#streaming is not like cable

[princess-viola]

i genuinely think people who say shit like 'streaming is basically cable now' NEVER actually paid for cable in their life

cable was and is absolutely bullshit and streaming is nothing like cable.

does it suck ass that there's like a million different subscription services now?

yes, it does - but that whole fantasy of there only ever being one single streaming service with everything on it was never going to last forever and even now it's still absolutely nothing like cable

i did some math recently and you could subscribe to the following streaming services:

netflix

disney+

hulu

apple tv+

max

paramount+

peacock

for less than $100/mo total. and i ain't talking like 'oh if you sub to the cheapest options with ads, it comes out to sub $100/mo', no that is the total price if you sub to Netflix Premium, the Disney Bundle Duo Premium, (Disney+ and Hulu), Apple TV+, Max Ultimate Ad-Free, Paramount+ with Showtime, and Peacock Premium Plus. The most expensive options for all of them (sans Disney+ since they also have a Disney Bundle Trio Premium that also has ESPN+ w/o ads)

now let's compare that with cable. obviously cable prices can vary depending on where you are and what providers are in your area, so i'm just going by what's available where i live right now. i have xfinity and here are the current channel packages available at my address:

choice TV - $20/mo

popular tv - $60/mo

ultimate TV - $80/mo

that sounds great, don't it? I mean even the most expensive channel package is ~$20 cheaper per month than being subbed to all the major streaming services. that clearly must mean that the complainers are right and streaming has just become the new cable and cable is even cheaper than streaming now

well, no. it's not. because here's the shit they ain't telling you: - the cheapest package? choice TV? that's literally just your local channels (which you can pick up for free with an antenna because they're broadcast OTA), C-SPAN, some shopping channels, and the music choice channels. that's literally it, that's all you get if you for the cheapest option.

also in addition to the advertised monthly price, there's tons of additional fees and shit you gotta pay that aren't included in the advertised price.

that $20/mo choice TV option? you also gotta pay a $24.40/mo broadcast TV fee. the $60/mo and $80/mo popular and ultimate TV options? you gotta pay the broadcast TV fee and a $16.50/mo regional sports fee

so at the very least the prices of $20, $60, and $80/mo are bullshit and the actual prices are $44.40, $100.90, $120.90 for each plan per month

WELL NO THOSE STILL AIN'T THE ACTUAL PRICES YOU'D BE PAYING EITHER BECAUSE SALES TAX, EQUIPMENT FEES, AND OTHER ADD-ONS ARE NOT INCLUDED IN THE PRICES

let's say i decide that i want the biggest channel package available from xfinity, so i go for the $80/mo ultimate TV option. $80/mo for all these channels, seems pretty great!

well, you can also customize and add additional packages to your plan, so i decide 'well i do also like to stream, so i'll go for the xfinity streamsaver bundle (which gives me netflix standard w/ ads, apple tv+, and peacock premium) for an additional $15/mo and maybe i'm into sports so i also get the more sports & entertainment package so i get more sports channels for an additional $9.95/mo

then comes the equipment, you get one TV box by default but most people have more than one TV. so let's say there are three TVs in my house: one in the living room and one in each bedroom, so i'll need three TV boxes total. those are $10/mo each, so that's $30/mo more for the TV boxes.

you got DVR as well, you get 20 hours included for free, but i figure 'well the option to get 150 hours of DVR recordings is only $10/mo, so i'll go for that'

so what would be the total estimated cost per month for all of this?

per xfinity's own website, all of this would cost me an estimated $203.88/mo

that's right, over $200 a month for a plan that they advertise as being $80/mo

being subbed to all of the major streaming services: sub-$100 and the price that the streaming service advertises is the price you are going to pay per month (maybe slightly more due to taxes depending on where you live). there's no hidden extra fees you pay that they don't advertise, you don't have to rent equipment from them to use their services, and the big one YOU ARE NOT LOCKED INTO A CONTRACT WITH THEM

thankfully lots of cable companies nowadays offer no-contract options (the example xfinity plan i was using was no-contract) but back in the day, you'd literally be locked into a 12 or 24 month contract with your cable company with no way out unless you wanted to pay an early termination fee

streaming? not a thing. you can cancel and resub whenever you want. you're only subbed to a service to watch one series and now the season is over and there really ain't anything else you wanna watch? you can cancel your subscription, you ain't locked into having, for example, a netflix sub for 12 months that you don't use

