Dish quarterly profit misses on pay-TV subscriber losses . . .

[ncted]

Did old people at the time still have trouble working remotes even being so simple?

My dad often needed my help with our first Zenith betamax (which we got when I was 5). Not so much with the remote (which was wired), but scheduling recordings required a level of attention to detail that he seemed to lack, probably because he was always exhausted from work.

 

[stardust3]

Imo part of the decline in traditional tv in addition to price is the content. History, TLC, discovery, etc, etc, etc are not what they used to be in the way of programming. Most of it is garbage with tons of commercials.

I love the H3 and do not foresee canceling anytime in the near future. However I will eventually end up on the welcome pack down the road as this gets more expensive and find myself streaming more and more.

 

[TheKrell]

Did old people at the time still have trouble working remotes even being so simple?

Only because the buttons were so stiff! You really had to press hard to overcome the spring that fired the hammer into a metal rod inside.

Not so much with the remote (which was wired)...

Wired remote on a Betamax? i did not know such things existed.

 

[omeletpants]

I expect that plateau will occur before it is only rural customers left. Why you ask.
1) Increasing fragmentation of the OTT market
-- Subscribe to Disney for that content
-- Subscribe to CruncyRoll for the Anime content that teens want
-- Netflix, just because
-- DNOW or YTTV or Sling for more traditional linear channels and sports
-- ESPN+
-- CBS All Access
-- Hulu
-- etc.
-- or get Dish/DirecTV to meet most of these wants
2) Increasing costs for the OTT providers
-- Some providers are already raising the cost to the consumer
-- Some services are seeing increasing fees from the content providers, Netflix especially
3) Services
-- The user experience of the Hopper3 or Genie is light years better than the cloud "DVRs" offered by OTT

PERFECT ARGUMENT WHY IM SATISFIED WITH DISH

 

[navychop]

I had an early Betamax with a wired remote. Got burglarized, still in the box. I replaced it later with a wireless VHS.


Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

 

[rvvaquero]

I had an early Betamax with a wired remote. Got burglarized, still in the box. I replaced it later with a wireless VHS.


Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

So, you're the one who made the choice which doomed the future of Sony's VCR standard. I knew I would meet him/her one day.

 

[joewhite57]

So, you're the one who made the choice which doomed the future of Sony's VCR standard. I knew I would meet him/her one day.

I had one also. PQ was superior to VHS, but smaller cartridge meant lower capacity. I think they were 90 minutes max.

 

[ncted]

Only because the buttons were so stiff! You really had to press hard to overcome the spring that fired the hammer into a metal rod inside.


Wired remote on a Betamax? i did not know such things existed.

It was very similar to this one, but the remote had mode buttons:

1979 Zenith Betamax Programmable Video Director & Remote For Beta Tape Cassettes • $99.00

It had the nice vinyl accent:

http://www.oaktreevintage.com/web_photos/Video/Zenith_Model-VR-9750J_Beta_VCR_web2.jpg

You can kind of see the remote here:

9750J.jpg

 

[joewhite57]

It was very similar to this one, but the remote had mode buttons:

1979 Zenith Betamax Programmable Video Director & Remote For Beta Tape Cassettes • $99.00

It had the nice vinyl accent:

http://www.oaktreevintage.com/web_photos/Video/Zenith_Model-VR-9750J_Beta_VCR_web2.jpg

You can kind of see the remote here:

9750J.jpg

Serious boat anchor!!!

 

[navychop]

Remember also, Betamax put less stress on the tape.

All technically superior, but shorter recording time (no football game on one tape). AND Sony opposed, err, certain material being sold on their tapes.


Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

 

[ncted]

Serious boat anchor!!!

I swear the thing weighed way more than the specs say. It had some serious inertia.

 

[Nate Bargmann]

I expect it to reach a plateau with fewer losses per year once the only subscribers left are the rural ones.

I'll likely be one as "broadband" as the rest of the world knows it--FTTH--won't happen here in rural AT&T territory.

 

[nelson61]

I'll likely be one as "broadband" as the rest of the world knows it--FTTH--won't happen here in rural AT&T territory.

And this week's news was the feds subsidizing another 1.5 million or so rural connections. They will likely migrate to an internet/tv package.

Drip drip drip

Sent from S10 Plus
using the SatelliteGuys app!

 

[joewhite57]

And this week's news was the feds subsidizing another 1.5 million or so rural connections. They will likely migrate to an internet/tv package.

Drip drip drip

Sent from S10 Plus
using the SatelliteGuys app!

Not sure what that means exactly, other than I make too much to qualify and above poverty level

 

[ncted]

Not sure what that means exactly, other than I make too much to qualify and above poverty level

The FCC rural initiatives aren't just about low income. They are supposed to get [almost] every address in the country access to some kind of broadband.

