TV Ownership Down For First Time in 20 Years

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I don't suppose this news will be a surprise to most of you. Right now the economy blows ass, more people are going without cable (opting for internet content instead) and the way they calculate the numbers isn't horribly reliable to start with.

If so, you're part of a history-making decline in television ownership. The Nielson Company — you know them as the folks who determine how popular TV shows are — discovered in a recent study that 96.7% of American homes own television sets, a decline from 98.9% the previous year. This marks the first time in two decades that year-over-year TV ownership has seen a dip.
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Thats what happens when Cable prices are threw the ROOF... Hell I had a 42" LED LG in my front room think I used it twice in the last 3 months. Streaming movies/watching shows over the net is alot cheaper than paying a $150+ cable bill..
 
I have no intent of ever having Cable TV. Not because of price, but because of commercials. Those annoying hideous brain sucking advertisements drive me crazy.

In addition it's so much better getting HD content online at any time of your choosing.
 
Netflix is the harbinger of the death of cable. It'll be a long time I'm sure, but Netflix has the model of the future. What you want, on demand. Cable companies haven't accepted this fact yet, but it is where it is headed.
 
I still occasionally watch TV content, but it is exclusively on my PC. I still have a tuner card in it for now, but I do not think I will bother with a tuner card in my next build. The few shows I like to watch can be found on various streaming sites. The content is still being viewed, it is just not being viewed on a TV.
 
service costs up, economy down, streaming media up, etc.

Yep
 
The amount of money that they charge for cable is ridiculous. At least they're not complaining about piracy though.
 
I dropped cable for about a year, I don't miss it at all. $65 a month for lowest tier after OTA channels. Most of the channels that were good 5-10 years ago are crap now (see History, sci-fi). I don't watch much TV since its mostly crap anyways. I do have netflix streaming though. Only show I cared about missing, Dr Who, I bought a season pass on amazon.

Also this whole channel crap is stupid, I want to watch TV on my own schedule. When I had cable I used to record shows to my HTPC, then comcast put all the channels in privacy mode and my TV tuner became useless. So my only option was to buy a $400 cable card tuner or buy a Tivo which is inferior to a HTPC. Cable companies are going to go the same way as telephone and music companies because they fail to see the future and adapt to it. The only thing cable companies have going for them is internet.

Also internet streamed shows look much better than cable, unless you get the HD package another $35 a month.
 
But how many TV's per household? Also, if they include tuner cards on PC's the number is likely up.

We have 5 TV's, and one computer with a tuner card, but 2 TV's are not even plugged in (really need to clean out that closet), and 2 others are used maybe once or twice a month.
 
BreezeDM said:
When I had cable I used to record shows to my HTPC, then comcast put all the channels in privacy mode and my TV tuner became useless. So my only option was to buy a $400 cable card tuner or buy a Tivo which is inferior to a HTPC. Cable companies are going to go the same way as telephone and music companies because they fail to see the future and adapt to it.
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We have basic cable (no cable box), mainly because we have terrible the TV reception, and we are not allowed to have an outside amntenna. If Cox ever decides to get rid of analog or open WAM channels, I'll likely drop cable completely.
 
we've been without cable tv for over a year and its great, no obnoxious commercials, no flipping through channels that you hate like foreign speaking ones or crap music videos, no huge bills for watching only a few hours a week, and no exposure to any of that crap to my 2 year old, she watches kids shows on netflix and only gets to see G rated stuff.. no accidental glimpses of sex/violence that happens to be on whatever channel your flipping through.. these are new times and I do not miss cable at all..
 
I find myself watching less and less and less TV all the time. Live TV is a joke. I really HATE turning on the TV and there is NOTHING on I want to watch. I think to myself: "and im paying for this why?"

g/f has some sort of need to watch live that usually has reruns anyway.

I want to setup my video collection to stream live so she can load up a program and flip through "channels"
 
I can do without cable TV for a number of reasons:


  • Too expensive
  • Annoying programming that appeals to the mindless mass (Reality TV, pop-science documentaries, etc)
  • Infuriatingly annoying and down-right tasteless commercials that play too loud and too often
  • Cable TV provides me absolutely nothing that I can't get from the Internet
  • Did I mention it's too expensive? Seriously, I feel like my cable bill is always due and it's always going up for one reason or another. No thanks.
  • The few interesting shows are available via the Internet
 
Worry not broadcasting assholes , with At&t placing bandwidth caps in place all those folks that canceled service to use Netflix/Hulu plus exclusively will soon have no choice but to go back to an overly expensive local provider.

