by Courtney Lockhart
THE CABLE-FREE LIFE
I haven’t had broadcast television in my home in over a
year. It wasn’t a philosophical
decision, strictly financial. In order
to get the genre-friendly stations like Space and BBC Canada, digital or
wireless television packages are around $70 a month not counting box rentals or
taxes. When I explain this to people
they understand the math, but get a little fuzzy on the method. So here are the basics of my cable free
existence.
HARDWARE: For the
price of one month of traditional television, we invested in a digital media
player for the living room. Our device
of choice was the Apple TV. We own several other Apple products and the
‘airplay’ function meant we could stream any video stored on any device to our
TV. Every brand has it’s pros and cons
so o your research to find out which box will suit your needs. If you have a newer game system you might be
able to skip this step and simply download apps from your favorite content
providers.
CONTENT: There are
more options every day for free or cheap television and movies online. The gold standard still seems to be Netflix
for its $8 a month all you can watch visual buffet. Recently the website Crackle came to my
attention. It essentially picks up what
Netflix chooses not to and supports itself with ad revenue. If you love older movies and don’t mind commercials,
I recommend checking it out. Most of the
major networks have mobile apps and online video libraries that allow people to
keep up with their current programming. The major downsides to these apps are
repetitive commercials and a limited time to view each episode before they are
taken away. In other words, not much
different from the channels they spawn from. In my home YouTube has become our number one
source of content. Our subscription list
easily delivers an hour or two of completely original programming daily. Cruising the related videos lists is our new
version of channel surfing.
OTHER THINGS TO CONSIDER:
When it comes to getting the shows you want, the key word is patience.
If you absolutely must watch shows live with the rest of the world, this may
not be the right decision for you.
Netflix usually likes to keep a one season buffer for shows meaning that
if season six is currently on the air, they’ll only have to the end of season
four available to stream. Even the most up to date TV network websites won’t
post episodes until the show has aired in all time zones. If you are a fan of your local morning show
you most likely won’t have access to it or other regional programming. Live sports also become a bit tricky. Lastly, you will want to check you bandwidth
cap if you have one, otherwise all your savings may be heading right back to
the telecom company you cancelled your cable with in the first place.
Courtney Lockhart
lives in the west end of Ottawa with her husband and step-cat. She is
polishing her skills to pursue one of her dream careers as either a costume
drama character, Torchwood operative or executive assistant to a billionaire
vigilante. You can follow her daily mission to DFTBA on Twitter @corastacy.
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