

Why I canceled Time Warner Cable - driverdan
http://adamlindsay.posterous.com/why-i-canceled-time-warner-cable

======
ghshephard
I haven't had Cable/Satellite since 2002. I started watching all my TV on DVDs
that I bought from Amazon, but then switched to iTunes around 2006.

Now it's mostly a combination of iTunes/DVD - I'm pretty certain it's less
expensive than subscribing to TV.

The good part of this (and it should be emphasized) - is that you now watch
for a _purpose_ - Latest episode of Lost, BSG, Dexter, Weeds, South Park, Doll
House, BtVS, Angel, The Wire, DeadWood, Heroes, The Office, Dr. Horrible, Mad
Men, Parks and Recreation, Castle, Californication, Dr. Who, Kings, Sarah
Connor Chronicles, True Blood, Torchwood.

Any time that might have been lost to just passively watching television,
news, is now, of course, lost to passively reading ycombinator, nyt, wsj,
groklaw... :-)

~~~
tsuraan
Is the iTunes tv stuff still DRM'd, or have the shows gone the way of their
music? I grabbed an episode of Drawn Together around 2006 (I think), and sort
of drove me away from the entire iTunes tv stuff. The quality was terrible,
the resolution was something like 320x240, and it would only play through
quicktime due to DRM. As I currently keep everything on my file server for
easy access from all my computers, that didn't work out well for me.

Right now I just download shows when they're available, and then purchase the
DVD when its available. Not technically legal, but I insist on owning my
purchases, and I don't feel like waiting a year for shows to come out on DVD.

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adrinavarro
I live in Spain. Local TV shows are crap, and cable or tv-over-dsl price &
coverage also is. Satellite is dying and DTV (and soon, paid DTV) is taking
over.

Right now, if you want good TV shows (US ones, basically) you have to
subscribe to any satellite or cable/tv-over-dsl offer including FOX and AXN.
You pay the equal of 80$ a month for watching badly dubbed TV shows, aired a
few months after airing in the US. As a bonus, your internet connection is
slow when you're watching TV (or recording a tv show with your shiny DVR which
is obviously not included in the stupidly expensive setup fee) if you use tv-
over-dsl (the most common way to get "premium" tv here).

And that's why I download tv shows. I have a Fonera router connected to my
home DSL router. The Fonera runs a "patched" system (allows to stream movies
through SMB –without asking password– and doesn't hangs the fonera's cpu when
loading multiple files at once). When a new episode appears, it's pushed to
the transmission server (the fonera runs a webserver and has a RPC service).
Transmission downloads the episode, and it's "published" through the LAN
network so I can copy it to any computer through WiFi, watch it through the
wired LAN network or just watch it from the multimedia hard drive (which has a
built-in network interface and a SMB client), sitting on the sofa (and
enjoying a pretty good quality!).

So, definitely, it's much better to have my favorite TV shows ready to watch
at any time (and having them downloading during the night, so my 1,5mbit
connection doesn't suffers from it) than paying 80$ each month for what they
call "premium tv". That it's not the future, but that doesn't means we have to
live in the past, right?

~~~
driverdan
Correct me if I'm wrong but my understanding is that Spanish copyright law
allows downloading and sharing of TV shows anyway so long as there's no money
involved.

~~~
adrinavarro
You're right. Looks like they want to "regulate" this, but I'm pretty sure
that things aren't going to change in the mid term (well, at least in the next
10 years). That's because we're in Spain (and even if things change, "real
consequences" will require lot of deeper legal modifications, hard to
accomplish). We're lazy, also.

(PS: not just TV shows, also movies & music or any other multimedia material.
You can't be prosecuted –because of the "secret" in telecommunications which
doesn't allows any tracking, as IP addresses are considerate "protected,
private data"– and presumption of innocence does the rest (with no real
evidence of being you, only you the infractor, there aren't any possibilities
here to prosecute a particular).

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mahmud
For free, the best show on TV:

<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/view/>

~~~
tptacek
They've fallen off a bit lately, definitely go watch the older ones.

Also, especially if you have kids, Nova is pretty solid.

~~~
fnid
Nova has changed too. I watched it every weekend growing up and it was much
more hardcore. I've seen them mainstreaming themselves and taking on more
social issues and less science/physics issues. Nova now is like a blend of
Nova Science Now and Nova of 2 decades ago.

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terrellm
We dumped DirecTV last spring and haven't looked back. The $80/month ended up
costing us $2-$3/hour watched and we still had to sit through commercials or
fast forward.

We watch most of our tv through Hulu and buy the rest through iTunes. The big
networks I have to get through iTunes are Discovery (Mythbusters, Dirty Jobs)
and A&E (Mad Men).

Our setup is a Mac Mini with Bluetooth keyboard and mouse + DLP projector.
I've enjoyed having the full computer because it's easy to watch videos on
websites. Don't have time to watch that 20 minute Vimeo or TED video you read
about on a blog? Drag the link to a Dropbox folder and watch it that night.

~~~
PStamatiou
I did the same and ditched DirecTV last February and saved the same
80-90/month.I honestly haven't had the time with my startup and blog to even
turn on the TV for more than an hour a week, and am somewhat considering
selling it .. 50" plasma.

That being said my setup also consists of a Vudu box that lets me rent movies
whenever I want (actually have used this a ton) and a Roku netflix streaming
box but I ended up canceling netflix to save money. If I have the time to
watch anything, it is likely on my PC that shares the same desk as my
development Mac.