Fucking dicks.
 
Godmachine said:
Worry not broadcasting assholes , with At&t placing bandwidth caps in place all those folks that canceled service to use Netflix/Hulu plus exclusively will soon have no choice but to go back to an overly expensive local provider.

Fucking dicks.
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Or they will just stop watching so many videos. Which is exactly what I would do.
 
The internets are a thousand times as interesting as television. There are like three movies and one television series a year that I actually watch.
 
TV turns people into retarded zombies. Close to 100% of television content is absolute trash, and I'm not even talking about the commercials. The commercials are doing more damage to individuals than any drugs or sex crimes. These statistics are giving me some hope for mankind.
 
I dropped pay TV. The internet had something to do with it. But, the big factor is that there just isn't many shows produced anymore than I have any interest in.
 
Godmachine said:
Worry not broadcasting assholes , with At&t placing bandwidth caps in place all those folks that canceled service to use Netflix/Hulu plus exclusively will soon have no choice but to go back to an overly expensive local provider.

Fucking dicks.
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The funny thing about that is that the cost of an uncapped business connection is still cheaper than internet + cable. I could even could add a second cable or dsl account just for netflix and I'd still be saving money vs cable TV.
 
Godmachine said:
Worry not broadcasting assholes , with At&t placing bandwidth caps in place all those folks that canceled service to use Netflix/Hulu plus exclusively will soon have no choice but to go back to an overly expensive local provider.

Fucking dicks.
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Sad but true.
 
Once the caps are across the board and bandwidth prices finish rising to accommodate the increased demand from streaming entertainment, I'm not sure how much better off the consumer will be in the post-cable world.
 
Team Obi Juan said:
Once the caps are across the board and bandwidth prices finish rising to accommodate the increased demand from streaming entertainment, I'm not sure how much better off the consumer will be in the post-cable world.
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Especially with e-providers like Netflix and Hulu are pretty much guaranteed to slowly increase their prices too. Netflix will get more expensive for the simple fact they want to push people away from DVDs and into streaming... once that happens they'll raise rates to accommodate that, and also to pay content producers to let Netflix stream their content.
 
I am about to dump my cable provider, but I still watch tv and movies through my HTPC on a TV.
 
Caps or not I will not ever have Cable TV. That is one service that is bound to make people lazy and brain dead. The shows that I do like, I'll happily buy them on Bluray and watch the episodes back to back.
 
If it wasn't for sports and being able to fast forward through commercials, I would have cancelled my DirecTV service years ago. I really would like to build a OTA DVR but the sports thing would drive me crazy.
 
SonicTron said:
Or they will just stop watching so many videos. Which is exactly what I would do.
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I know a family of 5 that went this route , even if they all cut down a reasonable amount then factoring even just general usage of other services (itunes , Steam) they will still hit that limit before a month is up.

Bandwidth costs account for 2-5 percent of your actual monthly bill , being billed 10 dollars per 50 gigabytes is not what I consider "reasonable"

For the rest of us it might not be as hard , for me its crippled my ability to back up important secure files off site and has forced me to build my own storage solution (which is less secure by the fact that its in my home).

From what I've researched and from my view point this entire series of "bandwidth" enforcement changes are in direct response to how people obtain there media. Now with services like Hulu , Netflix , Vudu , Steam , Itunes and so on .. the metered response from the broadcasters that depend on over charging you on a monthly basis is to increase penalties for using any of these options in place of the standard options?

I fail to understand how this is anything but a direct violation of "free market". This is now becoming the world standard (most of the world doesn't have imposed caps , except for a few of the more restricted countries like Canada and Australia) and with cloud computing already a reality there will be a point where this will be taken seriously by the nature of its legality and moved up the latter in Government.

Stifling the internet's ability to grow and evolve is really were this issue leads too , we all use vastly more amounts of data on a daily basis than we did 10 years ago and there is no stopping that pace .. even with the best efforts of world corporations to cash in upon it.
 
