>>The second part of the article was, I think, a response from the lobbyist for the cable companies <s>
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>>I don't really have much point of comparison but I know the bundling (I have AT&T uverse) makes for a pretty expensive package. I pay $250 a month or so for broadband, about a 1000 ttv channels including all premium 5 set top boxes, a DVR, and a VOIP phone line. Cell service (also AT&T) is about $80 a month for pretty much unlimited voice and 3gb data (which is more than I need as I am almost always on wireless)
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>I pay almost the same as you (almost 300 a month for broadband + tv + home phone) + around 160 for cell-phone (3 cells, 2 sharing 1.2 Gb of data, the third no data), my plan for before the end of the year is to cut down TV, I do not know what was I thinking.... and now I do not know what to do about the cell-phones, my contract is about to end so I need to renew 2 of them but I have no idea what will I do, crazy how much money we spend in this...
It's the damn bundling on the TV stuff. The UVerse I have includes probably every channel that exists. Wonderful for sports, and I get 10 HBO channels and 10 showtime etc. Lots of spanish channels. Lots of weird reality show channels. NFL Redzone on sundays.
But if I were paying ala carte I could pare the whole thing down to about 30 channels (including some of the crap my wife watches) and be quite happy.
I always scoffed at spending a dime more than I had to for cell. my wife uses a Net10 $15 a month 300 min plan and has 5000 + rollover minutes. Offered to get her a smart phone and a share on my plan and she didn't want it. Not a techy person.
I avoided any phone that required a data plan until recently. Now with the Galaxy Note 3 (god I love this thing) I have to have the data plan (3gb I don't use much) but for wireless it is very very cool and when I do use data out in the world the 4g is pretty nice.
No messaging plan. Didn't understand how that worked and before I switched over to exclusively Facebook messaging I ran up some charges I didn't know was incurring using SMS.
Charles Hankey
Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
- Thomas Hardy
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
-- T. S. Eliot
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.
- Ben Franklin
Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
