jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
 ·ProLog
| why watch tv online if I already have cable?
This makes no sense.
I am paying for cable- so I can watch clear, good quality with the cable- or I can deal with herky jerky video streaming instead?
What, do people need to watch tv while they're at work, visiting Grandma, at the supermarket, driving to work? What is the point of this?
Believe me, I have cable and would love to ditch it in favor of internet video, but I think the quality of what is available online has some quality issues that need to be resolved.
I have major problems with Hulu, with jerky, choppy video, and so do a lot of other people from what I read online.
I do watch some stuff online already, because I'm tired of the cropping the network/cable company does. So I'll watch stuff at the network websites, which usually work better than Hulu for me. And for the stuff that isn't available- which is a lot- I grab it from the newsgroups.
The cable industry isn't going to stuff this genie back in the bottle.
Cable and satellite are yesterdays technology. They need to move forward or become extinct. People want to watch stuff online because there are FAR LESS commercials. Not to mention it's free...
I can't stand the amount of commercials on cable anymore. $60 a month for this BS? If I never ever see another car commercial or fast food ad as long as I live I will die happy.
IF I could get any kind of OTA signal where I live I would have ditched cable already. But I can't. So next best choice is online video.
The cable companies better adapt or die. Time for an unlimited tier for their broadband customers. I'd pay an extra $15 or $20 a month for unlimited with no caps.
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Titus Pullo
I came, I saw, I slept
join:2004-06-26
 ·Embarq
| That's an angle you don't hear as often as you should: cable (content) channels supposedly pushing up the rates for cable providers, who pass it along to you, advertising the hell out of you anyway. The ratio of commercials to content on a prime-time network show is ridiculous; I don't, and won't, watch it. Five minutes of show, four minutes of commercials. It's stupefying why anyone would sit through that. Cable started out that way (nearly no commercials), and now they're almost as bad as the networks.
I suppose I'm spoiled by Netflix and PBS shows ...
The dumb pipers will meter bandwidth for sagging revenue. I don't believe a word regarding their increasing numbers -- everyone I talk with is either considering dropping cable or already has. If they have kids, they'll hang onto it as long as they can. Single people increasingly get what they need on the net and these guys have no recourse but to gouge your eyes out for access.
Why they bother with their own flavor of online content is beyond me ... it smells like bad PR -- the stink before the flush, so to speak.
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nasadude
join:2001-10-05
Rockville, MD
·Comcast
| reply to jazzlady
said by jazzlady  :.... Time for an unlimited tier for their broadband customers. I'd pay an extra $15 or $20 a month for unlimited with no caps. unfortunately, that's exactly the attitude the cablecos like to see - someone willing to pay more money for an uncrippled connection.
there shouldn't be caps or throttling and if there were competition in the U.S. market, we wouldn't even be discussing caps.
however, I'm guessing it will cost you more than $15 or $20 a month for no caps, assuming they even allow accounts with no caps. |
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Mchart
Super Joe
join:2004-01-21
Gurnee, IL
·AT&T Yahoo
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to jazzlady
I have no problems using Hulu. In fact, because of Hulu, and I stopped paying for cable TV a while ago. Now i'm just paying $50 a month for my internet bill. Granted, I don't get every TV show out there - But there is usually nothing good on Cable TV anyways. You are paying money for something that shows something you want only 10% of the time. Hence why people are so attached to their Tivo-esque devices these days. |
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ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16
Stratford, CT
1 edit | reply to Titus Pullo
Everyone you talk with is dropping cable?? LOLOL What world do you live in? Hardly anyone is dropping cable.. no matter how many bbr geeks say they are. Most of the world still want high quality pictures on their TV's... not their PC's. Once ISP's start capping their service, this wonderful idea of TVip will be dead. Even FiOS will eventually add caps when too much of their video revenue becomes depleted.
VoIP has only survived bc of its very small amount of data consumption. |
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jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
·ProLog
| reply to jazzlady
said by jazzlady :This makes no sense. I am paying for cable- so I can watch clear, good quality with the cable- or I can deal with herky jerky video streaming instead? I think I need to clarify that statement- it's a bit confusing.
I meant why watch Comcast/Your Cable Provider online- if you're already paying for regular cable service from Comcast or whomever?
Why would someone with cable service watch the same cable offerings online? They wouldn't. It makes no sense. They would just ditch the cable altogether and watch the stuff offered for free.
The free offerings are numerous, and increasing every day, but the streaming quality issues need to be resolved. |
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Titus Pullo
I came, I saw, I slept
join:2004-06-26
·Embarq
| reply to ITALIAN926
said by ITALIAN926 :Everyone you talk with is dropping cable?? LOLOL What world do you live in? Hardly anyone is dropping cable.. no matter how many bbr geeks say they are. In a world that values reading comprehension, evidently 
"everyone I talk with is either considering dropping cable or already has"
You're in CT, I'm in a rural area where unemployment is probably 1.5x to 2x the national average.
