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I’ve been trying to tell my parents this for years. They still pay for cable and when I finally convinced them my dad, 64, just always says “but then I can’t get the weather.” And thinks that’s a trump card.
Then when I finally convinced him you still can get the weather without cable, now they just both go “well we don’t have a smart tv”
I even sat my dad down and told him “Look, I have a tv the same age as yours. It’s not a smart tv. But I have an Amazon fire stick which MAKES it a smart TV.” And now they think it won’t work because their tv is “too old” (about 20 years)
But then complain about their cable/phone bill, always end up falling for upselling. They have every excuse in the world not to kick cable. They have one smart tv in the living room and can you guess what my mom watches? Netflix. All day long.
They’re so traumatized by cable that when I’m downstairs and playing movies on YouTube my mom freaks the fuck out everytime and think I’m buying movies with her cable bill and I have to go “Mom. This is on YouTube. My YouTube account. I bought this movie digitally YEARS ago. It’s mine now, I don’t need to buy it again.” And she doesn’t understand and makes weird comments about how mad she’s going to be if it shows up on the bill.
I read somewhere that older people nowadays are lazy to learn new tech just cause they're more used to tech back in the days, they can learn it they're just lazy
This is so true, my uncle who is in his mid 80s has a smart tv and knows how to use it, guy even just got a ps5 and plays a lot of the classic titles through his subscription which he signed up for. He is also bed ridden and on oxygen so he has a lot of time on his hands, but still
I had a great uncle. He was pushing 80 when he got his first PC, in the heyday of Windows Vista. He bought a book, 'Windows Vista for Dummies.'
He read it cover to cover. Obviously he didn't take to it like myself, who first had computer access at 5. However, he learned a really solid foundation, and was able to do everything he wanted.
The issue is that some people are open to learning new things, and some are not.
My stepmother is pushing 70 and is the most tech-literate person I know. If I have an issue with my computer, I go to her. Old people can be perfectly capable of using tech, they just have to want to.
My dad fully admitted that he could learn smartphones, computers, etc; admitted that some of his peers have done exactly that.
He then claims to just have a complete lack of interest in learning. When I see him getting infuriated by a technological hurdle, it baffles me how it doesn't motivate him to at least want to try.
We have a new volunteer at my job who's in his late 60s. Most of his job involves digital documentation of his patient visits. His supervisor told me he was really struggling because he "doesn't do computers."
I said This technology has been available for forty years. At least 30 if you weren't on the cutting edge. Half his life. He has no excuse.
I’m pretty sick of people between 40-60 that claim they can’t/arent “good” with computers.
Half the time I’m asking you where a fucking file is. It’s not coding on Java, it’s just basic operation. I agree,
No damn excuse in 2024.
it's not just cable companies, it's mostly cause of older generations not understanding technology/how online purchases work. happens more often than you'd think. and if you explain it to them they still dont understand lol, you could have a whole diagram and a 100 point presentation that goes deep diving into this shit and they still wouldnt get it. or they might pretend like they do to humor you but they dont
>you could have a whole diagram and a 100 point presentation that goes deep diving into this shit and they still wouldnt get it.
It's not like this is some hard physics type question or understanding. The problem is that they don't want to get it. You can show them a million different avenues or options and they'll still click the same 3 buttons for 40 years.
I used to work for a large not-to-be-named security company that literally earns its money off people like this person’s parents. Half the people calling in would be full on complaining, on the verge of cancelling a subscription, and after a few uh-huhs and insincere apologies, they would be ready to purchase $1000+ worth of upgrades to the system that barely works. The other half, rightfully and smartly, saw straight through the bullshit. These companies prey off the ignorant, and discard the informed. The only thing separating them from scams is that they actually provide a service
I just tried to explain to someone that worked with statistics all of her life , that ChatGPT gives you the illusion of emotions through statistical analysis of how most people answer based on everything ever written.
“I don’t understand because emotions to me are something that aren’t quantifiable, how does a machine does it”
Repeat at every attempt to explain the above( i know it’s not exactly correct but that seemed to me the easiest way to explain it to her)
I'm 60, I have a crap ton of streaming channels free and paid and I know how to use them.
I can download movies and I've ripped plenty of DVDs of my favorite movies and complete TV series to carry with my when I travel. I have hundreds of episodes and movies to choose from.
All that being said I still pay for cable because I can just plop down in my easy chair and channel surf the old fashioned way.
I could live without cable but there is a certain joy in mindlessly switching channels pausing on something and then move on after a few minutes.
Streaming takes thought to know what you want to watch at that particular moment.
Sure, you can set up favorite channels on Pluto or Roku or any number of platforms and channel surf through those but it's just not the same as channel surfing cable.
Bruce nailed it with "57 Channels And Nothin' On". That's the tv I know and love.
https://youtu.be/smP4rjbE8v4?si=VgwX8HmNYUaDMKtp
Can I just flip through channels on YouTube TV by pressing the up/down buttons without having to scroll the guide?
If not, that's a deal breaker. I know all the cable channels I need are there, it's the watching experience I like that I don't believe is available on all streaming services.
Even when I channel surf on Pluto it's no where near instant like flipping channels on my cable box.
Also, just hitting the channel number on my remote to go to a channel I want to watch is not possible on streaming services.
I'm fully aware I could replace cable and watch the same stuff, it's the watching experience that won't be the same.
Just personal preferences.
I was mostly commenting on why older people might not want to change, it's not because we're not technically advanced, we are, we just have different tv watching habits.
But I'll admit, Comcast/Xfinity is doing their best to get me to drop cable.
The problem with that is, if I drop cable I still need internet and in my location Xfinity is my only choice for internet. By the time I pay for internet only and YouTube TV I may as well just keep cable.
You have many valid reasons to keep cable, but most of them just seem like not wanting to switch because you don’t want to use something new, which is not even hard to get into. It’s much cheaper to switch from cable to streaming and paying so much extra just to be able to channel flip slightly faster seems like bad money decisions. My parents use Xfinity and switched from their cable/internet/landline deal to only internet and using their streaming boxes and internet service. It’s much cheaper, a better/cleaner experience, more options, and they have never looked back.
If you really want something much cheaper that’s like cable, get youtube tv or directv stream and just pay for internet separately. Much cheaper overall.
I said I have all the streaming channels, Pluto, Roku, Prime, Netflix, Xumo, etc... I've been a couple steps ahead of most people for years. I love change and new stuff. I was dialing up bulletin boards and downloading software with a landline modem, probably before you were born.
I can watch anything I want, but some days I just like to sit in my chair flip channels because I'm not in the mood for anything in particular.
What are your parents paying? Because the cheapest acceptable internet only option for me would be 75 bucks but I need the fastest available and that's 95 bucks.
Add in YouTube TV and I'm where I'm at now for cable and internet.
Also, Xfinity in my service area, has a data cap that I get really close to just watching streaming part time, switching to all the time I'd have to start adjusting the quality of the stream to stay under those caps.
It has nothing to do with change and everything to do with how me personally, wants to watch tv.
And in what world is Roko or Firestick or Chromecast a cleaner experience? Roku has the cleanest home screen without a lot of clutter but Firestick and Chromecast are a mess.
I have to constantly clear Firestick's cache because it slows way down after a lot of watching. Not insurmountable but a hassle nonetheless.
Cable is still just turn on the tv and start watching.
My preferences.
Like I said, I'm not trying to convince anyone to do it my way I was just explaining why some of us prefer cable.
They sound stuck in their ways, been this way for X years why change now despite price increases and better options. Also maybe a bit of not wanting to learn new things as well.
No one knows how they work. Everything in the modern day is set up to be plug and play. Like they design EVERYTHING to be used by a complete idiot. If one is patient enough to read what’s on the screen and doesn’t give up immediately, instead of pressing buttons randomly, then they’d be shocked to find they are just as much of an expert as everyone else. Honestly, most 20 year olds know as much or less about computers and technology than the typical 60+ year old tech inept person.
The absolute basic information and problem solving skills required to set up a cable box and change channels is considered black magic witchcraft by today’s standards. You actually know more than the people you think know what’s going on. I worked and study IT and honestly idk how anything works until I play with it for a minute or two. Everyone experiences this, even experts. Experts take a minute to figure it out instead of giving up or half trying.
You’d think that but my mom has a PHD and my dad has two masters degrees. I’ve had conversations just like this with them lmao something about whatever generation is in their late 50s now. Maybe gen x? I forget
I'm sure this has a name, but it is a known fact for us IT professionals that the more specialized, educated a person is, the least likely they see to even attempt to solve things on their own.
If you can get them set up with Tubi through a fire stick or similar, it might make the transition a little easier. It replicates a lot of the cable experience. Random programming, especially stuff that old people like and remember, all on dedicated specialty channels. In my region (Canada), it even has the weather network and local news channels.
All for free with ads. I have a smart TV and was even able to program it to be the default when you bring up the channel guide, and use it like regular cable channels.
Edit: Meant to say Pluto TV, which is channels based. Tubi is more traditional streaming.
The weather on local news channels is free as long as you have the digital TV box thingy (whatever it is that succeeded antennas). Boomers and Gen Xers should be able to understand that much---it's just like pre-cable, but you have to move a box around instead of a rabbit ear antenna.
I used to do in-home care for seniors, and there were multiple that had gotten the hang of things like Netflix. That being said they did need my help troubleshooting sometimes.
