Cutting the Cable Cord

Silicon Alley Insider is reporting on a Bernstein survey showing that 35% of internet video viewers may get rid of cable for online video within the next 5 years.

This gives some more evidence of the momentum towards a decabled world and an embracing of the web as a legitimate source of video content, which is great. The survey also showed the switch being party due to more content choices online – hopefully that includes a lot of the great independent productions for which there is no expsoure on television, but who knows. Just good to know there’s going to be more of us

Today started early in the decabled world for me, with the mainstream media calling in to find out how their listeners can cut the cable cord. Beginning at 6:50am and continuing through to 10am (Atlantic time), I’ll be talking with CBC hosts on programs across Canada about how to decable. Here’s the schedule in case you get a chance to tune in (or if you just want to see where the decabled message is being spread) – all times are Atlantic:

• 6:50am Charlottetown, PEI

• 7:00am Quebec City, Quebec
• 7:15am Windsor, Ontario
• 8:00am Goose Bay, Newfoundland
• 9:00am Whitehorse, Yukon
• 9:15am Regina, Saskatchewan
• 9:30am Prince George/Prince Rupert, BC
• 9:40am Vancouver, British Columbia
• 10:00am Kelowna, British Columbia

Thanks to all the interviewers and to CBC Radio for jumping on the decabled bandwagon.

Let us know if you found out about decabled.com through these interviews by posting in the comments (along with, as always, any other questions or remarks you might have)!

Hi everyone – as you may have noticed, we’ve done a complete redesign of the decabled.com site (which, incidentally, is also why we’ve been a little short on posts the past couple of weeks). In the coming weeks we’ll be adding Facebook Connect (and with it, a decabled.com Facebook page) and will be pretty-ing up a new Twitter feed, so there’s more great stuff to come!

Our goal with the redesign is to give our readers, the decabled (and thinking about being decabled) community, an attractive and functional site to help you on your cutting the cable cord journey. So let us know what you think of the redesign and any other changes that might be valuable by posting in the comments.

PS: Thanks to Aaron Dick and Shane Whitehouse from MGImedia.ca for all their help with the new site!

I guess the first thing to address about decabled.com is “why”.  Why decable from that steady stream of round-the-clock entertainment that has been serving us so well for over half a century?

1. To show that “we’re there”: I don’t think I could have made this decision much before now without largely sacrificing consuming any content from mainstream television. Cable speeds are getting respectable; wireless delivery within a home is easy and fast; and there is a wide array of new devices that deliver film, tv, and other video and audio content from enormous catalogs to your TV. And to be clear, I’m not trying to cut out all of the media that’s out there, our goal is simply to show that you can consume media with more choice and at your leisure in an easily scalable manner, making it so you naturally partake in a wider field of entertainment and activity than you would with the cable connected.  Maybe some of this time is playing Wii Fit, maybe some of it is enjoying interactive experiences online, but hopefully it gives you more time to create something of your own or just go enjoy the world outside.

   So a big part of decabled.com will really be about sharing technical solutions for living a decabled life – whether it be about gear, content providers, or whatever else – and we want you guys to help with this too by posting your solutions in the comments. However, we’re also here for the broader conversation about television, networks, movie studios, and how the world of media is changing as time goes on, so feel free to let us know your thoughts on that too.

2. To decide more “freely” what to do with my time: The problem with round-the-clock entertainment is precisely that it’s always there. It easily leads to a “path of least resistance” behavior by allowing us a seeming change in activity by just switching the channel but really just leaves us sitting on the couch for another half hour or more. The networks and cable companies have been hearing for a decade about the desire for on-demand television and yet pre-programmed television is by far the most consumed.

   Now you’d think that DVRs would have been the solution to the “wait around and watch” behavior above but I think they’ve introduced a strange, new kind of behavior: you want to keep your DVR box fairly full so you have a lot of options for what to watch BUT you also know that new shows will come along and bump old shows off the box. What this leads to in many cases is the mentality of “I’ve got to watch that to make room on the box”, i.e. specifically watching TV at a time you may not have otherwise, in order to catch up with the automated harvesting of new shows into the relatively small drive in your cable box. With new solutions come new problems, I guess.

   And why is being able to freely decide what to do with my time (at least outside of work) so important? In this day and age, not only do people seem shorter on time than ever, the opportunities we have for how to spend that “free” time are more impressive than ever. The average American watches 4 hours and 35 minutes of television per day (2006). That’s over 32 hours each and every week that someone like me could easily spend recording a music album or editing a short film on my laptop – to say nothing of the conventional “get some exercise” use for that time. The point is that, if my viewing per day were at the average American level, I could instead spend an hour doing exercise, an hour doing music stuff, an hour doing video editing, and still have enough time to watch more than four half-hour shows or two 1-hour shows or whatever combination (without commercials) EVERY SINGLE DAY! Our hope is that by having to explicitly choose what we REALLY want to watch (including through the use of financial disincentives, like having to buy shows off iTunes), we’ll end up watching less (but keep in mind, even the equation above leaves us with 2-4 individual series each day to watch if we wanted, so it’s not much of a sacrifice).

3. “The Networks” Behavior: While I realize that much of the content that would likely be consumed through cable or any other medium today relies on the participation of the big networks, I feel like I need to voice some protest over how they’ve grown increasingly defective by not allowing productions a proper gestation time to survive. This has basically encouraged production of further derivative works or the inexpensive lure of reality television – no thanks!

   There was a time when the networks let some of the greatest television of all time grow with the audience. The TV-changing “All if the Family”, for instance, debuted with a paltry 15% audience share (a distant third behind NBC and ABC) and struggled with ratings for months (ending its first season ranked 34) but the next five years it was ranked number 1 with over 20 million households tuning in. I can’t help but think that there would be no chance of that today and that’s part of the problem with network TV – I know they’re running a business but the fact that shows are being cancelled after a handful (or less) of episodes I think shows that their methods are in need of changing.

4. Shoddy Delievery and (for many) Equipment: This last one might be a bit nit-picky but there’s a reason why, for example, Motorola’s DVR/Cable boxes have ended up on worst technology gifts of the year lists and have people like Walt Mossberg and others complaining. What can I say, going from fast forward to rewind in the DVR causes the program to jump back to the beginning of the show; there are regular sound drops; recorded content time bugs show over 1000- minute programs and knock off old content I haven’t watched; countless screwups requiring restarts from the cable company (which I can’t trigger myself); etc. Suffice to say, I’ll be happy to see that miserable piece of garbage go.

But I can’t bring this to a close without stressing one final reason why we’re doing the decabled.com blog – we want YOU to join us in the journey and help us (and other visitors) along with any tips or ideas you might have. Decabled isn’t just about showing people that this CAN be done – it’s about showing people how to do it and what their many options are. So please, comment freely and let us know what you’re doing that fits into a decabled world!

PS: First decabled techTIP on commandN.tv Episode 163 – “How to surf the internet on your TV”.

In 2009, commandN.tv’s Jeff MacArthur will cut the cable television cord. He will take his family’s entertainment viewing online, using new devices and technologies, in the living room and in your pocket.

In addition to new decabled techTIPS and hotSTUFF video segments on commandN.tv (which we’ll let you know about here, of course), Jeff will be here at decabled.com writing about, reporting on, and showing you how to live a better life without cable. And more than that, he wants you to take part in the adventure – so be sure to subscribe and share your thoughts in the comments.

Goodbye cable!