
YouTube TV sharply increases monthly subscription to $64.99 - jbredeche
https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/30/21308449/youtube-tv-price-increase-64-99-viacom-hbo-new-channels
======
keithwinstein
ObShameless reminder that
[https://puffer.stanford.edu](https://puffer.stanford.edu) remains free of
charge.

The site streams San Francisco affiliates and local stations of
NBC/CBS/ABC/PBS/FOX/CW as part of a university study on video streaming
algorithms -- it's essentially a big A/B test to try to reproduce or clarify
some of the findings in the research literature. We're now posting all our
data and analysis each day. Research talk here:
[https://youtu.be/63aECX2MZvY](https://youtu.be/63aECX2MZvY)

The content is... well, it's U.S. network television and associated daytime
programming. But some people like it! And it's free (for people inside the
U.S.).

~~~
crazygringo
I'm no lawyer, but it doesn't exactly seem legal. Streaming free local network
broadcasts was definitively ruled as illegal by the Supreme Court in 2014 --
remember that was Aereo's entire business model. [1]

It seems like the Stanford service is trying to justify themselves by being an
academic study and limiting to 500 concurrent participants... but it's telling
they don't list any legal justification on the site, and merely generically
claim:

> _Stanford respects the intellectual property rights of others. If you
> believe your copyright has been violated on a Stanford site, please notify
> puffer-copyright-notices@cs.stanford.edu and give notice as stated under
> Reporting of Alleged Copyright Infringement._ [2]

I'm honestly shocked this ever passed Stanford legal review. Maybe it never
did?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aereo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aereo)

[2] [https://puffer.stanford.edu/terms/](https://puffer.stanford.edu/terms/)

~~~
ls612
I never understood what the business interest of the tv stations was in
preventing streaming online. They already give away for free the stream over
the air. What gives? Do they make money on the antennas or receivers or
something?

~~~
kgermino
They get paid by the cable companies (or YouTubeTV style equivalents). It’s
not too much (~$0.40/subscriber IIRC) but it obviously adds up.

They don’t get that money if you use an antenna, but that’s a small market
compared to the internet. Most people who use antennas won’t pay anyway, and
broadcasting gives them access to the network.

But opening up streaming will draw a lot of people who would otherwise have a
cable subscription. Which will lead to much more cord cutters and cut into the
carriage fees from the cable company.

~~~
hnburnsy
I have heard that small cable companies pay upwards of $11 per month per sub
in retran fees. This article from the industry says..."According to Kagan, the
average retrans fee charged by a broadcast station will reach $2.93 by 2022,
putting it behind only ESPN ($11.08) and cable channel TNT ($3.09)." [1]

This increase by YTTV is driven by the leverage that ViacomCBS has because of
the CBS locals then own. They are forcing YTTV to take these network. Until
retransmission consent is changed, we are stuck paying the local station
holders despite the fact that their content is free OTA.

[1] - [https://www.multichannel.com/news/is-the-retrans-cash-cow-
ru...](https://www.multichannel.com/news/is-the-retrans-cash-cow-running-low)

------
chrsstrm
For any YouTube TV PMs reading, I just added an event to my calendar marking
the day I'll cancel my account. Thanks for the helpful reference to the exact
date my current rate expires. Spectrum is offering more channels for $45/month
and you don't even need a cable box if you're using an Apple TV. YouTube TV is
an OK service that is very rough around the edges and I won't miss it a single
minute after I cancel.

"This new price reflects the rising costs of content, and we also believe it
reflects the complete value of YouTube TV"

Your price does not reflect the complete value of your service, but happy
churning.

~~~
texasbigdata
Not the same. Only works at home

~~~
chrsstrm
A road warrior VPN setup running on a Raspberry Pi 4 and placed in your home
costs less than $50. There are 1000 reasons to have one anyway, and watching
TV while traveling is also one of them. I know for a fact the Spectrum TV app
works quite well under this setup.

~~~
mav3rick
You'd expect the average Joe to do all of this ?

~~~
derefr
The average Joe isn’t subscribed to YouTube TV in the first place, are they?
They’re usually paying their cable/telco for TV service. (Which, as it
happens, already comes these days with mobile wi-fi streaming of the same
content via the provider’s apps.)

~~~
Infinitesimus
Not sure that's a given. Anecdotally, quite a few people on my friend circle
hate cable and have YouTube TV for sports and a few minor things.

No data but I'd assume YouTube's biggest pull is people young enough to hate
cable but old enough to use YouTube often and have $$ to pay for the
convenience

------
mnm1
Have they figured out how to play the show you click on yet? No. $50 a month
and the basic functionality of the app doesn't even work. With a Chromecast,
it's even worse. Eventually, after clicking back and forth, disconnecting and
reconnecting, it may play. Then you have to turn off the closed captioning for
every single show even though it's off in the settings. Then it randomly stops
at times. The ui displays the wrong show. And they have the gall to charge
even more for this shittiest motherfucking app I've ever had the displeasure
of using. This engineering team should be fired. They should be ashamed of
themselves. They can't even make the app play a single video without problems.
I've been putting up with it for years now just because of certain channels my
mom likes, but no more. Fuck this garbage app. I've submitted dozens of
support requests and the only people dumber than the engineers, project
managers, and others who work on this app are the idiots running customer
support. Fuck them all. They can shove this fucking app right up their ass.

~~~
judge2020
Sounds like you have a generation 1 Chromecast™ and bad WiFi. We hope you'll
try YouTube TV again with a Chromecast Ultra™ and a Nest Wifi™ 3 pack. Take
care!

~~~
9nGQluzmnq3M
Please tell me this is a parody of the support responses?

~~~
saagarjha
The ™s make me lean in that direction.

------
caymanjim
I love YoutubeTV, and I've been using it for years. This is probably enough to
get me to cancel, though. It started at $40 when I signed up a couple years
ago, they raised it to $50 last year, and now $65 for just a few more channels
(and among them, only one I even want).

