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27 March 2006

Tell Me to Cancel My Cable [More:]I am dithering whether or not to cancel my many many tv channels and go to a life of a handful of channels and lots of netflix dvds. Will my life really be complete without college gymnastics and episodes of The Girls Next Door? Words of encouragement appreciated.
I haven't had cable for 5 years.

YEU KIN DO EET!
posted by selfnoise 27 March | 11:15
I don't have cable. My life is faaabulous.

Do it! Use the money for something FUN.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero 27 March | 11:16
Cable is overrated. Use the time for something fun!
posted by Zozo 27 March | 11:20
do it.

he just left,
he's not that hot.
posted by ethylene 27 March | 11:20
*cough*bittorrent*cough*
posted by heatherann 27 March | 11:21
What heatherann said.
posted by box 27 March | 11:27
Get rid of cable! Yeah! I have about 3 channels and it's enough when you need a TV fix. Between netflix and the internet, you can see anything worth seeing!
posted by richat 27 March | 11:27
Seriously. If not for NFL on Sundays and the occasional PBS program, I wouldn't even own an antenna.
posted by selfnoise 27 March | 11:29
I have cable internet. If there's a show I want to see, I download it or ask a friend to tape it. Actually, I've never even asked a friend to tape anything, because it's never been an issue. All I was watching were the music video channels and the occasional HBO/Shotime. I got the Chappelle's show DVDs and that's about it. I don't even have netflix. My cable TV was about $60 a month (+$40 for the internet), and I decided I'd rather have that $720 / yr. to cover one month's rent.

When I moved to upstate NY, I just had them install internet. I haven't really missed TV. Music videos I can get from youtube.com, usually. MeCha Radio fills the rest of the musical hole in my life.

I'll probably go back to TV if I get married & have kids. I'm not one of those crazy anti-television people, it's just not for me so much any more. I can't imagine kids growing up without it, because there's so much to fire the imagination. And then there's being left out socially. I think moderate TV is better than none at all (for kids). But who knows? The landscape is changing and TV may not be that integral by the time I spawn.
posted by Eideteker 27 March | 11:35
I wish I had cable, but then again I read too much.
posted by Divine_Wino 27 March | 11:36
I have cable but I never watch it. I think I watched thirty minutes of television this month. I want to cancel, but I'm afraid that a "really awesome" show will come out and I'll miss it, or I'll suddenly have long stretches of lazy boredom with nothing to do. I know that this will never happen, but I still can't bring myself to cancel. So I say, do it. Do it for me and all those other spineless saps that can't break free of the television crutch.
posted by greasy_skillet 27 March | 11:41
Bah, I haven't had anything but DVDs for five years and I'm fine. Up here in the mountains we basically only get one channel without cable, so we have no TV at all, and we're all fine. Cable is evil. Cable is paying the devil to bring addictive crap into your home. Cable is paying to watch commercials. And think of what you can do with all that lovely money.
posted by mygothlaundry 27 March | 11:52
You know it's the right thing to do. What's the point of paying for a whole bunch of stuff you don't want when you can rent (or buy) stuff you do.

I gave up paying for a load of shit TV channels a few years ago and now I have an awesome collection of comedy DVDs. Best decision I ever made.
posted by dodgygeezer 27 March | 11:53
I've been TV-free for the better part of a decade now. I read more. I fall asleep on the deck in the sun more. I think it's less stressful. I don't actually do more, mostly because I'm bone idle. The newspapers, radio and the 'net give me news. Renting the interesting shows as DVD collections satisfies my occasional urges.

Sometimes I think I really should get hooked up again, but then I look at the monthly prices ($50 to $100/mo for the top end packages!) and I think how many magazines that would buy. This must be what an ex-smoker feels like. It is a rather liberating thing to know that I don't *have* to be home at 8 to watch Lost/Buffy/the European Cup rythmic gymnastics semi-finals.
posted by bonehead 27 March | 12:17
You'll get my cable when you pry the remote from my cold dead hands!!!

*hugs televison*
posted by jrossi4r 27 March | 12:37
Cable/Satellite free for 4 years and counting. Can't recommend it highly enough.
posted by ooga_booga 27 March | 12:40
Okay, jrossi4r scared me, so I did it. The box goes away Wednesday. Thanks for the encouraging words!

The bittorrent suggestions amused me, because I don't have an internet connection at home.
posted by JanetLand 27 March | 13:04
No internet at home?!? Now, THAT'S insane!
posted by richat 27 March | 13:43
Yeah, no internet? What the?!
posted by greasy_skillet 27 March | 15:18
No cable. No internet at home.

The former is by choice, the latter isn't.
posted by Specklet 27 March | 15:45
I am THIS close to cancelling my DirecTV and switching over to, um, a downloading model for things I can't get any other way, combined with Netflix. If I could buy individual TV shows at, say, $1 an episode, I'd happily do that; if I watch an average of five weekly shows, that's $20 a month, less than half what I'm paying for satellite now, not even counting the fact that there are new episodes of my shows a little under half the year anyway...
posted by kindall 27 March | 19:25
*sings*
I've got 13 channels of shit on the TV to choose from ....

I have never seen the point in spending stupid amounts of money to watch more shitty TV. Well, except for that one time when I realised Austar has a 24/7 motorsports show, but I soon got over that.
posted by dg 27 March | 22:05
NYC Meetup Pics! || Stanislaw Lem has died.

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