tara lamberson

What I Don’t Miss About Cable TV

It’s been over 6 months since Ted & I cancelled our Cable TV package. At first it was a bit of an adjustment, but overall I’m pleased with the decision. Some of the benefits:

• I tend to watch less TV in the background, simply for the noise. Now I listen to more music - I have quite a few Pandora stations set up on the Mac Mini that’s connected to our TV and speakers that pipe in all over the house. My new favorite station is ‘Justin Timberlake.’
• What I watch now tends to be researched more than when we had cable. I check out reviews of shows and take more recommendations, which I think saves wasted time surfing to find a quality product. Some of the series I’m now fans of include Mad Men, Arrested Development, Burn Notice and Life.
• I take more advantage of free podcasts, which are shorter than the TV version of the program. I watch The Today Show a day behind the original air date, sans lengthy commercial breaks.
• I thought I would miss out on live news, but CNN.com Live does a great job of providing live streaming news on their site - which I watch when I’m jonesing for breaking stories.

I admit that I do miss a few channels and would encourage these guys to figure out ways to distribute their video content through Hulu.com, iTunes, etc: HDnet, Discovery Networks and I’m kind of upset that the last season of Entourage and Californation still aren’t available on iTunes - what’s up with that HBO?

Who else has abandoned their Cable contract? I wonder if others are considering it for both the financial reasons and all of the benefits I cited above….