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400,000 American Homes Have Dumped Pay TV This Year

Posted by samzenpus on from the to-the-internet dept.

redkemper writes "More than 400,000 American homes have cut the cord and ditched their cable and satellite pay-TV services since the start of 2012. The figure includes 169,000 subscribers shed by Time Warner Cable last quarter, marking the service provider's tenth consecutive quarter of customer losses. It also includes the 52,000 net subscribers DirecTV lost this past quarter, and 176,000 customers who left Comcast."

43 of 333 comments (clear)

  1. I did... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...and I haven't regretted 1 minute of it.

    1. Re:I did... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      same here, cut my consumption of crap tv at the same time great bonus.

    2. Re:I did... by fiannaFailMan · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Me neither. I gave it up years ago and found better things to do with my time.

      If supermarkets worked like Cable TV you'd have your cereal sealed into the same container as hamburgers, frozen peas, a pound of apples, two candy bars, six loaves of bread, and you'd be forced to buy the whole container even if the only thing you wanted was that one brand of cereal.

      --
      Drill baby drill - on Mars
    3. Re:I did... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Good analogy, but you don't take it far enough. In reality it's more like:

      "Cereal, hamburgers, frozen peas, bread, tampax, a sears catalog, a bible, a box of adult diapers, a carton of, and a bag of that peanut taffy halloween candy that NOBODY likes" - And you pledge to buy one every month for two years, after which the price goes up unless you sign a new pledge.

    4. Re:I did... by TWX · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I was coming home and watching 4+ hours of CSI every evening. It was easy to veg out to. It was mildly interesting, mildly entertaining, and required minimal thought or engagement to pay attention to. I also watched The History Channel, The Discovery Channel, and the various movie channels like TCM and AMC.

      One day I realized I was neglecting my wife, my hobbies, my chores around the house, etc. We got rid of pay cable when Turner Classic Movies was taken off of extended analog and put on to digital, which was one of the few networks that we actually cared to specifically watch.

      We went without pay TV for years, and bought our DTV decoder boxes like everyone else, and I rediscovered many of the actually good vintage shows on RTN and Me and other networks. Just recently I started playing with XBMC, and I wholly recommend it. I threw together a junk PC from parts laying around and hooked it into the component inputs on our widescreen HD tube TV, and now we can watch hundreds of "channels" worth of free content from PBS, several cable networks, Vimeo, Youtube, and lots and lots of other sources. They seem to be without commercials too.

      Now we can watch what we want, when we want, and can pursue our hobbies without having to interrupt just to watch a stupid TV show.

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    5. Re:I did... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      same here, cut my consumption of crap tv at the same time great bonus.

      Likewise here. It feels like the quality of my life has improved. Now that I am no longer bombarded with commercials I don't have the desire anymore to buy things ( unless I really need it).

      So you're impulsive, undisciplined, and display follow-the-leader (sometimes derisively called "sheeplike") characteristics?

      Advertising can't work otherwise. That's why these master manipulators use beautiful women and cute children and fuzzy kittens in their propaganda, because getting an emotional response bypasses rational thought. That's where not being impulsive comes into play. They love to get you to buy things you don't really need by making you think you might need them, that's where discipline kicks in. They want your purchase to be their idea and not your own evaluation of your wants, needs, and budget, which is why being an individual is so important.

      I guess that sounds negative but the purpose of explaining this to you is so you can see just how ruthless and devious these people in marketing really are. These traits are not really your fault. The school system and the media and the government all find them useful to varying degrees and they all encourage these character defects. Becoming your own man or your own woman in a meaningful way that makes you resistant to manipulation/propaganda is difficult because at first the deck is stacked against you, but it is more than worthwhile.

      The other problem a lot of people have is that they're prideful and easily offended so they don't take criticism well, preferring to get mad at me for trying to tell them something like this rather than being grateful someone is actually telling them how it is. If that kind of outrage is so valuable to you that you'd rather continue to be impulsive, undisciplined, and easily led, well, that would be your option, but I hope you can do better than that. As you see I feel no need to sugarcoat everything to make it easier to hear because that's exactly the sort of thing a manipulator does so that'd be rather hypocritical of me.

    6. Re:I did... by dgatwood · · Score: 3, Funny

      a carton of, and a bag of that peanut taffy halloween candy that NOBODY likes

      I think you just the whole thing.