(also for fucks sake i pay for cable still and my combined cable and internet bill is $300/mo like deadass if you seriously think streaming is at all comparable to cable you can eat my ass)

[maya-caffrey]

can we bring back procedurals? or at least just proper shows like how TV used to be? 5 to 15 seasons, a generous amount of episodes per season, 45 minutes: the sweet spot between too long and too short, pilot episodes that are wildly different from the rest of the show, filler episodes that overall contribute nothing but are extremely fun because that is what god intended, random musical episode, crossovers, waiting an entire week in anticipation to see what happens next, like, this was the PEAK of television, where did we go wrong

[vamprisms]

it is possible to have longer & well written/produced seasons of tv shows that are made under good union conditions. you know this in your heart

[puppppppppy]

the shyest creature on earth dreams of art streaming

[fluffytheocelot]

honestly homophobic of netflix to remove the interactive with the julethief canon events in it

AND ON THE DAY CARMEN ESCAPES VILE NO LESS 😒

rip To Steal or Not To Steal. you had the entire fandom in a chokehold over that ending <3

[saltpepperbeard]

so this video is currently sitting on my YouTube homepage, and i cannot help but be like

[princehendir]

Every time I watch a show with ads o feel like I'm about to become the unabomber

[bibleofficial]

god bless sleeping 12hrs nightly

[fruitsofhell]

Lowkey thinking about how fucked over the Animaniacs reboot was as well as like almost attempt to bring back golden animation sensibilities cause they're not at all made for the streaming model. Funny animal gag cartoons were meant to be watched in haphazard bursts, forced upon audiences through Saturday morning TV spots or the ancient art of pre-movie shorts. They don't become so iconic because they build hype cycles and acclaim like 10 episode cinematic mini-series, they only gain that love because people were subjected to them in random intervals as kid and they grow up realizing "Oh hey those things from my childhood were like, really good and funny!" It's a kind of model that only exists from humbling putting out great kids content and letting it simmer and build fans over decades which is something absolutely no media conglomerate has patience for anymore lol.

I know someone could probably give me like a masters thesis on why the cable format for TV was unwoke and bad but the streaming, on-demand model for EVERYTHING is really bad for every show that isn't That One Kind Of Epic Moment show. There's no moderate trash anymore, it's all either like lowest common denominator brainrot on YouTube or world-shaking award winning drama #30.

[awakefor48hours]

As I'm rewatching TADC, I'm beginning to realize that in the near future, we're probably going to see more indie projects and I actually think that it has the potential to be good for the entertainment industry as a whole.

As time goes on, more people are pretty much only using streaming services but streaming services have a lot of problems with their platforms. The subscriptions are getting more expensive, there's so many of them, and a lot of the shows are getting cancelled in their infancy (some after being greenlit for more) despite their popularity.

Since 2019, Netflix alone has cancelled dozens of shows such as Dead End Paranormal Park, Julie and the Phantoms, Inside Job, Lockwood and Co, Warrior Nun, The Baby-Sitters Club, Raising Dion, Shadow and Bone, The Oa, I Am Not Okay With, A Typical, Anne with E, and much more.

This list doesn't even touch on other streaming platforms but I'm choosing to focus on these shows from Netflix (probably the most well respected streaming service) because I feel like it gets to the root of the problem. A lot of these shows were cancelled in their infancy despite having had high ratings (once again, some of them were even greenlit for more seasons). I almost never hear about shows ending anymore, I only hear about how they get cancelled after a season or two.

With both streaming services and cable not really giving creators the most certain platform, doing indie projects seems like the best bet and it works really well for both the creator and the audience.