I canceled cable TV a couple of years ago. I find I read more books and spend more time outside than before. Who knew there was this strange, bright orb floating up in the sky. I think someone told me it was called the sun. Go figure. :p
 
rive22 said:
I have no intent of ever having Cable TV. Not because of price, but because of commercials. Those annoying hideous brain sucking advertisements drive me crazy.

In addition it's so much better getting HD content online at any time of your choosing.
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Yeah, not only are the commercials really long/annoying but they are extremely LOUD. The program you are watching my be at a perfectly reasonable volume, then the commercials blow you away like that Maxell commercial.

Watching online has less commercials AND it's much cheaper (or even free), so it's pretty much a win-win. Who would have thought people like saving time and money? :)
 
I would have ditched cable a long time ago if it wasn't for the wife. So I hide in the man cave while she watches Dancing with the Stars, "insert cooking show name here", American Idol, etc etc etc.
 
i only have basic cable because its provided in my neighborhood HOA's... I probably wouldnt keep the basics if i was paying directly for them ...i have a computer that has a tuner to record shows... but most of those are all shared to all my other tvs/computers via devices like a ps3 and xbox and stuff. I only record about 2-3 shows though that are seasonal (amazing race, top chef, things like that), and most of these are now starting to show on hulu and netflix
 
rive22 said:
I have no intent of ever having Cable TV. Not because of price, but because of commercials. Those annoying hideous brain sucking advertisements drive me crazy.

In addition it's so much better getting HD content online at any time of your choosing.
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There's also the matter of censorship. Final Destination series for example, have been shown quite a few times already and i have yet to see one intact. What's the point of showing psychological horror movies if you don't show the psychological horror!

The worst i've seen are those western gunfights. Hero runs into a bad guy, reaches for his gun... CUT... hero runs to next room (Wait! what happened to the bad guy???), sees more bad guys, he jumps sideways and fir... CUT... hero runs into the room and unties the damsel with one of the badguy's knife (How'd he get the knife???). There should be a law against butchering movies like this!

These days, whenever i see a movie that looks remotely interesting on TV, even if it was coming up next, i go online instead. :rolleyes:
 
rive22 said:
The shows that I do like, I'll happily buy them on Bluray and watch the episodes back to back.
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The way shows get cancelled, it's probably best to wait until they come out disk... so you don't get yourself invested into a show that's going nowhere.
 
DustMite said:
I canceled cable TV a couple of years ago. I find I read more books and spend more time outside than before. Who knew there was this strange, bright orb floating up in the sky. I think someone told me it was called the sun. Go figure. :p
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But it is nuclear powered, best just to stay away from it.
 
Sly said:
There's also the matter of censorship. Final Destination series for example, have been shown quite a few times already and i have yet to see one intact. What's the point of showing psychological horror movies if you don't show the psychological horror!

The worst i've seen are those western gunfights. Hero runs into a bad guy, reaches for his gun... CUT... hero runs to next room (Wait! what happened to the bad guy???), sees more bad guys, he jumps sideways and fir... CUT... hero runs into the room and unties the damsel with one of the badguy's knife (How'd he get the knife???). There should be a law against butchering movies like this!

These days, whenever i see a movie that looks remotely interesting on TV, even if it was coming up next, i go online instead. :rolleyes:
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HAHA what channel were you watching those westerns on? I have never seen on that badly butchered but I haven't had a TV for the last 5 years so things may have gone down since then.

Netflix rocks... I don't even have to pay for it. I just use a family member's account when I want to watch something at home since they allow up to 5 devices per account.

And since FOX, etc. started streaming shows the day after they air, there is really no point to even watching shows "over air".
 
S-F said:
TV turns people into retarded zombies. Close to 100% of television content is absolute trash, and I'm not even talking about the commercials. The commercials are doing more damage to individuals than any drugs or sex crimes. These statistics are giving me some hope for mankind.
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*High fives* Tell me about it. My buddy is an avid tru.tv fan. When im visiting him i just sit and steam, i can feel myself getting cancer and i feel like shit the rest of the night. Its all so deprecating, mocking its own stupid ass viewers, sad thing the dumbasses dont even get it.

Pure garbage, people turn the TV OFF!! Now!! Use it for a monitor or a jukebox interface for some good music. People should be in jail for this shit.
 
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