Friday, August 11, 2017

I shouldn't have to pay to see the new Star Trek series airing this fall and yes this is a rant.

I just want to say once and for all that cord cutters, greed, and the twisted idea that monopolies are somehow inherently bad are (in the very near future) going to nickel and dime the middle class to death. A man (or a woman) should be able to subscribe to cable and get all the channels. It should be easy. That's it. Done. One bill. Yes, all monopolies are not bad people. Sometimes monopolies can get things done efficiently and with government regulation, can make it so that they aren't too powerful.

But in this country of "greed is good" where everyone is punching each other's lights out to fleece the middle class, I am now faced with the following dilemma:

1) I need to subscribe to cable so that I can watch episodes of The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Legion, Better Call Saul, Shameless, and American Gods live (as they air).

2) I need to maintain an Amazon subscription so that I can watch shows like "The Man in the High Castle."

3) I need to maintain a Hulu subscription so that I can watch shows like "The Handmaid's Tale."

4) I need to maintain a Netflix subscription so that I can watch shows like "Luke Cage" and "Jessica Jones" and "The Defenders."

5) I will need to maintain a CBS All Access subscription in order to watch "Star Trek: Discovery" this fall. This is complete bullshit by the way. I should be able to get this from CBS for free.

6) I will need to maintain a Disney subscription because they just announced that they are going to have their own streaming service and are pulling all of their stuff off Netflix. Why the hell not? Everyone else is making money with their streaming service, I'm surprised it took Disney this long. So I guess for any new Star Wars series or Indiana Jones thing or Pixar or just plain old Disney movies, I'll need to have a streaming service for it.

Sigh.

Everything (AND I MEAN EVERYTHING) is going to this model of pay as you go. The problem is, this will keep you on a treadmill forever. You will never get ahead with pay as you go. Ever.

/End Rant

8 comments:

  1. Well no one really NEEDS to watch TV. The Disney thing is disappointing.

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  2. I heard about this. The first one is on regular CBS and the rest is subscription. I gotta agree with you. This is just wrong. I know some people who rotate subscriptions, so they don't have too many at once. Where I live we only have one cable company, and they're constantly sneaking the bill up. So annoying. It's possible that some people might just stream and drop cable TV eventually.

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  3. I love Star Trek, but I'm not paying extra to watch it. Criminal I say.
    I'd heard about Disney's move. Will probably take a year, so watch them all now.

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  4. I think I'm just a bad TV watcher. I'm still not through Luke Cage, haven't started Iron Fist, so am not ready for Defenders. :(

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  5. We have cable but I doubt I'll watch the new Star Trek. I've seen all the other series and enough is enough.

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  6. You should Fire stick that shit http://mashable.com/2017/08/09/kodi-box-firestick-that-shit-illegal-streaming-piracy/?utm_cid=mash-com-fb-main-link#gOcoMfJgLaqH

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  7. Agreed. I like the idea of rotating your subscriptions. Only pay for one at a time, and catch up on what you missed. What's so great about watching in "real time" anyway? Binging is the future, so wait until all episodes have aired, and then go to the streaming service and watch them over the course of a week or a month.

    If they're going to try to nickle and dime you, why not game their system?

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  8. You're very right about balancing monopolies with government regulation, and now all the different payments we're expected to pay to view these show is getting ridiculous. I had no idea CBS was going to charge for the new Star Trek, which is especially ridiculous when we bear in mind that this is a COMMERCIAL network that's already making a fortune off all its commercial-interrupted shows.

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