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Television Movies Entertainment

You're Paying 40% More For TV Than You Were 5 Years Ago (businessinsider.com) 219

Posted by msmash from the tv-charges dept.
According to data from Leichtman Research's annual study, pay TV subscriptions keep going up and up. So much so that in the last five years, they have gone up by 40 percent. In 2011, subscribers were paying an average of $73.63 for cable or satellite, but now that average stands at roughly $103. From a BusinessInsider report: And it's not helping subscriber growth. "About 82% of households that use a TV currently subscribe to a pay-TV service," Bruce Leichtman said in a statement. "This is down from where it was five years ago, and similar to the penetration level eleven years ago." The pay-TV industry lost 800,000 last quarter subscribers last quarter, according to the research firm SNL Kagan. Putting that on a personal level, NBCUniversal CEO Steve Burke recently said his own kids don't even pay for TV. Burke has five "millennial" children, ages 19 to 28, and exactly "none" subscribe to cable or satellite, he said at a conference last week.
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You're Paying 40% More For TV Than You Were 5 Years Ago More

You're Paying 40% More For TV Than You Were 5 Years Ago

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  • Maybe so (Score:4, Funny)

    by ichthus ( 72442 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @02:44PM (#52948275) Homepage
    Maybe so, but that's only because I've voluntarily donated 40% more to my favorite private tracker.

  • Math checks out 1.40 * 0 = 0 (Score:5, Funny)

    by netsavior ( 627338 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @02:48PM (#52948315)
    actually it looks like I may be paying a quintillionteen jillion percent more for TV than I was 5 years ago.

    Since I haven't paid a television bill since 2004.

  • I most definitely am not! (Score:3)

    by Ecuador ( 740021 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @02:49PM (#52948327) Homepage

    I most definitely am not! I do watch shows free on Amazon since I have Prime anyway and when I was in the US I also had Netflix which is under $10/month, while now in the UK where Netflix has less stuff I complement Amazon with the free catch-up service of BBC and ITV. Why would I pay the exorbitant amounts listed for TV, especially if we are talking about regular programming and not on-demand, even if I had no other choice, I'd probably just go without TV...
    The only people I can understand having a reason to pay are sports fans. I do enjoy watching sports myself now and then, not enough to actually pay extra, but I guess others are willing to pay big bucks for that.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by imidan ( 559239 )

      I pay for HBO streaming at $15 per month. I got that for Game of Thrones and originally intended cancelling during the off-months, but I discovered that there's enough content there that I enjoy that I decided not to cancel. And my girlfriend's family has Netflix, which we don't pay for. I have Amazon Prime, so I get that content, and I guess you could count a part of the Prime subscription as TV costs. Call it $5 per month, which is probably overestimating--I get a lot more value out of Prime in shippi

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by swb ( 14022 )

        The HBO Now service has a better selection of movies than Netflix does.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by imidan ( 559239 )

          Yeah, but we like some of the Netflix exclusive content, too. My girlfriend watches Orange is the New Black and House of Cards, and we both dug Stranger Things.

          I had a Netflix account many years ago, and I watched a bunch of streaming movies there, but after a pretty short time, it became scraping the bottom of the barrel. Also, I was constantly annoyed that my browsing pages were cluttered with so much kids' content. I remember browsing for shows and having whole pages that were entirely Dora and Caillo

      • I got that for Game of Thrones and originally intended cancelling during the off-months...

        Now that Game of Thrones has jumped the shark it's hard to use that to justify anything. No cable TV here, bought the series up to season 5 on Blu-ray, enjoyed it, although less as it wore on. Won't bother with season 6 or later.

  • Other than a few favorite shows, I haven't missed a damn thing.

    I have Netflix and an Amazon account if I want to watch something.

    Since I'm the "techie" in the family, if I HAVE to watch something NOW, I can log into my parents' account and stream, as they haven't divorced themselves from TV.

    But, for the most part, I simply don't miss it.

    And somewhere in the past, my child TV addict self screams in horror.

    With the equipment costs, and the push towards a "$100 minimum" bill and all these fucking channels you

    • Since I'm the "techie" in the family, if I HAVE to watch something NOW, I can log into my parents' account and stream, as they haven't divorced themselves from TV.

      So basically, someone else is subsidizing the few programs you do watch on live TV.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Chas ( 5144 )

        Barter economy.

        It's not like I charge my parents for my services. Hell, I don't even charge them gas money or insist they feed me.
        Plus, they have access to one of the streams on my Netflix account.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Chas ( 5144 )

      And remember, you have 3 main "natural" or "grabber" price points.

      $20, $50 and $100.

