Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com/Aigars Reinholds
June 3, 2013
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For those of you sick of paying
ever-higher cable bills, two huge pieces of news in the last week should encourage you to take action.
First came
news that
two previously cable-only channels, TBS and TNT, “are about to become
the first national entertainment networks in the industry to stream
on-air content live across multiple platforms,” likely positioning the
stations to eventually (though not yet) sell their content direct to
consumers on an à la carte online basis, rather than only through
traditional cable TV packages. Then yesterday came word that
CNN and BuzzFeed are
partnering to create a YouTube channel, allowing anyone with an
Internet connection — but not necessarily a costly cable subscription —
to view the new content.
The action this (and other similar news
in the television world) should prompt, of course, is cutting your cable
TV cord — or at least considering it.
Now, sure, your initial
reaction to that idea might be apprehension or sheer fright. I get it.
That was my first reaction, too. Cable TV became so common and seemingly
mandatory in the pre-Internet age that it started to seem less like a
luxury than a necessary utility you paid for along with water and
electricity. But after decades of living in cable TV households, we
finally decided to become one of the 3 to 5 million Americans who have
cut the cord. Though we kept our Internet connection with our service
provider, we terminated cable service — and I have no regrets. Not even
close.
Two big factors — one of them related to this week’s news — finally pushed us to end our cable subscription.
First
and foremost, there was the cost savings of about $100 a month. That’s a
lot of money in our annual family budget and a boatload of cash over a
lifetime. Indeed, one estimate found that when you factor in inflation,
the monthly ongoing expenditure on cable and what you could additionally
be earning off that expenditure if you were investing it, cable TV over
your lifetime could cost
between $634,000 and $4.2 million.
But cost wasn’t the only consideration. There was also our simultaneous hate and love of cable television content.
On
the hate side, I can’t stand most of today’s cable TV news programming.
It is loud, grating, infuriatingly vapid and, at times, unnecessarily
terrifying. I’ve become particularly aware of — and disgusted by — the
latter quality as more and more “news” content is now just a bunch of
talking heads opining while ever more horrifying disaster porn fills the
screen.
Getting basic information about disasters is certainly
important, but being exposed to the disaster porn imagery that dominates
cable television simply isn’t healthy. Just as
scientific research suggested
that seeing images of the World Trade Center collapsing a zillion times
created a kind of virtual PTSD for everyone glued to their TV a decade
ago, so too do many
experts believe that
being televisually force-fed repeated images of a bombing or a
fertilizer plant explosion or a dude with a bloody meat cleaver can have
serious psychological consequences.
Yet, even though I was coming
to deeply despise cable news programming, when it was easily available
on my television, I often found myself uncontrollably drawn to it. That
meant time unnecessarily wasted and, worse, me finding myself in a bad
or angry mood. So cutting the cord thankfully removed the frictionless
availability of the unwanted noise and terror, while the Internet still,
for the most part, lets me find the clips and video content I truly
want.
That “want” part is the love side — and the part related to
this week’s news about yet more video content going online. Yes, there
is some select content (including news content) available on cable TV
that I do want. But, as alluded to, much of it is available in some form
on the Internet. The news stuff I need for work, for instance, is
available if not as video then as text, and that’s fine by me because
it’s news. Likewise, the entertainment stuff I want — documentary-based
shows, scripted programs, etc. — is mostly available in video form. And
I’m not a huge sports watcher, so I don’t feel like I’m missing anything
by losing the expensive sports stations that
disproportionately weigh down the typical cable bill.
Of
course, despite these compelling reasons, it took us a while to
actually cut the cord. The inertia was a product of fear and laziness:
Basically, I knew there were many other decisions and moves required if
we were going to both cut the cord and still get most of the content we
really wanted. The possible labor intensity and complexity of getting to
my desired content nirvana created paralysis — the kind that cable
television providers rely on. That’s right, they are banking on us
seeing the ease and simplicity of plug-and-play cable TV — and the
perceived hassle of getting content some other way — as a justification
to just keep paying the cable bill.
But a few weeks into our
cable-free life, I’m here to tell you that cutting the cord and still
getting the content you desire isn’t such a hassle, and is well worth
the effort. Assuming you aren’t really into sports (yes, cable TV is
probably still the only way to satisfy sports junkies), you can probably
rid your life of the content you don’t want and get most of what you do
want on your existing television screen, that is, as long as you adhere
to a some guidelines. Here are a few of those I developed through trial
and error while preparing to cut the cord.
1. Get an HD
antenna: While it may be difficult to remember, it’s true: Before the
advent of cable, there was no such thing as pay TV. Back then, people
paid for a television and antenna, and then received the content for
free over the airwaves.
Now here’s the good news that may surprise
you if you can’t remember that pre-cable era: A solid amount of TV
content remains free over the airwaves. And guess what? If you have a
decent television and the right antenna, a lot of that content is
high-def.
For many, the HD TV and HD antenna is a simple
plug-and-play conduit for lots of channels (in our case here in Denver,
more than 50). That includes HD versions of live local and national
programming from major networks like NBC, CBS and ABC.
The
complicating catch, though, can be signal; with some antennas and
locations it is easy to get, but with others, not so much. In our home
here in Denver, it was the latter, which meant I spent a week going back
and forth to Best Buy purchasing indoor HD antennas and then returning
them because they weren’t delivering the promised image quality.
Despondent, my last-ditch attempt to get this bundle of free content was
going online to purchase the much-vaunted
Mohu Leaf Ultimate.
And guess what? It delivered, leading me to believe that in most
population centers you will be able to find an antenna that will work
for your situation.
