Sometimes When We Touch Docuseries

The major difference is that there are no subscription term minimums and no cancellation fees. And instead of $20-$40 a month for cable, it's $10-$15 a month. So you can spend a month or two watching everything that appeals to you on (for example) Netflix, then move to Prime or HBO or Paramount+(or whatever---I think there are like seven majors).
Another major issue with subscriptions, just like cable/satellite you are paying for a ton of programming (maybe as high as 95%) that you don’t want.

At least with OTA antenna, you have no fees.
 
Another major issue with subscriptions, just like cable/satellite you are paying for a ton of programming (maybe as high as 95%) that you don’t want.

At least with OTA antenna, you have no fees.

True about OTA. Nothing competes with free.

As for streaming vs cable, the difference is again the cost ($10.95 a month vs $40) and I think that makes a huge difference in the "paying for stuff you don't want" factor.

Where I live, a movie ticket is $11.50. If my wife and I were to go, even without popcorn, a drink, and parking, that's $23.

We can watch that movie (especially post-COVID, with streaming usually happening within weeks of theatrical release) and everything else we want to see in a month on that streaming service for $12.05 less than seeing the movie all by itself. I don't care what they have that I don't want to see...I care what they have that I do want to see. And they have tons more of that than basic cable does at roughly 1/4 the price.
 
Streaming is also on-demand. You don't have to abide by a network schedule before your program appears in the rotation. (I was going to say that it's also free of advertising, but I've read Netflix is going to start including ads at some level.) Cable is crazy expensive everywhere, as is satellite (DirecTV). I know some acquaintances of our are paying $120 or more per month for cable and lower-end Internet.

The only thing I subscribe to is YouTube Premium, since anything I watch is from the couple dozen channels I follow. I'd rather pay that and not endure endless advertising, and the creators get paid as well. My other half rotates subscriptions between Netflix, Hulu, PBS, etc. as shows become available that are worth watching, and cancel once those are watched. Some of those streaming subscriptions are well under $10/month.

That beats dealing with a cable company that tries to rope you into expensive services and monthly commitments, usually through some offshore customer service that barely understands English.

Granted, we do pay for fiber Internet, but we also use it for work and business and as such, can write it off as an expense. Still, less than half of what acquaintances are paying for a full ride with cable. Honestly, I don't know why the cable industry hasn't completely imploded yet. Too many legacy subscribers and TV addicts, I'm thinking. I've said for decades that we'd all be better served with a la carte offerings, but cable companies make money by bundling the few things you want with a dozen that you don't.
 
I'm not up on sports anymore (if I ever watch hockey or the Winter Olympics, it's over the air from Canada 😁), but aren't the sports network groups basically ESPN and Fox Sports (which covers more local sports)? If they both went to a streaming/subscription model, sure, it would probably kill off cable rather quickly.

I just wonder what would happen to all the local stations. I can't forsee a sudden fad of residents putting digital antennas up on the chimneys and rooftops to get the local stations.
 
I'm not up on sports anymore (if I ever watch hockey or the Winter Olympics, it's over the air from Canada 😁), but aren't the sports network groups basically ESPN and Fox Sports (which covers more local sports)? If they both went to a streaming/subscription model, sure, it would probably kill off cable rather quickly.

I just wonder what would happen to all the local stations. I can't forsee a sudden fad of residents putting digital antennas up on the chimneys and rooftops to get the local stations.

I think NBC also has regional sports nets, and you can buy multi-game or "season pass" packages for teams and/or leagues.

The local stations are preparing for a digital future. Last week, KCBS-TV in Los Angeles rebranded all of its newscasts on both itself and sister station KCAL as "KCAL News". The press release says KCAL, an indie that does nine-plus hours of news a day, has a stronger news brand than the mothership KCBS, and they're using "KCAL News" not as "call letters and type of program" but as a brand like "Action News" or "Eyewitness News."

The next move, logically, is away from air and to an app sitting next to Netflix and HBO on your smart TV---the button you press when you want to watch local news.
 
For the only sport I really care about, baseball, and Phillies specifically, I subscribe to the MLB.TV app that works on smart TVs, my Roku or Firesticks, my computer, and my android phone. I pay for a yearly subscription, and since I live out-of-market, you'd think I would be able to see every game. Not so. Any time they play the Tampa Bay Rays, I'm blacked out locally, because of the Tampa Bay Rays network's agreement with local cable outfits. Meantime, other outfits are muscling their way into the MLB rights with packages of their own. When a game is on ESPN - I'm blacked out because of cable rights. When a game is on Fox Sports, I'm blacked out because of cable rights. And now streaming outfits are muscling in too. Peacock was running some Sunday morning games this year, and Amazon grabbed some Thursday games, all of which are blacked out on the MLB app.

