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Americans cut the Cable and Satellite as prices soar

D

dmcowen674

No Lifer
Another related article showing Americans are going without not just switching providers as the rich Republican paid Corporate shills in here are trying to suggest:

8-3-2012

http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/advi...s-matures-weak-economy-214433522--sector.html

Americans drop pay-TV



Stubbornly high U.S. unemployment, a weak housing market combined with a mature business prone to regular programming blackouts has seen more than 400,000 American homes drop their cable or satellite TV service since the start of the year.


The maturity of the nearly fifty-year-old cable TV market has raised the stakes leading to more bitter and prolonged battles between distributors and their program producing partners. These disputes now typically end up with customers losing some of their favorite programming for days on end and adds to customer weariness with pay-TV.


White, a former senior PepsiCo executive, had a similar comment during DirecTV's call with analysts.


"All of us in this industry, both on the media side and on the distributor side, need to spend a little more time in the customers homes, understanding what's happening with their income and this economy."


The U.S. unemployment rate has stayed above 8 percent for several quarters as the sluggish economy forces Americans to reconsider previously thought essentials.


Distributors including White and Britt have pointed to regular above-inflation rate programming cost increases as a danger to the pay TV ecosystem.

The steady parade of customer losses has led to speculation that customers are 'cutting the cord' and dropping the expense of paying for TV altogether.


8-3-2012

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Cable-Industry-Lost-400000-Users-So-Far-in-2012-120632

Cable Industry Lost 400,000 Users So Far in 2012

Cord Cutting Denial Strong as Industry Refuses to Compete on Price

Reuters notes that more than 400,000 pay TV subscribers have dropped their television subscriptions since the beginning of this year.

Following on the heels of Comcast losing 176,000 cable users and Time Warner Cable losing 169,000, DirecTV this week announced their first ever net subscriber decline.
 
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It's to be expected there are countless different ways to cut the cord now; Roku, Apple TV, Boxee, WMC, OTA HD, etc.

I gave it up two years ago with XBMC and couldn't be happier.
 
The poor still have ample content they can view, an HD TV is pretty cheap now adays along with a cheap Roku and Netflix subscription most everyone is covered for 1/8'th? the price of cable.
 
I'd like to cut the chord, but there are two problems. One, I like to watch sports, which I can't easily get in HD live without cable (ever more college and pro football games etc are on cable channels now), and my cable co has me trapped. If I don't take their bundle of services (phone, cable, internet), they charge me a lot more for just internet, to the point where I'm not saving much going from having cable+internet+phone to just internet.

If there was a way to get sports in HD live, I'd ditch cable in a second.
 
What will the cable companies do?
Raise prices or cut services for the same price.
Introduce hard bandwidth caps and charge for overages.
Persecute and prosecute anyone who shares a large file, just in case its copyrighted material.
End competition amongst themselves and Fios.

And I am sure they will come up with more stuff tomorrow.
 
It should be pointed out that those numbers do not include either Verizon (FIOS) or AT&T (UVerse) who both added approximately 275,000 customers to their pay TV rosters.

Total offset is still approximately a net loss of 125,000 subscription television (cable) customers.
 
This is the best news I've heard. Unfortunately it is likely the people who are responsible with their money and could actually afford it if they wanted to who are cutting it. The people who have no business paying for it are likely eating Ramen while watching the Food network.
 
Matt1970 said:
Good lord, is there anything you won't blame the rich for?
Click to expand...

No, they are destroying the country.

Only when they are gone can it re-build.

History shows that over and over again.

History repeats itself, always does.

Humans are dumb and let history repeat itself.
 
dmcowen674 said:
No, they are destroying the country.

Only when they are gone can it re-build.

History shows that over and over again.

History repeats itself, always does.

Humans are dumb and let history repeat itself.
Click to expand...

You really have hit an all time level of dumb. You are blaming people switching service providers on the rich.
 
Matt1970 said:
You really have hit an all time level of dumb. You are blaming people switching service providers on the rich.
Click to expand...

Most are not switching service providers, they are going without.

You are rich and wouldn't know what that is like and sadly most likely never will so your hate for Americans will only grow deeper by the day.
 
I watch Internet tv/movies. My favorite thing to watch is Korean TV Series with sub-titles. Not much intelligent to watch on TV anyway.
 
dmcowen674 said:
Most are not switching service providers, they are going without.

You are rich and wouldn't know what that is like and sadly most likely never will so your hate for Americans will only grow deeper by the day.
Click to expand...

I made 40K last year you dumb fuck.
 
Also Broadcast is much easier to pick up, there are quite a few HD channels and more channels overall. Let's also not forget Netflix.
 
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