I'm sick of goddamned streaming services

Get Ready for HBO Max and Discovery+ to Become One Mega-Service

Roku Effectively Bans Porn With Private Channel Crackdown

To be honest, I had no idea private channels was a thing that could be done on Roku.

Yeah, but isn’t that why computers were invented?

I like Chris Wallace, CNN? Come on Chris, you can do better than that.

He could have done better than Fox...anyway, the gig is with CNN+ their new streaming service. It sounds like he's going to be doing a lot more than news interviews. Fox's spin is that his contract was up.

Hopefully, he's seen what damage Fox and others are doing and thinks that on CNN+ he'll be able to do something about that, and not a case of him taking the job because they offered him a shitload of money and a share in the streaming service.

"Leaned."

Just got word from YouTubeTV that they may lose the Disney channels on Dec 17 if they can't reach a new agreement. I assume that includes all the ESPN's. They're promising a $15 discount if that happens until they get those channels back. Not bad when you consider that the Disney bundles is close to that. The ESPN + package is $6.99. Google might want to be careful because Disney might decide they're better off letting people pick it up separately than fussing with individual providers. Google vs. Disney..who you got?

Man, all these media empires are really encouraging a resurgence in piracy.

I wholeheartedly recommend it.

I mean, support independent artists, and give back where you can, but Disney+? Netflix? Peacock? Take to the high seas (responsibly).

The late Sen. John McCain was an advocate for "a la carte" pricing, but with all the mergers to get what you want you'd still end up paying more than you're paying now. It's almost like they planned it that way...not that I'm saying it's a conspiracy or anything....

We have the cheapest, slowest internet service available (which is honestly still pretty fast), and the most basic cable package you can get (because if we unbundle it the price goes *up*), and it's still $130 a month. That is Spectrum, folks. God bless monopolies.

I call them Speculum and refuse to do business with them. Thankfully there are several better options here.

I wish we had them here. Rural Ohio has two choices: Spectrum, or satellite internet and TV. The equipment is several hundred dollars out of pocket, the subscription cost is three times as much, 1/5th as fast, and bandwidth capped. So it's not even a choice.

While the equipment might be pricy, I don't think that the bandwidth is capped with Starlink. I don't have fiber, just DSL, and Starlink's got better speeds than I do (though not as good as I'd have with fiber).

Interesting! It's not available here, yet, though they expect to start service sometime in 2022. Average speeds for our area (geographically speaking) would set it at about 65 Mbps at $99 a month. It also seems to be put on delay indefinitely, as people who have ordered are now being pushed back a year, two years. Plus, the network is already limited, despite not having many users. They will have to launch thousands more satellites to bring it up to handling even a couple hundred thousand people worldwide.

Still, it is an interesting experiment, and I'll keep watching.

Do not ever go satellite internet. It is horrible. I was forced to do it once because DSL went all wonky and decided we were no longer serviceable, and cable would not go down a dirt road, so last option was the satellite. Holy shit was that a bad choice. I would rather have dial up again.

WARNING! do not believe them. I did the starlink thing, and it was the worst shit ever. That cap is there, and the synch sucks ass for gaming and streaming. It is not what they say. It would actually be better to pay for cellular and hotspot things.

Because, fuck you, that's why!

It turns out that subscribing to ESPN + does not give you access to regular ESPN. So, I pulled the plug on YouTubeTV and switched to FUBO which has all the channels I usually watch and it has ROOT sports, which gives me Seattle sports which I did not have with YTTV. Gonna be an extra $10 a month, but I figure the YTTV price will go up anyway after they settle with Disney, so...

What kind of nerd is gonna pay extra for CNN+?

Oh, it should be clear within a few months.

YouTubeTV and Disney have settled their spat. Too bad, I've already switched to Fubo, which gives me more of what I want for a few $ more anyway. Whatever. Anyway, I put the over/under on how long it will be before YTTV jacks up it's monthly rate at 3 months. Place your bets!

Wasn't there that Air America thing in the early 2010s that folded pretty quickly? They were trying to be FOX for liberals and collapsed fairly quickly.

I figure it'd be the same shit here.

That was radio and it was more like the early 2000's and it was a spectacular flop, which, along with the success of right-wing hate radio says a lot about their respective target audiences. To be fair, though, it should be pointed out that when Clear Channel, AKA iHeartRadio hoovered up all those stations, they kept the AM signals that were worth a shit. Air America not only had a product that nobody wanted to hear, they had such lousy signals that no one could have heard them anyway.