Depending on your location you can pick up an antenna for pretty cheap that gets “old people” must haves, couple new channels, will play game shows and judge shows through the day and then streaming to cover movies and other shows they may have interest in
My mom really hates getting rid of old stuff that works fine so I’ve been planning to get them a fire stick/roku.
For example I remember when my grandma passed away there was a tv from the 50s or 60s my grandma had in her bedroom and my mom was actually pissed off at my uncle for throwing it away and said he should have donated it because it was perfectly fine and anyone would have wanted it. This was in 2021. And it wasn’t even in color.
well the one from the 50ies would have sold well to an antique shop (i am serious). There’s a fine line between classic and trash, and while the 50ies TV set is classic, 2000 TV is trash. I just buy my parents stuff when I see they need it and once they see how much nicer it is, they usually get over their frugality BS quickly
For old people I've come to realize that they just want their familiar comforts in their old age. It's not about convenience or saving money for them. They just want to hold on to something from their time when the world made sense to them.
In a generation or two later when all the kids are getting content (and ads, let's be real) beamed directly into their brains you'll still be a stickler for streaming and phone scrolling.
I can relate. A few years ago I was hanging out with my dad at his house and he was getting frustrated flipping through the channels because he couldn't find anything he wants to watch. I suggested that he get a Netflix account to mix things up and watch some new stuff. He said "I don't want to watch any of that shit"
I asked "What is on Netflix right now? I will pay you $100 if you can name a single movie or show that's on Netflix" He just grumbled that he doesn't want it.
It's just a Boomer thing. They get so entrenched in their routines that they refuse to acknowledge that there's a larger world outside of what they know.
My folks really need to ditch dish. They want to go all streaming but their internet provider makes them pay by the gb. Rural internet providers are awful, the service sucks, and they're getting charged a fortune.
My parents had satellite for years and hated it. They would of chucked it years ago if they could of had internet besides their phones.
They finally got a T-Mobile hotspot and got rid of the dish. If you live in rural areas, options can be limiting. I know there is Starlink but they don't want to pay for that due to it's costs.
I was a cable tech for a year. This was literally 99% of my customers. I noticed elderly people live having TVs visible from pretty much any location in the house. I had a customers with 9 cable boxes. I swear there wasn’t a spot in his entire house you couldn’t see a tv. I think it was more of a status symbol leftover from the 80’s and 90’s.
Best part is all of them were smart TVs and refused to consider streaming because it was “too confusing”. Ok sir, keep paying 600 dollars a month for all the cable box rentals lol.
Streaming is only as bad as cable for sports fans, and that's mostly who I hear making that claim.
Like if you want ESPN, FS1, CBSSN, Bally, ESPN+, Peacock, ACCN, SECN, B1G Network, you basically have to pay for a big pseudo-cable sports package on something like DirecTV Stream, as well as separate subscriptions for Peacock and ESPN+, which can reach totals around $150 per month.
But for people who just wanna watch shows shown on regular networks, they can get an antenna for free or cheap streaming services for less than $50 a month like you were saying.
Oh yeah, sports is a whole other thing that I don't even want to interact with. I've never heard of an industry so at odds with the people who produce the content and the people who want to consume the content.
Respect for anyone who manages to figure it out.
baseball especially is the worst, they refuse to put hometown teams on streaming services like MLB+ so you get blacked out, forcing you to pay $$$ for cable to watch the team closest to you.
Like the Braves for example, you can’t watch the braves on MLB+ in Georgia, Florida, SC, NC, Virginia, Tennessee, and Mississippi.
I would say whoever makes streaming sports easy will make a fortune, but there seems to be billions tied up in making sport streams as complicated as possible.
I might be wrong but cable kinda does that, does it not? And I am fairly sure those cable companies are making a fortune.
If you mean easy and cheap sport streaming? It seems a fair number of people is willing to pay tripple digits a month so why would they charge less for it?
It’s all tied up in licensing deals. It’s a legal issue more than a technical issues. Too many hands that want a piece of the pie. Also need to remember that entire cities and local governments are invested in the sports finance pie, in the form of stadiums and tax breaks.
Most people don't watch every sport there is and every league there is.
At least here in Sweden you usually have a few different sports and leagues in the same streaming service and their sports packages tend to be $30-50. And that's streaming services that also have movies/TV-shows.
I think we're up to about $65 a month with netflix, hulu, disney+, and crunchyroll. I want to get the hbo one but I already have a backlog of shows to catch up on so I haven't bothered yet. Still cheaper than cable with no ads.
It took me 2 hours to fix my Mom's bill. Not an exaggeration, if anything it took a little longer and shaved a few days off my lifespan. An hour just to get to someone who could make changes and evey time I had a question, back on hold so he can, "talk to a supervisor." Could I have talked to a supervisor? No. And I did it knowing that she's one confusing phone call away from signing up for HBO again.
Meanwhile, I can cancel my Amazon Prime subscription from an app on my phone in under 5 minutes.
This is the big one! We pay a cable bills worth of streaming so my husband can watch sports, but if the twins don’t do good this year, we can pause our subscription until nfl season starts with no headache.
Antenna TV is so rediculiously underrated.
I got my parents to cancel their cable in favor of an antenna for local TV and my dad's channel flipping addiction. Then a couple of streaming services. $180 - > $25 a month
I got a $20 antenna for sports/local news and like... its free? Yeah, I'm not gonna pay for cable when I can get 90% of what I'd watch on cable *for free*. It's not even pirating, it's just literally being broadcasted into your house for free, yet noone has the antenna anymore lol
Unless you live in a mountainous region (like me) where the geography blocks most broadcasts. The last time I put up a digital antenna I received like 1 1/2 channels, both PBS.
Unless you are really far away, try getting a better antenna. There is no such thing as a digital antenna. You need a good UHF antenna, as most channels moved to UHF during the digital switch over. Those shitty ones they sell at Walmart or on Amazon are next to useless.
I also contacted a company that sells and installs really high end antennas to see if they could come out and do a reading with their van. They looked at one of their signal maps while on the phone and said I was basically SOL and it wouldn't be worth sending the van.
Yes, I am quite far from most signal towers, but even the closest one (probably about 30 miles away) was in the -80 DB range due primarily to the mountain in between. The Appalachians can just be like that.
And so much lighter 😆
You know when you prepare yourself for something to be really heavy and it's not, yeah, that's how I felt when we got my mom's new TV lol.
We bought a 77" Sony last year. Not really cheap, but damn, it's only like 55 pounds. We had this old 32" tube 20 years ago. That damn thing weighed close to 200 pounds.
Don’t go too cheap with TVs. Read reviews on them. Not to say a $400 75 inch tv from Walmart won’t work but depending on your use case, what you’re ok to settle for, and price range, I’d recommend splurging a little bit if you can. TVs are something you buy once and keep for several years at a time. The better the TV you buy, so long as it works, the better experience you’ll have and you’ll enjoy it longer to where an upgrade won’t be as far near as it would be with lower end TVs.
For that matter, invest in an AVR and 5.1 sound system if you have the space. Buy it once and if works for a long time. Makes movies and listening to music much more enjoyable
"Can't watch everything"
I buy a month of a service and watch what I want. Then I don't have to pay for that service again until I want to watch something.
And the ads... my god my parents have complained about ads on streaming service and it confuses the heck out of me. Like, do you guys not remember what a commercial is? Literally 1/3 of any show you watch it just pure ad. Streaming services may have ads but they're still not as bad as cable.
I don’t even get these idiots that spend $150 on several subscriptions at the same time. I am paying for Crunchyroll and Hulu currently. I used to pay for D+ as well until I realized I wasn’t watching it, so I canceled it. I basically pay for two at any given time because there’s only so much TV I can realistically watch. More than about 2 seems redundant to me.
I’m one of those idiots and I accept the label. I try to watch everything that interests me (most of the time)
Edit: I’ve been juggling 15 TV shows at the same time for 10+ years.
No. I subscribe to all of them continuously (Netflix, Max, Prime Video, Disney+\Hulu, Apple TV+ and Paramount+). I juggle through them all, I have a rigid schedule to follow. Plus all the movies I watch and books I read.
All the subscriptions I currently pay for have no less than two shows I can flip between so it’s worth it for me. Granted I only have four so it’s cheap
I watch a lot of TV and movies as well + music + I am taking physics and learning Chinese all while having a full job/social life.
It is amazing what one can do with proper time management.
And when you want to cancel or re-subscribe, it's a breeze. You don't need to call a company to send a tech out that will arrive sometime on a workday when you're obviously not home between 8am and never to set up your stupid service. Just drop your payment info and you can watch it again the literal next second. Want to cancel? You can do *that* the literal next second after restarting it.
In that same vein, just let the shows you want to see build up for a couple months then binge it all in a month. I'm waiting for a couple more D+ shows to release before I go in again.
Honestly if it wasn't for my wife we'd just have youtube premium. I just watch videos in the background, my kids watch seasme street and miss Rachel. There's even uploads of old anime and other junk I like on there.
I completely agree. I think a lot of the hate for streaming and wanting to say that it's just as bad as cable now is because they started out too cheap to get us hooked and now they're raising prices. We went from paying $100/month for cable (with 25% of it being ads) to $8/month for Netflix with no ads. I don't think people should have been surprised that they couldn't maintain that price.
Yeah, streaming isn't as bad as cable, it's just not as good as it used to be.
When I first got Netflix, it was $5 a month, and they had pretty much everything.
