5 ms·

I suppose it's the price of convenience? For my part, I pay a lot less for just Internet, borrow DVDs from the public library, and occasionally pay a la carte t

I suppose it's the price of convenience? For my part, I pay a lot less for just Internet, borrow DVDs from the public library, and occasionally pay a la carte to stream specific shows I particularly want to watch. It's definitely less expensive in the long run, but my real motivation is that I really hate ads, enough so that I'm willing to put up with lower definition (the library doesn't do as much in the way of blu-ray), waitlists for popular shows, and having to actually plan ahead when deciding what to watch. I'm very, very aware, though, that choosing to do it this way makes me an unusual case. And I'm pretty sure it's not because I've discovered some lifehack that nobody else is clever enough to know about. No, it's because I'm grumpy and easy to irritate, and because, as someone with objectively poor taste in entertainment, I genuinely don't give a damn about keeping up with Star Wars or Game of Thrones or whatever. I'm perfectly satisfied with ancient crusty stuff like Murder, She Wrote. Ads seem to do a good job of riding a very fine line. There's no need to care about what people will gripe about; people who gripe on the Internet are just a vocal minority, and realistically, as paying customers, they aren't even a problem, in and of themselves. All they've really got to do is be ever so slightly less annoying, to the majority of people, than any of the alternatives.

munk-a 5y ago
I don't know if it's fair to describe cable TV as convenience. Netflix costs about a tenth as much as cable TV (though it does require Internet so if you'd otherwise not have Internet maybe bump it up to half the cost) and provides a generally better service. People are paying out of laziness.
- mumblemumble 5y ago
  The thing about Netflix is that it's become very homogenous. If you don't like the kind algorithmically-optimized stuff that the people who produce Netflix Original Series are doing, then it's good for about as much time as it takes to finish binging the first couple Star Trek series and The Great British Baking Show, and then you're just sort of done with it.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  Live sports are still an enormous draw to cable tv and (legal) ways to get them otherwise are convoluted and still pricey anyways.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  Netflix is worth 10 times less. Netflix thinks a season is 10 episodes or less. Popular shows get cancelled a few get kept but seasons take years to come out. The availability of content goes down every year. I'm not sure it's worth what they are charging for compared to Prime, etc With cable you get to pick a channel and let them broadcast to you. You don't select the next episode you select a channel. The benefit of selecting a channel over an episode or series is you don't have to think what should I watch next. Weekdays at this time they will play a show you expect.. it's freeing to just put a channel on and you get a certain background rhythm. When you stream the lack of ads means the lack of mental breaks. The watcher doesn't have time to take in the last 8-12 minutes and think a.out it without the ads. That causes one show to blend into another and at the end of the binge you can hardly remember the details. Plus you get tons of on demand content channels offer cable subscribers. News, Sports, Live Content, Local channels all exist in cable but not streaming.
  - salamandersauce 5y ago
    Local channels can be had for free with a decent antenna usually. And you can get TV tuners that record to external HDDs for about $30. Live content for free! Netflix also now has a "play something" mode that's basically shuffle but takes into account what you've already been watching/watched.
  - munk-a 5y ago
    I think that the opinion of what streaming or cable service is the best is very much a personal preference. You've got Netflix, Hulu (still around I think?), CBC Gem and Acorn as the ones I hear about most often - the price to access any one of those services is a fraction of cable's cost - either half (if you assume you'd otherwise be without internet) or a tenth (if you're part of the vast majority of people that will pay for internet either way). So I think it's more fair to assume that somewhere out there there's a streaming service for you and it's going to be somewhere between 10-15 USD/mo. > When you stream the lack of ads means the lack of mental breaks. The watcher doesn't have time to take in the last 8-12 minutes and think a.out it without the ads. That causes one show to blend into another and at the end of the binge you can hardly remember the details. No. I have ADHD and ads absolutely destroy me. For some people ads might be a nice time to meditate, for me they absolutely destroy the enjoyability of any program because in those few minutes I'm going to start playing a game or reading an article or cleaning something. Even beside my ADHD - ads don't give you "peaceful time". If you want a snippet of peaceful time then pause the stream every once in a while and go outside and be at true peace - don't come up with excuses to justify advertisements being shoved down your throat. The act of spamming adverts like that disrespects you as a person and your time, it borders on offensive.
raxxorrax 5y ago
Having to watch ads isn't convenient at all. This is certainly a factor why people left TV for streams in the first place, even if they get introduced here more and more. I am subbed to some streaming services and the moment they introduce ads I will leave. TV-like ads won't be able to compete here.