As for broadcast television, there's a future development that could be a game-changer with regard to over-the-air TV reception, called NextGen TV (or ATSC 3.0). It's supposed to be a more robust system as far as reception goes, so more people could get local signals that they can't get reliable now. It will also utilize the internet in ways we can only imagine, and could split the bandwidth in more ways and at higher definition than presently possible with ATSC 1.0 that we're using now.
 
True about OTA. Nothing competes with free.

As for streaming vs cable, the difference is again the cost ($10.95 a month vs $40) and I think that makes a huge difference in the "paying for stuff you don't want" factor.

Where I live, a movie ticket is $11.50. If my wife and I were to go, even without popcorn, a drink, and parking, that's $23.

We can watch that movie (especially post-COVID, with streaming usually happening within weeks of theatrical release) and everything else we want to see in a month on that streaming service for $12.05 less than seeing the movie all by itself. I don't care what they have that I don't want to see...I care what they have that I do want to see. And they have tons more of that than basic cable does at roughly 1/4 the price.
I’d point out that besides your streaming fee, on top of it you also have your internet cost. And for streaming you need high speed internet and it’s best to have unlimited, or you’ll pay for overages. And working in their internet, people could easily be paying $50 for their streaming service. Also there’s still the issue with older shows and movies not being on streaming services because of copyright issues, since streaming was not around or thought of in the past. Especially shows that used a lot of music—-they can be re-run on broadcast and sort of air on live streaming services as those mimic broadcast, but the shows can not be placed on streaming sites for access anytime. Also that applies to sports as well because of contracts. Plus movies and TV shows are constantly being removed because of residual costs rising. You may like a show, but if it’s not profitable for a streaming then they’ll remove it.

Also with broadcast, you can always PVR a show or still use the old VCR/DVD recorder to record the program to watch whenever.
 
I’d point out that besides your streaming fee, on top of it you also have your internet cost.
I don't know how Canadian cable is run, but most in the US have their cable TV costs on top of their Internet costs in a bundle. In addition, I don't know a single person with cable TV who doesn't have Internet these days--the Internet is a commodity, a utility like electric power or water service, and Internet through the cable company is anywhere from a $35 to $80 chunk of that total cable bill. (All regions are different, of course, but on average it's expensive. That's why "cutting the cord" has been so popular.) Any local cable TV provider that offers telephone service does this through VoIP, so Internet is required there as well.

I pay less for fiber Internet with AT&T now than I did when I had Internet only (no TV or phone) from the local cable company, and I get a faster speed with no data caps. Most households won't come anywhere near their caps with streaming anyway. The caps are really there for the small percentage who abuse the service.

If I were a cable subscriber with my old provider and added on a TV package with premium channels to cover what anyone else in the household might watch, we'd have been near $100/month. And that's not including any on-demand content on top of it, and still having to pay streaming fees anyway since cable TV programming is largely crap. (A lot of content has moved to streaming, those providers having left cable.) After taxes and other fees, cable TV would cost $110-$120/month. And that monthly rate is only good for a year, when they unceremoniously jack up your monthly fees by $5, $10, $20, whatever they can get away with until you spend a half hour on the phone threatening to cancel until they offer a succession of lower deals until you bite at another one...which only lasts, again, nine months to a year, when you're back on the phone to the same offshore call center with barely intelligible English and reading from a corporate script.

Fiber with a couple of streaming subscriptions? Probably $75/month, all in. And most of that, again, I write off since we both use the fiber for work. Bonuses? I don't waste hours fighting with their retention department. I don't waste hours fighting to cancel cable add-ons I don't want. I get what I want, I can cancel any of this at any time, and I can raise or lower my Internet service online without needing a phone call. And the streaming services actually have content my other half will watch, unlike just about everything the cable company provides.

Over the air? I'm rockin' that! Two directional antennas, one pointed to Amherstburg ON (can't miss Hockey Night in Canada when the playoffs are on), the other to a local suburb on our side of the border. We're pulling in all the major networks, a few syndicate/independent stations, the CBC from Canada, and one dumpy broadcaster about five miles away from us who I have no desire to pick up (but I do, as the back end of the Canada antenna points that direction).

They are both fed (after a combiner) to an HDHomeRun box connected to my network. We access it via their app on our TVs (it took them a few years to finally offer an app for LG TVs), and it also has a built-in DVR that connects via the network to my NAS server, where I can record as much as I want (currently 16TB storage total, but that will be growing over the next year or so). It's handy because that not only feeds the TVs, over-the-air broadcasts can be watched on computers, phones, tablets, or anything else we can load the app on. It also has better reception than the TVs, and everything comes in clearer.
 