I wish they'd offer a more a la carte option. I'd be willing to pay $10-15 per
major broadcaster's channel collection, or $2-7 for individual channels
(depending on quality of programming). I might even land at $50 or more with
my channel choices, but I'd prefer to pick what I'm paying for instead of
subsidizing dozens of channels of programming I dislike (and quite a few that
I would prefer to boycott entirely).

~~~
CivBase
I don't understand why they don't do that with YouTube channels too [edit: as
in "sub to each channel a la cart"]. Let users pay $1 or $2 a month to disable
ads on a channel (or $10 a month for "YouTube Premium"). That seems much more
sustainable than relying exclusively on ads for income and loosing potential
subscription customers to Patreon. They could even offer higher priced, per-
channel subscription tiers that add flairs to comments and unlock emojis like
Twitch.

Twitch, Floatplane, and Patreon are all proof it's a viable strategy.

Ad revenue has proven to be terribly unstable and YouTube is extremely
expensive to maintain. They should be desperately trying to diversify their
revenue.

Right now, every video that isn't "advertiser friendly" is dead weight and
money on the table.

~~~
justapassenger
> I don't understand why they don't do that with YouTube channels too. Let
> users pay $1 or $2 a month to disable ads on a channel (or $10 a month for
> "YouTube Premium"). That seems much more sustainable than relying
> exclusively on ads for income and loosing potential subscription customers
> to Patreon. They could even offer higher priced, per-channel subscription
> tiers that ad flairs to comments and unlock emojis like Twitch.

Complex subscription options are one of the easiest way to lose subscribers.

> Twitch, Floatplane, and Patreon are all proof it's a viable strategy.

It's far from being proven:

[https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/23/crowd-funding-platform-
patre...](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/23/crowd-funding-platform-patreon-
announces-it-will-pay-out-half-a-billion-dollars-to-content-creators-
in-2019.html) [https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/01/15/amazons-twitch-
hit...](https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/01/15/amazons-twitch-hit-a-wall-
in-live-streaming.aspx)

> Ad revenue has proven to be terribly unstable and YouTube is extremely
> expensive to maintain. They should be desperately trying to diversify their
> revenue.

Source? Alphabets ad revenue is extremely stable for the company and keeps on
growing. So is YouTube share in it. Ad revenue for creators tho - that's a
different story.

~~~
CivBase
> Complex subscription options are one of the easiest way to lose subscribers.

Source? Twitch and Patreon get along just fine. The existing options can
continue as they are.

> It's far from being proven.

YouTube has already swallowed the expensive part of the deal - creating a
video hosting platform. I'm just asking them to augment their monetization
scheme that other platforms have already demonstrated demand for.

> Source? Alphabets ad revenue is extremely stable for the company and keeps
> on growing.

Source for what? Of course YouTube is expensive. It's expensive to host
content at that scale. It's expensive to regulate content at that scale to
comply with the law and satisfy ad partners. I don't know what else to say. I
don't know if YouTube operates at a profit or not, but that's not really
relevant.

What matters is YouTube's profit is almost completely dependent on their
ability to sell ads. Content without ads can only benefit the platform if it
drives premium subscriptions or drives users towards content with ads.

~~~
justapassenger
> Source? Twitch and Patreon get along just fine. The existing options can
> continue as they are.

It’s how human brain operates. We’re very easily overwhelmed with multiple
options.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/iese/2018/11/05/cant-decide-
wha...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/iese/2018/11/05/cant-decide-what-to-
order-why-the-human-brain-struggles-with-plenty-of-choice/#707b95455768)

> Source for what?

Source for a claim that selling ads is extremely unstable. Check alphabet or
Facebook earning reports from last 10 years.

> I don't know if YouTube operates at a profit or not, but that's not really
> relevant.

How is operating at profit not relevant in a context of a business model?
Especially when suggested business models of companies that lose money, like
patreon, as a something that YouTube should be doing.

We’re so deep in the bubble now. Real business models and profits are
irrelevant as long as they seem cool.

~~~
CivBase
> It’s how human brain operates. We’re very easily overwhelmed with multiple
> options.

Then just present those options intelligently. Without overwhelming the user.
I'm not convinced the model I'm proposing is that complex. Many content
creators supplement their income with this exact model, but YouTube doesn't
get a cut.

> Source for a claim that selling ads is extremely unstable. Check alphabet or
> Facebook earning reports from last 10 years.

Earning reports do not reflect the revenue earned from each ad. Alphabet is a
massive company that serves ads on much more than just YouTube. The mounting
interest YouTube has shown in "advertiser friendly" and "kid friendly" content
demonstrates how concerned they are regarding their ad revenue.

> How is operating at profit not relevant in a context of a business model?
> Especially when suggested business models of companies that lose money, like
> patreon, as a something that YouTube should be doing.

You keep bringing up how Patreon isn't doing well as though it's obviously the
fault of the monetization model, rather than the extraordinary cost of
deploying a diverse content hosting service that has to compete with
established giants like YouTube. YouTube already has that part done. They are
paying to host the content no matter how they monetize it. Why do you think
deploying a new, optional monetization option will result in a net loss?

I brought up Patreon, Twitch, and Floatplane because they demonstrate there is
demand for that model. If YouTube offers it, people will certainly buy it.
Just the a la cart, per-channel, tiered subscription model. That's it.

Whether or not YouTube operates in the black is not particularly relevant. I'm
talking about augmenting their existing ad-based revenue model, not replacing
it. For the overwhelming majority of users, it wouldn't change a thing, but
YouTube could stand to bring in a lot more revenue from the minority who would
be willing to purchase payed subs to support the platform and creators.

------
cwhiz
YouTube TV had enough channels at launch. They kept adding channels that I
didn’t want and charging for it. This went from best value to worst value in
three short years.

Not sure what the old media hacks are trying to accomplish here.

