Pick an Apple and Cut the Cord? You Tell Me.

Are you a cord cutter?

Have you taken the plunge? Left your cable company?

So many claim to have done so. Yet, frankly, I am confused. Exactly what cord are we talking about?

Yesterday, Apple announced a slew of new products, and although iPhones and iPads were the rage (more on that next week), Apple TV was an important component in the announcement.

Again, I’m confused.

The new and improved Apple TV will bring us the Internet, all the premium channels we can hope for (maybe), will deliver games (even has a potential game controller) and is a platform for other apps and software.

And in their continued, very smart drive to make sure that all the slices of the Apple link, Siri gets into the act, liberating us from keyboards to help us look up random facts and compile lists of shows we might want to watch, among its many talents.

I don’t mean to be cynical or sarcastic. Believe me, I am a sucker for everything new. Yet I’m at a bit of a loss to fall on my Apple corer for this Apple TV, given that my smart TV, my Xbox 360 and Google (sort of) all claim to do the same thing. And the big issue is still that everyone is getting into proprietary content as in Netflix, Amazon and Vice. Finally, I recommend you check out Verizon’s new mobile video — free, as in it comes with lots of advertising around it.

Frankly, then, tell me, what cords do we think we are cutting? I wager, in fact, that we have never been more tethered than we are today.

The cord you cut was replaced by many threads that will track you and sell you and use you and make money from you, all for the promise of that cut cord and more/better content.

Look – let me be clear that I am all in here and, judging by my past patterns, the first on line – cords cut, new threads connected and ready for every new link on the horizon.

Yet all I want is great content – when I want it – the ability to browse and watch, but also the ability to access live news and events, and of course, play my games and share — in other words, do everything that our digital world promises and has made possible.

But let’s not kid ourselves. We are not cutting any cords. That is Digibabble nonsense and frankly insults our intelligence.

We are all tied to Apple, or Netflix or Hulu or Youtube, and any of the other providers we fancy. And I’d bet that you, like me, are finding that, gimmicks aside, most of the available viewing options are the same. And in order to get all the content I really want, I’m forced to switch providers and pay à la carte, tying me up again.

Bottom line, I guarantee you that sooner than you think, the next aggregator will come along with another more powerful cord-cutting message, more focused on us and what we want to watch and will tempt us to cut once again.

We are being hyped by the cordless cord, but it is clear that there are more strings attached to it than ever before. Like many, I have sold my soul for the dream I had as a kid – limitless watching what I want, when I want. But make no mistake, someone somewhere has to pay for the great content we are demanding when and where we want it. In the old days when there was no cord, just an antenna, the pact was we watched advertising. It looks like that’s where we are going back to. Just spare me the cord-cutting rhetoric.