When many families go through their monthly bills they find that cable TV is one of the biggest household expenses. Only a few decades ago cable was a great new thing that exposed people to channels and programming never seen before. Over the last 10 or 15 years however cable has been monopolized by a few major companies (think Comcast) and have forced millions of people to buy into overpriced bundles of services and channels that we don't really need.
With the rise of YouTube, and online TV, cable is no longer the only way to watch programming. In this article we examine what you really get for the money with cable and hopefully convince some that there are other ways to watch your movies, videos and programs at a much better price.
The mission of the cable company is to trick you into a long term contract paying for as many services as possible. By offering reduced introductory rates and discounts on a cable, phone, movie channel and internet bundle they convince many to sign long term contracts for overpriced services. In addition to the negatives of the contract, the reality is that most of the stuff in the bundle you don't need or use.
| Cable Company | Other Vendor |
| Phone - Landline | Magic Jack - $40/year |
| High Speed Internet | Multiple - $30/month = $360/yr |
| Basic Cable | Internet - $0/year |
| Movie Channels | Netflix $8/month = $96/yr |
| Fees/Extra Charges | $0 |
| Totals: $199/month = $2,388/yr | $41/month = $496/yr |
From looking at the above comparison it is clear that you are paying 10 times extra for the luxury of having one company provide all your services. Hardly worth it, but if you look at the amount of programming you get you also can see that the usable service is also less than you might expect. There are many cable channels that you don't watch, the quality of cable programming has decreased dramatically, and only a fraction of the channels are in high definition. For every quality show on cable there are 20 ridiculous shows:
| Ice Road Truckers | Cupcake Wars | 19 Kids and Counting | Alaska Troopers | American Hoggers |
| Basketball Wives (of Everywhere) | Big Shrimpin' | Hairy Bikers | Pit Bulls & Parolees | Puppies vs Babies |
| Rocket Rednecks | Squidbillies | Storage Wars | Swamp Men | Toddlers & Tiaras |
The sad part is that if you really want to watch these silly shows, you could watch most of them free on the Internet.
10 Reasons Why Cable is a Big Corporate Scam
So since much of the programming on Cable is subpar at best you would think that the cable companies would be ashamed to overcharge you, right? Wrong! The cable companies are making money hand over fist, while gouging you with fees and tricks to make you overpay.
1. Introductory prices (ex: first 3 months half off) are a trick to get you to sign a long-term contract. Once the introductory term is over you will overpay for cable for the rest of your life.
2. The Internet Bundle forces you to pay for services you don’t need and channels you will never watch.
3. If you cancel a service in the bundle all the other services you have will get charged at “regular price”, 50 – 100% MORE than the bundle price
4. Introductory prices are mostly for new customers. Once they hooked you on the original contract you don’t qualify for the “discounts” they sucked you in with.
5. Half the channels in cable are NOT in HD. HD TV accounts for less than 100 channels
6. A good portion of the channels are in another language! You are paying for things you can’t watch
7. You can get high speed internet for $15/month. Through cable you will pay twice as much or more
8. Landline service through cable costs $30 PER MONTH. You can get landline service through MagicJack for $20 PER YEAR. Skype is FREE
9. Cable movies are only On Demand for a few months and then they’re gone. With Netflix or another service the same movies are ALWAYS available.
10. If you are late paying your cable bill you will be hit with late fees, restoral fees, phone pay fees or all of the above.
What You can Watch For Free on the Internet
With a $10 VGA cable you can connect your computer to your TV to watch all your internet programming on your big screen TV.
You can also use your PlayStation or Xbox to stream directly to your TV.
News – All your favorite national news shows on MSNBC, CNN, etc. can be watched online for free – with very limited commercials. In addition to video, of course you can also use the Internet to read all the free local and national news you want – in real time.