~~~
adventured
> Not sure what the old media hacks are trying to accomplish here.

They're trying to keep their channels artificially expensive and trying to
limit the success of (previously) less expensive TV channel platforms like
YouTube TV. They don't want to give ground on that, because if they do then
it's a big freefall down to what the real value of their channels are.

They make an enormous amount of cartel-capture money from the high cost
subscription services like traditional cable and DirecTV. In their ideal
world, absolutely nothing would change about that (other than prices always
going up over time).

~~~
cwhiz
They have lost almost 4 million subscriber this year. And streaming companies,
such as YouTube TV, have also lost subscribers. So these people just stopped.

~~~
ogre_codes
> So these people just stopped.

I suspect a fair number of people just don't care about TV as much as the
experts thought. Netflix plus Amazon Prime and a season pass of Dr. Who is
about all I can watch anyhow.

------
vanc_cefepime
Really not surprising that old media still has pull like this.

I enjoyed using YouTubeTV during this past college football season, but I
won't be renewing this year. It was already iffy at best with Coronavirus, but
now with this price hike YouTube can forget it. Probably exactly what old
media wants from us anyway so we go back to cable. Forever a cable cutter.

If needed, I'll go back to Sling despite it going up as well when it first got
started, but not as dramatically as YouTubeTV. Sling Orange + sports package
will be $40, which is good for the few months I need it. At-least we still
have some other options out there instead of having to go back to cable.

~~~
mrits
Yeah, we just cancelled as well after we realized we haven't logged in for a
few months. I have it mainly for sports and those don't exist right now.

------
ChuckMcM
At $20 they were disruptive, at $65, they are dead to me. I will be
interesting to see how many others leave. The "teaser" cable package is more
channels and half the cost.

I think it is just a continuing trend in Google getting squeezed harder and
harder by the falling search advertising margins and no replacement or even
side hustle to compensate.

Just before Google winks out of relevance I expect to see them try to charge
people to use maps.

~~~
thallium205
They definitely charge people to use maps... A lot.

~~~
onefuncman
corporations aren't people, despite a lot of hand wringing to the contrary

~~~
esarbe
Corporations aren't people. (Just to hammer it in..)

------
russellbeattie
At least they were nice enough to include a link to cancel the service in
their email about the price hike. Seriously! Other services purposefully make
it difficult, so props to Google for doing the right thing there.

I liked the service but I just don't use it enough to continue. I'll re-
subscribe when they drop the price again.

~~~
mrits
I agree, it was really easy. Unfortunately I first pressed the "manage my
services" button which took me down a deep rabbit hole of other google
services.

------
lowmemcpu
That cost is nearly double it's original price 3y ago, and looking at the
recent channel additions -- I'm not sure the users will be convinced it's
worth the extra cost. I wish someone would have a selection like:

$5 - one channel

$7 - two channels

$10 - five channels

$20 - fifteen channels (you pick)

$50 - 40 channels (we pick)

$50 + $15 - 40 channels (the $50 package), plus <package B>

~~~
draz
YouTube is not the content producer, rather strikes deals with content
producers. The reality is there is consolidation in the media world, with a
few mega corporations managing most channels. They typically bundle a few
channels together for vMVPDs/MVPDs, for leverage - “you want channel X, you
must also get channel Y.”

Source: I head a Product organization at a mega media org.

~~~
eslaught
Honest question: why do big organizations do this?

I mean, I get it: you're making people pay for stuff they don't need. You can
charge a higher price despite users not actually watching everything they buy.
Clearly, this tactic must work at some level, or else they wouldn't do it.

On the other hand, there are users like me who take one look at that and say,
"ew", and walk away from TV completely. And it's not like I'm unwilling to pay
for content, I just want to get what I want when I want it and not pay for the
privilege of wandering through this ridiculous maze of content that no one
cares about.

Maybe I'm being naive, but it just seems to me like this is a strategy that's
going to kill the cash cow on the long run. Am I wrong?

~~~
slg
Subsidizing new content and making it easily discoverable are the primary
reasons for bundling. When new content comes to you for free with your
existing purchase, the only thing stopping you from trying it out and
potentially getting hooked is your willingness to commit time to it. If every
piece of content had a price associate with it, people would be much less
willing to try new things. This same principle applies at both the individual
show level and at the channel level. The people selling you this content want
you to consume as much as possible so you don't associate your purchase with a
single show and end up canceling HBO once Game of Thrones ends.

You can see how this lack of bundling might impact content by looking at
movies which are traditionally more a la carte. Movies are produced under the
assumption that they all need to be financially self sufficient. The end
result is that most content produced is either blockbusters based off big
budget IP (which tries to address discoverability) or low cost and easy to
produce content that can potentially be hugely profitable if it hits. The mid-
budget TV (traditional TV mainstays like sitcoms would generally fall into
this bucket) would likely disappear if everything was purchased a la carte.

It is also worth considering that most of the streaming content providers all
do the same bundling as the traditional powers like Viacom. The difference is
that the Netflixes of the world don't organize their content into channels.
However there are definitely different verticals within these companies.
Netflix has one for comedy[1] that is the equivalent of Viacom's Comedy
Central, they just don't actively separate this content from the rest of their
catalog.

[1] - twitter.com/NetflixIsAJoke

~~~
draz
That’s exactly right. I can’t talk numbers, but a consumer is more likely to
stick with a channel/app by X% (where X is a significant number) if s/he
watches Y shows. Y increases as X increases.

------
gundmc
This is certainly CBS Viacom flexing their influence. Youtube TV without CBS
and their sports coverage is dead in the water. That gives them leverage to
force feed the other Viacom junk. Even the official blog post announcing the
changes sounded like more of a resignation.

Unfortunate. Too much money for me and I won't be continuing my subscription.

------
shepardrtc
YouTube TV is nowhere near good enough to demand that high of a price. The
shows are limited, the DVR interface is terrible, and the DVR barely even
works. It's nowhere near as good as Vue was.