      --

      Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

    7. Re:I did... by LateArthurDent · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Depends how low you want to set the bar for passing as human.

      I'm not the AC you replied to, but I agree with him.

      The bar is pretty low. Humans are just like any other animal, mostly ruled by instincts, and our emotions are easily manipulated. We do have capacity for great intellect, and have accomplished great things as a result, but don't fool yourself into thinking your really that much ahead of other animals. It's just that small differences count for a lot.

      The people who recognize this are typically far better at resisting their base impulses. People who think they aren't influenced by mass marketing are typically the puppets of their psychological tricks. It's only when you manage to put aside your feeling of superiority that you can see it in yourself. And it's only when you see it in yourself that you can do something to stop it. If you don't know it's happening, you can't fix it.

    8. Re:I did... by bzipitidoo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      No, I just don't watch TV anymore. Last time I regularly watched TV was during STNG, around 1990. They had a few awful episodes during the 7th season, and I tuned out and never came back. I have seen only a few DS9 and Voyager episodes. Meh.

      There was this new thing called the Internet. You could actually participate instead of passively absorbing whatever messages they thought people wanted or needed to hear. Now I've done enough grinding in MMORPGs to have a full appreciation of how boring and tedious that can get. TV is worse than that, that's how bad TV is.

      I don't have much of a movie collection either. Just a handful on DVD and VHS. No BluRays. Whenever I've tried to identify shows worth watching, I come up with so little that I don't bother. Last time I strolled through a Blockbuster, I didn't see a thing on the shelves that I thought worth watching. Don't subscribe to anything like Netflix either.

      I also object to the MAFIAA's policies, and do not wish to patronize an industry that treats their customers so shabbily. There are plenty of other, better things to do.

      --
      Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
    9. Re:I did... by fm6 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is actually why I don't have cable. I cut it off about 8 years ago because I was broke and couldn't afford it. Later, when I could afford it, I realized I was glad not to have a firehose of crap emptying into my living room. So I never hooked up again.

    10. Re:I did... by cpu6502 · · Score: 3, Informative

      I saved about $10,000 over the last decade by not having cable TV. You probably have similar savings amounts.

      Of course even with "just" an antenna I sill end-up watching more TV then I probably should: Perry Mason, Alfred Hitchcock, Dragnet...... plus hulu's free shows (like Syfy). My schedule is booked even w/o the comcast cable in my home.

      --
      My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
    11. Re:I did... by lgw · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Is anyone cutting the content cord, that actually has a decent AV system they've invested in?

      That would be me. After yeras of bitching about nothing good on TV, I finally did the raitonal thing. I still get DVDs, but no OTA anything, no cable, no sat, nothing "real time" at all. I don't even miss it a little.

      I still watch TV,mind you, at higher quality than most cable (to just by the bitching of /.ers on other stories), but only once its out on DVD as a complete season. The rate at which top-quality new stuff becomed available to me is the same at which it becomes available to you, only the latency has changed. The massive upside is: no filler No turning on the TV in hopes of finding something good, then watching even though I didn't. I haven't seen a commercial at home in 10 years or so.

      Only turning on the TV because you have something really good to watch, and otherwise spending your time doing something more productive - well, I highly recommend it.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  2. Goodbye Pay TV by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Usenet + SAB + Sickbeard = I'm satisfied

    1. Re:Goodbye Pay TV by Rude+Turnip · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you're still partaking in TV programming, regardless of the means, you haven't said goodbye to it.

      --
      Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
  3. It would have counted me too by Anubis+IV · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ...but for some reason my cable/internet provider charges less for 10Mbps when it's also packaged with their basic cable than they do when it's by itself. So, I gladly accepted their $8/month credit to add basic cable, and I simply unplugged the cable from my TV as soon as the cable guy had left. Strange thing is, this isn't a special as part of signing up with a contract, since I have no contract with them.

    I really don't get how they do their accounting, and I'm beginning to think they don't either since they're losing so many customers.

    1. Re:It would have counted me too by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I really don't get how they do their accounting, and I'm beginning to think they don't either since they're losing so many customers.

      If you have CATV then you are counted as a "viewer" for the purpose of selling advertising. Same reason magazines give out free subscriptions.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:It would have counted me too by Anubis+IV · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've found that I'm much happier, more productive, and better entertained when the option of idly watching whatever is on the air is removed. Even though it's something for nothing, watching it wastes time that would have been put to better use watching shows I'm actually interested in or engaging in some other form of entertainment that I enjoy more (e.g. plowing through my backlog of games, reading a nice novel, finding a friend who I haven't seen in awhile to grab an impromptu dinner with). That's why I unplugged it: to enjoy things I like better more often.