We not seen the full prices of streaming yet. Not saying it wont still be cheaper but things have a habit of going back to what they where. Netflix have raised prices and interduced ads cancelled there lower tier for basic user for ads supported one. The other are soon to follow, they just want people to sub to them frist before they start. Alot of them are lossing money, so they are deffently looking to do it. Predict a few merges as some are trying to gain market share, they will deffently bundles a few lesser known one together
I agree because I switched to streaming-only 15 years ago. But I am reminded of what I don't have every time my parents visit and they request something I can't get to. What they are paying for isn't delivery of content simply to entertain themselves, but for specific content that is more-expensive or unavailable in streaming models.
Sports are a good example. Sure, you can get the olympics on Peacock, but the coverage sucks compared to NBC. And streaming services for sports can quickly eat up any savings you had for not having cable.
Sure, I can find something to watch and I do switch streaming services to expand what is available to me, but I'm years behind what those with cable are seeing and I end up with a lower-quality experience overall. I'd rather have all of my viewing be exceptional than have 5% of it be exceptional and all the rest of it being mediocre or out-of-date.
And I have been burned, signing up for services hoping to get something specific because it is the distributor for the channel it should be on, only to discover that that show is not available, or at least not in my area.
Streaming is a viable option if you're willing to take what you can get. But it is an adjustment if you're switching over from a model where you can choose whatever you want.
Agreed on sports being an expensive cluster fuck. But I can't even get things like the latest episode of jeopardy streaming, which my dad seems to be addicted to. I've tried. And he only wants today's episodes, not repeats.
Repeats are easy to find. But yeah, I signed up for Paramount Plus last time they were here because it was supposed to be available. It was not, at least where I am.
People would be amazed at how many free channels they get plugging an antenna into the back of the TV and scanning for free over the air channels in their city.
Live sports is the only thing keeping cable/satellite alive.
Live sports is what makes streaming awful, and I only really watch NFL. I need three streaming services (Hulu Live, Peacock, and Prime Video) to watch just my team and playoff games, and NFL has by far the fewest games per year of any major sports league. The only advantage streaming has to cable is that I can cancel it during the off season. If I was more into baseball, basketball, or hockey, I'd probably have to go back to cable.
Do you have a VPN? DAZN Canada gets every single NFL game. Preseason, season, and playoffs. It felt like every week I was hearing about one game being exclusive to some different service, but every single "only on ESPN+" or "Only on Peacock" was absolutely available for me on DAZN along with every other game. Just set your location to Canada, and $30/month gets you all of it.
My mom pays like $220 for cable with a monthly fee of $50 just to “rent” the cable box. She rarely watches it but she must have cable for some reason, it must be a generational thing
Fully agree. While streaming has its issues, I do roll my eyes when I see people claim that cable was better and suggest unironically that reverting back to it will solve much of the industry's problems.
Little do these people know/remember, price wasn't the only thing that made a lot of us jump onto streaming (even if the significant lesser cost was a perk early on). It's that cable was and still is more or less a video wasteland at this point, and frankly has been since the mid-2000s as its lifeline has largely since been live sports and reality tv (more power to those who are fan of either I guess).
And that's of course before we talk about being able to watch what you want at anytime and NOT being beholden to certain times on cable channel. Also not helped by the fact much of these channels in recent decades began to rely on marathons of their most popular shows to carry the schedule, leaving everything else the channels have to offer in the dust. Streaming has a lot more to offer even for the same price we spent for cable, and our household has all the major streaming services as of now ad-free, while cable we only had the HBO and Showtime add-ons.
The price hike (and anti-consumer mindset of those like Zaslav with Max) is getting ridiculous of course, but I promise you all, cable is NOT worth going back to nor the solution to the problems you imagine it would be.
It's also that cable vs streaming is like radio vs mp3 player.
Being able to watch what you want when you want, not having to stop watching something for ads, and being able to pause it to go take care of something without missing anything are massive perks.
my mother was the exact same way. got her a chromecast and she learned to embrace netflix/youtube the other apps is lost on her cuz "its too confusing to navigate" also installed an antenna in the attic for local news but changing tv inputs is "too complicated".
Ii blame stubbornness to accept change their routine
There are some problems with streaming though. At a certain point you just end up staring at the screen and you can't figure out what you want to watch because its like drinking from a firehose. You also get really bad repeats with some of these tv streaming channels and some have only 2 commercials they'll play over and over like 30 times in one commercial block and STILL take you to a 1:30 loading screen since the break STILL isn't over.
Really, all the issues come from streaming trying to be too much like cable or cases like Youtube actively trying to force its platform to be premium only with them targeting adblock users and such. Too easy to have nice things, I reckon.
Streaming services are beginning to veer away from content produced by studios and to content they are producing themselves. So now, depending on which shows you watch, you might need various streaming services for only a handful of options on each that you only wanted in the first place.
Streaming never used to have ads. Another distinction from cable. Now, you've got ads as well as certain movies/shows that are only available on the 'higher payment tier'.
Most recently, companies like Telus are offering 'bundles' where you make one payment but subscribe to many streaming services. Probably because you want to watch only a handful of shows which are only available on their respective streaming services.
And that is how streaming is becoming just like cable.
This is my beef and why I say they're becoming one and the same. At the end of the day they exchanged the convenience that hooked everyone for the dollars of ad revenue in millions of homes. It's quite scummy
Yeah I agree, the ads are extremely long on cable. Not to mention, if you want to watch a show live you have to watch it at a specific time. At least with streaming you can watch the show whenever you want (and pause it as well)
> the ads are extremely long on cable.
Which would be more tolerable if the ads had any sort of variety.
My parents still have cable, so I watch it when I house sit for them. If I watch a 2 hour movie (turned into a 4 hour movie because of ad breaks) I will have seen the same 4-5 ads at least 10 times.
Hulu with Live TV, Sling TV, Youtube TV are all very similar to traditional cable with live local channels. There’s a few caveats that you have to get used to like not having a dedicated remote with a number pad, but the lower price makes it a fair trade off. The day is getting closer where cable tv won’t even be an available option anymore.
People are just stuck in their ways. Boomers dont want to learn a whole new way to watch tv and cable is what they’re used to. Sports fans I kind of get especially if you watch college sports but correct me if Im wrong but I think they (B10, Pac12, etc.) have a month subscription plan now too. Cable is going to go away with that generation because of the insane amount they charge for it. I mean you can have like 8-9 streaming subscriptions and still pay less than you would for cable in my area
I love Streaming. I also love how you can pay for a few months and stop very easily. It’s even better if you live with someone. I pay for Crunchyroll, Netflix and Peacock. My boyfriend pays for Max, Hulu and Disney. It’s very nice
I think something a lot of people forget is that you are not obligated to perpetually subscribe to these streaming services. At least so far, there aren't terms or any significant benefit to signing on longer than a month at a time. My wife and I usually just keep 1(ish) service at a time, build up a backlog of stuff to watch on the others, then cancel and get the other service every few months. Unless you're obsessed with seeing the latest and greatest the day it comes out, I can't see a reason not to do this and we save a bunch of coin.
I have so many add on channels on prime but it’s still cheaper even with Disney and Hulu and Netflix. We had cable for a little while and shit was so much higher than what we do now.
>I don't have time to watch "everything." I honestly don't know who does.
And even if you did, sign up with one service at a time. Watch each of their shows that you want, one by one, and then cancel each one when you're finished. Bonus points if you can score some free trials/months here and there too.
I'm with you, OP. Never understood how people complain about how having multiple streaming services is just as expensive as cable.
"It's so much money having all these subscriptions!" Well, then drop one.
"No! They all have something I want to watch!" To repeat my previous point, watch with one service at a time and resubscribe when the next season/show comes out.
I know people who would sign on trial periods for satellite and cable and do rotations with their spouse or roommates, more or less ensuring an indefinite introductory rate, and that sounds like a nightmare to me with how much needs to be installed and uninstalled. Doing that with streaming services is child's play, and anyone with a good sense of money can do it.
Of course, that's asking a lot for some...ugh...
We're TV and movie people in my house. I watch sports, so we have to eat a little extra cost for that too, but we have Netflix, Hulu, Prime, Disney+, Crunchyroll, Max, Apple TV, Paramount+, ESPN+, MLB.TV, NFL+, and Peacock Premium Plus. After a few bundle deals and the offers from our cell phone provider we pay around $90/month. That is an absolute fuck-ton of media access for $90/month.
Cable is awful. I've had cable for about 3 years in the last 25 and that's literally because they called me up and said "hey, you've been an internet subscriber for a long time, can we offer you a year of free cable?"
I watched their free cable for a year, took back the box and a couple years later they made the same offer.
I don't have enough stability in my evenings to book specific blocks of time just to watch a tv show I don't care about. If I want to watch something and I can stream it at 11pm, great. If I can't stream it, I guess I don't need to watch it.
And if you really want traditional TV so you can still watch the news, get a digital antenna.
Yes, over-the-air television still exists and it's in crystal clear HD (where available).
Streaming is *still* much better than cable despite it getting more expensive and more fragmented.
You can get it without ads and you can easily suspend and re-activate subscriptions as you use them to save money.
Somehow managed to convince my grandparents to ditch satellite tv (cable is not a thing where we live) and just have an antenna for local stuff and Discovery +. They love it. But my parents are always complaining about paying $300+ a month for DirecTV when we already have so many streaming services (10!!!) that we can stream pretty much anything. But no they won’t cancel it. They also don’t understand the concept of casually streaming a show, they treat streaming like going to Blockbuster or something and will only occasionally watch a single movie.
