Scott Moritz and Kamaron Leach for Bloomberg:
AT&T TV Now, the carrier’s online television service, is raising prices again.
Notices are going out this week telling about 1.3 million customers of AT&T Inc. that prices are rising as much as 30% starting next month. Subscribers who were paying $50 a month for the “Plus” package will see prices climb to $65, while those paying $70 for the 65-channel “Max” package will be charged $80 a month.
It’s the second price hike this year and highlights what has been AT&T’s top priority — to widen margins and reduce a debt load that ballooned to as much as $195 billion after the acquisitions of DirecTV and Time Warner. To ease that burden, AT&T has retreated from competitive pricing and said goodbye to more than 2.3 million TV subscribers in the past year.
AT&T TV Now, previously called DirecTV Now, is a package of live TV channels delivered online. The idea is to attract cord cutters, who are abandoning traditional satellite and cable packages.
MacDailyNews Take: We use and recommend Sony’s rather excellent live TV/cloud DVR service, PlayStation Vue (packages start at $49.99/month).
Boy there’s going to be a day of reckoning as to how many packages the market can support, or how much people will be willing to pay.. Ain’t going to be pretty.
Agreed. Some of these companies are going to find out that consumers are tired of getting reamed and will lose millions of customers rapidly you cable internet/TV bill from Comcast had risen to around $240 per month. I could buy a decent car for that at current loan rates. Now that the kids are out of the house, I am soooooo close to dropping cable TV.
But streaming is not a perfect solution by any means. It can be difficult to piece together access to the channels that you want. Channel bundling and packages are increasingly prevalent in streaming. The main advantage over cable TV is that there will be a lot more competition, at least for the near future. The barrier to entry is much lower than for cable TV. Unfortunately, the cable companies will still control the Internet pipe to our homes. Prices for plain internet access services are going to explode as these companies lose TV customers and seek to increase profits elsewhere.
I cut the cable cord. With Cable TV/Internet connection, plus HBO Now, Netflix, HULU, and Prime Video, BlazeTV, I was running over $350.00. I added HULU TV (Plus regular HULU) and just kept all my other streaming services cut my bill down to $160.00 a month.
DVD IS BETTER WHO KNEW?
I highly doubt that! I’d like to see someone start something on social media to get everyone to call the same week and cancel their cable. Hit them all, Comcast, Dish, etc. Then CBS and other greedy companies will see people are not messing around. Probably will never happen, but would like to see someone try something to get as many people on board and do it! Something like the occupyflash movement.
I recommend cutting the cord and cutting loose on the streets, trails and by-ways for the increased flow of corpuscles. Butts-in-couches is so sedimentary.
This is what happened when congress deregulated the TV distribution industry, the companies promised lowered prices and better service, but LIED to congress and the people, Congress knew this was a Lie took payoffs while turning their back for decades while the industry jacked up prices, and screwed the consumer. Bills now are around $300 a month. for 1000+ channels which no one watches, they pack commercials in by cutting content, charge you incessant Fees and force you to get packages with channels that you don’t want and don’t watch to justify the prices they charge maximizing their profit. I really hope more states take up the effort to pass the a la carte rules for channels and wake up and start pressuring congress to reregulate them. Read this and remember.
In an a la carte system, shows without a mass audience will quickly disappear. That would prevent the studios or providers from using the popular programs to subsidize quality shows. Do you really want hundreds of clones of Friends and NCIS?
Of course prices are going up. Wait till the next raise and cost saying measures
Here’s an idea, get a VPN, connect to the BBC iplayer app and get all the content for free. You don’t even need to watch live as it has what’s called ‘catchup’, so watch what you want, when you want. Make sure your VPN is in the uk and follow the signup details, telling them you’re a uk resident. Being a uk resident, I’m not able to test it works, but perhaps worth a try!
Just turn the TV off for a month or more. You will not miss it and you will find lots of other things to do. 99% of the shows are junk.
Spot on. Play the piano, bike with your dog, or learn a language. TV is not worth $300 a month, it’s all fake trash.
One problem where I live is that there is no real competition in Broadband. I can get Comcast(which I have for internet) or AT&T, which I have with DirecTV for channels. No other choice for internet and considering they are both the same and not competition. Comes down to what your municipality has a contract with!
Competition is key. For a long time the only game in town was verison/comcast. HORRIBLE! Finally got Google Fiber and ATT fiber.. Now pay $130 per month for 100 MBper second up/down and have a great selection of channels plus massive DVR.