Good bye to my Direct TV Streaming service

[Painthappy]

It was good knowing you but it is time for us to part ways. I was an early cord cutter adopter. Did it back when it was unthinkable to most. My only pre-requisite was that I needed Nickelodeon since my daughter was still young. I came across something called directvnow. It was $30 or $35 a month back then. Since I was what they called an early adopter or beta tested they even gave me an extra $5 off a month for some time. It was great.

Then it changed names a few times, AT&T bought them and they changed the name a couple times: AT&T Stream, AT&T TV... Now we have settled on just Directv.

Through all the changes and all the new app downloads, I stuck with them. So why the change of heart?

Value vs Content

Their cheapest service is now $85 a month. That's cable company money. I then started flipping through the channels and it hit me. I passed the baby channel, nick jr, Disney jr, Spanish channel, two hallmark channels, three QVC channels, two PBS channels, a freaking Scientology channel amongst other crap and realized I only watch a handful of channels if I watch tv at all.

Then I flipped through those channels. Absolutely nothing was on. Junk. All junk. The content was either old movies I had already seen 10 times during my life, or content made for the people you would find in the movie Idiocracy. If you haven't seen that movie, please watch it. It is worth getting that reference alone.

My theory is all the good and new content has gone to the premium channels and I'm left paying a premium for gutter worthy shows and movies.

If I wanted that, there is plenty of free content found at: Pluto, Tubi, Freevee, Roku Channel, etc - That is if I wanted to just veg in front of the tv and watch something I didn't have to think about and wouldn't change my life. But without the Roku channel, where else would I find Robocop: The Series. I did seriously watch that for a few minutes though.



I'm debating on getting "SlingTV" to try that as the price is right and they have what I'm looking for, but as someone that just doesn't watch tv much, I guess the question is: Is the draw of TV over?

So I cancelled my DirectTV streaming subscription that will end mid-June. Not sure what I'll do then but I have a feeling the day will pass and I won't really be missing anything except the latest alien astronaut theory... But I suppose I'll live.

[Blackmagic71]

Definitely some good points and I think our house could probably do the same thing.

My favorite “show” to watch these days is to scroll through the options on Netflix for 30min, then turn the TV off in disgust without watching any of them.

[Cyberpyr8]

I canceled our DirectTV full service yesterday. The only reason I had it was because my 89 year old mother in law that lived with us wanted a few channels and trying to teach her to use the Roku or FireStick was too hard. She understood the cable remote. She passed away earlier this month and so I canceled it yesterday. I watch Discovery shows and History channel here and there on it but it really didn't get used enough for what we paid. I think I'm going with Philo. $25 a month and has all those channels plus the Hallmark that my wife and girls like to watch. I'm going to start the free trial and see how it works. Free DVR and about 70 channels.

I tried the streaming DirectTV when it came out too and it was ok. I wouldn't pay more than $30 for it either. I looked at Hulu Live TV but it's $82 for the version with no ads in Hulu and Disney+. Again, that's cable money. Add in Netflix and the others and we're back to paying $150+ for everything.

[Painthappy]

I think I'm going with Philo. $25 a month and has all those channels plus the Hallmark that my wife and girls like to watch. I'm going to start the free trial and see how it works. Free DVR and about 70 channels.

I looked at that one also, but it didn't have the news channels I wanted which is why I think I might give sling a go over that one, but yes, that was a good choice otherwise. I guess in the end I'm really questioning if I need anything as I really don't see anything on that is worth paying for.

[JonM]

We cut the cord a while back too. Since then, we've gone with a few streaming services like Hulu, Discovery+, HBO Max, and so on by watching what we want for a while and cancelling once we exhausted what we're interested in until they release more content we might want to see. Of the services I listed, the only one we tend to keep all the time is Discovery+ mostly because my wife really likes her ID shows. So, between Discovery+ at $6.99 without ads and the ad free Hulu/Disney+/ESPN+ bundle at $14.99 per month, we can watch pretty much whatever really interests us for only $22 per month. Toss in the occasional HBO or Netflix subscription and it's still way cheaper than cable or satellite.

[flyweightnate]

We head to Half Price Books once a month to search for old Disney movies in the clearance bin, and do Netflix and Prime. I'm honestly surprised at how much Amazon has now; I'm tempted to drop Netflix but it's shared with my extended family.

