Our cable company (the always infuriating Time Warner Cable) and the owner’s of our local NBC station KXAN (LIN TV) are having a dispute about who should pay for what. Apparently KXAN thinks TWC should pay them for their signal and TWC disagrees. This is the second time this has happened in the Austin area. When we first moved here LIN TV was feuding with a small cable company that serves outlying areas over the exact same issue.
The end result is that on October 3rd we lost our NBC channel. Did Time Warner replace it with one of the many affiliates they use in other markets? No. Instead we have a 5 minute long tutorial instructing us on how to play NBC shows over this thing they call the internet using this other thing they call a computer. Very complex stuff. As far as I can tell it runs 24 hours a day in a giant loop punctuated by 20 seconds of telling us how very bad and uncaring KXAN is. For KXAN’s part they began running commercials weeks ago telling us to switch to satellite or one of the IP based TV services that are available here (Verizon FiOS and ATT U-verse).
Now I don’t know who is right or wrong. And frankly I don’t really care. But I think TWC is being about as short sighted as they can be. They are actually giving me video instruction, 24 hours a day, on how to watch all of the best programs using my computer. Now Amber and I already watch most of our TV online through Hulu, but most people don’t (yet). Yet here they are telling us how easy it is to basically dump cable TV and watch all your favorite shows. “You can even pause and rewind if you want” they say at one point. Its works just like a DVR only you don’t have to pay extra for it! If it is all so blessed easy and wonderful why should I pay for cable TV at all? That is a really good question.
You see we only pay for the basic package. I’m not talking about the standard package most people mean when they say they have basic cable, the one that comes with things like the Discovery Channel, TLC, History Channel, CNN, and the like. No, I’m talking about the most basic “we only offer it because the government makes us” package that has the local networks and a slew of other channels that with very few exceptions nobody watches. For us that means 21 channels in all. Of the channels that we get we really only watch the following:
- Ch2 – Fox
- Ch 3 – ABC
- Ch 4 – NBC
- Ch 5 – CBS
- Ch 9 – PBS
- Ch 12 – CW (rarely)
- Ch 20 – PBS2
- Ch 21 – WGN Chicago (also rarely)
The channels we don’t watch, but could, include, three public access stations, Azteca America, Univision, a home shopping channel (which comes in fuzzy even though its cable) and the always riveting City of Austin Access channel. If we stopped receiving any of these other channels I wouldn’t even notice. And really channels 12 and 21 wouldn’t bother me if they went away either.
Now my problems with Time Warner started with our internet access. We are now happily on DSL with ATT. Then a few months ago they raised our rates by 42%. People who subscribed to larger packages actually had less of an increase (not only as a percentage, but also in dollars per month) than we did even though their packages include all of the channels we get. Now they are failing to deliver one of only 8 channels we actually watch.
If it was up to me we’d ditch them all together. But the kids like PBS and we get nothing on antenna. So, at least for the time being I’ll keep flipping through the channels and getting drawn in to that nifty how-to video. I can’t help myself. I see computers and cables and buttons being pressed and I just have to watch.
For those of you wondering about the title of the post, this is a Seinfeld reference. And ok one on a couple of different levels including the fact that Seinfeld was an NBC show and the fact that they have now taken away my “soup”. Okay its a bit of a stretch.
Tags: Austin, KXAN, Time Warner
I had heard about HULU before, but tonight pushed me to look. Gave me the opportunity (or should I say time) to watch the vice presidential debate. Thank you!