Maybe Cable Wasn't So Bad, After All.

Paramount+ recently announced an increase to its prices for most of its streaming plans. The news caused me to reconsider the number of streaming plans I pay for, and once again compare it to my now defunct "linear TV" plan. For 19 years, I had been a DirecTV subscriber. I worked in software supporting a number of entertainment and telecom utility brands, so I remained a subscriber to linear TV long after most of my friends and colleagues cut the cord. I hung on mostly for nostalgia and an affinity for the companies that indirectly paid the bills, I suppose.

Today, after cutting the cord, I manage a frippery of streaming services including YouTube TV to replace essential local and live channels and the mainstays of those middle tier cable plans. Of course, we have Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, the latter only for the occasional rerun of Jack Ryan or in the hopes of a new future series worth watching. I added Peacock in order to watch some series somewhere then never cancelled it, and we have Paramount+ because of a Walmart app promotion. Along the way, I've had Disney+ and Apple+ and Hulu, only to cancel them when prices increased, which forced me to realized how rarely I watched the one or two shows on each channel. Forgive this old GenX'er the use of an archaic term like "channel" but I still recall actually turning a dial on a television to watch a show. (You must be over 50 to understand that last sentence at all.)

It was HBO, Max really, that lost my business for DirecTV. You see, when AT&T owned DirecTV, they promised me HBO for life. Then Discovery bought HBO parent Time Warner from AT&T, and AT&T spun off DirecTV, and somewhere along the way, DirecTV changed a billing code and started billing me for MAX. I hadn't noticed that I'd been paying for this "free for life" service for several months, and customer service told me that they couldn't do anything about it because I must have changed my service. So I just cancelled them. After 19 years of paying $115+ per month and buying the occasional premium service and rarely noticing the random price increase for a few months, I just cut the cord over a broken promise and generally lousy customer service. Bye DirecTV.

After a few months of solely streaming my video content, I'm starting to think linear TV isn't so bad after all. Early on, the promise of streaming was that I could get pretty much everything I wanted for one low monthly price. That's when Netflix was the only game in town, had all the old network series and cost under $10 a month for those few of us adults who actually paid for a subscription and didn't share passwords. My smart TV had a Netflix button that delivered a simple interface, plentiful content and intuitive operation for hours of binge worthy fun.

Fast forward just a few years and every studio with a content library that felt compelled to deliver a streaming brand has lost millions and now faces pressure to staunch the bleeding. Studios licensed their content back to linear TV, raised prices on their streaming brands, and withheld investment in their product, leading to a mediocre CX. I'm paying more, can't find series that I want to watch, managing multiple remote controls, and dealing with apps that randomly fail on my smartTV without warning. That damned virtual DVR makes me watch shows with commercials and won't let me fast forward. And good luck getting customer service from a smart TV manufacturer or a streaming provider through their social media support channel on your smartphone. I'm actually nostalgic for waiting on hold for DirecTV customer support.

At least with linear TV I had 1 remote, a predictable bill, channel lineups I could remember, premium channels, on-demand content, and actual customer service. If only DirecTV could have been straight about promotions, avoided playing billing games, and cut the ridiculous hardware charges that jacked up my bill. I'm never dropping Netflix, but all of the rest of the streaming services essentially started as premium content on cable and satellite TV and haven't evolved much except their prices.

All that really changed about video was the transport, from cable to Internet, and the world lost their minds. Streaming became the medium, availability shifted from scheduled to on-demand, and devices shifted from televisions to tablets and phones. Let the next generation consume short form content on their phones over the Internet, but I'm pretty sure that streaming services still depend on adults and families watching video content on large format screens in order to pay the bills. Perhaps time to pay attention to us?

The first linear TV company that sends me a reasonably priced plan and no hidden fees just might get me back. Not much chance of that, but I remain hopeful.