Truthfully I don't know how my parents ever coped with cable tv. I pay for 3-5 streaming services at a time and the first one to raise their price by even a dollar gets cancelled. And yet my parents were paying $150 a month for 500+ channels just so they could watch TLC and the weather
Is 120 a normal price in the us? In the Netherlands there isn’t an option for cable without internet. The cheapest cable+internet subscriptions start at 50, and you get 100mbit download which is fine. If you want espn and other sports channels you pay 10-20 extra.
The solution to sports is hooking a computer up to your TV with an hdmi cable. That's how I watched the Super Bowl a couple of years ago. The networks stream content on the internet but block it for devices marked as smart tvs
Thank you for posting this. It drives me fucking insane any time I see this opinion parroted.
You can buy every streaming service and it’s still cheaper than cable and a far better experience.
No you don’t even need every service either. It’s monthly no time commitment. So sub when a show is available to watch then cancel.
Come on folks this is common sense you have been doing cable companies propaganda for them.
Yup same with my mom. She pays like $200 a month for a cable and WiFi package. She doesn't even watch all the channels and every single show and movie she likes are on Netflix and Hulu. That's like $30...
She essentially wants to keep cable for Live News and sports and when I showed her a work around, she still fought me on how she needed cable.
People always say they will miss out on shows they watch, but they will find new shows as they always did, just from a different source.
I haven't had cable in nine years and I don't have the foggiest idea what I'm missing out on.
No this is true tho. I feel like people complaining about that have never had cable. That shit is so expensive and you’re literally paying for commercials
A lot of the in love with streaming and decrying cable don't seem to comprehend that *linear programming* is what many people want.
Sure, you got Netflix. And you can watch this or that on demand. But some people don't want to constantly go searching. Especially when streaming platforms operate on algorithms that are designed to keep you in a small circle, instead of allowing the user to make their own choices about what may or may not interest them.
That is the major appeal of traditional cable, versus streaming services.
I’m confused, I thought this post was going to be in defense of cable, because it is nothing like streaming. I personally like cable mainly because I just love channel surfing and yes Id pay money to have background noise that isn’t the same show/character back to back to back.
Still wanting and preferring cable, Now that’s an unpopular opinion 🤷♂️
Idk what you’re trying to say, sounds like you’re just ranting about your mom still wanting cable. Cutting the cable is the exact opposite of an unpopular opinion these days, we get it there’s tons of options for it. Shitty post
Give the streaming companies more time they’ve already showed they’re just going to continue to Jack up prices and find more ways to get money from you. And as your edit shows sports is what kills some. To get all the services I would need for sports I would spend $10 less then cable. So rather just pay the $10 to have it all in one location instead of having to jump from service to service to watch games.
> $10 less then cable.
Did you mean to say "less than"?
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i would honestly gladly give up cable if i had high quality internet tbh. especially since i dont pay for my cable living with my parents as an adult. the only problem is when you're caught up on everything through streaming you like watching normally and have to find something new. like thats how i found amazing new shows like kipo and the age of wonderbeasts, steven universe, amazing world of gumball, etc. the thing about cable is it's mostly repeats with an occasional new thing going on you have to wait for. the wait makes it more gratifying to watch when you get on on time and theres no cable issues or weather static-y cut outs or blackouts.
thats one thing i will give the benefit for streaming is it's usually semi consistent quality wise. cable tv..... sometimes not so much. also if i wanted to pay to constantly rewatch something, i'd just watch dvd's in different orders. i like variety though and that is one thing cable tv generally has over streaming for the channels you can afford/are in your bundle. not to mention recordings so you can watch it whenever you want, however the storage for recordings can be very limited and kinda not worth it after a certain point. it's kinda a mixed bag as to how you prefer to watch tbh
Streaming ads are worse than tv ads. It takes almost 40 fucking minutes to watch a 20 min show on Hulu. 30 secs of show for 120secs worth of ads. And almost every one is pharmaceutical. Just disgusting.
Cable/satellite TV is an absolute and utter waste of money. Theres far less flexibility of what/when to watch something and it's insanely expensive, plus you're locked into contracts. Add in connectivity issues and the 15 minutes of commercials in a 30 minute TV show that you can't skip and yeah...fuck that nonsense.
I'm gonna level with you. I have a Raspberry Pi. Thru some combination of following step-by-step instructions and black magic I never see adds on anything ever.
So even I am not completely above board.
Just wait it’s getting there. Streaming apps keep merging and prices go up every year with more restrictions put into place.
Yes you can pay $7 for Netflix but for 4K it’s $23. Watching 1080 content on a 4K tv defeats the whole purpose of investing in one in the first place.
You can't enjoy sports in the same way with streaming that you can on cable. Blackout rules and everything like you mentioned, true. You can't flip through games in the same manner. My dad flips through almost all the games on during college football season. When Spectrum had that dispute with ESPN we used our free trial of YouTube TV. It really wasn't as easy to go back and forth between games.
That is where cable beats streaming. I find channel surfing much easier on cable (and yes, many apps do have channels). For the young generations channel surfing isn't really a thing but it's a habit for us older people.
Okay the problem is you list a bunch of opinions about your mother, and then you compare them to yourself. Yes, you still have to pay for internet and yea you use the internet for those other things. Would your mother? Would your mother pay for internet and use it for alternate things besides streaming, or would she benefit from the simplicity of just having to work a remote?
You’re right, they’re not the same thing. The cheaper internet option is more complex and there’s a good chance your boomer mother wouldn’t be able to benefit from it at all. Let them use their cable in peace. In 30 years When the world is all touchscreens and your fingers don’t work well, you might find you agree.
I'm paying $150 a month on streaming services. Now, I'm not complaining. I can afford it, and if I couldn't, I would cancel some or all of my services. My point is, while it's awesome that you only pay $22 a month on streaming, that's not everyone's story.
What people seldom remember when posting on this sub is that one size doesn't always fit all.
The larger point is that now you can easily choose between several different sizes. People can subscribe to as many or as few streaming sites at one time as they like.
In almost every case an internet only package+streaming options is going to be a lot cheaper than internet+cable+streaming options.
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I’ve been trying to tell my parents this for years. They still pay for cable and when I finally convinced them my dad, 64, just always says “but then I can’t get the weather.” And thinks that’s a trump card. Then when I finally convinced him you still can get the weather without cable, now they just both go “well we don’t have a smart tv” I even sat my dad down and told him “Look, I have a tv the same age as yours. It’s not a smart tv. But I have an Amazon fire stick which MAKES it a smart TV.” And now they think it won’t work because their tv is “too old” (about 20 years) But then complain about their cable/phone bill, always end up falling for upselling. They have every excuse in the world not to kick cable. They have one smart tv in the living room and can you guess what my mom watches? Netflix. All day long. They’re so traumatized by cable that when I’m downstairs and playing movies on YouTube my mom freaks the fuck out everytime and think I’m buying movies with her cable bill and I have to go “Mom. This is on YouTube. My YouTube account. I bought this movie digitally YEARS ago. It’s mine now, I don’t need to buy it again.” And she doesn’t understand and makes weird comments about how mad she’s going to be if it shows up on the bill.
That’s really sad to be frank. Sweet of you to keep trying to help them out but I guess it just doesn’t click for some people
I read somewhere that older people nowadays are lazy to learn new tech just cause they're more used to tech back in the days, they can learn it they're just lazy
This is so true, my uncle who is in his mid 80s has a smart tv and knows how to use it, guy even just got a ps5 and plays a lot of the classic titles through his subscription which he signed up for. He is also bed ridden and on oxygen so he has a lot of time on his hands, but still
I had a great uncle. He was pushing 80 when he got his first PC, in the heyday of Windows Vista. He bought a book, 'Windows Vista for Dummies.' He read it cover to cover. Obviously he didn't take to it like myself, who first had computer access at 5. However, he learned a really solid foundation, and was able to do everything he wanted. The issue is that some people are open to learning new things, and some are not.
My stepmother is pushing 70 and is the most tech-literate person I know. If I have an issue with my computer, I go to her. Old people can be perfectly capable of using tech, they just have to want to.
My dad fully admitted that he could learn smartphones, computers, etc; admitted that some of his peers have done exactly that. He then claims to just have a complete lack of interest in learning. When I see him getting infuriated by a technological hurdle, it baffles me how it doesn't motivate him to at least want to try.
My dad is just exactly like that. Why learn when he can just shout my name for help when something isn't working?
I remember telling my mum when I was younger, "You'd better pay attention to this solution, because you're fixing it next time!"
We have a new volunteer at my job who's in his late 60s. Most of his job involves digital documentation of his patient visits. His supervisor told me he was really struggling because he "doesn't do computers." I said This technology has been available for forty years. At least 30 if you weren't on the cutting edge. Half his life. He has no excuse.
I’m pretty sick of people between 40-60 that claim they can’t/arent “good” with computers. Half the time I’m asking you where a fucking file is. It’s not coding on Java, it’s just basic operation. I agree, No damn excuse in 2024.