Over the years I have documented my various home theater setups.. starting
with my 100-inch college projector diy setup:

[http://paulstamatiou.com/how-to-100-inch-uber-theater-on-
a-b...](http://paulstamatiou.com/how-to-100-inch-uber-theater-on-a-budget)

<http://paulstamatiou.com/how-to-download-with-newsgroups>

<http://paulstamatiou.com/going-hd-part-1>

<http://paulstamatiou.com/going-hd-part-2-htpc>

[http://paulstamatiou.com/going-hd-part-3-blu-ray-and-
surroun...](http://paulstamatiou.com/going-hd-part-3-blu-ray-and-surround-
sound)

[http://paulstamatiou.com/review-boxee-media-center-or-
going-...](http://paulstamatiou.com/review-boxee-media-center-or-going-hd-
part-4)

[http://paulstamatiou.com/how-to-build-microsoft-
windows-7-in...](http://paulstamatiou.com/how-to-build-microsoft-
windows-7-intel-core-i7-pc)

(this is not an attempt at link baiting, I genuinely believe several people in
this thread will enjoy what I've got to say)

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daleharvey
In the UK I have found getting rid of my tv completely pretty easy, originally
I went from sky to freeview, which has most of what I wanted for £120 a year
(tv license), and then eventually just got rid of the tv+freeview and only
watch <http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/> or
<http://www.channel4.com/programmes/4od>

I have found that I ended up watching a lot more varied and interesting stuff
when I can search as opposed to just watching whats on.

~~~
imajes
It still costs you £120 though.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
You only need a UK TV licence to watch live TV online, not replay things that
have already been broadcast.

 _iPlayer Doesn't Require A TV Licence... Yet_ :

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2008/01/iplayer_does_...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2008/01/iplayer_does_not_require_a_tv_1.html)

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jasonlbaptiste
This sector and the issues around it are about to explode (canceling cable,
online content, digital living room, associated hardware, etc.).

The one resounding friction point people have when it comes to canceling cable
is: SPORTS. Sadly it's content that requires you to make deals with
gatekeepers, but someone should do something around RFS 4 and sports. I don't
know if it starts as anything more than espn talking heads type content, but
people clearly want more sports content via the internet to watch in their
living room.

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scootklein
I will say that the only reason I have cable right now is because it is
football season and i have 3 other roommates that i split the cost with.

with the major networks and hulu available through boxee, seems more and more
like the apple tv will be a great solution when im living on my own and only
watch a few shows.

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ahlatimer
I never set up cable when I moved into my apartment. I just got internet
(through TWC). I sometimes miss being able to channel surf through the few
channels I did actually watch, but that's just as easy to do with Hulu. The
commercials are shorter, there's less of them, and I can watch at my leisure.
Like the OP, I get annoyed watching TV at other people's houses now since
cable is completely overloaded with commercials.

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pieter
In the Netherlands you pay ~€8-15 / month for all the TV channels that are
available, so the AppleTV solution would never work here. There are less
channels and US series are delayed (usually by a year or somewhere near that),
but it's still a lot cheaper. We get BBC1 and 2 but no other UK channels.

The AppleTV is much more expensive here, €270 ($400) and iTunes doesn't do any
tv shows here yet, so it's not like we have a choice :). Anyway, what I'm
trying to say is that the tv market really differs a lot between countries.

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rdtsc
I gave up on cable as well. I get my news online and then I subscribe to
Netflix. I have the 2-at-a-time plan + all I can watch online. I've watched
most of the movies I wanted to see during the years and soon enough I'll
switch to one-at-time $9/month plan + all I can watch online.

My laptop has an HDMI output so all the online movies look decent.

In 3 years, I can't say I miss having TV. But what has happened is that I get
a lot more irritated with commercials whenever I am someone's house and they
have the TV on.

------
awolf
Perhaps OP should have tried to negotiate with Time Warner. I'm paying $79 for
tv, HD, DVD, 3 months free showtime, AND high speed Internet.

~~~
rdoherty
+1 I call Comcast every 6 months and threaten to cancel if they don't give me
the latest signup package. Been paying ~$80/month for TV, Internet & HD for
the past 3 years :)

If they say they can't help you, just ask to talk to a manager, they'll do
anything to get you off the phone.

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mhb
Sounded great to me. So I went to look at Apple TV on apple.com and I can't
figure out how to see what TV shows are available. Help?

~~~
driverdan
Check the iTunes store for shows.

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MikeCapone
I might do this when iTunes carries more shows in Canada.

Sadly, the selection has pretty big holes (f.ex. Dexter).

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chris123
We don't have a TV (by choice).

~~~
indranil
"What's all your furniture pointed at?"

~~~
die_sekte
A family (without a TV) that I know of has all their furniture pointed at a
grand piano. Definitely not cheaper.

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yesimahuman
That's pretty expensive to be buying those episodes from Apple. $35 a season?
Why not get netflix and watch them online or get the DVDs in the mail? I guess
this is a better solution if you are further ahead in the series you are
watching.

~~~
driverdan
Netflix only has past seasons and their quality is mediocre. I'd agree with
you if they offered true HD and more current episodes.

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chrischen
With digital downloads you also get to keep the episodes forever.

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tomjen2
Sadly the place I live by cable for all the units, whether we want it or not
otherwise I might go for something like that as well (it would be far cheaper
too, since I would only watch one or two shows).

Sadly it does not appear as if iTunes video store is available in Denmark, so
I just read a lot of the free content.