~~~
Bud
Disagree, and I doubt you're a regular user of YouTube TV given your comments.
"The shows are limited" doesn't even make sense; you get access to the live
feed of all the channels in question. The DVR works perfectly in my experience
over the last year or so; it has never failed to record what I wanted it to
record.

~~~
shepardrtc
I use it every day. It's just now getting Comedy Central. I tried to DVR an
episode of Atlanta and it just didn't do it. It did record an episode later on
though.

------
kemonocode
So it's just cable with extra steps now. Nice.

I really don't expect too many people to stay subscribed, unless they're
relying on the (sketchy) revenue stream that's people who subscribed once and
then forgot all about it.

~~~
judge2020
I would doubt more than 1% are in that category - $50 (now 65) a month raises
more mental alarms than your old $11 Netflix subscription.

~~~
Shivetya
Well Netflix 4K is $16 a month. Which pretty much puts it above Disney+ let
along D+ with Hulu/ESPN. Then you have HBO which still acts as if they are
truly premium, if anything they are the binge a month channel.

Many made the joke when Cable companies started losing subs to internet
streaming sites that people would end up paying more. The big catch is most
people forget to factor in their internet cost writing it off mentally as "I
was already going to have it", a sentiment the streaming services want you to
have.

~~~
acdha
> The big catch is most people forget to factor in their internet cost writing
> it off mentally as "I was already going to have it", a sentiment the
> streaming services want you to have.

It reads oddly for you to present something unequivocally true as a catch,
especially during a pandemic when most people are especially relying on
internet service to talk with friends and family, work, and education.

------
quantumwannabe
If they keep increasing the price every time they add more channels pretty
soon it’ll end up being the same as the old cable subscriptions. What happened
to a-la-carte channels?

~~~
dragonwriter
> If they keep increasing the price every time they add more channels pretty
> soon it’ll end up being the same as the old cable subscriptions.

It's already ahead of many cable plans.

> What happened to a-la-carte channels?

Most of the cost isn't per-available-channel (and having more freedom to pick
and choose increases costs), so per channel charges would be much higher than
current package charges divided by channels, high enough that even though
people like the idea in the abstract, they'd flee from it in concrete form.

~~~
mohaine
What about base + a-la-carte blocks in the same blocks they have to pay for
them? Why has no one offered this yet?

------
awill
The content providers want Youtube TV to fail, and are doing it with forced
bundling that increases the price. There's no other explanation.

In hindsight, it was stupid for Google to get into a business where they
cannot control pricing.

------
burlesona
Disappointing, as Youtube TV's low entry price for the last several years took
the wind out of Playstation Vue, which I really enjoyed. It's frustrating to
see the big tech companies engage in monopolistic, anti-competitive behavior
by selling services at a loss to drive out competition only to then jack up
prices.

~~~
Arainach
I doubt this is intentional. Google has no moat here - they own none of the
content they provide, and the content owners have all the leverage over price.

~~~
DaiPlusPlus
It’s just odd that they bothered getting into this space in the first place
_and_ that they used their YouTube brand for this - “YouTube” was meant to
disrupt and subvert established television, not become a part of it.

I guess Google’s thinking was that the data about what people are watching was
worth something which would allow them to extract higher ad revenue from TV-
provider-ad-inserts as they’d be more targeted than the general-audience ads
you get with traditional cable/satellite TV - but Sling and PS Vue have the
same proposition to advertisers.

------
cable2600
[https://pluto.tv/welcome](https://pluto.tv/welcome)

Pluto.TV is free because of commercials, and it has 250+ channels. It has a TV
guide for what is playing and while it has no DVR it has the ability to start
a movie from the beginning so you don't miss it.

~~~
mojo982
I've never heard of this before now. It looks legit. How are they able to
remain free? Do they inject more ads than the already existing ones? It's not
like TV doesn't already have ads.

EDIT: Okay, looked at the channels. Looks like they just don't have the
expensive ones (ESPN, etc). So it doesn't have the sports people want.

~~~
zip1234
I am one of the people that only has YouTube TV for sports. However, they
cancelled Fox Sports and added a bunch of other stuff that is not sports.

------
jimbob45
The whole streaming platform war is beginning to resemble the Stone Soup
parable. At some point, no platform will have enough content for anyone to
care to subscribe (arguably now). Someone needs to come along and convince
them all that sharing is in everyone’s best interests.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Soup](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Soup)

~~~
ilaksh
That reminded me of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup ("dcss"), which is a pretty great
free-to-play game.

[https://crawl.develz.org/](https://crawl.develz.org/)

------
Unklejoe
I was thinking the other day: if you replace the word "commercial" with "ad",
it somehow seems much more ridiculous to be spending $50+ month for a video
service, only to still have to sit through countless ads.

It seems obvious, but for some reason, I accepted that TV will have
"commercials", but I always associated "ads" with computers. Maybe it's a
regional/language thing...IDK.

------
couchdb_ouchdb
Cancelling. Really really terrible to do this in the middle of a pandemic. Who
cares about these extra channels?

~~~
serg_chernata
Same here, I cancelled immediately. I swallowed the previous price increases
but this is getting close to regular cable TV. I switched to YTV to avoid
cable to begin with.

------
mennis16
I signed up for YouTubeTV quite recently (at the beginning of last baseball
season) at $40/month. I'm pretty surprised to see in such a short span of time
it has gone up to $65.

If things were normal right now I'd probably just shrug it off, but between no
sports and quarantining with family instead of at my apartment I have
basically been paying for nothing for 3 straight months now. This is
definitely pushing me over the edge to cancel.

Maybe next spring I'll reconsider, but this doesn't seem like a great move to
me right now?

------
uptown
What's more interesting to me is that Google only has ~2M YouTube TV
subscribers. Perhaps there's newer metrics now.