      Technicaly $19.99, $49.99 and $99.99, but I'm lazy and not going to worry about fudging a penny (which they kinda count on).

      Basically things like cell phone service, single lines for service talk about something right around the $50/month price point. And shared plans are all around $100.
      Same thing with cable. They, for a long while were $50/month (plus fees, etc). Now they've climbed into the $100 range.

  • I've been paying Comcast roughly the same amount of money per month since 2007. Since then, my Internet speeds have gone from 8Mbps to 125Mbps, and I have a whole slew of HD channels I didn't used to get a decade ago. And never mind that I moved to Comcast to consolidate what, before, was phone and DSL from the telco and TV from satellite, and I was paying a lot more for less back in those days.

    Oh, and if you take inflation into account, let's just say I'm paying a lot less than I ever have for my TV servic

  • Just compare the prices of other utilites (Score:3)

    by no-body ( 127863 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @02:58PM (#52948403)

    Electricity
    Water
    "Natural" gas
    Sewer
    Garbage

    against TV

    and what you get as net gain and how much abuse you have to take

    is it really worth it?

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by no-body ( 127863 )

        Why did you put quotes around natural? What's not natural about natural gas? Do you think the methane is manufactured somewhere?

        There are some voices that "natural" gas is not of organic origin, but formed or occurring deep down in the planet at a time long before organic processes existed nor, when they existed, those would not capable of creating such amounts:

        http://origeminorganicadopetro... [blogspot.com]

        That's not my point though. The term "natural" implies being OK, renewable, then good to use. While it may be better than crude oil derived fuels or coal, it still is a carbohydrate when oxidized, creates CO2, a greenhouse gas contributing to

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by HiThere ( 15173 )

          Well, it is indeed a "hogwash misleading term", as it no more deserves the term "natural" than does white sugar or beer. It's a highly processed refinement of a naturally occurring substance.

          Forget thinking of it as green-wash though, since the term is a lot older than that. It wasn't new in the 1950's, when I was surprised that my grandfather used propane rather than "natural gas". This doesn't keep it from being a misnomer, though I guess that it may have earned the term when being distinguished from "

        • "The term "natural" implies being OK, renewable, then good to use."

          Uh you can redefine words all you want, but don't act like your hipster defintion is correct.

          NATURAL: (1) existing in or formed by nature (opposed to artificial)
          http://www.dictionary.com/brow... [dictionary.com]

          This is what happens when you listen to too much marketing, and let the advertisers change language for you. But i bet you think "organic" means something other than "characteristic of, pertaining to, or derived from living organisms".

          Face it, you've

      • Because it's really supernatural gas. You're burning the ghosts of dead dinosaurs!!!!

  • We need to be able to buy the box with no outlet fees / mirroring / tv fees / receiver fees / etc.

    • This option is exactly what TiVo is. You buy your TiVo equipment, and rent a Cablecard from your existing provider. Per FCC rule, the fee to rent the Cablecard is capped (IIRC, at $5.00/month, although Comcast charges like $3). One Cablecard can support up to 6 TVs.

      Except for the Cablecard, your cable company won't be charging you an equipment fee because you own your own devices.

  • Why offer programming people want to see when you can just impose a "reasonable" 300GB/month cap on your internet-only offering for "network management" that magically goes away when you pay an additional $30-50/month or bundle in a TV package?

  • Does this article - you know the thing you shall never read - consider Netflix and other stream-only subscriptions? My take is that people want to watch new series at their own pace, maybe recall what the 90s were with Friends. What nobody wants is to sit through comercials. After all, are not subscribers paying for the content already?

  • Not surprising (Score:3, Insightful)

    by redmasq ( 4395537 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @03:14PM (#52948507)
    Cable networks, partially out of necessity, sells in packages. These packages come because networks sell their channels in sets in order to maximize profits for their shareholders (more channels mean more advertising slots to sell). I would imagine that cable companies have a hard to negotiate against larger networks so those channel groups in packages represent an (almost) fixed overhead. As cable companies get few customers, they raise prices to keep their own margins up. Unfortunately (for them), this only accelerates the number of subscribers lost. In the meantime, streaming services, in spite of decreasing the breadth of their selection, are still providing more individual programs which is better satisfies the busyness in everyday life without requiring an extra fee for a DVR. If networks were able to sell individual channels to people rather than packages, I would assume that more subscriptions would occur. That said, cable companies might be better off ditching the idea of selling video services directly and spin off new companies from themselves that does video subscriptions separately leaving all of that bandwidth to compete with fiber.

  • In other news, Free OTA HDTV is still as free as when it started. I've also recently started experimenting with network connected HDTV tuner hardware so that every device on the network has access to the OTA broadcasts with just a simple app.