To go back to streaming services, the amount of streaming services in the world are only growing and not everyone has the ability to pay for all of them but even the people that do pay for a lot of streaming services can't watch everything. I've mentioned this once but my parents are subscribed to 5 different streaming services, that's so many but they still ask me for help to pirate about once a month because they want to watch a show that isn't available on the streaming platform they use. That is ridiculous and I fully believe my parents should be allowed to watch whatever they want. (Just like my parents, I'll gladly share the piracy sites I use but it's through DMs only, I promise I'm not scary I cry watching kids cartoons).

But when it comes to shows on YouTube, it's available to basically everyone with a Wi-Fi connection and I fully believe it's the main reason why shows like TADC, Lackadaisy, Helluva Boss, RWBY, RvB, and more were able to get their level of popularity. They're on a free to use platform and can be shared to other people just as easily. Also when creators post their show on YouTube, it's much easier for people to make gifs and edits (which, let's be honest, are the real advertisers of a show) because YouTube lets people take screenshots/screen record without any hassle.

*If you want to know how to screenshot/screen record DRM content (things like Netflix, Hulu, CrunchyRoll, etc), I do have a post about here.

Along with the fact that it's more available to the public, it's also more available to the crew and creators. A few years ago, Dana Terrace (creator of The Owl House) made a tweet introducing a new character to the show but the tweet got popular because admitted that she had to pirate The Owl House in order to watch it.

(Since it's cropped in this screenshot, in the top right corner is a watermark of a well-known piracy site for The Owl House).

Imagine working for a company like Disney and not have the ability to watch your own show. They couldn't even give her complimentary mp4 files or even a subscription to Disney+ despite the fact that without her the show wouldn't exist. It's really annoying to see this but when it comes to shows like TADC, that problem doesn't really exist. You can just watch the episodes for free on YouTube.

Also, the fact that the episodes take a while to come out really makes the fandom feel a lot more united. The wait time between episode really kills the binging aspect of TV and I'm in full support of that. Ever since streaming services started to become the default way to watch TV, binging culture has gotten really bad and it can be pretty isolating to people who have busy lives.

Take me for an example. Someone like me, a single adult who has no kids and a terrible sleep schedule (ignore username), can stay up until 3 in the morning binging shows without too many negative consequences. But I have friends who are married/getting married and have kids/planning on having kids, meaning that they don't have the same amount of time as me. I can finish binging shows in a day or two which isn't a pleasure my friends have and it also mean I can't talk to them about it because they're only on episode 2.

I also feel a lot more comfortable donating to these indie projects because the money goes directly towards the creators and crew. When the WGA strike happened, creators explained how they got paid (you can watch the whole video here), and the quick version of it is, they only get paid the amount of times someone watches and episode, they get paid thee residuals from the subscriptions which is so little that it almost feels criminal. When you really put it into perspective, donating to 2 dollars to a GoFundMe and watching the show three times on YouTube is going to do more for a show then paying for a 15 dollar subscription and watching it 10 times.

YouTube definitely has it's problems, I've been subjected to whole ass adults saying "seggy" for nearly a decade, but when you compare it to the current state of streaming and cable, it seems like the best option for both the creators and fans.

[thetimelordbatgirl]

Not Disney Plus literally just straight up reinventing cable but more expensive and calling it 'live channels' lmao.

[whyeverr]

"So I know we said we'd work on stranger danger stuff, buuuuut I found a copy of Sims of the Dead... Wouldn't watching a zombie movie be considered research?"

[https-hunter]

Officially moved in because I got bob’s burgers set up in my new apartment <3

[moths-in-a-coat]

one of my biggest gripes with netflix tbh is the inconsistency of what shows are available and that what is available is based on geolocation. the fact you have to use a vpn to get access to part of a service you’re paying for is fucking ridiculous. and the fact netflix tries its hardest to prevent the use of a vpn on top of it is fucking stupid

[ambassadorquark]

i tried turning on my shitty old TV i never use and it basically started smelling strongly of burning plastic and refused to do anything so it may be time to send it to a farm upstate where TVs can run and play

[kpmeat]

anytime i do a discord call i start the convo talking completely normally but i know i like my friends if by the two hour mark i've started rocking back and forth and speaking in pictures