[https://twitter.com/RichLightShed/status/1224454820309811202](https://twitter.com/RichLightShed/status/1224454820309811202)

That's nothing, and in my mind - doesn't bode well for the long-term prospects
of the service.

I've been a subscriber for about a year, but with the price increases, and the
interface on AppleTV that seemingly wants to always show me Tennis when I turn
it on, and suggest I resume programs which were recorded 3-6 months ago, it's
got a very long way to go before it's got the usability of TiVo.

At this price, they're pushing me back to cable TV with a locked promo rate.

~~~
gkoberger
That's $1.5Bn/year in revenue for a 3-year-old product that just rebroadcasts
content. How is that "nothing"?

~~~
ChicagoBoy11
I could've sworn I was doing something wrong with my math give your the parent
comment to yours, so I'm glad I saw this -- my math was right, after all!

------
M2Ys4U
$779.88 a year? Yikes. That's a _lot_ of money.

~~~
xenospn
Isn't that A LOT more than just getting cable for Internet+TV? I mean, YouTube
doesn't include the $50/month I'm paying for internet.

~~~
DavidPeiffer
YouTube TV's value proposition includes DVR and, if you're in your home area,
the ability to fast forward through commercials for DVR'd content.

The tricky part I'm noticing is how traditional providers are bundling.
Mediacom provides internet, cable, and phone service in the Midwest. My
parents got a better total price for the same service by bundling it all
together. When I look at pricing, the marginal cost of basic cable TV would be
a few extra dollars per month.

I'm definitely switching away from YouTube TV, but need to decide if I should
go with basic cable (which won't have everything my household desires) or
Hulu.

------
ralmidani
Unless you must have live sports/CNBC or can’t have your internet slow down,
how are YouTube TV or cable packages attractive? We have Netflix, Hulu,
Disney+, and Apple TV+. Even when the free/promotional periods are over, they
would still end up costing less than a semi-decent cable package, but with way
more useful content (in fact, more than we could ever hope to watch), and
little to no ads.

~~~
notatoad
>Unless you must have live sports

From these comments at least, it seems like this is pretty much their entire
audience.

~~~
leereeves
Which makes this seem like a very bad time to raise prices, with so many live
sporting events cancelled because of the pandemic.

~~~
astura
Both baseball and basketball are starting up again at the end of July.

~~~
leereeves
But the NBA will only be playing 8 games plus playoffs, and MLB will only be
playing 60 games (one third of a regular season), right?

------
beervirus
I like the service in general ok, but YouTube TV has the worst DVR interface
I've ever used. It's worse even than any of the shitty one-off cable company
boxes.

For $65/month, it would be nice to at least have a decent interface. Google
pls buy Tivo and incorporate that.

------
fomopop
If you're looking for a new service, we built a tool that lets you add your
favorite channels and makes a recommendation.

[https://thestreamable.com/matchmaker](https://thestreamable.com/matchmaker)

------
thrill
Who's with me to start the Ron Swanson streaming channel? It'll have all the
worthwhile channels: hunting, fishing, _and_ woodworking.

~~~
DavidPeiffer
I wonder what the cheapest way to do so would be? Something through YouTube
would allow easy account management, consistent interface people are familiar
with, no concern regarding bandwidth and scaling - but I'm entirely unsure if
there's a way to do so within the TOS and YouTube structure.

Planet Money had an episode on starting a small cable TV channel.
[https://www.npr.org/transcripts/471633490](https://www.npr.org/transcripts/471633490)

------
thrownaway954
"This is just like cable but with extra steps"

I don't get how everyone was in the "cut the cord" movement not too long ago
when all we really have done is create another cord. $70 a month is way too
much for a bunch of channels included with basic $30 package in my area:

[https://www.moneysavingpro.com/tv-providers/comcast-
channels...](https://www.moneysavingpro.com/tv-providers/comcast-channels/)

~~~
p-law
You have to watch Comcast, though. Does the quoted rate include their local
station rebroadcast fee? Their "sports fee"? These two together were something
like $14/month -- and not disclosed in the price of any package -- when I
finally dropped their scammy ass about 16 months ago. PLUS any boxes you may
or may not have to use.

------
jurassic
I was on the fence at $50 and will be cancelling as I don't care anything
about these new additions. I can think of many things I would prefer to spend
the $180 price hike on. Seems like they should be doing these expansions as
add-ons if they don't want to see people like me churn.

------
habosa
I’ve had it since day one (actually since dogfood) but this is it, I just
cancelled.

It’s a shame because it really is a great service. The infinite DVR basically
lets you build up your own on demand library of any show.

In the end I was only in it for the live sports. Those aren’t even on anymore
and when they come back they’ll be cheaper on Hulu.

------
ogre_codes
It's increasing in price by one Netflix.

I can't grasp paying $65/ month for all my streaming combined, let alone just
one service. I could buy a season pass to 3 new great shows every month for
that much.

------
boromi
When it increased to 50 that was my upper limit. I had to cancel my
subscription today.

------
thebeefytaco
I was on the fence and about to cancel, since it's the media subscription
service I pay the most for and get the least use out of. This makes the
decision easier...

------
gscott
[https://try.philo.com/](https://try.philo.com/) is $20 a month is great. It
is missing some news stations, but Pluto tv is free and has a lot of news and
a mystery science tv 3000 station.

~~~
alex_dev
Thanks for the suggestion; I'm trying it out now. Looks like Chromecasts
aren't supported, but they do have a Roku app. The Roku interface seems to be
much better than Youtube TV's!

------
tpmx
Sort of related:

I've noticed that regular Youtube has been cranking up the ads quite a lot
lately.

I view most of my youtube on the TV, via their crappy HTML-based Apple TV app.
So many ads to suffer through, suddenly.

On the desktop, it seems like they've suddenly started work against that one
chrome extension I've loved the most: The one that blocks the ads from
youtube.

I can't see myself subscring to youtube red or whatever they call it. Just not
going to happen.