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james
join:2001-02-26
antarctica
| reply to ITALIAN926
said by ITALIAN926 :Most of the world still want high quality pictures on their TV's... not their PC's Oh, ok. Enjoy all your commercials while I enjoy high quality pictures on my second PC, which happens to have a DVI to HDMI cable that hooks directly to a 42 inch HDTV. It streams commercial free tv shows I actually like constantly, plus has a library of Tv shows from The Three Stooges and Our Gang, through the Honeymooners and Flintstones, all the way up to today, with everything in between.
So you just keep on watching your "reality tv" garbage, I'll be laughing from my grave (because I'll die from lack of vitamin D because my TV shows are so awesome). |
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jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
·ProLog
| reply to Titus Pullo
said by Titus Pullo :That's an angle you don't hear as often as you should: cable (content) channels supposedly pushing up the rates for cable providers, who pass it along to you, advertising the hell out of you anyway. The ratio of commercials to content on a prime-time network show is ridiculous; I don't, and won't, watch it. Five minutes of show, four minutes of commercials. It's stupefying why anyone would sit through that. Cable started out that way (nearly no commercials), and now they're almost as bad as the networks. Right you are- about both points.
My cable bill went up $5 a month when they added the Disney channel.
Hey- I don't have kids- and I've NEVER watched it. Not one single time. So I've paid hundreds of dollars for a channel I don't watch and would dump in a hot minute if I were able to.
Makes me feel justified when I "acquire" some of their films. They owe me.
Stupefying is a great way to phrase it. The amount of commercials is mind numbing. I tape anything I want to watch that is still broadcast in widescreen, so I don't have to sit through the commercials. I've seen as little as 4 minutes of the show interspersed with 5 minute commercial breaks. It's truly unbearable.
The dumb pipers will meter bandwidth for sagging revenue. I don't believe a word regarding their increasing numbers -- everyone I talk with is either considering dropping cable or already has. If they have kids, they'll hang onto it as long as they can. Single people increasingly get what they need on the net and these guys have no recourse but to gouge your eyes out for access.
Why they bother with their own flavor of online content is beyond me ... it smells like bad PR -- the stink before the flush, so to speak.
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LOL
That cracked me up.
But the more they meter, the more they're going to lose with people switching to uncapped alternatives like FIOS and DSL.
Are they too stupid to realize that giving people unlimited access, and charging a bit more for it is much better than losing the customer altogether?
Apparently so... |
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me1212
join:2008-11-20
Pleasant Hill, MO
 ·VOIPo
| reply to ITALIAN926
Ifthe owners of FiOS were smart they would get together with the IPTV cos(like netflix, hulu, ect.) and get a bundle and keep the no cap, but charge a bit more for that package, and offer it with or with out normal tv. That would deal a blow to cablecos. |
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me1212
join:2008-11-20
Pleasant Hill, MO
·VOIPo
| reply to jazzlady
"But the more they meter, the more they're going to lose with people switching to uncapped alternatives like FIOS and DSL."
Yup, there will always be a ISP with a huge cap(1tb like in Japan) or no cap, there will always be a market for that, even if we have to par a but more(like $15-$20) for a business connection. |
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jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
·ProLog
| reply to james
said by james :said by ITALIAN926 :Most of the world still want high quality pictures on their TV's... not their PC's Oh, ok. Enjoy all your commercials while I enjoy high quality pictures on my second PC, which happens to have a DVI to HDMI cable that hooks directly to a 42 inch HDTV. So you just keep on watching your "reality tv" garbage... Hey- I resent that remark.... 
I will admit... I do like a couple of reality shows. I couldn't live without "No Reservations" and "Bizarre Foods" on the Travel channel, and I do like Iron Chef on the Food network and Ghost Hunters on SciFi.
But for the most part I HATE reality shows.... and lately the stations that used to show better stuff like TLC, Discovery, and History have switched to mind numbing reality tripe.
Like you I would like to set up a PC and HDTV, but really don't know much about doing this. I'd need another PC, and I'm still using my old analog tv. I still have analog cable, and I've read that analog cable on an HDTV looks pretty awful, that's why I haven't gotten a new set yet... |
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me1212
join:2008-11-20
Pleasant Hill, MO
·VOIPo
| reply to nasadude
Yup, if you were in an area that had a few DSLs with no cap or, FiOS, or both along with cable internet, which would you choose?
