was already a big problem, but TV manufactures bypassing the Apple TV and Roku by having the access provided within the TV (SmartTV) has really put a nail in the cord coffin.

Disney+ will add another nail.