2. Apple TV, another Airplay-esque device, or
the right computer-to-TV cord: I don’t mind watching short videos on my
computer. However, the computer is my work machine, and because of
location issues (it’s in my office) and work-life balance issues, I just
don’t want my work computer to be my main television. Yet, having cut
the cord, Internet-based content is my television content. How, then,
could do I get that computer content onto my couch-positioned
television?
Enter the Apple TV. This $99 item is Apple’s conduit
to get you to purchase content from the Apple Store (more on that in a
second), but it is also a way to stream anything on your properly
equipped computer or smartphone onto your regular television. As long as
your computer or smartphone has Airplay or Airplay-like capabilities,
you can use the Apple TV to mirror the video and audio from your
computer or smartphone screen onto your television.
In practice, this puts great YouTube programming like, say,
The Young Turks right
on your television. Additionally, it opens up a whole world of cable TV
content — but for free. You want to see Rachel Maddow’s latest takedown
of the GOP? You want to watch the latest “Frontline”? You want any of
the programs available for no cost on demand at the free version of
Hulu? And you want to do all of this on your cable-less television? No
problem; pull up the corresponding websites on your laptop or smartphone
and then Airplay it over to your TV.
If you happen to be
Apple-averse, or if you just don’t want to buy an Apple TV, the
workaround is to just plug your computer or smartphone directly into
your TV with a device-to-HDMI cord. It’s a different method with more
cords, but it achieves the same result: more content you want on your
regular television.
3. You can legally mooch a premium channel off
a family member: So far, I’m giving you suggestions for using your
Internet connection to get totally free content. The gray area between
free and paid content is the mooch.
I’ve
written before about
the moral dilemmas involved in bumming HBO Go off a family member.
Wherever you come down on those questions, the fact remains that,
according to the
New York Times,
that HBO Go “allows subscribers to have three separate accounts so that
family members can watch different shows at the same time.”
In
practice, this means that if you happen to know a family member who is
already paying for HBO, you are allowed to use their account to stream
HBO content to your computer or smartphone. Using the aforementioned
techniques to mirror those devices onto your TV, you can easily get that
content on your regular television screen making your situation,
content-wise, no different than someone paying for HBO to come through
their TV.
Now the reason I said this is a gray area is
because someone (read: a family member) is paying to get you your HBO
content. So it’s not totally free. That said, if a family member is
already paying for HBO because they really want it integrated into their
cable TV landscape, they aren’t paying any extra to let you use their
HBO Go account, so that’s at least sort of free … right?
4a. Pay
for the stuff you want, part 1: If all the aforementioned free content
isn’t enough for you — and it isn’t for me — the next step is to get
comfortable with paying for the programming you do want because for most
people, that will still be less than what you’d pay when you subscribe
to cable.
In terms of dollars spent for sheer volume of
programming, the most consumer-friendly ratio in the pay-for-content
world is a subscription to a service like Netflix and/or Hulu Plus.
Netflix,
for instance, gives you access to movies, documentaries and — most
important to making a seamless transition to a cable-free household —
many TV series. The catch here is that, unless it is a Netflix original
like “House of Cards,” you don’t get those series right when they are
released. Instead, you typically have to wait up to a year to be able to
stream them (if they are available at all). For people who don’t care
about being completely up to date on a TV series, this is a perfect
option.
For those who want to be up to date, though, Hulu Plus
might be a preferable option (or, better yet, a good compliment to
Netflix). Assuming it has the programs you want, Hulu typically provides
those programs with a delay of only a few hours or days.
Netflix streaming service (as distinct from its DVD-by-mail service) and Hulu Plus are each
$7.99 a month. That’s not nothing – but again, it’s probably way less than you will spend on even basic cable TV service.
4b.
Pay for the stuff you want, part 2: OK, so let’s say that, like me, you
are a “Mad Men” fan. Let’s also say that, like me, you are willing to
wait a year for a lot of shows to get to Netflix, but that you aren’t
willing to wait a year or more for this particular show. You want it,
and you want it now. Are you out of luck because the show isn’t on Hulu
Plus?
Nope. Just buy the season from the Apple Store, and don’t feel like doing that means cutting the cord was a bad idea.
Look, full seasons of current series aren’t cheap; “Mad Men,” for instance, costs
$34.99.
But again, most TV watchers will spend way more on cable TV than they
will buying seasons of the relatively few shows that A) they don’t want
to wait to get to Netflix and B) aren’t available on Hulu Plus (or
anywhere else). Just do the math: If you save $75 a month by cutting the
cord, at the “Mad Men” rate, you’d have to be buying more than two full
seasons every month of premium for-pay content to make cutting the cord
not worth it. Most likely, you aren’t going to be buying nearly that
many full seasons.
5. Powerline Adapter/Wired House: One of the
appealing things about cable TV is not just its plug and play simplicity
but also its reliability. You turn on the TV and most of the time, you
get a decent picture and don’t have to worry about it cutting out.
Streaming
video can be a bit different. Especially if you are relying on wireless
connectivity, your viewing experience can be plagued by buffering
delays — or, as we call it in our household, the spinning wheel of
death.
Don’t fret, though; the simple solution is to
follow these easy steps to strengthen your home network.
When it comes specifically to video, just make sure your streaming
content comes through a high-speed connection. You can do this by
hard-wiring your Apple TV to an Ethernet cord. If that’s not feasible,
then get a powerline adapter that turns your outlets into an
Ethernet-like connection.
Sure, you still may see the buffer sign
or the spinning wheel every now and again, but you won’t see it all that
often. On the occasions that you do, remember: It’s a tiny price for
not having to pay that absurd cable bill anymore.