I can understand a bit more, or a business connection for no cap, if it does not cost more than 30%(even thats a bit much) more than caped internet. |
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Titus Pullo
I came, I saw, I slept
join:2004-06-26
·Embarq
| reply to jazzlady
They'll know they've won when cable is reduced to reruns of:
Cops
Dog the Bounty Hunter
Cheaters
Wildest Police "(insert something here)"
House Porn (HGTV)
The Kardashian enema
Lockup "RAW"
(the last two are in their order on purpose!)
And ESPN, of course, where men gourmandize their way to the Cath Lab
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jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
·ProLog
| reply to Mchart
said by Mchart :I have no problems using Hulu. In fact, because of Hulu, and I stopped paying for cable TV a while ago. Now i'm just paying $50 a month for my internet bill. Granted, I don't get every TV show out there - But there is usually nothing good on Cable TV anyways. You are paying money for something that shows something you want only 10% of the time. Hence why people are so attached to their Tivo-esque devices these days. If I could get Hulu to work properly... their Flash based streaming is not smooth on any of my systems- even my quad core, and I have a 15 Mbps connection, so that's not the problem.
I can watch the same shows at the network sites- like CBS.com- and the streaming is much smoother.
I would love a la carte cable. I want to dump 90% of the channels I have because I don't watch them. And it really pi$$es me off every time my bill goes up because of them. Disney comes to mind with all it's offshoots. Ka-ching, ka-ching...
Hulu is the wave of the future. They're even advertising on tv. And now there is a plethora of other sites as well like tv.com, joost.com, veoh.com, sling.com and several others.
The handwriting is on the wall for the cable companies. They better forget about providing video and stick with just being a dumb pipe or else they'll just disappear altogether. |
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jazzlady
join:2005-08-04
Bartonsville, PA
·ProLog
| reply to me1212
said by me1212 :"But the more they meter, the more they're going to lose with people switching to uncapped alternatives like FIOS and DSL." Yup, there will always be a ISP with a huge cap(1tb like in Japan) or no cap, there will always be a market for that, even if we have to par a but more(like $15-$20) for a business connection. I was investigating a business connection with my cable ISP- only to find out it's more expensive, 1/3 the speed- and has a lower cap that I have now.
Makes no sense... |
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rradina
join:2000-08-08
Chesterfield, MO
| reply to jazzlady
said by jazzlady :If I could get Hulu to work properly... their Flash based streaming is not smooth on any of my systems- even my quad core, and I have a 15 Mbps connection, so that's not the problem. (snip) My bet is that this has more to do with the video card than your processor. For years (and several generations of chips) we've been able to watch smooth DVDs (MPEG2) on entry level desktops. The streams you are watching might be MPEG4, which does require more power to decode but if you say your connection is not the problem, a quad-core should have plenty of power to decode as long as your video subsystem can render it. My son has a TV tuner card in his PC and until I bought him a new graphics card, 1080 HD video was not smooth. He was using the built-into-the-motherboard video which was not very powerful. It didn't matter that he had a dual core CPU. However, after we upgraded his video card to, by today's standards, a modest nVidia 8600GT, the problem vanished. |
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batch
@speakeasy.net | reply to jazzlady
I too hate commercials. I built a home theater pc/DVR to record the shows I watch. I don't watch commercials any longer, and can watch a show whenever and however I like. You may want to look into doing something similar. |
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TKJunkMail
Enjoy the sun
Premium
join:2002-03-03
Avalon, NJ
 ·Sprint Mobile Broa..
·Comcast
|  reply to jazzlady
Cable will start bill-by-byte tiers
You still need to get the video to your house somehow. If people stop using linear cable TV and use the internet to watch Network series & movies, the ISPs(also the same people as linear TV providers - like Comcast, TWC, AT&T, Verizon fios, etc) will just start charging more for the internet connections. And the best way to do that will be to start charging by bill-by-byte tiers. That way the more video you watch, the more they make to pay for all the costs of providing fatter pipes(including upgrading networks to fiber) for the last mile.
P.S.>> If people stop watching Broadcast Network & Cable TV networks over cable, the Networks have to recoup the cost of providing the shows somehow. So, expect to see advertisements embedded in their online video offerings even more than they are now. No more 2 mins of ads added to 40 min drama series shown online. It will be back to the 20 mins of ads like they have on cable TV.
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My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page |
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badtrip
East Bay
Premium
join:2004-03-20
Albany, CA
·Unwired Ltd
·Comcast
| reply to jazzlady
Re: why watch tv online if I already have cable?
When my Dish contract is up, I'm gone. I'm tired of paying for commercials and channels I never watch. I basically watch HBO and a little Comedy Central and Cartoon Network.
At first my wife protested a bit but when I showed her how well Hulu works on the PS3, her complaints dissipated. Further, the PS3 plays damn near any media file I throw at it. I can no longer justify paying monthly for video entertainment. |
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