Enough with the streaming services already

What did we hate so much about cable?

I think that, to a large degree, we already live in a post-cable world. Anecdotally speaking, I don’t know anyone who watches cable TV through a cable box anymore. The numbers are bearing that out, too. We’re cutting out subscription televisions services faster than ever, with nearly a million people ditching services like Comcast, Dish, Charter, and DirecTV in the last quarter. So it can be tough to remember what was so frustrating about cable.

With a cable subscription, everything comes in bulk. You want sports? You got it, You want movies? They’re in there. But it’s all tied together. You’re paying for Fox and MSNBC, regardless of where you sit on the political spectrum, and so forth. To get the SyFy Channel, you have to fund TLC (which used to be called The Learning Channel, let that sink in).

Netflix was the first streaming service that felt like a proper relief from all of that. The service offered up enough options to make sure we could “channel flip” anytime we wanted. At one point, it was the only game in town. Or a least, the only game that mattered.

Now, the number of streaming services has exploded. Worse, everyone wants their own paid subscription service. Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go, Amazon Prime Video, and (soon) Disney each offer a variety of shows and movies, as well as some specialty or another. You could even throw the anime-streaming service Crunchyroll in there, especially in light of Sony’s acquisition of their streaming partner, Funimation. Then, services like Sling TV and PlayStation Vue attempt to replace cable, offering a variety of channels you’d normally find on cable television. But we’re going to focus on the first and best-known group, as each of those services offers some kind of exclusive programming.

Article source: https://www.technobuffalo.com/2017/08/09/enough-with-the-streaming-services-already/