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Columnist Mocks The Case Against Cord-Cutting As 'Too Many Choices' (techhive.com)
An anonymous reader quote TechHive:
The cord-cutting naysayers are trotting out a new argument in favor of cable, and it's even more absurd than the old ones: Having too many high-quality, standalone streaming services, they say, is actually bad for consumers, who are apparently helpless at using technology or making sound purchase decisions... The New York Post's Johnny Oleksinski concluded that all those sneering hipsters who've had the nerve to ditch cable are about to get their comeuppance -- in the form of additional services to choose from... By now, anyone who's actually cut the cable cord should be screaming out in unison: No one's making you subscribe to all these services! You can pick the ones you care about most, rotate between services, or occupy your screen time with a growing number of other digital distractions...
I will concede that if you want to use multiple streaming services, trying to sift through them all can be confusing. But even this concern is blown entirely out of proportion by naysaying pundits, who seem to ignore solutions that already exist. Roku, Amazon Fire TV, and Apple TV all offer universal search across services like Netflix and Hulu, while features like Roku Feed and the Apple TV TV app demonstrate how system-wide browsing is getting easier. Besides, using a handful of apps to get what you want isn't that burdensome -- especially for the growing audience of people who've been raised on smartphones... consumers are smarter than they're getting credit for. That's why cable subscriptions continue to plunge, even as these bogus stories keep popping up like clockwork.
I will concede that if you want to use multiple streaming services, trying to sift through them all can be confusing. But even this concern is blown entirely out of proportion by naysaying pundits, who seem to ignore solutions that already exist. Roku, Amazon Fire TV, and Apple TV all offer universal search across services like Netflix and Hulu, while features like Roku Feed and the Apple TV TV app demonstrate how system-wide browsing is getting easier. Besides, using a handful of apps to get what you want isn't that burdensome -- especially for the growing audience of people who've been raised on smartphones... consumers are smarter than they're getting credit for. That's why cable subscriptions continue to plunge, even as these bogus stories keep popping up like clockwork.
One guy makes a point that you might not save a lot of money by cord cutting and buying into several streaming services. Then we get a spate of reactionary articles that take some kind of offense like he's out to stop cord cutting. Guess there's not much better to do on a Sunday.
The fragmentation of services like HBO and the new Disney service will lead to a case against cord cutting, but the same can be said for piracy. A legit case against cord cutting is also a case that can be made for piracy.
You would have thought they learned their lesson.
Make SELinux enforcing again!
... you could, you know, just go outside and have a life away from screens.
Age 51, computer geek since 1977. My dad began with RCA in 1947 installing television sets. We never had cable or satellite, the concept of paying for television being bonkers, so what's there to miss? Movies and CDs I can check out from the library. Seriously, paying for television?
Too many choices? If you say so. I think people can handle having choices. I personally choose not to participate.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
It's absolutely a viable option. There is more produced every day than you could ever hope to consume in a lifetime. "Cord cutting" is mainly a matter of getting over your current addiction, and acquiring a new one.
Whatever it is that you 'want' to watch on cable, there's another option online that will entertain you just as much.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Having too many streaming services isn't "too many choices" it's "too many bills."
you might not save a lot of money by cord cutting and buying into several streaming services.
And this right here is why I'm staying with piracy. The cable companies force me to buy bundles of crap channels just so I can get the three or four I actually watch. And now streaming services want me to subscribe to all or nothing, and I need to subscribe to three competing services to get those three or four channels I watch. And if I want to watch a sports game, I basically need to buy another Ferrari for one of the players....
Also there is a huge logical fallacy in the articles argument, which is that you will subscribe full-time to these services instead of switching every few months.
When I first used Netflix streaming, I held the plan for about a year. Since then I subscribe for ~2 months per year because I've already exhausted their core catalog. They have some content I am not getting elsewhere, but I dont need a 24/7/365 plan to consume it.
Amazons non-prime model is pay as you go, while their prime model is tied to more than just streaming video. Disney can do the first and that would be great, but they cant do the second at all. They are going for the Netflix model and that just isnt going to land 24/7/365 business.
"His name was James Damore."
The columnist misses the point. No one is complaining that $99.99/month for 700 channels they want isn't a good deal, people are complaining that they are paying $99.99/month for the 3 or 4 channels they want, and they get 696 channels thrown in that they don't want. The problem for most people is not the value of the channels (although that certainly is it's own debate), the problem is you have to buy all this stuff you don't want just to get the little you do want.
How would you feel if you only had one place you could go to for ice cream, and even though you only want one scoop of vanilla and one scoop of chocolate, you are forced to buy one scoop of ever flavor and pay $50? That business model wouldn't work, even if it were a monopoly, because people realize they don't need ice cream *that* badly. And people are starting to realize they don't need TV *that* badly, either, especially since their need for video content is being more and more fulfilled by the internet.