Dramas/Sitcoms– ABC, CBS, A&E, etc. offer all their shows on their websites for free
Movies– Netflix is $8/month and you can watch whatever movies plus TV shows you want - when you want
Videos– Between YouTube, MTV and VH1 websites you definitely don’t need cable TV to watch videos
Sports– CBS, ABC and others have web channels to watch more college sports options than cable. Sites like Apple TV and others provide on demand viewing options for professional sports (ex: NBA and MLB) at a nominal fee.
Porn– Why pay the cable company $8.99 per movie when you can get all the free porn you want on the web? Sorry - you know we are not posting pron links
Radio– Truly the dumbest thing on cable – radio stations through your television. Use Pandora and create your own stations of the music that you like
Partial List of Free TV Channels on the Internet (from ComputerHope.com)
Hulu - The number one location for finding full and legal TV shows, trailers, and some movies for US visitors. Hulu is a joint venture between NBC, Fox, and many more.
Joost - A great collection of content from a wide arrange of sources and includes some of the old cartoon classics such as GI Joe, Transformers, Popeye, He-Man, Fat Albert, and much more.
Emol - Another great collection of free public domain movies, videos, music videos, and TV shows.
A&E - The A&E TV site features such popular shows as Dog the Bounty Hunter, Intervention, Obsessed, The Cleaner, The First 48 and many more.
ABC - The ABC page has many of its popular shows such as Dancing with the stars, Desperate Housewives, Extreme Makeover, Grey's Anatomy, Lost, Scrubs, and many more online that can be viewed freely.
Blip.tv - A great site to find the latest and most popular independent shows.
CBS - The CBS page has full shows from such shows as 60 Minutes, CSI, The Amazing Race, and more.
Comedy Central - The Comedy Central site features shows such as The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, South Park, and more.
Discovery Channel - The Discovery Channel page features such shows as Man vs. Wild, The Colney, Verminators and more.
Fox - The Fox Broadcasting site features such popular shows as 24, American Idol, Cops, Family Guy, Hell's Kitchen, The Simpsons, and much more.
FX - The FX page features such shows as 30 Days, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Rescue Me, and more.
History Channel - Expedition Africa Ice Road Truckers, Pawn Stars, and more.
Lifetime - The Lifetime network features such shows as Army Wives, How I met your Mother, How to look good naked, and more.
MTV - The MTV page features such shows as America's Best Dance Crew, The Hills, Punk'd, and more.
NBC - The NBC page has many of its popular shows such as America's got talent, ER, Heroes, law and order, the office, Saturday night live, and many more as well as many of their old classic shows.
SpikeTV - The Spike TV's page features such shows as Jesse James is a Dead Man, Manswers, Pros vs. Joes, TNA iMPACT, and more.
TBS - The TBS page features shows such as 10 Items or less, Family Guy, My Boys, Seinfeld, and more.
TheCW - The CW also features many of it's shows such as 90210, America's Top Model, GossipGirl, Melrose Place, and more.
TheWB - The WB site has a collection of their new and old shows online such as Angel, Babylon 5, Buffy, Smallville, Firefly, Friends, Gillmore Girls, The Lake, and many more.
TLC - The TLC page features such shows as Cake Boss, Flip That House, Miami Ink, Say Yes to the Dress, and more.
TNT - The TNT site features popular shows online such as Bones, ER, Law and Order, Saving Grace, The Closer, and many more.
USA - The USA network features such shows as Burn Notice, Monk, Psych, Royal Pains, and more.
VH1 - The VH1 site features shows such as Brooke Knows Best, Sober House, T.O show, and more.
All the sites and methods described above discuss legal viewing of TV on the Web. Downloading a TV show through a bittorrent however is often going to be illegal. Many of the movies and shows have been shared on Torrent sites have been posted by people who do not have the rights to the copyright. Use at your own risk.
Cable companies count on you being lazy and buying the overpriced bundle instead of getting the individual services that you really need. Find the best company for each service and save.
Do not be fooled by "introductory rates" (ex: half-price for 3 months). When the introductory rate is done you will be overpaying on cable for the rest of your life.
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