cord-cutting
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Sling TV getting more on-demand content thanks to Epix (update)
Dish's Sling TV is great for cord-cutters, but sometimes TNT and TBS won't cut it. The service is about to fill the gaps by tying up with Epix, a premium content channel co-owned by Viacom, Paramount and other studios. It'll carry all four of Epix's channels for scheduled viewing along with its streaming service, letting cable-haters watch recent cinema, classics and Epix original programming. Dish hasn't revealed the Epix price yet, but the basic Sling TV service runs $20 and sports, news and kids add-in packs are $5 a pop. Epix is also a $5 add-on from providers like Time Warner Cable. Update: This post originally reported that Sling TV didn't yet have on-demand content. The streaming service already offers movie rentals and the ability to start currently airing programs once they've started. The Epix partnership expands the existing catalog, and the text has been edited to correct the error.
Dish goes after cord-cutters with Sling TV, a $20-per-month service
According to a Bloomberg report earlier this year, Dish was said to be preparing to launch an online television service last summer. But, as we now know, nothing ever came from that -- at least not until today. The satellite company has taken to CES 2015 to reveal Sling TV, its long-rumored internet TV service, and it wants all current and would-be cord-cutters to know that this is designed specifically for them. Dish says that Sling TV has been years in the making, pointing out that it was born out of learning from Dish Anywhere and DishWorld, a US-only, internet-based TV package that offers access to about 200 international channels.
AT&T tempts cord-cutters with $40-a-month broadband with HBO and Amazon Prime
If you tried to count the number of times that we'd wished cable companies would offer nothing more than HBO Go and broadband, you'd run out of limbs well before you hit the total. AT&T, however, is following Comcast's lead in offering a cord-cutter bundle that offers us exactly what we want without any of that messy cable grift we normally have to pay for. The $39 a month U-Verse + HBO bundle offers U-Basic TV and U-Verse Internet Max Plus, paired with HBO and HBO Go but also, more notably, a year's free Amazon Prime subscription as well. The company is also trialling a package that ditches the U-Basic TV and HBO options and just offers you broadband and Amazon Prime for $29 a month, although that's only available in Atlanta, Chicago, Houston and San Francisco. The catch here is that once the 12-month contract expires, you're bumped up to AT&T's standard rates, but, hey, at least that's a year you don't have to worry about paying through the nose for 900 channels you'll never watch.
The NFL's new digital network is a step forward, but still not what cord-cutters want
Many people were excited by the announcement that this year's Super Bowl would be streamed online. But this came with a catch on smartphones -- the need to go through Verizon's NFL Mobile service rather than the Fox Sports Go app. And that's nothing new, as most networks often require some sort of subscription for access to live or on-demand content. A&E, CNN, MTV, NBC Sports -- they all do it, and the list goes on and on. Last week, the NFL announced Now, its new network tailored for the era of the internet. However, despite the league trying to do something novel, a quick look at the comments from our recently published article about the release tells you that on-demand content isn't enough, particularly for those who have decided to cut the [pay-TV] cord. For those people, the lack of live games overshadows most everything NFL Now will bring to the table when it launches in July -- namely, an online channel with a personalized experience accessible on different platforms all over the world.
NPD: premium TV networks losing subscribers as streaming services continue to grow
Don't color us surprised by The NPD Group's latest report, one that highlights the decline in subscriptions for paid TV networks over the last couple of years in the US. According to the research, there was a six percent overall drop in the amount of subscribers to channels like HBO and Showtime in the past two years; conversely, video streaming services had a four percent growth in that same period of time. As of August 2013, NPD says 32 percent of American households were subscribed to a premium TV network, while 27 percent held an on-demand streaming subscription. Not surprisingly, the findings note that Netflix is leading the way among US folks, although Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime aren't far behind and have experienced "the biggest growth benefits in the category." A sign o' the times indeed -- and with companies like Netflix producing great original content, these numbers will likely keep getting better for members of the streaming pack. Update: As reported by The Wrap, NPD has pulled the original report from its website, and is reviewing its data, after HBO, Showtime and Starz all claimed their numbers show recent growth instead of decline.
Editorial: Cutting the cable cord is a young trend going in the right direction
This week I bought a Roku. Late to the party? Yes, but not as late as you might suppose. Roku has sold about 2.5 million streaming media boxes since the product launched in 2008. Approximately 1.5 million of those units moved in 2011, indicating an acceleration of demand. Coincidentally, those numbers roughly represent the cord-cutting movement: Reportedly, 2.65 million cable subscribers ditched their service between 2008 and 2011, with about 1.5 million of those defections happening in 2011. While cable cord-cutting is a trend, the movement is occurring in the context of customer inertia. About 100 million customers subscribe to cable, satellite, and other pay-TV providers (e.g. AT&T's U-Verse). The problematic value proposition of cutting the cord will probably keep massive inaction in place for the short term, but cannot, I believe, withstand long-term marketplace demands.
Comcast pushes back fears of cord-cutting customers with strong Q4 results
Fresh off its absorption of NBC Universal, Comcast had good news for investors today when it announced it lost only 135,000 subscribers. That doesn't sound like good news, but it's fewer than it lost in the year or quarter preceding, and may push back some of the talk of the trend of "cord-cutting" as the remaining subscribers continue to opt for bundled services with high speed internet and phone contributing to rising profits. We'll check back next quarter see if its Xfinity offerings are enough to keep more customers hanging around, or if the cable-cutter rhetoric comes back stronger than ever.
Verizon CEO: 4G can be a 'substitute' for home internet and cable, will accelerate cord cutting
Sometimes, you have to wonder if these CEO types are being paid the big bucks just because they can believe their own outlandish claims. Latest to try and push the boundaries of credulity is Verizon's Ivan Seidenberg, who told an investor conference that he sees the company's newly unveiled 4G offering as becoming a "modest substitute" for premium home entertainment services as offered by cable and online streaming companies. He concedes that for now VZW's new LTE network will be viewed as an addition, rather than a replacement, to our connected world, but, over time, Seidenberg expects that its presence will be enough to convince more people to cut the cord. Perhaps those who'll find the $50 per 5GB levy easiest to swallow will be people with no cord at all -- the folks in rural areas for whom wired broadband isn't yet an option. As to the rest of us, we'll just wait until the economics start to look a tiny bit more appealing. Update: Speaking of economics, Fierce Wireless has another disclosure from the same conference. On the topic of LTE smartphone plans, Ivan said Verizon is still undecided on pricing, but he sees 10GB a month as the "floor of what people will do," going on to say that Verizon must "hold firm as best we can until the entire environment is mature enough." Listen to the webcast of his speech at the link below.
Microsoft in talks to start new TV service using the 360?
Microsoft's been strangely quiet during the recent smart TV explosion even though it has arguably the most mature set of products in Windows Media Center and Mediaroom, and now we know why: Reuters says MS has been meeting with media companies in an effort to create an entirely new TV service possibly delivered through the Xbox 360. Apparently there are multiple options on the table, ranging from a full-on "virtual cable operator" with monthly fees to using the 360 as an extension of existing cableco online TV initiatives to simply delivering certain channels like ESPN and HBO a la carte, and Reuters' sources say the plan might take another 12 months to develop. That sounds like a bit too long, if you ask us: Apple and Google are waging a major living room assault, and we can't imagine Microsoft is willing to miss another technology cycle -- especially not one where it holds the significant advantage of the 360's installed base and proven history as an IPTV device on multiple operators worldwide, including Uverse. We'll see what happens -- it sounds like the battle might finally be joined.
