
Amazon Prime is on pace to become more popular than cable TV - SirLJ
https://www.recode.net/2017/7/9/15938658/amazon-prime-numbers-members-us-households-cable-tv
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zeta0134
I continue to feel as though the primary reason I would subscribe to Cable
Television would be sporting events. This remains the main televised event
where I can see the value in following along in realtime, and for which the
advertising is already inescapable, making it feel like less of a slap in the
face that I'm being advertised to in addition to also paying for the rights to
view the content stream.

Fortunately, I don't actually care about sports broadcasting, so I ditched
cable years ago and haven't looked back. (The other realtime argument I hear
frequently is news, but I find a wide variety of online sources to be better
at delivering this content anyway. I prefer to read my news.)

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mcpherrinm
Youtube TV ($35/mo) seems like the best place for getting a variety of sports
TV right now, and unlike cable you can watch it outside your home.

Unfortunately it's only available in a few markets right now. I assume it'll
expand if it's successful.

[https://support.google.com/youtubetv/answer/7068923?hl=en&re...](https://support.google.com/youtubetv/answer/7068923?hl=en&ref_topic=7071745)

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GauntletWizard
I'd say the exact opposite. If it's successful, it's competitors (the vastly
powerful Telco/Cable/ISP hybrid monstrosities that significantly grew from the
scattered bits of Ma Bell) will move to squash it - Making deals with sports
broadcasters, simply cutting off the deals with Google, or putting pressure on
Google in other ways - They're gearing up to silently disrupt Google in a
variety of ways, many of them underhanded (Which is what the Net Neutrality
debate is actually about - They're negotiating for rents from Google, and the
question isn't if they will, but how much).

It's only if it manages to gather steam slowly that it has a chance of really
disrupting the networks.

(Of course, I still really wish Google had simply starved the beast in the
early tens; In 2010 or 2011, Google could simply have put less effort into
copyright protection and more into original programming, and utterly rewritten
the Movie and TV industries in one fell swoop)

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Aron
I don't think Prime users have a particularly high utilization rate of the
video service, though this might change with time. If you look at how many
ratings on IMDB any of their originals have gotten, I see just tiny fractions
of shows on broadcast or Netflix. The Man in the High Castle is perhaps their
most popular show and it has ~50k ratings which isn't bad, but say, House of
Cards has 365k. Stranger Things has 315k in a year. Fargo has 210k.

Mozart in the Jungle and Transparent have won major awards, and they both have
~16k ratings.

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dingo_bat
Agree that Prime video's catalog is highly limited. I treat it as a bonus perk
that you get for subscribing to Amazon prime. Netflix's library is vast
compared to it.

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nodesocket
I actually just ditched my Comcast cable subscription for Google YouTube TV
([https://tv.youtube.com](https://tv.youtube.com)) and loving it. Paired it
with a Google Chromecast Ultra and Samsung TV.

Saved $60 a month and only missing History and Discovery channels. They have
nearly all major US sporting networks and events as well.

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tssva
This is an interesting look at how many people read beyond the headline. Most
of the comments are references to Amazon Prime Video streaming versus cable TV
and/or Netflix. The article itself states that Amazon Prime is used mostly for
its shopping and shipping benefits and not for video streaming. The comparison
to cable TV subscribers is purely to show the level of market penetration of
Amazon Prime in US households.

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ShadowGloom
For streaming, I still prefer Netflix. I don't like the interface of Amazon on
the firestick or the phone app, though I do like a lot of the options Prime
has that Netflix lacks.

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dingo_bat
For me Netflix is unusable of mobile because I simply cannot stream on LTE. I
have a 1GB/day cap which gets blown away in 20 minutes. Prime lets me download
shows on wifi and watch later.

~~~
ShadowGloom
I can see the frustration on that. I don't use mobile for Prime or Netflix,
always wifi. But, I use Amazon Prime Music, and it seems to be much better
designed for mobile than other streaming services I've used.

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dpkonofa
I don't understand why this is so shocking or surprising. Amazon Prime offers
on-demand viewing (on top of the free shipping and all that) which is
something cable TV doesn't offer, at least not to the degree that Prime does.
Prime is a much better service and a much better value. Why would anyone be
surprised?

