This Sunday will be a major television-viewing day for millionsof Americans. Most of them will pay to have Fox's broadcast of theSuper Bowl beamed into their homes. But I won't.
Why would I? I haven't paid for TV service since October 2009.
At the time, this exercise in what TV-industry types call "cordcutting" was just an experiment: Could my wife and I get by withonly over-the-air broadcasts and Web video? Sixteen months later,the experiment has become a habit for us. And for many others: Cableand satellite services lost almost 250,000 viewers over two quartersof last year.
It helps that we've conducted it under favorable conditions. Evenwhen we paid to get our dozens of channels via satellite, we watchedvery little of that selection: some network sitcoms and dramas (fewof which we tuned into with any regularity), sports and theoccasional movie.
Meanwhile, we have good over-the-air digital-TV reception at ourhome, plus a fast FiOS Internet connection that can easily streamhigh-definition video off the Web.
And we bought the right TV. I followed my own advice, getting aset with "connected TV" software that can play video and audio fromsuch sites as Amazon, Netflix and Pandora. This Sony also includes anifty and free but rare feature called "TV Guide on Screen," whichlets us see what's on the air by browsing through a simple programgrid.
Relying on over-the-air broadcasts may sound like a throwbackhabit, akin to baking your own bread, drying your clothes on a lineor owning a manual typewriter. (Note: All of those descriptionsapply to me.)
But the transition to digital TV has made this far more viablethan before, providing outstanding, high-def picture quality andbonus channels from local stations to those blessed with goodreception.
So network fare has been no trouble to replace. The ABC, CBS, Foxand NBC affiliates all come in clear, and PBS stations MPT and WETAare almost as good (although sometimes we've had to reposition the$13 rabbit-ears TV antenna next to the set to tune in some of them).
Recording programming has been less enjoyable. The DVD recorder Ibought in 2009 tunes in the same channels but only does so instandard-definition quality - and having to program in recordings,VCR-style, by specifying a time and a channel instead of selecting ashow off a TV Guide on Screen grid, is so irritating that I rarelybother.
I could have fixed this issue by adding a digital-TV tuner to acomputer but opted not to. Instead, the Web has become our DVR: Ifwe miss a show, we just watch it on Hulu on a computer.
Sports have been a stickier issue. Much of that programming isconfined to pay channels - and online services such as Major LeagueBaseball's MLB.tv generally limit you to watching live games of out-of-town teams, not your own city's. As a result, I watched moreNationals games in the ballpark than on TV last year. Then again, wegot used to hearing games on the radio during the team's first yearin town, when most TV services did not carry its fledgling sportsnetwork.
And the selection of games viewable online has kept improving.ESPN's ESPN3.com has allowed me to keep up with Georgetownbasketball, while my wife was pleasantly surprised to be able towatch the U.S. Open online for free - even on an iPad.
Movie viewing might be the most frustrating part of ourtransition to free TV. We've had a more reliable selection ofcontent at the local library than over the Web. The big studios'insistence on protecting every other movie-viewing business beforemaking their content available online has left the likes of Amazonand Netflix with a weirdly limited menu of titles. Worse, popularfilms routinely vanish off the online shelf at preset dates.
This also applies to shows on non-broadcast channels, too.Netflix will gladly mail me a DVD of a "Mad Men" season, but I can'twatch the same episodes via the Netflix app on my TV.
Hollywood is going to have to get over its fear of Webdistribution unless it's happy with continuing to cede the onlinemarket to file-sharing.
I expected that we'd watch less TV when we no longer had anypsychological need to justify the bill. That has certainly happened -but the arrival of our daughter last summer has cut down on our TVtime anyway and given us plenty of other places to spend the moneyonce devoted to TV.
Yes, you can't overlook the financial issues here. The total ofwhat we would have paid to keep our old TV service over the past 16months, not even factoring in price increases? $1,120. Not having tounderwrite a TV business model that denies customer choice?Priceless.
robp@washpost.com
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