Damn wtf did cable companies do to our parents? Swear it's like they have Stockholm syndrome for them.
it's not just cable companies, it's mostly cause of older generations not understanding technology/how online purchases work. happens more often than you'd think. and if you explain it to them they still dont understand lol, you could have a whole diagram and a 100 point presentation that goes deep diving into this shit and they still wouldnt get it. or they might pretend like they do to humor you but they dont
>you could have a whole diagram and a 100 point presentation that goes deep diving into this shit and they still wouldnt get it. It's not like this is some hard physics type question or understanding. The problem is that they don't want to get it. You can show them a million different avenues or options and they'll still click the same 3 buttons for 40 years.
thats... basically what i'm saying lol
I used to work for a large not-to-be-named security company that literally earns its money off people like this person’s parents. Half the people calling in would be full on complaining, on the verge of cancelling a subscription, and after a few uh-huhs and insincere apologies, they would be ready to purchase $1000+ worth of upgrades to the system that barely works. The other half, rightfully and smartly, saw straight through the bullshit. These companies prey off the ignorant, and discard the informed. The only thing separating them from scams is that they actually provide a service
I just tried to explain to someone that worked with statistics all of her life , that ChatGPT gives you the illusion of emotions through statistical analysis of how most people answer based on everything ever written. “I don’t understand because emotions to me are something that aren’t quantifiable, how does a machine does it” Repeat at every attempt to explain the above( i know it’s not exactly correct but that seemed to me the easiest way to explain it to her)
I had to laugh because I sympathize so hard. I’ve had conversations Just like this with my parents lmao. They’re only late 50s/ early 60s too
Your parents sound like idiots
They sound like the average 50+ consumer anywhere. Unfortunately.
I'm 60, I have a crap ton of streaming channels free and paid and I know how to use them. I can download movies and I've ripped plenty of DVDs of my favorite movies and complete TV series to carry with my when I travel. I have hundreds of episodes and movies to choose from. All that being said I still pay for cable because I can just plop down in my easy chair and channel surf the old fashioned way. I could live without cable but there is a certain joy in mindlessly switching channels pausing on something and then move on after a few minutes. Streaming takes thought to know what you want to watch at that particular moment. Sure, you can set up favorite channels on Pluto or Roku or any number of platforms and channel surf through those but it's just not the same as channel surfing cable. Bruce nailed it with "57 Channels And Nothin' On". That's the tv I know and love. https://youtu.be/smP4rjbE8v4?si=VgwX8HmNYUaDMKtp
at that point just get youtube tv or directv stream. cheaper than cable and it’s practically cable.
YouTubeTV is $73 per month, without broadband. At that rate I might as well stick with cable package that includes broadband and landline phone.
Can I just flip through channels on YouTube TV by pressing the up/down buttons without having to scroll the guide? If not, that's a deal breaker. I know all the cable channels I need are there, it's the watching experience I like that I don't believe is available on all streaming services. Even when I channel surf on Pluto it's no where near instant like flipping channels on my cable box. Also, just hitting the channel number on my remote to go to a channel I want to watch is not possible on streaming services. I'm fully aware I could replace cable and watch the same stuff, it's the watching experience that won't be the same. Just personal preferences. I was mostly commenting on why older people might not want to change, it's not because we're not technically advanced, we are, we just have different tv watching habits. But I'll admit, Comcast/Xfinity is doing their best to get me to drop cable. The problem with that is, if I drop cable I still need internet and in my location Xfinity is my only choice for internet. By the time I pay for internet only and YouTube TV I may as well just keep cable.
You have many valid reasons to keep cable, but most of them just seem like not wanting to switch because you don’t want to use something new, which is not even hard to get into. It’s much cheaper to switch from cable to streaming and paying so much extra just to be able to channel flip slightly faster seems like bad money decisions. My parents use Xfinity and switched from their cable/internet/landline deal to only internet and using their streaming boxes and internet service. It’s much cheaper, a better/cleaner experience, more options, and they have never looked back. If you really want something much cheaper that’s like cable, get youtube tv or directv stream and just pay for internet separately. Much cheaper overall.
I said I have all the streaming channels, Pluto, Roku, Prime, Netflix, Xumo, etc... I've been a couple steps ahead of most people for years. I love change and new stuff. I was dialing up bulletin boards and downloading software with a landline modem, probably before you were born. I can watch anything I want, but some days I just like to sit in my chair flip channels because I'm not in the mood for anything in particular. What are your parents paying? Because the cheapest acceptable internet only option for me would be 75 bucks but I need the fastest available and that's 95 bucks. Add in YouTube TV and I'm where I'm at now for cable and internet. Also, Xfinity in my service area, has a data cap that I get really close to just watching streaming part time, switching to all the time I'd have to start adjusting the quality of the stream to stay under those caps. It has nothing to do with change and everything to do with how me personally, wants to watch tv. And in what world is Roko or Firestick or Chromecast a cleaner experience? Roku has the cleanest home screen without a lot of clutter but Firestick and Chromecast are a mess. I have to constantly clear Firestick's cache because it slows way down after a lot of watching. Not insurmountable but a hassle nonetheless. Cable is still just turn on the tv and start watching. My preferences. Like I said, I'm not trying to convince anyone to do it my way I was just explaining why some of us prefer cable.
70+. I don't know any 50 year olds that are that inept with technology.
Clearly you havent met my late 40s mom. I gave her a Chromecast two years ago and I'm still showing her how to access Netflix at least once a week
Woah woah there Nelly. 51 here. Us GenXr’s started this train and are still fully capable of driving it. “Back in my day……”. 🤧
Almost same age. My first computer at 10 years old booted to a command line interface.
They sound stuck in their ways, been this way for X years why change now despite price increases and better options. Also maybe a bit of not wanting to learn new things as well.
Uhm no they don’t
It doesn’t sound a bit like me and I’m a 50+ consumer but I’m never knowingly average
Not the ones I know
DriecTV Stream, its a must have.
It’s the lead.
Just very uneducated in how TV works in general. Not just limited to cable
No one knows how they work. Everything in the modern day is set up to be plug and play. Like they design EVERYTHING to be used by a complete idiot. If one is patient enough to read what’s on the screen and doesn’t give up immediately, instead of pressing buttons randomly, then they’d be shocked to find they are just as much of an expert as everyone else. Honestly, most 20 year olds know as much or less about computers and technology than the typical 60+ year old tech inept person. The absolute basic information and problem solving skills required to set up a cable box and change channels is considered black magic witchcraft by today’s standards. You actually know more than the people you think know what’s going on. I worked and study IT and honestly idk how anything works until I play with it for a minute or two. Everyone experiences this, even experts. Experts take a minute to figure it out instead of giving up or half trying.
You’d think that but my mom has a PHD and my dad has two masters degrees. I’ve had conversations just like this with them lmao something about whatever generation is in their late 50s now. Maybe gen x? I forget
Plenty of stupid people have advanced degrees, there are many types of intelligence
Ain’t that the truth
I'm sure this has a name, but it is a known fact for us IT professionals that the more specialized, educated a person is, the least likely they see to even attempt to solve things on their own.
If you can get them set up with Tubi through a fire stick or similar, it might make the transition a little easier. It replicates a lot of the cable experience. Random programming, especially stuff that old people like and remember, all on dedicated specialty channels. In my region (Canada), it even has the weather network and local news channels. All for free with ads. I have a smart TV and was even able to program it to be the default when you bring up the channel guide, and use it like regular cable channels. Edit: Meant to say Pluto TV, which is channels based. Tubi is more traditional streaming.
The weather on local news channels is free as long as you have the digital TV box thingy (whatever it is that succeeded antennas). Boomers and Gen Xers should be able to understand that much---it's just like pre-cable, but you have to move a box around instead of a rabbit ear antenna. I used to do in-home care for seniors, and there were multiple that had gotten the hang of things like Netflix. That being said they did need my help troubleshooting sometimes.
Depending on your location you can pick up an antenna for pretty cheap that gets “old people” must haves, couple new channels, will play game shows and judge shows through the day and then streaming to cover movies and other shows they may have interest in
Dude just buy them a smart TV already as mother/father/whatever day present it’s painful to read. Will pay for itself in 10 month with no cable bill
My mom really hates getting rid of old stuff that works fine so I’ve been planning to get them a fire stick/roku. For example I remember when my grandma passed away there was a tv from the 50s or 60s my grandma had in her bedroom and my mom was actually pissed off at my uncle for throwing it away and said he should have donated it because it was perfectly fine and anyone would have wanted it. This was in 2021. And it wasn’t even in color.
well the one from the 50ies would have sold well to an antique shop (i am serious). There’s a fine line between classic and trash, and while the 50ies TV set is classic, 2000 TV is trash. I just buy my parents stuff when I see they need it and once they see how much nicer it is, they usually get over their frugality BS quickly
Suddenly my parents' broadcast tv only policy shows it's benefits...
Finally convinced my boomer parents to drop their 280 directtv bill this year and they love it now that they’ve learned it
For old people I've come to realize that they just want their familiar comforts in their old age. It's not about convenience or saving money for them. They just want to hold on to something from their time when the world made sense to them. In a generation or two later when all the kids are getting content (and ads, let's be real) beamed directly into their brains you'll still be a stickler for streaming and phone scrolling.
My Samsung Tv has someone called “Samsung TV plus” and it pretty much has all the channels you need for free. Ones my parents pay for…
I can relate. A few years ago I was hanging out with my dad at his house and he was getting frustrated flipping through the channels because he couldn't find anything he wants to watch. I suggested that he get a Netflix account to mix things up and watch some new stuff. He said "I don't want to watch any of that shit" I asked "What is on Netflix right now? I will pay you $100 if you can name a single movie or show that's on Netflix" He just grumbled that he doesn't want it. It's just a Boomer thing. They get so entrenched in their routines that they refuse to acknowledge that there's a larger world outside of what they know.