Sling is ... OK. I got it for college football five or six years ago, and I could see the games with the sports add-on, but the commercials were atrocious. The same ad, Every. Single. Break. Not sure if that's changed, but it was rough.

[Painthappy]

Sling is ... OK. I got it for college football five or six years ago, and I could see the games with the sports add-on, but the commercials were atrocious. The same ad, Every. Single. Break. Not sure if that's changed, but it was rough.

That's how the directv was originally, over and over. Eventually they just played elevator music instead with just a background telling you to wait patiently. Not a big sports person, so wouldn't need to worry about that. Just feeling out my options. I would do the trial and see. I actually got rid of prime a year or so ago. My theory was that they had built up such a network that you would get stuff in a couple days anyhow and found that out to be a fact. They'll threaten you and say it will be a week, but then send an email saying how I was in luck and it will show up early now. So I just don't bother with it.

[Cdn_Cuda]

Been using a combo of Netflix, Disney Plus and Amazon Prime Video (free with Prime membership). For hockey I buy a monthly pass to Sportsnet and can stream on a variety of devices. Most news I get is online articles and Prime actually has a bunch of different news channels. There are still times I suffer the same fate as Blackmagic71, but mostly because my wife is busy doing school work and I don’t want to watch good shows without her.

[Grendel]

Yup, cut the cord and dumped Satellite TV back in 2011. I get the fastest broadband available (doing Data Analytics from home now so need it for work) and use Amazon Prime, Netflix and BritBox for most of our viewing pleasure. Netflix will be dumped the moment my granddaughter is no longer living with us (My daughter's family is in the middle of a complete renovation on a 60's ranch) and I only have prime because of the other benefits which are seeming less worth it daily so it might be hitting the streets as well. Like flyweightnate I still buy bargain basement DVD/Blue-rays. I have a pretty large Media library (used to have a 2nd job at a video rental back when they were a thing) and have ripped almost all of my media and host it on my own Plex server. There really is not much out there that I am interested in that is new so I can usually find what I want. I don't watch sports and hate "reality TV" so there really is not a lot of draw for me to watch on TV. Movies (especially old movies) are my thing and books.

[cellophane]

I have an old PC hooked up to my TV and a cheap wireless keyboard with a track pad. Means I can still use Firefox with browser extensions (uBlock Origin, Greasemonkey, etc), can still access Prime and Netflix, and I don't have to deal with the crappy interfaces that the add-on boxes tend to have. And honestly 95% of what I watch is via YouTube or stuff I've ripped that I've seen a million times. Usually it is more background noise than anything.

[cellophane]

Totally. Mine is an old tower that I repurposed rather than building something new, but it works great. Granted it doesn't fit in my media center and sticks out when on the floor, but still 100x better than the alternatives. Now I just need to figure out how to get audio from it when connected to my surround amp /eyeroll

[ketzer7]

This just popped up in one of my RSS feeds coincidentally

https://www.engadget.com/best-live-t...0.html?src=rss

You can ignore their "Best cable without a contract" rating though


The biggest problem with streaming anymore is the fragmentation from all of the content providers trying to each grab more of the pie by monopolizing their stuff from anyone else's service.

[redsquirrel]

I’ve cut all streaming out now (until my wife protests at least). Big advocate for the public library. Usually a lot of movies and shows to choose from and it’s just fun going to browse like the good ole rental store days.

[Seajay]

Pick whatever streaming service you want that has the shows you want to see. Pretty simple today. Hulu/Disney/Netflix/Discovery... etc.

The key, and probably most important life decision, is to get a modern tv that let's you search for shows or movies using your preferred streaming apps.
I've got an 2021 LG and you just pick your show, it'll give you an option on where to stream the show from.
You don't have to switch media devices or apps... it's all from one remote.

Finally an almost tailored tv experience.

I just watch movies though... so much terrible stuff out there.

[Redragoon]

Honestly, I just don't ever sit to watch a show without looking for it anymore. I'm not putting up Scrubs or some sitcom for background noise anymore.
I actively look for information on Youtube or watch a specific show on whatever streaming service I have.

However, those services still have contracts and pass shows to each other. Most of the rest on them is bloat to fill out the catalog.
Even the cost of all the services is nearing cable prices.

[chrislognshot]

if have internet get ruko