Why does everyone think I’m an asshole for not having a TV?
Posted on Feb 28, 2012 in Uncategorized | 7 comments
Perhaps my title has a bit of hyperbole, but it’s true! I don’t pay for cable and I don’t I have the 5 local channels in my apartment, and people plainly think I’m an asshole for it. They probably think I’m some neo-intellectual who is trying to enact some half-smart vision of what I might consider an enlightened existence.
Why don’t I have a TV? When TV, as I had grown up to know it, disappeared in 2008 (antenna broadcasts were replaced by a mess of digital converter what-whoozels) I refused to pay $40 for the technology that enabled me to watch the shitty local programming I’d always gotten for free.
Truth be told, I watch more programming than I ever have before, and I would still kill for cable or even normal TV, but it isn’t worth the price. I watch streaming services (Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon, etc…) and my monthly bill doesn’t even come close to what cable would rack up to in my area. Whatever those don’t cover I acquire by other means… I’m sort of ashamed to say. I’m not alone in protesting that if I had a viable option to pay for all the content I’d like to watch, I would.
Take HBO: That’s some of the best programming I’ve ever seen in my life. I am hopelessly addicted to Boardwalk Empire. If I could pay HBO a reasonable subscription fee I would in a heartbeat. The time savings I’d incur from not having to track the show down online would make it well worth a “normal” streaming charge (round $8-$12/month). Hell, they could even serve me ads after I pay them if they want (I’m looking at you Hulu Plus), I don’t care. Instead, to watch HBO online, I’d need to buy cable, then buy a HBO package, and THEN buy the privilege to then watch it online. What gives?
Isn’t it just a matter of time when content providers will realize a screen is a screen, regardless of the method of delivery? Why not treat them all basically the same? How long will we have to wait?
Back to my original point, people think I’m some hipster elitist who scoffs at the idea of frying my brain with an afternoon of cartoons, when in fact I love doing precisely that. It’s time to change our vocabulary. TV no longer exists. we’re plugged in 24/7 and have access to content whenever we want. When will everyone else catch up?
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About Me
I'm a front end web developer for the digital marketing agency Room214.com and writer for the music blog PlaybackSTL.com.
When I'm not scribbling wireframes, tweaking CSS, or trying to find yet-another way to describe sounds with words, I doodle, play guitar, try to write and kill zombies.
Relax, you’re not an asshole. You’re a thief.
I’m glad you like Boardwalk Empire, it’s a good show. It cost HBO a lot of money to make it available. Big name actors, big name director, CGI effects, period costumes, etc. HBO’s business model is to make that money back through cable subscribers. Thanks to long-term contracts with cable companies and their willingness to play hardball with content providers, it’s extremely difficult to offer programming any other way.
Luckily for people like yourself who don’t care about intellectual property rights, there are lots of like-minded individuals who have ripped the shows and made them available online. Your example is doing a great job incentivizing HBO and other content providers to make their content freely available. Who wouldn’t want a customer like you?
Eek. I think I may have been unclear. The point I was trying to make is that if HBO should offer their content at a reasonable fee, I would jump at the change to pay for it. I would gladly pay rid myself of the hassle of tracking down streaming copies online. It’s true that HBO offers streaming content, but to require a cable subscription, HBO subscription, and THEN streaming subscription (as I understand it) is way too complicated and expensive.
I’d like to incentivize HBO to offer a more direct route to get to their content, simply put. Not just the, but everyone who’s worried about Intellectual Property rights… I don’t think I’m alone in proposing that if these content providers moved into the 21st century there’s a cadre of willing customers waiting to hand them money for their content.
You’re not an asshole, but Ted sure is.
You’re not an asshole because you don’t have a TV, you’re an asshole because you tell people you don’t have a TV.
Thanks Scott!
I know exactly what you mean. I’m an American, and studied in England for a semester. It was the first time in my life that I didn’t watch TV for more than a day. That 6 months without TV changed my life. A few months ago, I realized that I was destroying my idea time – my shower – by playing music or podcasts while I showered.
I made a rule to have silent showers. Soon thereafter, I took it a step further and declared my entire apartment to be computer-free. I use my computer at work and in my office, but my room is a faraday cage (minus my phone which I will use for calls and texts – but no browsing). I must say that I have turned back into a producer of knowledge, ideas, and concept instead of being just a consumer. I haven’t felt this way since the ’80s.
People treat me as though I have insulted them. But I really appreciate the people who listen, and try it themselves. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing you ideas.
Boy, thank you for sharing. Yeah, I haven’t watched TV for years, but I totally agree with you that a screen is just a screen and that the concept of TV, and even computer, ought to be changed. All those industries that see themselves threatened by the advances of technology are just waiting their time in trying to keep a business that can no longer works the same way as before, instead of trying to adapt and find a different and better way to improve their services. I’m sick and tired of being ripped off by all sorts of companies (cable, telephone, ISP, news and magazines – I cannot understand how a printed subscription can cost more than the online one or why do I need to have the printed one in order to have the online one) that force us to pay for services we don’t actually need or overpay for services we actually barely use. And all those bullshit about piracy, shame on them, for they are mostly the ones to blame. The system basically induce us to download content, which, as you well put it, is a hassle, for which I don’t even have the patience. But I have been more and more outraged regarding the way we, as a consumer, are treated and by the fact that all the anti-piracy and intellectual property law created only worked to impose trouble in the life of correct consumers (I have thousands of movies – DVDs & BluRays – that I have trouble watching because they were legally acquired in different countries and hence I have problems with area and region codes and my hardware area and region). Besides, as you said it, I don’t know about the rest of the world, but I’m in the 21st century, it’s a global world, we travel a lot, we move abroad, heck, we’re not in Kansas anymore. It pisses me off I cannot watch or access some contents which I have payed or would pay for just because I’m elsewhere in the world. The physical world is gone. It’s time to move on. The screen is just a screen, it is supposed to give us the content we want when we want it, for a reasonable and fair price if needed, but it’s our screen and not the other way around. I don’t waist my time nor my money on things I won’t actually use just to justify the existence of some shit industries (and their executives) that might have had their time, but are now gone, so they should just get over it and move on. Sorry my comment is getting bigger than the original post…