    3. Re:It would have counted me too by vux984 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      At-least watch Olympics

      Why do I need to watch a corporate orgy of sponsorship and advertising where the public foots the bill and they take profit?

      So I can see which individual blessed with the right genes and the most funding can run faster or jump higher?

      I'd rather watch a Coke commercial. At least its not pretending to be something its not, and it usually has good production values.

    4. Re:It would have counted me too by camperdave · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I thought the Olympics WERE a Coke commercial.

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  4. Please Find Alternative Ways to Our Money by ohnocitizen · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I really hope some of the companies out there (HBO especially, I needs my Game of Thrones fix) figure out other ways of getting money from customers. I wouldn't want to see the shows I like cut back or eliminated if the tv/cable networks go the way of newspapers. So, dear cable/tv companies: We have money, we want to support your art. Let's figure something out!

    1. Re:Please Find Alternative Ways to Our Money by CanHasDIY · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I really hope some of the companies out there (HBO especially, I needs my Game of Thrones fix) figure out other ways of getting money from customers. I wouldn't want to see the shows I like cut back or eliminated if the tv/cable networks go the way of newspapers. So, dear cable/tv companies: We have money, we want to support your art. Let's figure something out!

      I.e., don't be douche bags and try to tie your loyal fans into antiquated distribution methods that we, the consumers who drive the economy and thus are your bottom line, have repeatedly and soundly rebuffed.

      --
      An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
    2. Re:Please Find Alternative Ways to Our Money by tool462 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      HBO Go and ESPN3 need to be made available to those of us who want their programming, but have no desire to pay for cable.
      If anybody from those companies is listening, hurry up and make it happen. You have a customer waiting who's desperate to give you money, but can't without giving 10x that amount to Cox/Comcast/DirectTV/etc.

  5. Oblig. by fiannaFailMan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Edward George Ruddy died today! Edward George Ruddy was the Chairman of the Board of the Union Broadcasting Systems, and he died at eleven o'clock this morning of a heart condition, and woe is us! We're in a lot of trouble!

    So. A rich little man with white hair died. What has that got to do with the price of rice, right? And *why* is that woe to us? Because you people, and sixty-two million other Americans, are listening to me right now. Because less than three percent of you people read books! Because less than fifteen percent of you read newspapers! Because the only truth you know is what you get over this tube. Right now, there is a whole, an entire generation that never knew anything that didn't come out of this tube! This tube is the Gospel, the ultimate revelation. This tube can make or break presidents, popes, prime ministers... This tube is the most awesome God-damned force in the whole godless world, and woe is us if it ever falls in to the hands of the wrong people, and that's why woe is us that Edward George Ruddy died. Because this company is now in the hands of CCA - the Communication Corporation of America. There's a new Chairman of the Board, a man called Frank Hackett, sitting in Mr. Ruddy's office on the twentieth floor. And when the twelfth largest company in the world controls the most awesome God-damned propoganda force in the whole godless world, who knows what shit will be peddled for truth on this network?

    So, you listen to me. Listen to me: Television is not the truth! Television is a God-damned amusement park! Television is a circus, a carnival, a traveling troupe of acrobats, storytellers, dancers, singers, jugglers, side-show freaks, lion tamers, and football players. We're in the boredom-killing business! So if you want the truth... Go to God! Go to your gurus! Go to yourselves! Because that's the only place you're ever going to find any real truth.

    But, man, you're never going to get any truth from us. We'll tell you anything you want to hear; we lie like hell. We'll tell you that, uh, Kojak always gets the killer, or that nobody ever gets cancer at Archie Bunker's house, and no matter how much trouble the hero is in, don't worry, just look at your watch; at the end of the hour he's going to win. We'll tell you any shit you want to hear. We deal in *illusions*, man! None of it is true! But you people sit there, day after day, night after night, all ages, colors, creeds... We're all you know. You're beginning to believe the illusions we're spinning here. You're beginning to think that the tube is reality, and that your own lives are unreal. You do whatever the tube tells you! You dress like the tube, you eat like the tube, you raise your children like the tube, you even *think* like the tube! This is mass madness, you maniacs! In God's name, you people are the real thing! *WE* are the illusion! So turn off your television sets. Turn them off now. Turn them off right now. Turn them off and leave them off! Turn them off right in the middle of the sentence I'm speaking to you now! TURN THEM OFF...