~~~
DavidPeiffer
I've noticed a significant uptick in ads as well. The ad quality is akin to
ads on streaming-specific apps.

It's not uncommon to only have ~4 different ads shown to you on something like
CBS Mobile. They have the potential to target ads, they have an app installed
(and all the privacy implications that go with it), but somehow they're
showing the same 30 second ad 4 times in a row to make up a commercial break.

Others are far better. For a time, ESPN's app would simply show the logo and
repeat the same ~4 second music loop until the commercials were done.

~~~
tpmx
Yeah, the ad quality is horrible. I'm in Sweden; I've seen/skipped through all
of the local ads like 200 times each by now. At least it feels like that.

Sometimes you get something new - it's always some poor american local company
that made their own ad (often some construction company targetting home
owners) but messed up the geotargetting, I presume.

------
throw03172019
I was already considering cancelling but this is the nail in the coffin. We
don’t care about the added channels. Also, the recordings are usually messed
up. It will be a new show but think it’s already been watched. So we typically
turn on the show in between its air time just to catch it. The iOS app makes
it easier to choose which to watch. We mainly watch on Apple TV and the UI is
not very good... good bye.

------
nodesocket
When I first signed up it was great value at $35/mo. It’s dramatically been
increasing since adding little value. I literally just want CNBC, ESPN, ESPN2,
CNN, FOX NEWS, ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS, TBS, and TNT. I have gotten zero value from
my nearly doubling of monthly price.

    
    
      Original signup June 2017 - $35/mo
      Price increase June 2019 - $49.99/mo
      Price increase August 2020 - $64.99/mo

~~~
fomopop
Hulu Live TV has all those channels for $55.

[https://thestreamable.com/matchmaker?channels=cnbc,espn,espn...](https://thestreamable.com/matchmaker?channels=cnbc,espn,espn2,cnn,fox-
news,abc,nbc,fox,cbs,tbs,tnt)

------
nostromo
Google has successfully recreated cable TV along with the awful "pay top
dollar for stuff you don't want" pricing model... wonderful.

------
jiofih
Well, it’s not like nobody predicted this. We’re back to cable, but even more
expensive. Somehow even a company with a monopoly on the internet eyeballs
still bows to the old barons.

------
Twirrim
Yikes.

I really felt "meh" about YouTube TV when I used it. To make matters worse
about a 5th of the things I asked it to record ended up being the wrong thing.
No idea how they managed it. All I got back when I reported the incorrect
recording was a "whoops, sorry".

------
KWD
I was already on the fence at $50, as I don't watch many of the channels.
Primary use was for local, and just a couple of other channels. I'll keep it
for July, and then use that time to get an attic antenna setup, and then look
at an antenna + Sling option, or some other setup.

Overall, they need to split into multiple offerings so they can still present
some value options. I don't watch sports, so that was already a waste of money
in the subscription for me. These new channels do not add anything I'll be
watching either.

~~~
mcgrath_sh
Definitely get an antenna for local OTA channels. Cheap and great picture
quality. Does not even need to be a complicated antenna. We have some plastic
square thing draped around a clock on a wall and it works perfectly. We only
have one TV hooked up to the cable box in our house because antenna +
streaming covers 99% of our TV needs. If I could stream the in-market NHL
team, I’d ditch cable.

------
ibdf
10 years ago I imagined online live tv would become 100% alacarte, pay just
for what you watch... but unfortunately we continue to pay for tv like we
always have, we just got rid of the box (in some cases not even the box).

I have tried Sling and have used all service's free trial, but at the end of
the day I am not willing to pay full price to watch 10% of the content. I do
miss watching live sports... and thankfully, we are getting more streaming
options now.

------
thehoff
Anyone else using Locast? Works well for us (where we are regular rabbit ears
don’t work).

------
beezle
Started at the beginning but all things come to an end. What was once a sports
centric + news service has become more and more bloated. Is the audience
really cord cutters? As it is probably far cheaper to get a cable+internet
package than just internet + yttv.

In honestly, was probably gone once baseball started as they recently dropped
YES network. Same goes for many friends in the north east who were also using
yttv.

------
bugeats
So you want me to pay for the privilege of watching a mind numbing stream of
psychologically manipulative advertisements interspersed with the toxic,
propaganda laden death throes of the legacy media? No thanks.

YouTube Premium may already be censored by a paranoid AI taking personal
kickbacks from Jimmy Kimmel Show, but at least I can still find good content
with a little effort.

------
xivzgrev
What’s the point of YouTube vs xfinity? It would be interesting if they let
you pick a la Carte but no one wants to do that (lower fees)

------
dastbe
While this price change is certainly impactful, I wanted to see if my
experience is universal.

Does the swipe behavior in the iOS Youtube TV app (and only the Youtube TV
app) drive you crazy? It's the only app where it will consistently move two
tiles with the same force any other app requires for one. After about a day of
the free trial I gave up because it was that frustrating.

------
lifeisstillgood
They seem to be making a fundamental mistake in calculating their prices?

It seems when they add a new channel that costs say 100M pa to broadcast they
divide the cost by their existing number of subscribers and mark up
accordingly.

surely everyone else does it by "in five years i will have all the subscribers
so divide by that number"

------
manigandham
It's the endless cycle between bundled and a-la-carte (regardless of medium).

Cable TV was already priced optimally and digital versions are just catching
up. People want more channels from a single source, but each person wants
their own selection. Bundling brings down overall cost and provides many more
channels, especially smaller ones with more niche content. A-la-carte can be
cheaper (not always) but is limited in content.

Add in licensing and rules by content producers and there's no escape.
Something fundamental needs to change beyond just the delivery mechanism of
video. Many people now watch Youtube creators as a replacement for TV so maybe
that's the future altogether.

------
jdechko
If you are on Spectrum, check out the TV Choice package as a decent option for
a la carte. It's $28/mo (including the broadcast fee) on a 2-year promotion. I
get all the local channels as well as 10 channels that I pick (which includes
ESPN/2/FS1). They have decent app support, and while the app blocks certain
channels (like ESPN) while not on the home network, the subscription allows
you to use the ESPN app anywhere.

[https://www.buyinternetcable.com/blog/spectrum-tv-choice-
cha...](https://www.buyinternetcable.com/blog/spectrum-tv-choice-channels-
list)

------
YetAnotherMatt
Did patio11 start working at Google instead of Stripe?

More seriously though, it looks like people are overwhelmingly not happy about
this change. Google already launched a special form to give feedback:

[https://support.google.com/youtubetv/contact/yttv_price_hike...](https://support.google.com/youtubetv/contact/yttv_price_hike_survey))

Their youtubeTV support pages also have a banner stating:

"We are experiencing high contact volumes and longer than normal wait times.
If you have feedback about our updated price, we encourage you to fill out
this form. Find information about our updated price on this Help Article or on
our blog post."

