How to Divorce Your Cable Company and Not Look Back

Paying an expensive cable bill every month when you only watch a few channels is ridiculous. Looking into alternatives can be very rewarding.

Cable Companies Leaving You Broke?

Fed Up With Your Cable Company

If you are like me you are fed up with paying upwards of one hundred dollars a month for cable t.v. when you only ever watch two or three channels. This was the situation I found myself in about six months ago. And it really burned me up when they announced that they were either going to have to raise my rates, or drastically reduce my channel choices (oh well, I didn’t watch them anyway). But that made me ask myself, what the hell was I paying so much for? It literally seemed like they (the cable company) were robbing me blind. And what made matters worse was that I could watch just about anything I wanted to online—for free!

Netflix and Hulu to the Rescue

I didn’t want to over-react, though. I took a deep breath, and called my cable company. If I let them know that I was thinking about cancelling their service surely they would offer me a discount, right? Wrong. Maybe it depends who you get your cable from, but Time Warner Cable was far from sympathetic to my situation. So I took to the internet.

I discovered what I already knew and took for granted. Most shows currently on air now can be seen online almost immediately. Going to the website for the channel that your show airs on was one solution. Another is services like Hulu. Hulu is a streaming service and it’s completely free. While their selection isn’t that great, they offer another service called Hulu Plus for a monthly fee that offers a more current lineup. But even with the monthly fee, it is mere pennies on the dollar in comparison to what big cable companies charge. Even with the bad publicity that Netflix got over the summer, they are still the king of the hill when it comes to streaming service, and they offer the DVD rentals, too, so for less than twenty dollars a month you can enjoy great movies and shows.

Don't Let the Cable Company Control You

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It's Not the End of the World

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking the same thing I was thinking when I was debating whether or not to make this switch. I had always had cable, for as long as I could remember. I didn’t know if I could live without it. What if I couldn’t just come home and watch my favorite shows? What if I had to give up watching my favorite shows? Sadly, this terrified me. But anyone who has Facebook can attest to how easy it is to find anything online. With sites like Youtube and Veoh, and as I mentioned earlier, by just going to the channel’s site, you can watch your favorite shows. The only thing that would be missed was the convenience of just flipping on the t.v. and having something familiar come on.

You'll Feel Better Immediately

Look, I’m not saying the switch will be totally seamless. It took me a week or so to get into a new routine, but I did it, and I couldn’t feel better. Seeing how much money I saved that first month after cancelling my cable company was orgasmic. And yes, it did feel good to call my cable company up and tell them I didn’t need them anymore. When the lady on the other end asked if she could offer another service and I said no, well, that was just the best feeling I’d had in a long time. It is the nicest way I can think of to tell your cable company to go to hell.

The fact is that you will feel better about yourself the minute you decide to give your greedy cable company the boot. I signed up with Netflix, made a free Hulu account for myself, and keep other free streaming sites bookmarked on my computer. I never feel like I’m missing out on anything. But that’s me.

A Challenge Becomes an Opportunity

My sister, on the other hand, is a huge sports fan and she brought this problem to my attention, because unlike t.v. shows, you usually can’t find a baseball or football game online, and part of the fun of watching a sports event is watching it happen live. So I’ve come up with an idea for this problem, as well. Why not make watching your favorite sports events an outing and get together with your sports loving buddies at the local sports bar. You can watch the game and have a good time with your friends.

The point I’m making is that there is life after cable. You will learn to schedule your time more wisely and to actually appreciate the time you set aside for watching something on t.v. because it’s not just on all day long, like with cable. There are no commercials to distract you, either, and that is something I do not miss at all. You will learn to pick and choose what you want to watch, as opposed to settling for whatever is on. Take this as an opportunity to better yourself. You don’t have to be dependent on a company that is only after your money. Take matters in your own hand and vote with your feet. Maybe a massive action like this will shake up the cable industry and they will see that they can only screw us for so long before we wake up.

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