I’d point out that besides your streaming fee, on top of it you also have your internet cost. And for streaming you need high speed internet and it’s best to have unlimited, or you’ll pay for overages. And working in their internet, people could easily be paying $50 for their streaming service. Also there’s still the issue with older shows and movies not being on streaming services because of copyright issues, since streaming was not around or thought of in the past. Especially shows that used a lot of music—-they can be re-run on broadcast and sort of air on live streaming services as those mimic broadcast, but the shows can not be placed on streaming sites for access anytime. Also that applies to sports as well because of contracts. Plus movies and TV shows are constantly being removed because of residual costs rising. You may like a show, but if it’s not profitable for a streaming then they’ll remove it.

Also with broadcast, you can always PVR a show or still use the old VCR/DVD recorder to record the program to watch whenever.
Rudy made most of my points. I'd have internet anyway. And I'm fortunate to live in a place with high speed internet pretty much standard. For the past three years, without asking, they've increased my speed twice a year with no additional charge.

I'd be curious what older shows would be in broadcast syndication that aren't streaming. Broadcast certainly isn't showing my favorites (SUCCESSION, SEVERANCE, HACKS, ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING, TED LASSO, FLEISHMAN IS IN TROUBLE, WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS, TOM CLANCY'S JACK RYAN, LAST WEEK TONIGHT WITH JOHN OLIVER, LOOT, THE WHITE LOTUS, THE CROWN, DEAD TO ME, BARRY).
 
Rudy made most of my points. I'd have internet anyway. And I'm fortunate to live in a place with high speed internet pretty much standard. For the past three years, without asking, they've increased my speed twice a year with no additional charge.

I'd be curious what older shows would be in broadcast syndication that aren't streaming. Broadcast certainly isn't showing my favorites (SUCCESSION, SEVERANCE, HACKS, ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING, TED LASSO, FLEISHMAN IS IN TROUBLE, WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS, TOM CLANCY'S JACK RYAN, LAST WEEK TONIGHT WITH JOHN OLIVER, LOOT, THE WHITE LOTUS, THE CROWN, DEAD TO ME, BARRY).
If you want to watch the old 1950’s “Dragnet”, you can find a handful of episodes online (the same ones that were released on public domain VHS & DVD’s) however the rest of the series is sitting in Universal’s vaults because Universal has no idea which episodes are public domain and which are still under copyright. Also, the series hasn’t been in syndication since 1967, so there are no videotape masters for the majority of the 264 episodes. Universal took the series out of syndication before the 1967-1970 series debuted.



Also the 1995 series of both “Nancy Drew” and “The Hardy Boys” are unavailable to stream. Both series were by Nelvana that’s currently making the new Hardy Boys series.
 
If you want to watch the old 1950’s “Dragnet”, you can find a handful of episodes online (the same ones that were released on public domain VHS & DVD’s) however the rest of the series is sitting in Universal’s vaults because Universal has no idea which episodes are public domain and which are still under copyright. Also, the series hasn’t been in syndication since 1967, so there are no videotape masters for the majority of the 264 episodes. Universal took the series out of syndication before the 1967-1970 series debuted.



Also the 1995 series of both “Nancy Drew” and “The Hardy Boys” are unavailable to stream. Both series were by Nelvana that’s currently making the new Hardy Boys series.
I think we have very different interests when it comes to television. I've seen every DRAGNET---the 50s shows once and the 1967-70 shows twice (once when they first ran and once in summer reruns). And, having been 39 at the time, the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys shows aren't really on my radar.
 
In the US, DRAGNET is available for streaming on sites like Pluto TV. Not all episodes are available, and the episodes on Pluto have commercials, but it's totally free.

 
I don't know where they're coming from, but my LG TV has dozens of streaming channels, none of which I would ever watch. But, they are there, and they're free. I use the NVidia SHIELD vs. the LG's built-in sources, so I don't even see those channels.
 
I don't know where they're coming from, but my LG TV has dozens of streaming channels, none of which I would ever watch. But, they are there, and they're free. I use the NVidia SHIELD vs. the LG's built-in sources, so I don't even see those channels.
Yeah, my Samsung TV has similar stuff, and my Roku (which I've had forever, and use as a backup) has tons of channels I have no idea about.
 
We're truly in the era of hundreds of channels of "nothing to watch."
 
We're truly in the era of hundreds of channels of "nothing to watch."
Nah. That was pre-streaming. Now we have hundreds of channels, some of which have a lot to watch. The trick is finding it. Scrolling through Netflix's menu gives me flashbacks to walking through Blockbuster 25 years ago---how do I narrow this down?
 