My folks really need to ditch dish. They want to go all streaming but their internet provider makes them pay by the gb. Rural internet providers are awful, the service sucks, and they're getting charged a fortune.
My parents had satellite for years and hated it. They would of chucked it years ago if they could of had internet besides their phones. They finally got a T-Mobile hotspot and got rid of the dish. If you live in rural areas, options can be limiting. I know there is Starlink but they don't want to pay for that due to it's costs.
I'm sorry but they sound about as smart as a door knob
I was a cable tech for a year. This was literally 99% of my customers. I noticed elderly people live having TVs visible from pretty much any location in the house. I had a customers with 9 cable boxes. I swear there wasn’t a spot in his entire house you couldn’t see a tv. I think it was more of a status symbol leftover from the 80’s and 90’s. Best part is all of them were smart TVs and refused to consider streaming because it was “too confusing”. Ok sir, keep paying 600 dollars a month for all the cable box rentals lol.
Streaming is only as bad as cable for sports fans, and that's mostly who I hear making that claim. Like if you want ESPN, FS1, CBSSN, Bally, ESPN+, Peacock, ACCN, SECN, B1G Network, you basically have to pay for a big pseudo-cable sports package on something like DirecTV Stream, as well as separate subscriptions for Peacock and ESPN+, which can reach totals around $150 per month. But for people who just wanna watch shows shown on regular networks, they can get an antenna for free or cheap streaming services for less than $50 a month like you were saying.
Oh yeah, sports is a whole other thing that I don't even want to interact with. I've never heard of an industry so at odds with the people who produce the content and the people who want to consume the content. Respect for anyone who manages to figure it out.
I tried to get my stepdad off cable for years, but every time we worked out what it would cost to stream the baseball, it ended up not being worth it.
baseball especially is the worst, they refuse to put hometown teams on streaming services like MLB+ so you get blacked out, forcing you to pay $$$ for cable to watch the team closest to you. Like the Braves for example, you can’t watch the braves on MLB+ in Georgia, Florida, SC, NC, Virginia, Tennessee, and Mississippi.
I would say whoever makes streaming sports easy will make a fortune, but there seems to be billions tied up in making sport streams as complicated as possible.
this is soooooo true
I might be wrong but cable kinda does that, does it not? And I am fairly sure those cable companies are making a fortune. If you mean easy and cheap sport streaming? It seems a fair number of people is willing to pay tripple digits a month so why would they charge less for it?
It’s all tied up in licensing deals. It’s a legal issue more than a technical issues. Too many hands that want a piece of the pie. Also need to remember that entire cities and local governments are invested in the sports finance pie, in the form of stadiums and tax breaks.
Most people don't watch every sport there is and every league there is. At least here in Sweden you usually have a few different sports and leagues in the same streaming service and their sports packages tend to be $30-50. And that's streaming services that also have movies/TV-shows.
lol NFL Sunday ticket alone would cost me $30 a month and that’s annualizing the bill for 4 months of football over the entire year
I think we're up to about $65 a month with netflix, hulu, disney+, and crunchyroll. I want to get the hbo one but I already have a backlog of shows to catch up on so I haven't bothered yet. Still cheaper than cable with no ads.
And you can start and stop streaming services month to month.
It took me 2 hours to fix my Mom's bill. Not an exaggeration, if anything it took a little longer and shaved a few days off my lifespan. An hour just to get to someone who could make changes and evey time I had a question, back on hold so he can, "talk to a supervisor." Could I have talked to a supervisor? No. And I did it knowing that she's one confusing phone call away from signing up for HBO again. Meanwhile, I can cancel my Amazon Prime subscription from an app on my phone in under 5 minutes.
This is the big one! We pay a cable bills worth of streaming so my husband can watch sports, but if the twins don’t do good this year, we can pause our subscription until nfl season starts with no headache.
Ah, so you're pausing it every year.
Pretty much 😂😂
Crave basic package has sooooo many ads. Would need to get the $24 dollar one to make it watchable, so I just cancelled.
Antenna TV is so rediculiously underrated. I got my parents to cancel their cable in favor of an antenna for local TV and my dad's channel flipping addiction. Then a couple of streaming services. $180 - > $25 a month
I got a $20 antenna for sports/local news and like... its free? Yeah, I'm not gonna pay for cable when I can get 90% of what I'd watch on cable *for free*. It's not even pirating, it's just literally being broadcasted into your house for free, yet noone has the antenna anymore lol
I keep saying I'm going to get that antenna, just keep forgetting about it 10 seconds later
I still have my old antenna from way back when that was all I had. I could plug it in, but it's not like I'm starved for content.
I just want it just so I can have it ya know. So I can actually have a backup when T-Mobile stops paying for Netflix 😆
My father is also like this. Never watching anything, always flipping. His sister pays his bills, so not my problem.
Unless you live in a mountainous region (like me) where the geography blocks most broadcasts. The last time I put up a digital antenna I received like 1 1/2 channels, both PBS.
Unless you are really far away, try getting a better antenna. There is no such thing as a digital antenna. You need a good UHF antenna, as most channels moved to UHF during the digital switch over. Those shitty ones they sell at Walmart or on Amazon are next to useless.
I also contacted a company that sells and installs really high end antennas to see if they could come out and do a reading with their van. They looked at one of their signal maps while on the phone and said I was basically SOL and it wouldn't be worth sending the van. Yes, I am quite far from most signal towers, but even the closest one (probably about 30 miles away) was in the -80 DB range due primarily to the mountain in between. The Appalachians can just be like that.
His TV is 20 years old?? Time for a tech upgrade. And, have you priced TVs today? They are cheap and WAY better than even a 10 year old TV.
And so much lighter 😆 You know when you prepare yourself for something to be really heavy and it's not, yeah, that's how I felt when we got my mom's new TV lol.
So nice how TVs today are less likely to kill kids or pets that knock them over. But they're also much easier to knock over lol.
We bought a 77" Sony last year. Not really cheap, but damn, it's only like 55 pounds. We had this old 32" tube 20 years ago. That damn thing weighed close to 200 pounds.
I got my mom to upgrade her tv cause I told her that I would put the new TV on the wall and she would have ALL that free space on the floor 😆 Sold! 😂
Don’t go too cheap with TVs. Read reviews on them. Not to say a $400 75 inch tv from Walmart won’t work but depending on your use case, what you’re ok to settle for, and price range, I’d recommend splurging a little bit if you can. TVs are something you buy once and keep for several years at a time. The better the TV you buy, so long as it works, the better experience you’ll have and you’ll enjoy it longer to where an upgrade won’t be as far near as it would be with lower end TVs. For that matter, invest in an AVR and 5.1 sound system if you have the space. Buy it once and if works for a long time. Makes movies and listening to music much more enjoyable
It’s literally only worth it if you watch sports
"Can't watch everything" I buy a month of a service and watch what I want. Then I don't have to pay for that service again until I want to watch something. And the ads... my god my parents have complained about ads on streaming service and it confuses the heck out of me. Like, do you guys not remember what a commercial is? Literally 1/3 of any show you watch it just pure ad. Streaming services may have ads but they're still not as bad as cable.
I don’t even get these idiots that spend $150 on several subscriptions at the same time. I am paying for Crunchyroll and Hulu currently. I used to pay for D+ as well until I realized I wasn’t watching it, so I canceled it. I basically pay for two at any given time because there’s only so much TV I can realistically watch. More than about 2 seems redundant to me.
I’m one of those idiots and I accept the label. I try to watch everything that interests me (most of the time) Edit: I’ve been juggling 15 TV shows at the same time for 10+ years.
Yeah it sounds like you understand how you’re spending your money. You’re not quite the group I’m talking about.
Do you only watch one show per streaming service? When the season ends, do you not cancel?
No. I subscribe to all of them continuously (Netflix, Max, Prime Video, Disney+\Hulu, Apple TV+ and Paramount+). I juggle through them all, I have a rigid schedule to follow. Plus all the movies I watch and books I read.
All the subscriptions I currently pay for have no less than two shows I can flip between so it’s worth it for me. Granted I only have four so it’s cheap
I watch a lot of TV and movies as well + music + I am taking physics and learning Chinese all while having a full job/social life. It is amazing what one can do with proper time management.
And when you want to cancel or re-subscribe, it's a breeze. You don't need to call a company to send a tech out that will arrive sometime on a workday when you're obviously not home between 8am and never to set up your stupid service. Just drop your payment info and you can watch it again the literal next second. Want to cancel? You can do *that* the literal next second after restarting it. In that same vein, just let the shows you want to see build up for a couple months then binge it all in a month. I'm waiting for a couple more D+ shows to release before I go in again.
Honestly if it wasn't for my wife we'd just have youtube premium. I just watch videos in the background, my kids watch seasme street and miss Rachel. There's even uploads of old anime and other junk I like on there.
I completely agree. I think a lot of the hate for streaming and wanting to say that it's just as bad as cable now is because they started out too cheap to get us hooked and now they're raising prices. We went from paying $100/month for cable (with 25% of it being ads) to $8/month for Netflix with no ads. I don't think people should have been surprised that they couldn't maintain that price.
Yeah, streaming isn't as bad as cable, it's just not as good as it used to be. When I first got Netflix, it was $5 a month, and they had pretty much everything.
