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Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

unofan

unofan

Well-known member
So the wife and I just moved into a new house, and for now we're foregoing cable and just getting high-speed internet. Honestly, right now all's well. Netflix streaming + hulu is working fine, and we'll be getting some rabbit ears to get the over the air channels soon. If we need to, getting a season pass for a couple shows on iTunes is still going to be way cheaper than cable ($20/show/season vs. $100/month for cable).

But, the inevitable question will be sports. NFL we can still get primarily over the air, so that's not an issue. Likewise most major college sports. And I don't give a crap about the NBA.

Living in Iowa, we get taken to the woodshed by MLB's blackout policies. 6 teams claim the state as home territory, which means even if I wanted to subscribe to mlbtv - it'd be pointless as up to a 1/3rd of the schedule would be blacked out, including the entire NL Central on certain weekends (not to mention the national blackouts on Saturday afternoons and Sunday nights). Nice job, MLB, way to make sure you don't get my money. Of course the best was living along the Missouri River in Counciltucky a few years back. If I lived 1000 feet to the West in downtown Omaha, I could have streamed Cubs games all season with no blackouts. But since I was in Iowa, Cubs games were blacked out even though 2/3rds of them weren't on WGN or a national broadcast.

Anyone know if there's an NHL blackout map out there like there is for MLB? I'm rying to find out which teams' games would be blacked out in Iowa. If it's only one or two, then I'll probably just subscribe to their internet feed. If it's 3 or 4, then it gets a bit iffier.

Anyone else cut the cable cord yet? How's it working out?
 
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Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

unofan said:
Anyone else cut the cable cord yet? How's it working out?
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My mom tried that with rabbit ears when she moved into a new place, and one thing we noticed is that the digital over-the-air signal that's around now seems to be a lot weaker overall than the old analog signal, so using rabbit ears not is a lot tougher than it was before. This might have been more due to where she was, but just a warning that using rabbit ears might not work as well as expected.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

We dumped satellite TV a couple months ago. I miss a few things, but we found that for what we paid, we just didn't watch enough to easily justify paying more and more (dish network had raise our rates about $15 a month over the last year or two, with no programming additions by us). The toughest thing is missing some sports events, but I find that less and less do a I want to sit down and spend 3 hours or so watching a sports event. For the most part, checking scores on the internet and seeing highlights online is enough is most cases. Having the TIVO was a really nice thing also. We actually don't even have a TV in the house at the moment, as we're selling our house and got rid of our old one (non-digital and old) when we dropped dish network. We'll watch a movie or something here and there on our laptop, and see news reports and such online when something major happens. And we'll probably get a new TV when we move, but probably not get cable/satellite TV again. Sometimes we'll just read a book together or play a game instead of watching something on TV. So, it's an adjustment, but working pretty good so far.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

Why don't you move? That seems like the best option all around.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

I'm thinking hard about dumping cable (well, Uverse from AT&T) purely for money reasons. I love it everything about it but the cost. I had cable before for slightly cheaper but the interface and reliability of Uverse blow that out of the water. Currently, I'm paying about $105/mo for internet + tv, and that would be about $35 for just internet. We record a ton of stuff on the DVR and I know I would really miss that. If I do cut that cord, I'd pick up Netflix (currently I Redbox it often). Ironically, another benefit of cancelling the 'cable' would be more Badger hockey on TV. Canceling would prompt me to get the digital rabbit ears which would get me the PBS subchannels which show some Badger hockey games. Time will tell...though our new baby may force the issue.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

I'd use DirecTV as a guide to what would be blacked out in your area, since it's pretty much regulated by ZIP code anyway.

http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/global/contentPageIF.jsp?assetId=3450006


*edit* The random Council Bluffs ZIP code I picked (51501) shows it's the "Home" market to the 'Hawks, Blues, and Wild.


*edit2* XM has no blackout rules. ;) But that's more of a "theatre of the mind" since it's just radio.
 
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Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

I cut cable probably almost a year ago. I pretty much only used it for sports anyway, and now I mainly stream them or go to a friends place or a bar. Definitely worth the savings for me. Also, many of the TV shows on the OTA channels are available online, so you can still watch those with hooking your laptop up to the tv. It would be nice if the sports leagues would start realizing how many people are cutting cable and offering online packages that don't have the stupid blackout rules. I would even pay a little bit more to get home market games.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

I've never seriously considered this myself (tangent: I need to watch less TV) but I'm pretty sure Gizmodo and Lifehacker have done postings on the subject before that you might want to look up and see if they have any useful info.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

I have a buddy that is cutting cable as soon as March Madness ends. He has Apple TV and he likes that quite a bit. Add in Hulu and some bit torrenting and you really dont need cable anymore.