I'm not much of a TV or movie fan, so just about all of it is lost on me these days. Unless it's something I watched growing up, or one of the classic movies I've liked, most of it looks all the same to me. In my case, TV would just take time away from music and video games, and working on cars. 😁
 
Some of the streaming "channels" just love to jumble things up and attempt to let you see what THEY think you want to see by what you looked at before. Watch one disaster movie and the menu list will populate with a whole bunch of disaster movies. The best ones are the ones that at least allow you to search for what you're looking for.

We mostly use Amazon and Paramount+ for our streaming content, but every now and then I like to go poke around in the "free with commercial" streamers like Pluto TV, Freevee, Tubi, etc.

My tastes in video entertainment are pretty much like my music tastes, mired in the 60s and 70s. I'd much rather sit down and watch an old episode or MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE or THE FUGITIVE than much of anything from the current century. But I still tune into the latest STAR TREK live action shows when I want a taste of something current, and we watch a number of the current CBS procedural shows like the FBI's, CRIMINAL MINDS, and S.W.A.T., but always a day later on Paramount+ with no commercials.
 
We're in a new Golden Age of TV---have been since MAD MEN and BREAKING BAD. Way too much good new stuff to spend time watching something a second or third time. Your mileage may vary.
 
Touchstone Pictures, Sony (which has the vaults to Screen Gems/Columbia Pictures) & 20th Century Fox do not have the rights to Shout! Factory. Does anyone know about this??? Why isn't "Nanny And The Professor", "Getting Together" (starring Bobby Sherman & Wes Stern late 1971 show) & "Empty Nest" (which starred the late Richard Mulligan, Kristy McNichol, David Leisure & Park Overall) among the stuff NOT on DVD box sets???
 
In the US, DRAGNET is available for streaming on sites like Pluto TV. Not all episodes are available, and the episodes on Pluto have commercials, but it's totally free.

What are you talking about? There’s nothing there! Even when I search for Dragnet, Pluto TV returns nothing.

But with Dragnet there’s the 1950’s TV series, the 1954 movie, the 1966 TV movie, the 1967 series, a short series from the late-80’s/early-90’s, the 1987 movie and then a short series from the early-2000’s (produced by Dock Wolf the producer of LA LAW). And they are called Dragnet (the second season of the early-2000’s series was retitled LA DRAGNET, while the 80’s/90’s series had “NEW” tacked on) with really no difference in titles.

But the most readily available Dragnet is the 1967-1970 series that I already have all 4 season in better quality on DVD than streaming offers.

But even the episodes from the 1951-1959 that are on streaming sites are all the public domain episodes that have been out on VHS, Betamax and DVD that were sourced from 16mm prints that escaped from TV stations in the 70’s and 80’s, and where copied to tape in the 70’s and 80’s. But there’s on 66 of 264 episodes out there.
 
What are you talking about? There’s nothing there! Even when I search for Dragnet, Pluto TV returns nothing.

But with Dragnet there’s the 1950’s TV series, the 1954 movie, the 1966 TV movie, the 1967 series, a short series from the late-80’s/early-90’s, the 1987 movie and then a short series from the early-2000’s (produced by Dock Wolf the producer of LA LAW). And they are called Dragnet (the second season of the early-2000’s series was retitled LA DRAGNET, while the 80’s/90’s series had “NEW” tacked on) with really no difference in titles.

But the most readily available Dragnet is the 1967-1970 series that I already have all 4 season in better quality on DVD than streaming offers.

But even the episodes from the 1951-1959 that are on streaming sites are all the public domain episodes that have been out on VHS, Betamax and DVD that were sourced from 16mm prints that escaped from TV stations in the 70’s and 80’s, and where copied to tape in the 70’s and 80’s. But there’s on 66 of 264 episodes out there.
Tom,

I'm betting this is geofenced and you can't see it because you're in Canada. I clicked the link and there are several episodes available---most likely the ones in the public domain.
 
What are you talking about? There’s nothing there! Even when I search for Dragnet, Pluto TV returns nothing.
Like Mike said, you're running into geographical restrictions. There are many, many complaints online about all different streaming services where content we have in the US can't be accessed in other countries (UK, EU, Canada, you name it) while by the same token, content in their countries is not available here. For a couple of the YouTube channels I follow, their creators have also been offered a series on Motor Trend +. And those are two instances where fans over in Europe, the UK, Australia, etc., can't stream Motor Trend + because they do not allow it over in those countries.

In some cases, you can get around restrictions by using a VPN that has a presence in that country. But some of the streaming companies have wised up--they can restrict a paid streaming account based on where the payment comes from. The free services without a paywall likely would work in many cases through a VPN.
 
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