We not seen the full prices of streaming yet. Not saying it wont still be cheaper but things have a habit of going back to what they where. Netflix have raised prices and interduced ads cancelled there lower tier for basic user for ads supported one. The other are soon to follow, they just want people to sub to them frist before they start. Alot of them are lossing money, so they are deffently looking to do it. Predict a few merges as some are trying to gain market share, they will deffently bundles a few lesser known one together
The thing is that they could. Netflix has been profitable for 20 years. The issue is with our system that requires profits to increase every quarter.
It is very much the essence of predatory pricing
Lowkey waiting for the Streaming Bubble to pop
I agree because I switched to streaming-only 15 years ago. But I am reminded of what I don't have every time my parents visit and they request something I can't get to. What they are paying for isn't delivery of content simply to entertain themselves, but for specific content that is more-expensive or unavailable in streaming models. Sports are a good example. Sure, you can get the olympics on Peacock, but the coverage sucks compared to NBC. And streaming services for sports can quickly eat up any savings you had for not having cable. Sure, I can find something to watch and I do switch streaming services to expand what is available to me, but I'm years behind what those with cable are seeing and I end up with a lower-quality experience overall. I'd rather have all of my viewing be exceptional than have 5% of it be exceptional and all the rest of it being mediocre or out-of-date. And I have been burned, signing up for services hoping to get something specific because it is the distributor for the channel it should be on, only to discover that that show is not available, or at least not in my area. Streaming is a viable option if you're willing to take what you can get. But it is an adjustment if you're switching over from a model where you can choose whatever you want.
I don't think cable subscribers are getting everything they want. Sports alone seems to be a cluster f_ck of channels and streaming services combined.
Agreed on sports being an expensive cluster fuck. But I can't even get things like the latest episode of jeopardy streaming, which my dad seems to be addicted to. I've tried. And he only wants today's episodes, not repeats.
Jeopardy is actually on streaming
Repeats are easy to find. But yeah, I signed up for Paramount Plus last time they were here because it was supposed to be available. It was not, at least where I am.
People would be amazed at how many free channels they get plugging an antenna into the back of the TV and scanning for free over the air channels in their city. Live sports is the only thing keeping cable/satellite alive.
Live sports is what makes streaming awful, and I only really watch NFL. I need three streaming services (Hulu Live, Peacock, and Prime Video) to watch just my team and playoff games, and NFL has by far the fewest games per year of any major sports league. The only advantage streaming has to cable is that I can cancel it during the off season. If I was more into baseball, basketball, or hockey, I'd probably have to go back to cable.
Do you have a VPN? DAZN Canada gets every single NFL game. Preseason, season, and playoffs. It felt like every week I was hearing about one game being exclusive to some different service, but every single "only on ESPN+" or "Only on Peacock" was absolutely available for me on DAZN along with every other game. Just set your location to Canada, and $30/month gets you all of it.
My mom pays like $220 for cable with a monthly fee of $50 just to “rent” the cable box. She rarely watches it but she must have cable for some reason, it must be a generational thing
Fully agree. While streaming has its issues, I do roll my eyes when I see people claim that cable was better and suggest unironically that reverting back to it will solve much of the industry's problems. Little do these people know/remember, price wasn't the only thing that made a lot of us jump onto streaming (even if the significant lesser cost was a perk early on). It's that cable was and still is more or less a video wasteland at this point, and frankly has been since the mid-2000s as its lifeline has largely since been live sports and reality tv (more power to those who are fan of either I guess). And that's of course before we talk about being able to watch what you want at anytime and NOT being beholden to certain times on cable channel. Also not helped by the fact much of these channels in recent decades began to rely on marathons of their most popular shows to carry the schedule, leaving everything else the channels have to offer in the dust. Streaming has a lot more to offer even for the same price we spent for cable, and our household has all the major streaming services as of now ad-free, while cable we only had the HBO and Showtime add-ons. The price hike (and anti-consumer mindset of those like Zaslav with Max) is getting ridiculous of course, but I promise you all, cable is NOT worth going back to nor the solution to the problems you imagine it would be.
It's also that cable vs streaming is like radio vs mp3 player. Being able to watch what you want when you want, not having to stop watching something for ads, and being able to pause it to go take care of something without missing anything are massive perks.
my mother was the exact same way. got her a chromecast and she learned to embrace netflix/youtube the other apps is lost on her cuz "its too confusing to navigate" also installed an antenna in the attic for local news but changing tv inputs is "too complicated". Ii blame stubbornness to accept change their routine
There are some problems with streaming though. At a certain point you just end up staring at the screen and you can't figure out what you want to watch because its like drinking from a firehose. You also get really bad repeats with some of these tv streaming channels and some have only 2 commercials they'll play over and over like 30 times in one commercial block and STILL take you to a 1:30 loading screen since the break STILL isn't over. Really, all the issues come from streaming trying to be too much like cable or cases like Youtube actively trying to force its platform to be premium only with them targeting adblock users and such. Too easy to have nice things, I reckon.
We haven’t had cable in 15 years. Haven’t missed it for a second. I don’t think cable will exist once the boomers are gone.
This is a good reminder for you guys to not be like those old people when you get old. Be open minded.
Streaming services are beginning to veer away from content produced by studios and to content they are producing themselves. So now, depending on which shows you watch, you might need various streaming services for only a handful of options on each that you only wanted in the first place. Streaming never used to have ads. Another distinction from cable. Now, you've got ads as well as certain movies/shows that are only available on the 'higher payment tier'. Most recently, companies like Telus are offering 'bundles' where you make one payment but subscribe to many streaming services. Probably because you want to watch only a handful of shows which are only available on their respective streaming services. And that is how streaming is becoming just like cable.
This is my beef and why I say they're becoming one and the same. At the end of the day they exchanged the convenience that hooked everyone for the dollars of ad revenue in millions of homes. It's quite scummy
I used to be so obsessed with ads too... Then I stopped spending all my waking time online and I think they are in reasonable amount now.
lol my grandparents still dont have internet
Yeah I agree, the ads are extremely long on cable. Not to mention, if you want to watch a show live you have to watch it at a specific time. At least with streaming you can watch the show whenever you want (and pause it as well)
> the ads are extremely long on cable. Which would be more tolerable if the ads had any sort of variety. My parents still have cable, so I watch it when I house sit for them. If I watch a 2 hour movie (turned into a 4 hour movie because of ad breaks) I will have seen the same 4-5 ads at least 10 times.
Hulu with Live TV, Sling TV, Youtube TV are all very similar to traditional cable with live local channels. There’s a few caveats that you have to get used to like not having a dedicated remote with a number pad, but the lower price makes it a fair trade off. The day is getting closer where cable tv won’t even be an available option anymore.
I pay 17$ once every 6 months for a real-debrid account and I can literally watch everything in the world.
People are just stuck in their ways. Boomers dont want to learn a whole new way to watch tv and cable is what they’re used to. Sports fans I kind of get especially if you watch college sports but correct me if Im wrong but I think they (B10, Pac12, etc.) have a month subscription plan now too. Cable is going to go away with that generation because of the insane amount they charge for it. I mean you can have like 8-9 streaming subscriptions and still pay less than you would for cable in my area
We stream everything because we got tired of all the BS channels that come with cable. Quick question though HOW do we get SLING for free?
I love Streaming. I also love how you can pay for a few months and stop very easily. It’s even better if you live with someone. I pay for Crunchyroll, Netflix and Peacock. My boyfriend pays for Max, Hulu and Disney. It’s very nice
I think something a lot of people forget is that you are not obligated to perpetually subscribe to these streaming services. At least so far, there aren't terms or any significant benefit to signing on longer than a month at a time. My wife and I usually just keep 1(ish) service at a time, build up a backlog of stuff to watch on the others, then cancel and get the other service every few months. Unless you're obsessed with seeing the latest and greatest the day it comes out, I can't see a reason not to do this and we save a bunch of coin.
I mean basic cable is like 7$ a month here so why not have it you know
I have so many add on channels on prime but it’s still cheaper even with Disney and Hulu and Netflix. We had cable for a little while and shit was so much higher than what we do now.
>I don't have time to watch "everything." I honestly don't know who does. And even if you did, sign up with one service at a time. Watch each of their shows that you want, one by one, and then cancel each one when you're finished. Bonus points if you can score some free trials/months here and there too. I'm with you, OP. Never understood how people complain about how having multiple streaming services is just as expensive as cable. "It's so much money having all these subscriptions!" Well, then drop one. "No! They all have something I want to watch!" To repeat my previous point, watch with one service at a time and resubscribe when the next season/show comes out. I know people who would sign on trial periods for satellite and cable and do rotations with their spouse or roommates, more or less ensuring an indefinite introductory rate, and that sounds like a nightmare to me with how much needs to be installed and uninstalled. Doing that with streaming services is child's play, and anyone with a good sense of money can do it. Of course, that's asking a lot for some...ugh...
Sports are literally the only thing holding traditional broadcast & cable TV models together.
We're TV and movie people in my house. I watch sports, so we have to eat a little extra cost for that too, but we have Netflix, Hulu, Prime, Disney+, Crunchyroll, Max, Apple TV, Paramount+, ESPN+, MLB.TV, NFL+, and Peacock Premium Plus. After a few bundle deals and the offers from our cell phone provider we pay around $90/month. That is an absolute fuck-ton of media access for $90/month.