~~~
profmonocle
Interesting URL. You don't often see a company refer to their own action as a
"price hike".

~~~
vanc_cefepime
Probably because those who made that feedback page are the same people within
the YouTube team that actually use the service and feel the same as we do.

------
projektfu
Over and over, customer surveys showed people want a la carte cable. They
perceive their high bill as paying for 100 channels they have no interest in
to get 3 they want. And yet, no provider will offer it that way.

~~~
manigandham
Because it's not profitable and users always want more, it's just that each
person wants a different set of channels.

------
kup0
Couldn't YouTube TV at least do what other providers and cable companies do-
have different packages with different sets of channels? That + the DVR
functionality/etc just might be enough to make it worth it to enough users
instead of only having this noncompetitive high price-point.

I can't stand _any_ normal cable TV other than sports, so both YTTV and cable
are not for me at all, but my local cable company offers enough channels at
less than $65 that even if I _did_ decide to pay for cable TV, YT TV is a
tough sell.

------
sirmike_
Personally I might keep it at $65 if they had just value added youtube premium
with it. I was hoping they would do this at some point as an option. But will
most likely not happen.

------
solarkraft
Gen Z speaking: Why would anyone ever have wanted that, even at 40$?

~~~
jftuga
Live sports: football (pro, college), baseball, basketball (pro, college),
hockey, etc.

------
garfieldnate
I'm 31 and I find this totally _insane_! Why would you pay $65/mo for
something that has 8 minutes of commercial for every 22 minutes of content?
Regular TV is dead to me now that we have streaming services. I'll pay for the
content, but don't waste my time trying to make more money by showing me ads.
I haven't had a regular TV connection since leaving for college.

------
joshstrange
The amount of money I would pay monthly for ALL the TV shows I care about
delivered at mp4/mkv files that I can stream to any of my devices without
commercials/tracking and with good subtitles is probably close to $150+/mo.

Unfortunately there is only 1 way to realistically do this and it involves
piracy and costs somewhere from free to <$15/mo (+hardware which can vary
greatly).

------
choppaface
For the few months I tried YoutubeTV, the stream consistently failed
(especially for live sports) and I reported it several times. I finally
disputed three months of their charges with my credit card company. Google
accepted the disputes within a day and effectively gave a $150 refund. I later
canceled, but important to know they’re willing to give out their crappy
service for free without a fight.

------
Mindwipe
These OTT retransmission of mostly FTA broadcast channel services haven't
caught on at all anywhere globally except the US, and that seems to have been
mostly a focus of unsustainable pricing.

It's a shame the US sector is so badly regulated. Must carry obligations and
effective competition mean many of these bits of structural weirdness didn't
happen elsewhere.

------
TouchyJoe
I prefer them asking for money upfront instead of selling ads and becoming
controlled by the people who pay for those ads.

------
ycombonator
[https://www.locast.org/](https://www.locast.org/) Don’t pay for TV

------
j45
Increases like this will accelerate the jump away from cable. There is no
infrastructure costs comparable to physical cable, or last mile boxes and
equipment. Just OTT.

I’ve recently started watching more YouTube and while the production quality
might not be where people like, you can certainly find meaningful content for
non-fiction.

------
khill
I was planning to start using YTTV when sports start up again. We were using
Hulu Live before and, while it wasn't terrible, I wanted to give YTTV a try.

This price hike kills that option. I will go back to Hulu or, more likely,
just add TV to my monthly Fios package.

------
diwu1989
This is getting out of hand, at this point, going with the special deals at
Comcast is a better option.

~~~
jedieaston
Comcast is $10 per TV (unless you’re cool with Roku) and the cord-cutter apps
have good support on a bunch of different devices you can plug into your TV. I
think Hulu still wins unless you want all of the channels.

~~~
scarface74
And sports fees, broadcast fee, fake fees that they try to pass off as
government mandated taxes, HD technology fee, etc.

And with s contract....

------
tyingq
Add another cancellation. This was enough for me to dig up the account info
for my internet provider to see if they offered a streaming service. They do,
and it's $24.99/month plus $5 for the cloud DVR. That's less than half of your
new rate. Dumb move.

------
iamwpj
Still a good value. Comparable cable service in our area still hovers around
$95/month, plus this has better recording and works on many devices
(simultaneously!). We've had it for two years and no complaints -- we
recommend it.

------
josefresco
When I ditched cable TV my bandwidth usage skyrocketed. Now that the prices
are closer, there seems to be almost no benefit to streaming TV. My Internet
will be faster and Xfinity's apps are as good if not better than YT.

------
circa
Price hike and still no NHL Network or NFL Network/Redzone option. Good-bye
YTTV!

------
FpUser
I've resigned from TV be it cable or online version ages ago and have never
looked back. Not paying crazy price for bunch of garbage with the one or two
channels I've used to actually watch. Goodbye vultures.

------
bitL
So YouTube is the same as cable TV now, but in a worse quality?

Is Google running out of money?

------
voicedYoda
I still don't understand, and refuse to pay for, basic TV in the United
States. Bunny ear is now a digital receiver with even more local broadcast
options. And yt brings no value add, imho.

------
easytiger
We don't have this in Europe. Does it carry in show adverts as well?