    • I tried that with an HDHomeRun. I wanted to get some DVR software running on my computer, but couldn't get it to work right.

      Then again, we subscribe to Hulu which acts like a DVR for us anyway, so it wasn't a high priority for me to get working.

      • I tried that with an HDHomeRun. I wanted to get some DVR software running on my computer, but couldn't get it to work right.

        I did that years back with HDHomerun and MythTv.

        I just now switched to OTA again..this time, I priced out the hardware needed and found that the Tivo Roamio OTA unit was only about $399...and it was cheaper to do that for a 4 tuner unit than to buy the HDHomerun units (2 of them) and the computer to run it on.

        Look into the Tivo OTA unit...lifetime service for $399.

        I got the Tivo mi

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Megane ( 129182 )
          Does it let you download the raw unrestricted MPEG files to a computer?

          • Does it let you download the raw unrestricted MPEG files to a computer?

            The Tivo?

            No, I do not believe so...but why would I want to?

            LOL..there's nothing on tv really that I find worth long term storage or archiving.

            That being said, there is a way to get video off the Tivo....not sure the format.

  • Well this dispels any myth that the industry is trying to fight online piracy in a meaningful way.
  • Got an email from a comic I like saying he had a TV special coming up... on Seeso (NBCUniversal / Comcast).

    Sorry pal, but nope. Not even worth a trial / cancel trick as those effers can't even be trusted with my CC info (I don't have Comcast, thank FSM).

  • No cable
    No Netflix
    Not buying any more new DVD's
    Yes to Piratebay
    Yes to pawnshops for $2-5 DVD's

    Do I feel guilty for buying probably stolen dvd's/cd/br at pawn shop so actors and music artists can't get paid. Nope its actually leave the money they would have sucked out of me in my pocket and I'm ok with that.

    • probably stolen dvd's/cd/br at pawn shop so actors and music artists can't get paid

      So instead of paying for Netflix, you'd rather support literal theft (by paying for stolen property)?

  • I don't have a cable subscription. So, no.
  • ...we're getting way more than 40% more ads today, so - it's a win! /s

  • I've stopped watching TV about 22 years ago.
    When you have books and video-games, ... who needs biased, or simply wrong "news", sports, bad shows and heaps of advertising ?
    Besides, even DVDs and BluRays are cheaper than before, for the few select TV shows that are worth it (Breaking Bad, ...)

  • I'm paying 100% less, like the other slashdotters (Score:3)

    by BenJeremy ( 181303 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @03:43PM (#52948711)

    Cord-cutting. My live sports is less-than-legit, but honestly, it is worth about $20/mo for sports, and nobody wants to offer me a decent legit alternative at that price. Worse, NHL Center Ice blacks out my favorite team's games in favor of cable coverage.

    Otherwise, we went all last summer without turning on the cable box... why pay for it? We can't stand being tied to TV schedules, either.

  • Milking the Stubborn (Score:4, Insightful)

    by mentil ( 1748130 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @03:51PM (#52948771)

    There are many in the older generations who are anti-Internet and are seemingly afraid that if they even sign up for Internet access their bank balance will disappear and their grandchildren will get kidnapped. Others have Internet access but barely use it; you know the ones, they check email or Facebook and maybe one or two other sites and that's it; they don't do web searches or visit new sites regularly.
    These are the people who will, most likely, NEVER sign up (on their own) for Netflix or cut the cord, no matter how expensive their cable/satellite bill gets, because as far as they're concerned, there's no alternative. They wouldn't know how to get Netflix on their TV and have no idea how to find out.
    So, the pay TV companies are raising rates in order to milk these older generations as much as possible before they die off or figure out how to connect a Roku to their TV (or someone else shows them); or before they buy a smart TV that puts all these cord-cutting options on the screen they're looking at, accessible with the remote they're holding.
    The older generations are also set in the "watching what's on" paradigm; while the newer generations have had access to on-demand, home video, and file sharing, allowing for "watching what you want". With Netflix, there is no mindless "watching what's on", you have to choose what to put on, at least a series to autoplay. If you don't like it, you can't claim lack of responsibility a la "these networks air nothing but crap nowadays. yep", it's all on you for putting that show on.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by XXongo ( 3986865 )

      There are many in the older generations who are anti-Internet and are seemingly afraid that if they even sign up for Internet access their bank balance will disappear and their grandchildren will get kidnapped.

      Yeah, I hate it when that happens.

      Best solution, if you want to use the internetz, is to not have a bank balance and not have children (thus nicely preventing grandchildren as well). Which seems to be how most slashdottahs do it.

  • You're Paying 40% More For TV Than You Were 5 Years Ago

    Jesus Christ. You know, some of us are capable of being interested in a headline even if it doesn't try to directly address us.