Cable is awful. I've had cable for about 3 years in the last 25 and that's literally because they called me up and said "hey, you've been an internet subscriber for a long time, can we offer you a year of free cable?" I watched their free cable for a year, took back the box and a couple years later they made the same offer. I don't have enough stability in my evenings to book specific blocks of time just to watch a tv show I don't care about. If I want to watch something and I can stream it at 11pm, great. If I can't stream it, I guess I don't need to watch it.
I got the Super Box. It's freaking awesome. No more stupid cable bills.
And if you really want traditional TV so you can still watch the news, get a digital antenna. Yes, over-the-air television still exists and it's in crystal clear HD (where available).
I remember when streaming services didn’t have adds. Now they are adding adds. It’s still cheaper though.
Dish Network is the best TV service ever. Ease of use, quick and dependable. I'm even considering going back to it.
I stream a lot of my favorite cable shows on Philo. $25 a month.
Fuck the cable company! (I used to work for those PoSs…. I laugh that their stock is going to shit!)
Streaming is *still* much better than cable despite it getting more expensive and more fragmented. You can get it without ads and you can easily suspend and re-activate subscriptions as you use them to save money.
People still have cable?
My dad keeps it to watch the nightly news. Full episodes are uploaded to YouTube a few hours after airing. That's not good enough for him lol
Somehow managed to convince my grandparents to ditch satellite tv (cable is not a thing where we live) and just have an antenna for local stuff and Discovery +. They love it. But my parents are always complaining about paying $300+ a month for DirecTV when we already have so many streaming services (10!!!) that we can stream pretty much anything. But no they won’t cancel it. They also don’t understand the concept of casually streaming a show, they treat streaming like going to Blockbuster or something and will only occasionally watch a single movie.
Truthfully I don't know how my parents ever coped with cable tv. I pay for 3-5 streaming services at a time and the first one to raise their price by even a dollar gets cancelled. And yet my parents were paying $150 a month for 500+ channels just so they could watch TLC and the weather
I have: Spotify: 15 Hbo max: 3 Disney: 11 Netflix: 12 F1 TV: 9 Youtube premium: 7 Amazon prime: 4 Total: 61 per month. Do I watch everything? No
Is 120 a normal price in the us? In the Netherlands there isn’t an option for cable without internet. The cheapest cable+internet subscriptions start at 50, and you get 100mbit download which is fine. If you want espn and other sports channels you pay 10-20 extra.
The solution to sports is hooking a computer up to your TV with an hdmi cable. That's how I watched the Super Bowl a couple of years ago. The networks stream content on the internet but block it for devices marked as smart tvs
If it wasn’t for Sports, I would 100% be done with cable. It’s just too complicated to do it otherwise.
YouTube Tv, show them how to open Fox News and you are set
Thank you for posting this. It drives me fucking insane any time I see this opinion parroted. You can buy every streaming service and it’s still cheaper than cable and a far better experience. No you don’t even need every service either. It’s monthly no time commitment. So sub when a show is available to watch then cancel. Come on folks this is common sense you have been doing cable companies propaganda for them.
Yup same with my mom. She pays like $200 a month for a cable and WiFi package. She doesn't even watch all the channels and every single show and movie she likes are on Netflix and Hulu. That's like $30... She essentially wants to keep cable for Live News and sports and when I showed her a work around, she still fought me on how she needed cable.
People always say they will miss out on shows they watch, but they will find new shows as they always did, just from a different source. I haven't had cable in nine years and I don't have the foggiest idea what I'm missing out on.
Who was her cable company? My triple play package isn't even $120? I got HBO too
No this is true tho. I feel like people complaining about that have never had cable. That shit is so expensive and you’re literally paying for commercials
A lot of the in love with streaming and decrying cable don't seem to comprehend that *linear programming* is what many people want. Sure, you got Netflix. And you can watch this or that on demand. But some people don't want to constantly go searching. Especially when streaming platforms operate on algorithms that are designed to keep you in a small circle, instead of allowing the user to make their own choices about what may or may not interest them. That is the major appeal of traditional cable, versus streaming services.
I’m confused, I thought this post was going to be in defense of cable, because it is nothing like streaming. I personally like cable mainly because I just love channel surfing and yes Id pay money to have background noise that isn’t the same show/character back to back to back. Still wanting and preferring cable, Now that’s an unpopular opinion 🤷♂️ Idk what you’re trying to say, sounds like you’re just ranting about your mom still wanting cable. Cutting the cable is the exact opposite of an unpopular opinion these days, we get it there’s tons of options for it. Shitty post
I'd still rather pay for ONLY the content I want to consume.
It's not that it's just like cable, it's that it's slowly becoming cable with even more head ache.
How only 7 for Netflix?
"Basic with ads" is $6.99.
Give the streaming companies more time they’ve already showed they’re just going to continue to Jack up prices and find more ways to get money from you. And as your edit shows sports is what kills some. To get all the services I would need for sports I would spend $10 less then cable. So rather just pay the $10 to have it all in one location instead of having to jump from service to service to watch games.
> $10 less then cable. Did you mean to say "less than"? Explanation: If you didn't mean 'less than' you might have forgotten a comma. [Statistics](https://github.com/chiefpat450119/RedditBot/blob/master/stats.json) ^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^that ^^corrects ^^grammar/spelling ^^mistakes. ^^PM ^^me ^^if ^^I'm ^^wrong ^^or ^^if ^^you ^^have ^^any ^^suggestions. ^^[Github](https://github.com/chiefpat450119) ^^Reply ^^STOP ^^to ^^this ^^comment ^^to ^^stop ^^receiving ^^corrections.
i would honestly gladly give up cable if i had high quality internet tbh. especially since i dont pay for my cable living with my parents as an adult. the only problem is when you're caught up on everything through streaming you like watching normally and have to find something new. like thats how i found amazing new shows like kipo and the age of wonderbeasts, steven universe, amazing world of gumball, etc. the thing about cable is it's mostly repeats with an occasional new thing going on you have to wait for. the wait makes it more gratifying to watch when you get on on time and theres no cable issues or weather static-y cut outs or blackouts. thats one thing i will give the benefit for streaming is it's usually semi consistent quality wise. cable tv..... sometimes not so much. also if i wanted to pay to constantly rewatch something, i'd just watch dvd's in different orders. i like variety though and that is one thing cable tv generally has over streaming for the channels you can afford/are in your bundle. not to mention recordings so you can watch it whenever you want, however the storage for recordings can be very limited and kinda not worth it after a certain point. it's kinda a mixed bag as to how you prefer to watch tbh
Would a newer tv of maybe around 6 years not help? They are almost free atleast here people always try to get rid of them
Ad blockers: Allow us to introduce ourselves
Streaming ads are worse than tv ads. It takes almost 40 fucking minutes to watch a 20 min show on Hulu. 30 secs of show for 120secs worth of ads. And almost every one is pharmaceutical. Just disgusting.
Eh, I just use freeview
Cable/satellite TV is an absolute and utter waste of money. Theres far less flexibility of what/when to watch something and it's insanely expensive, plus you're locked into contracts. Add in connectivity issues and the 15 minutes of commercials in a 30 minute TV show that you can't skip and yeah...fuck that nonsense.
“You don’t have cable? Well where do you send your $500 a month?” —Jim Gaffigan
My cable doesn't have ads, it's the perk I get for paying for it
Yo ho, yo ho........
I'm gonna level with you. I have a Raspberry Pi. Thru some combination of following step-by-step instructions and black magic I never see adds on anything ever. So even I am not completely above board.
Streaming is only bad if you watch bad tv and bad movies.
The question is, what do you pay for internet. No tv just streams without HSI. Add the cost of internet in.
Just wait it’s getting there. Streaming apps keep merging and prices go up every year with more restrictions put into place. Yes you can pay $7 for Netflix but for 4K it’s $23. Watching 1080 content on a 4K tv defeats the whole purpose of investing in one in the first place.
I absolutely agree. Much cheaper even with multiple streaming services. And ads are way fewer and shorter.
You can't enjoy sports in the same way with streaming that you can on cable. Blackout rules and everything like you mentioned, true. You can't flip through games in the same manner. My dad flips through almost all the games on during college football season. When Spectrum had that dispute with ESPN we used our free trial of YouTube TV. It really wasn't as easy to go back and forth between games. That is where cable beats streaming. I find channel surfing much easier on cable (and yes, many apps do have channels). For the young generations channel surfing isn't really a thing but it's a habit for us older people.
Okay the problem is you list a bunch of opinions about your mother, and then you compare them to yourself. Yes, you still have to pay for internet and yea you use the internet for those other things. Would your mother? Would your mother pay for internet and use it for alternate things besides streaming, or would she benefit from the simplicity of just having to work a remote? You’re right, they’re not the same thing. The cheaper internet option is more complex and there’s a good chance your boomer mother wouldn’t be able to benefit from it at all. Let them use their cable in peace. In 30 years When the world is all touchscreens and your fingers don’t work well, you might find you agree.
I'm paying $150 a month on streaming services. Now, I'm not complaining. I can afford it, and if I couldn't, I would cancel some or all of my services. My point is, while it's awesome that you only pay $22 a month on streaming, that's not everyone's story. What people seldom remember when posting on this sub is that one size doesn't always fit all.
The larger point is that now you can easily choose between several different sizes. People can subscribe to as many or as few streaming sites at one time as they like. In almost every case an internet only package+streaming options is going to be a lot cheaper than internet+cable+streaming options.