I am torn about it...Comcast in this market is ridonkulous, I could definitely save a ton of cash by dropping. (I would keep internet since DSL blows) If I did that I would have no need to buy an HDtv either which would save me even more money in the long run. To be honest 90% of the reason I still have it is because of sports and I am watching less and less these days.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

Handyman said:
I have a buddy that is cutting cable as soon as March Madness ends. He has Apple TV and he likes that quite a bit. Add in Hulu and some bit torrenting and you really dont need cable anymore.

I am torn about it...Comcast in this market is ridonkulous, I could definitely save a ton of cash by dropping. (I would keep internet since DSL blows) If I did that I would have no need to buy an HDtv either which would save me even more money in the long run. To be honest 90% of the reason I still have it is because of sports and I am watching less and less these days.
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You might as well keep Cable if you are keeping your Cable internet. Its basically the same price if you drop a service. You probably would not save any money at all by just having one of them.

What you could do is go to the cheapest cable package however. Add ons will always cost you a lot more.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

JF_Gophers said:
You might as well keep Cable if you are keeping your Cable internet. Its basically the same price if you drop a service. You probably would not save any money at all by just having one of them.

What you could do is go to the cheapest cable package however. Add ons will always cost you a lot more.
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Really? The packages we have here from various providers don't throw in one if you get the other. They have package deals, but those only net you a discount, but not that much.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

Bob Gray said:
Really? The packages we have here from various providers don't throw in one if you get the other. They have package deals, but those only net you a discount, but not that much.
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I know from experience, since I have DirecTV for my TV and Comcast for my internet. I actually added the $10-12 cable tv package to my internet to reduce the price by like $2 overall.

Its insanely stupid.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

JF_Gophers said:
You might as well keep Cable if you are keeping your Cable internet. Its basically the same price if you drop a service. You probably would not save any money at all by just having one of them.
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I don't think that's how companies make money.

They make money by convincing people to spend more money than they want for products they don't need, while convincing them that spending more is actually saving them money. ;)
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

JF_Gophers said:
You might as well keep Cable if you are keeping your Cable internet. Its basically the same price if you drop a service. You probably would not save any money at all by just having one of them.

What you could do is go to the cheapest cable package however. Add ons will always cost you a lot more.
Click to expand...

Unless they double my internet price because I drop cable (which last I looked they dont but I may have missed it) I will save a pantload. Having the Minneapolis WiFi has curtailed the internet jackup deal they used to have.

The other option I was looking into was cutting down service quite a bit but that jusst may be delaying the inevitable.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

Handyman said:
Unless they double my internet price because I drop cable (which last I looked they dont but I may have missed it) I will save a pantload. Having the Minneapolis WiFi has curtailed the internet jackup deal they used to have.

The other option I was looking into was cutting down service quite a bit but that jusst may be delaying the inevitable.
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Internet alone is about $56 with all the fees and crap. Unless you do the 1mb option (no streaming for you), then its like $30 I want to say.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

My DishNetwork contract is up in August and I may buy out the remainder of the contract before then. We don't watch tons of tv and what we do watch we could get via internet (we have a 21" lcd screen for our computer) or via Netflix Watch Instantly (movies, past seasons of shows, etc). We were thinking of getting a Roku box, but I'm not 100% sold on it yet.
We have Comcast for internet and I have no interest in going back to them for cable.

I'm not sure what we'll do if there is an NFL season or for hockey next season. I'm not feeling enthused about the Sox as of yet, so I'm not too worried about baseball.
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

JF_Gophers said:
Internet alone is about $56 with all the fees and crap. Unless you do the 1mb option (no streaming for you), then its like $30 I want to say.
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So like I said, I will save a pantload. Do you have any idea how expensive cable TV with HBO is after the initial 6 months is up?
 
Re: Going without cable? (aka, "home market" blackouts suck)

Handyman said:
So like I said, I will save a pantload. Do you have any idea how expensive cable TV with HBO is after the initial 6 months is up?
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Right, thats why I said keep cable and drop the "add on" channels. :)
 
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