    It's so fucking condescending.

    According to data from Leichtman Research's annual study, pay TV subscriptions keep going up and up. So much so that in the last five years, they have gone up by 40 percent.

    ...in the USA, I assume this means. There are other countries, Slashdot. And even if that wasn't the case, your average Slashdotter is probably more likely to have "cut the cord" than most people. Know your readers.

    Look at the original headline: "Americans are paying 40% more for TV than they were 5 years ago." Informative and to the point without treat

    • You do realize this is a US based news site, right?

      Your complaint would be like me going on the register and bitching about UK centric news headlines, in which the primarily UK readership there would appropriately tell me to sod off....

      • You do realize this is a US based news site, right?

        Is it? I hadn't seen a flag on it. It doesn't give much, if any, indication of where it is based or who it is aimed at. According to Alexa only 45.3% of its readers are US based.

        Your complaint would be like me going on the register and bitching about UK centric news headlines, in which the primarily UK readership there would appropriately tell me to sod off....

        It's not about UK or US centric, it's about not being clear when dishing out statistics.

        Can you find a headline/story at the Register which similarly gives a statistic in this way? If anything, they go out of their way to be clear when they are talking about "UK jobs" or "British universities" rather than just assuming everyone will

      • It can be US based and still not US-centric. It's just that a lot of readers are in the US and tend to forget that there are other countries. And I agree with OP, that's very annoying, even when you live in the US (but happen to have lived in other countries). The fact that proposed articles are written that way is normal, but editors should modify them to be more generic if they want Slashdot to be a general tech web-site.

        Since there is only one Slashdot (except slashdot japan), it should not be US-centr

  • I've used OTA all my life and no plan to change. Way back in early 2000's bought a rokuHD and a PCI card that could capture HD OTA. After I had that, it was easy to time shift anything I wanted to watch. I am going to be pissed if FCC decides to sell the HD airwaves to the wireless carriers.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by JustNiz ( 692889 )

      > I am going to be pissed if FCC decides to sell the HD airwaves to the wireless carriers.

      What? Is that actually being considered?

      • Is that sarc/ ? Google "repacking". The FCC is selling off the higher UHF channels to the wireless carriers. There will be loss of HD TV coverage, but hey, Verizon can charge you $30 for 2gb of spotify, so there's that.

  • Not regretting anything since cutting everything 5 years ago...

  • "You're Paying 40% More For TV Than You Were 5 Years Ago"

    No, I'm paying exactly the same amount....zero. (And I've always found it to be a super bargain at that price.)

    Between stuff like Putlocker, PirateBay, and Netflix, the notion of paying a fee for monthly cable TV service is not only quaint, it's downright hilarious.

  • Sorry, I don't give a rat's a$$ for this. The cable tv can charge anything they want, I am not buying. You don't like it, don't buy it. It is not a human necessity to have cable. Entirely optional. I have not had cable for 25 years (except for brief 1 month periods every 4 years for the world cup). Stop whining and get a life.

  • .... In 2011, subscribers were paying an average of $73.63 for cable or satellite, but now that average stands at roughly $103. From a ...

    Just curious, $73.63 and $103 per what?

    Per year? Per month?

    (I own a TV, but I haven't turned it on since I think maybe 2007 or so, and I have no idea how much people pay for cable access.)

  • I'm paying 100% less now for cable than I was 10 years ago. Once the internet became a mainstream thing there was no point in paying absurd amounts of money to cable companies for content that is mostly ad-riddled garbage. I don't mind paying for content, but make it on-demand, and make it things I actually want to watch.

  • I realize that most Slashdotters are probably not sports junkies...but where did people think all this new TV revenue coming into professional and college sports was coming from? Sports is really what is driving the rising prices. Once sports leagues make realtime streaming deals, the days of traditional cable/satellite TV are numbered.

  • Makes perefect sense (Score:3)

    by waspleg ( 316038 ) on Friday September 23, 2016 @05:14PM (#52949407) Journal

    they're trying to mitigate the damage cord cutters are doing (haven't had cable tv for more than 10 years; still have comcast for internet no good alternatives) and keep their earnings projections from tanking and taking their stock with it.

  • I cut the cord.

  • Burke has five "millennial" children, ages 19 to 28, and exactly "none" subscribe to cable or satellite, ...

    As opposed to approximately "none". Perhaps all his children are just dumb too.

  • ...People who subscribe to the top-tier ultimate everything-included cable package with umpteen premium channels are less likely to cancel their cable subscription than light casual viewers who are fine with just netflix/hulu, thereby driving up the average price paid by the few remaining cable co customers?

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