 

[mwdxer1]

I can see these 2 things being a driver for some people to stay or come back to traditional TV distributors. Some aspects of cloud DVR are great: you don't have to worry about tuners, and your recordings are available on any device anywhere in the US with an Internet connection. The downside is that every service has different restrictions, and you usually have to chain together multiple services to cover all of the channels you might be interested in.

Sling - can't record any of the Disney networks (including ESPN), 50 hours max
Vue - Most locals have DVR restrictions, can't record premiums like HBO (Last week tonight problem), can't pause live TV for more than a minute or two, and recording expire after 28 days
Hulu - have to pay an extra $10 for the privilege of being able to forward past commercials, and even then it doesn't work if you pause LiveTV past a commercial break, it will still force you to watch the commercial breaks as you fast forward.
Youtube - CBS and CW shows are swapped with forced commercial VOD options overnight, record as much as you want for the other networks but recording expire after 9 months.
DirecTV NOW - all that time in beta for a 20 hour DVR that can be summed up in 2 words: train wreck.
FuboTV - Didn't even get series record until a few days ago, and it's still a beta feature. TIVO HAD THIS OVER 20 YEARS AGO.
Philo - Record all you want, but recording expire after 30 days.

Individually these restrictions aren't so bad, but depending on your watch habits this could leave you maintaining DVR inventory across multiple services, and having to track shows to make sure you can watch before the recordings expire or get overwritten.

Overall, I think YoutubeTV has the only DVR implementation that would give cable/sat DVR a run for its money. They do pre-fetch on trick-play so it feels local, with none of the lag that most services have. The obvious downside to YoutubeTV is that their channel selection is somewhat restrictive. They're clearly inking deals to get channels that people will tend to watch live (so mostly news and sports) so that they can turn that into a targeted advertising money maker.

That is all true. However, streaming is in the early stages. In time a lot of that will change. The beauty of adding streaming in addition to Dish, is access. I do not plan to drop Dish as I get so much out of it, for the price. However, Roku can add 50 channel apps in a week. So streaming is a nice add on.

 

[mwdxer1]

For 13 years we have used satellite TV because, as RVers, that is the only way we could rely on getting TV. As we are leaving the road and building a house, I am in a position to finally have enough Internet bandwidth to try streaming. So far I am not impressed.

For one, counting the number of channels I view on a regular basis, streaming from the multiple source to make those channels would add up to a bill that is almost as big as our Dish bill. And those streaming resources are subject to the same price increases from the content makers as Dish is.

What I really don't like with using multiple stream sources is the lack of a common program guide. I like going through my Hopper guide and seeing all that is available to me at the time. One place.

So I hope that Dish stays around long enough for my end of time because I plan to stay with Dish.

I have a neighbor that had Spectrum cable for years. She had a friend put up an antenna and she is happy with the 16 OTA channels. She is thinking about getting a Roku and getting what is free. She just could not take the price increases any longer. She said she was paying $80 a month and on SS, she just felt she could use that money elsewhere. The two complaints I hear about cable/satellite are, too many added on fees, which in time makes their bill go up a third and the cost of programming. The fees complaints I hear more.

 

[Nate Bargmann]

The FCC rural initiatives aren't just about low income. They are supposed to get [almost] every address in the country access to some kind of broadband.

I'm not holding my breath as the likes of AT&T seem to figure out how to funnel those funds into the populated areas. I've been hearing about this or that initiative for rural areas ever since the '96 telecom bill and so far I've seen zip except for the areas served by several independent telcos that actually have to serve their rural customers as they're mostly the only ones they have.

My guess is AT&T will shell game the FCC in order to pay down their debt from buying DirecTV and HBO, etc.

Knowing the crooks AT&T are, I'm not sure I would sign up with them anyway!

 

[ncted]

I'm not holding my breath as the likes of AT&T seem to figure out how to funnel those funds into the populated areas. I've been hearing about this or that initiative for rural areas ever since the '96 telecom bill and so far I've seen zip except for the areas served by several independent telcos that actually have to serve their rural customers as they're mostly the only ones they have.

My guess is AT&T will shell game the FCC in order to pay down their debt from buying DirecTV and HBO, etc.

Knowing the crooks AT&T are, I'm not sure I would sign up with them anyway!

Not sure how it works in MO. Here in NC, a lot of the rural counties are running dark fiber everywhere with the money, and then ISPs can sign up users to use it -- pretty cheaply too, since they are not having to foot the bill for the initial capital investment. A coworker just got 1 Gb fiber at his mountain cabin for $45/month. He can now work remotely 90% of the time.

 

[Nate Bargmann]

I don't know about MO either. I'm in Kansas.

Doing something like that (county installing dark fiber) would probably be regarded as borderline communism or some such! I won't hold out much hope for anything like that here.