Cutting the TV Cable Connection: Can U Survive?
While Cable TV seems to have been always around, there was a time up until the early 1970's, it was a new kid on the block and many areas did not have it. So, the TV antenna, that relic, sat perched on top of the house getting the signal. You had to live within range of a major urban area to get the signal, the closer the better.
Cable began as a cheap service, maybe $20 a month or so. Now, depending on your own needs, even the most basic is around $55-65, once the subsidized promo offer expires. Often, this really comes to $75 for too many channels you do not need or watch. Most people will only watch a handful of stations they are loyal to. Take myself, I have over 100 channels, yet, watch only seven on a regular basis, why cannot cable offer the channels only you want and pay them them? Maybe charge $5 a channel. Why does anyone have to buy a package of channels that are simply trash? This is the greatest complaint from cable consumers.
What's the alternative?
Cutting the TV cable cord takes guts and creativity, but its not difficult to save money if you do not need live TV, like CNN news or network channels. If you tend to watch TV shows or movies after they have aired, there are options.
- Netflix - for $8 a month you can stream them to the computer for older TV shows and movies
- Hulu Plus - $8 a month, you can view more recent TV shows and movies. Both of these services do not always carry the same shows\movies, so they compliment one another.
- Others are Amazon Instant Video and Vudu. For Mac owners, you can buy them on iTunes.
- Live TV remains an issue if you do not live within a 100 miles of the broadcast station. If you do, use the old TV antenna-like for it. A new service is Aereo, which for $8 a month, streams live TV from CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, FOX to your computer. This service is only available in NYC presently.
- Go to the website where your TV shows air, like, ABC family, CW, CBS. They often will have the show to watch once it has aired. They often carry many episodes.
In your perfect world without cable, your monthly bill is only $24. Big savings! However, if you must watch the latest TV episode and not wait several days for it to be on Hulu or Netflix, then you must go with cable. Likewise, if you are a live news junkie and use CNN a lot, then unless you get reception or live in NYC, you probably have to go cable.
The other possible