    --
    Drill baby drill - on Mars
    1. Re:Oblig. by symbolset · · Score: 4, Funny

      This is why you always log out after slashdotting from Tom Cruise's house.

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
    2. Re:Oblig. by ilsaloving · · Score: 5, Informative

      For those who found the above too long/hard to read, you can watch it here.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5Gf0VKXk5Q&feature=related

      I'll just be over here soaking up the irony.

  6. Re:And yet by beernutmark · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Even worse, they still limit what you can see. The BBC has Olympics coverage right with their iplayer and catchup links. That's the way we all want to watch TV and we are willing to pay for it as well.

  7. Re:Getting there... by preaction · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, they'll see it as a reason to lobby the government to prop up their failing business model, just like every other business model disrupted by the Internet.

  8. Dear Comcast by stox · · Score: 3, Funny

    Don't let the door knob get wedged up your ass on the way out.

    Sincerely,
    A Happy Ex-customer

    --
    "To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
  9. Meanwhile in Latin America by Kohath · · Score: 3, Informative

    DirecTV alone added a record 645,000 subscribers in the latest quarter. And they added 593,000 subscribers in Latin America during the first quarter.

  10. I can't think of a better use of the phrase... by ilsaloving · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And nothing of value was lost.

  11. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  12. Re:Irony by crakbone · · Score: 3, Funny

    Foresee? You obviously have not been anywhere near SYFY.

  13. Oblig, Star Trek Quote by Nethemas+the+Great · · Score: 5, Funny
    Lt. Cmdr. Data:

    That particular form of entertainment did not last much beyond the year Two Thousand Forty.

    --
    Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
  14. Well, duh! by AnalogDiehard · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Content providers keep adding more and more commercials to content, the content gets worse and worse, and they keep driving up subscription costs by demanding more $$$ from cable companies and demanding worthless channels to be bundled together.

    TW charges too much, keeps pushing their prime channels to higher priced tiers, and refuses to offer als carte programming to customers.

    Comcast is no better than TW, and to add salt to the wound they spy on their customers for the government and the MAFIAA.

    DirecTV has poor service, fails to deliver product, and screws customers for cancelling services. I had them for 4 weeks with the promise of internet service. No one installed the internet service. After being passed around DirecTV phone support for 90 minutes, I cancelled my service because they failed to deliver. And I STILL had to pay a $135 early termination fee, despite not signing any contractual agreement.

    The industry is getting greedy and corrupt, and consumers are tired of it. Very soon my parents will join the exodus.

    --
    Eternity: will that be smoking, or non-smoking? I Corinthians 6:9-10
  15. Re:Getting there... by erroneus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well many cable TV providers are fighting this trend by offering free service to people who want to leave. Why would they do this?

    Well, I can answer that by describing the reason why I get free bicycle magazines. I bought a bicycle a couple of years ago...a really nice one. With it, I was given a trial subscription to a cycling magazine. Nice, but not worth paying for... I would look at it if I had it, but wouldn't buy it. But that's why I got it for free. Initially, I started getting "your subscriiption is going to expire!" notices. Then I got "last issue!" notices. Then I got more magazines after that. But why? Well, the magazines are full of ads. And those ads are worthless if they can't show the advertisers they have subscribers.

    Now, let's look at cable TV... lots of ads... ads which are worthless if they don't have subscribers.

  16. Sports by dohnut · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If it weren't for sports I think that number would be at least 10x higher.

    There was a thread about "cutting the cord" on one of the AV forums recently and sports was the primary argument for sticking with cable. ESPN and its ilk are well aware of the clout they have. Networks like HBO have influence too, but if you can wait a year all of the shows worth watching on those networks are going to be out on DVD/Bluray/streaming.

    I ditched cable 5 years ago and I've had to make a few sacrifices. I used to be able to watch my local BigTen basketball and football games on network TV until the BigTen Network came along. Then ESPN took Monday Night Football. Yeah, NBC has Sunday Night Football, but there was something special about MNF. I just don't watch most those games now. I also don't get to see college football bowl games or march madness games unless I go out or to a friend's house. You do miss that a little but then you remember the 100 other things you could be doing with your time and life goes on.

