Is Cable Worth It?
I think I am going to finally pull the plug and cancel cable. I do not have Dish, Comcast, DirecTV or any of those fancy packages; just basic cable. There are only two shows I have been watching that are not on Hulu or viewable on their respective network’s website. One was a reality show I wrote about in my last article called “Bullrun”, which just had its season finale last Thursday. Congrats to Team Lambo, by the way, for winning it all. Part of me would have liked to have seen Team Hummer in the final three instead of Team NSX since Hummer were the kings of the challenge in the first several shows of the season. But NSX, Lambo and HemmeCuda put on a great show for the finale. Now please convince Goldberg and SPEED to release all the seasons on DVD, please!
The other show that is not legally viewable online I have been keeping up with is RAW, which has been a staple of mine since its inception in 1993. Lately I have been starting to watch RAW over at a friend’s pad these past couple of weeks, and in glorious HD cable to boot. WWE’s other three prime time shows: Superstars, NXT and Smackdown are all available on Hulu. As are 24 and Lost, both of which are unfortunately rolling out their final episodes over the next month or two. The Office is also available online, as are the animated shows I irregularly watch like South Park, Simpsons and Family Guy. I rarely kick back at home and channel surf, so I told myself I do not really see it being worth an extra $40-50 a month just to watch RAW.
Now if I had a family, that would be an entirely different scenario and would probably opt with some premium channels so there were plenty of options available for everyone. But for just me living by myself, aside from the aforementioned shows all being available online and the many choices to watch from Netflix Instant Streaming, I have a growing pile of movies and TV season DVDs and BluRays I need to catch up on and should tide me by for the foreseeable future.
So my question is: is anyone of the Robot Panic community in the same situation I am in? Do you find it worthwhile to keep cable, or just ditch and watch your shows through DVDs, Netflix and the series of tubes? Part of me was thinking this would be a growing trend, but I ran into an old acquaintance at a bar a couple months ago who is now a cable installer. I asked him if they have been getting more people than average over the past couple years canceling cable with the emergence of Hulu, Netflix Instant Queue, etc. To my surprise he said installation rates are actually on the rise. Since I am not as plugged in as I thought I was to cable trends I find myself mighty curious how others digest their cable. So what say, you RP community? How do you consume your television?