munk-a 5y ago

I don't know if it's fair to describe cable TV as convenience. Netflix costs about a tenth as much as cable TV (though it does require Internet so if you'd otherwise not have Internet maybe bump it up to half the cost) and provides a generally better service. People are paying out of laziness.

mumblemumble 5y ago
The thing about Netflix is that it's become very homogenous. If you don't like the kind algorithmically-optimized stuff that the people who produce Netflix Original Series are doing, then it's good for about as much time as it takes to finish binging the first couple Star Trek series and The Great British Baking Show, and then you're just sort of done with it.
zamadatix 5y ago
Live sports are still an enormous draw to cable tv and (legal) ways to get them otherwise are convoluted and still pricey anyways.
ipaddr 5y ago
Netflix is worth 10 times less. Netflix thinks a season is 10 episodes or less. Popular shows get cancelled a few get kept but seasons take years to come out. The availability of content goes down every year. I'm not sure it's worth what they are charging for compared to Prime, etc With cable you get to pick a channel and let them broadcast to you. You don't select the next episode you select a channel. The benefit of selecting a channel over an episode or series is you don't have to think what should I watch next. Weekdays at this time they will play a show you expect.. it's freeing to just put a channel on and you get a certain background rhythm. When you stream the lack of ads means the lack of mental breaks. The watcher doesn't have time to take in the last 8-12 minutes and think a.out it without the ads. That causes one show to blend into another and at the end of the binge you can hardly remember the details. Plus you get tons of on demand content channels offer cable subscribers. News, Sports, Live Content, Local channels all exist in cable but not streaming.
- salamandersauce 5y ago
  Local channels can be had for free with a decent antenna usually. And you can get TV tuners that record to external HDDs for about $30. Live content for free! Netflix also now has a "play something" mode that's basically shuffle but takes into account what you've already been watching/watched.
- munk-a 5y ago
  I think that the opinion of what streaming or cable service is the best is very much a personal preference. You've got Netflix, Hulu (still around I think?), CBC Gem and Acorn as the ones I hear about most often - the price to access any one of those services is a fraction of cable's cost - either half (if you assume you'd otherwise be without internet) or a tenth (if you're part of the vast majority of people that will pay for internet either way). So I think it's more fair to assume that somewhere out there there's a streaming service for you and it's going to be somewhere between 10-15 USD/mo. > When you stream the lack of ads means the lack of mental breaks. The watcher doesn't have time to take in the last 8-12 minutes and think a.out it without the ads. That causes one show to blend into another and at the end of the binge you can hardly remember the details. No. I have ADHD and ads absolutely destroy me. For some people ads might be a nice time to meditate, for me they absolutely destroy the enjoyability of any program because in those few minutes I'm going to start playing a game or reading an article or cleaning something. Even beside my ADHD - ads don't give you "peaceful time". If you want a snippet of peaceful time then pause the stream every once in a while and go outside and be at true peace - don't come up with excuses to justify advertisements being shoved down your throat. The act of spamming adverts like that disrespects you as a person and your time, it borders on offensive.

raxxorrax 5y ago

Having to watch ads isn't convenient at all. This is certainly a factor why people left TV for streams in the first place, even if they get introduced here more and more. I am subbed to some streaming services and the moment they introduce ads I will leave. TV-like ads won't be able to compete here.