    I do subscribe to a number of streaming services and my over the air selection is pretty decent. So, I really watch about the same amount of television that I did before I got rid of cable. I just pay a heck of a lot less now.

    Some retort, "Yeah, but you still have to pay for Internet access..." Like I wasn't going to do that anyway? Yes, of course, now there is no "bundle" deal. Fortunately I live in a town with multiple cable providers (yes, 2 different coax cables are run into my home) and DSL so Internet access is reasonable even without a cable TV package.

    I also didn't /have/ to buy extra equipment for watching streaming video on my TV. I use my PS3 which was not bought for streaming video but, rather, for playing games. Now it gets more use as a media player than a game console though. The only device I /did/ buy that I might not have needed to before was a Roku for the bedroom TV.

    If cable companies offered an a la carte subscription service I might actually sign up again, but I don't see that happening.

    --
    Stupider like a fox! - H.S.
  17. Re:Cable-Free Since 7/12 by camperdave · · Score: 4, Funny

    Easiest habit I ever kicked.

    Cable free since July? You haven't even gone two days yet.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  18. Did it to themselves by Charliemopps · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The content proviers force the cable/satalite/phone companies to force packages on their customers. For example, if you want AMC... you have to get all of the channels that they force you to take along with it. AMC will not allow you to get AMC without also getting IFC, WE tv, Sundance Channel, and IFC Films. Why do they force these companies to carry these other channels? Becuase the content on those channels is very very cheap... But they are full of commercial revenue. AMC itself has all of their hit shows, which are expensive.

    Because the majority of content providers follow this same format, we now have hundreds of channels, most of which are airing total crap... or decades old reruns. Sprinkled inbetween these channels are the core channels that people really want to watch. Unfortunately you have no choice in your lineup, and because the content providers force everyone to sign the same contracts, you don't have any choice in what you get to watch.

    Sick of it all, everyone's turning to Netflix or outright piracy.

  19. I'm watching Netflix right now by Grayhand · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I dropped Cable over the AMC fight and haven't looked back. Frustrated that I'll have to wait to see Game of Thrones and Walking Dead but maybe this latest debacle will force the content providers to sell streaming services like HBO Go. The joke is Netflix streaming doesn't carry much current content but they have a ton of older stuff and they are adding faster than I can consume so at this rate I'll never run out. I mostly let it run while I work for white noise anyway. It's got the added benefit of no annoying commercials. It's why I stopped watching CNN, their ratio of news to commercials is 50/50. Completely obscene.

  20. Even though... by __aaqvdr516 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Even though my only current option for TV is satellite and my ISP is capped at 600 MB/day, my wife and I have seriously talked about dropping our TV subscription.

    It's not Netflix or internet content. It's just shitty TV.

  21. Re:Getting there... by LateArthurDent · · Score: 4, Informative

    Nice, but not worth paying for... I would look at it if I had it, but wouldn't buy it. But that's why I got it for free. Initially, I started getting "your subscriiption is going to expire!" notices. Then I got "last issue!" notices. Then I got more magazines after that. But why? Well, the magazines are full of ads. And those ads are worthless if they can't show the advertisers they have subscribers.

    I'd double-check the credit / debit card you used to buy that bike. Years ago I bought something at Best Buy and the cashier said they were offering a free subscription of some magazine, and to just fill out the card with the address to send it to. I was just a stupid college student back then and filled out the card. After those "your subscription is about to expire" notices, I also kept getting the magazines. But they charged the same credit card I used to make the best buy purchase for the renewal, without any action on my part.

    I called and got them to refund my money, but it's easy to overlook a $20 purchase that happens once a year, so I'd check just to be sure.

  22. Re:Getting there... by erroneus · · Score: 5, Funny

    Shut up. I'm old. I like to tell stories to make me think my life is meaningful.

  23. Re:Getting there... by preaction · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Except they are not government-regulated, it is just prohibitively expensive for a competitor to run cable on the power company (a gov't regulated monopoly) poles. Which is why the Internet is so disruptive to these entrenched businesses.

    http://gizmodo.com/5830956/why-the-government-wont-protect-you-from-getting-screwed-by-your-cable-company Apparently there used to be exclusivity but that was repealed. Probably in the guise of "de-regulation" that everyone is so fond of.