~~~
leetrout
Yes.

You get the same ads as when the show is airing live and if it’s a local
market slot you get a dark screen with text saying it’s taking a commercial
break.

When watching shows you recorded as a DVR you can skip them by fast
forwarding.

When watching shows YouTube tv has offered that you didn’t record you get
preroll and in-line ads that are usually unskippable just like Hulu.

~~~
easytiger
Thanks. That's horrific.

~~~
greatpatton
A European will have a big problem to understand how you can pay that much
money to submit yourself to this torture...

~~~
easytiger
Having really only watched TV, in my university years through piracy, or later
through dvd, streaming services etc. I have become so sensitive to
interstitial advertising that I can't stand it.

I have recently returned to watching golf by subscription to sky sports golf.
They often mirror the NBC/CBS advertising schedule instead of using the clean
feed. Totally ruins the golf tournament. I have to pause 45 mins before I
watch and use an app I've written to quickly jump the two minute ad breaks.

I've spent much time in American hotel rooms. Watching TV there is like
entering an ADHD simulation.

------
coronadisaster
I didnt realize that it was already $50/month... I didn't signup at $35
because I thought that it was too much...

I get more than 50 HD channels for free over the air and I watch only 3 of
them.

------
amriksohata
I paid Google for Google One and it doesnt include Youtube Premium, their own
video service. Whilst Amazon Prime gives you Prime Now, Prime Video and Prime
Delivery. Much better value.

------
Causality1
Starting to remind of Amazon Prime, which started out at $79 a year for two
day shipping and is now $120 a year for two day shipping plus a bunch of crap
I don't need or want.

------
ecoqba11
There are so many free alternatives now days... PlutoTV, Locast, Plex & Tubi.
These combine with Netflix or Prime Video or even TV+ is more than enough.

~~~
mmanfrin
The distinction that needs to be made is that people aren't typically looking
for _things to watch_ , they're looking for a _specific_ thing (generally live
sports).

------
dingle_thunk
Good of them to do this thing to people’s credit cards, inside of a major
economic crisis.

Google must be close to death! A business needs money to survive, don’tcha
know.

------
pcurve
I must've been living under a cave. This is first time I'm hearing about
YouTube TV. Might be because I cut the cord many years ago.

------
kerng
The amount of ads I'm seeing on YouTube is pretty insane recently. Google must
be under quite some pressure to make money.

------
beastman82
I've had it for at least a year and it blows away the competition in most
respects. This is a fair price.

------
VikingCoder
So, what's the best way for me to watch SNL, Rachel Maddow, Rick and Morty,
and Brooklyn Nine-Nine? Hulu?

~~~
intellix
Netflix and YouTube with ExpressVPN?

------
m3kw9
Is a ploy to make people feel good once they lowered the price to the new
still sharply higher price.

------
TehShrike
Hey, I decided to minimize YouTube and pay for Nebula even before the price
hike :-D

------
coding123
I used it 2 years ago to watch the olympics. Going to have to find an
alternative...

------
bsenftner
You mean to tell me people actually clicked that YouTube TV ad?

------
mjparrott
Key question: why would you watch broadcast TV?

~~~
dfxm12
For local content, mostly news & sports, but maybe also lifestyle stuff.

------
touchpadder
A dying service milking some last few dollars

------
fmakunbound
Is it at least ad-free for that much?

------
torgian
Wow this kinda blew my mind. I never knew there were tv sites like Hulu tv, or
even YouTube tv...

And the prices! Outrageous. I’m glad I stick with Netflix.

------
jeegsy
I gave up MythTV for this crap

------
rafaelvasco
Jesus. If I was subscribed to this, in my local currency this would cost me
347.61 moneys each month right now. Ugh.

------
briandear
Still no weather channel?

------
m0zg
So now they'll charge you $65/mo to watch ads every 10 minutes? Where do I
sign up?

------
kristopolous
youtube, no longer the loss leader of the internet?

------
coldtea
YouTube TV still exists?

------
intellix
Didn't even know people still paid for TV but reading this thread surprised
me. I would say this industry is dead with the upcoming generation but guess
I'll be surprised again

~~~
scarface74
Really? Are you going to do the feigned Slashdot era ignorance “Do people
still watch TV? I haven’t owned a TV in ten years”?

82.9 million households have cable

[https://nocable.org/learn/cable-tv-cord-cutting-
statistics/](https://nocable.org/learn/cable-tv-cord-cutting-statistics/)

There are 128.53 million households in the US.

That means 65% of households have cable.

So what are the statistical chances that you don’t know anyone that pays for
cable? Those numbers are somewhat skewed lower as far as cable TV because I
don’t believe it counts OTT providers like Youtube TV, Hulu Live TV, etc.

------
vmception
I didn't know we were at the place to have nuanced discussion on Youtube TV
benefits

If you pay for:

Youtube Music

Youtube Premium

Youtube TV

Youtube Kids

I question your entire decision making process.

Am I missing something here?

------
dkdk8283
Price hike aside I cannot support a company that abuses creators. It used to
be such a great source of knowledge and content but now it’s been gutted and
has become just as mind numbing as daytime TV.

------
catsarebetter
Think this may have an effect of pushing more people to get adblockers and
Netflix subscriptions than anything else. Or they just want people to get free
Youtube so that they have a wider audience of ad viewers to sell to
advertisers.

~~~
rahimnathwani
You may be confusing YouTube TV (a replacement for cable TV) with YouTube
Premium (ad-free access to YouTube and Google Play Music).

~~~
catsarebetter
Hmm yep I definitely was lol

