sharke
Whatever cable package you get, 95% of it is junk. Commercials, trailers, promotional BS and all that annoying crap. Unless you watch 8 hours of TV a day I just cannot see the point of having cable. If you're the kind of person that watches maybe 1-2 hours of quality shows in the evening then Netflix or Amazon Prime Video are more than enough and only a fraction of the cost. 
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That is exactly what I cannot stand about the TV. You cannot immerse yourself in a show because of the constant interruptions from ads, trailers and promos. The music associated with these horrible things disturbs me deeply too. Every now and then in the gym I figure what the hell, I'll watch 5 minutes of TV. I last about a minute.

Boy, I sure hear ALL OF THAT ^^^ Sharke!

KenB123
For the basic channels, which I assume you mean the local Over-The-Air channels, consider an antenna. As long as your TV is newer and has a digital channel tuner and you are within range of the broadcast signals, you can enjoy the local OTA stations for free. Actually the OTA signal is superior to cable transmissions because no compression is involved.

bitflipper
No cable here. An antenna gets me local news, and Netflix provides all the entertainment I can possibly handle. 

This seems to be the way we're leaning - at least so far. We bought a Sony BDP-s5200 BlueRay player about 8 months ago, which has built in WiFi. It's already setup with Netflix, Crackle, and others, etc.
 
It also has a built-in option to connect to YouTube [although we would have to suffer through Googles ads there], but my Mrs. pointed out that unlike TV where, like Sharke has pointed out, although there is now a bombardment of commercials and other such non-sense, at least there's usually only one ad to sit through for each clip.
 
And of course there's just no end to what's on Youtube now.
 
As stated, it's getting harder and harder to find something good to watch. We generally don't like most of the shows that are out now and haven't for quite some time.
Lists of 'favorites, suggested, recommended or popular' usually just turn us off and send us looking the other way. We really don't watch much TV as a result.
 
We found a local ADSL ISProvider that charges only $30 a month for 325 Gigs Bandwith [with the option to go unlimited for $5.00/month extra], with 6.0 Mbps download speed [1.0 Mbps up]. No contracts or terms, 5 emails, SPAM filtering, email virus scanning and is a multiple recipient of Consumer's Choice award for Business excellence for customer support and Internet Service.
 
For those who suggested an antenna, can I ask you to recommend the one(s) you're happy with?
We have a Sony Bravia TV that's only a few years old, so we're good there.
 

At the end of your contract do not renew! And then just choose internet only package. As for TV get a roof antenna and watch the air channels. Now the phone find the lowest price and go for it.
 

Thanks Red. We're just gonna use our cell phones as we have been for about 4 years now. We see no need for a home phone anymore.
 
I contacted Telus today and confirmed that our TV and internet contract ended in November so we're happy about that.
 
They've offered us $10 discount a month, but only for the next 6 months, which is not enough to keep us.
 
I've looked at digital antennas and would really like to hear which ones some here have tried.

Here in Arkansas...I live right on the edge of the digital antenna circle. That why we decided to keep a basic cable for $23, but I could do without it. With a good streaming device, I'm happy. Next time we will cancel everything but the internet too.

Rain
From watching Hulu and being forced to watch commercials, I gather that there is a new trend among the people who come up with publicity - commercials need to make as little sense as possible, and in a lot of cases, to have strictly nothing to do with what's advertised.
 
I guess the tactic is to puzzle you as much as possible so that the brand name sticks in your mind. My wife and I often end up looking at each other going - what the... Can it really be THAT stupid?
 
I personally find it an agression on intelligence so if anything, it only causes me to boycott those product. On the other hand, the usual alternative, an agression on the senses, isn't much more successful with me.

I'm the same way there Rain.
If I see a commercial too many times, it's overly annoying, it's way too loud, there's some screaming in it - like the new one I saw the other day - or I just don't like it [which happens to be most commercials anyway] then I'll boycott the product or service as well.
 
Especially if I see it [#1] and then another [#2] and then the first one again [#1], I'll almost start to feel the hair stand up on the back of my neck.
 
And if any are really bad or annoying, I'll even step it up a notch and actually send them an email telling them that all that money they spent on the production, actors and air space has back-fired on at least one person - and that if one person feels that way, then most likely others do too.

I know some of you folks are old enough to remember the original introduction of cable TV in the 60's, and remember wondering why you'd pay for something that was already free. 
 
Cable companies countered consumer resistance on these main points:

• signal quality was better
• there were no commercials (yes, kids, really)
• movies were not censored or edited
• having many channels made room for niche interests and educational content
• it was cheap, around $10 a month

Point #1 was made moot by the switch to digital. Even if you're using an antenna (assuming adequate signal strength) the sound and picture are as good as cable (sometimes better).
Point #2: Not only are there more commercials on cable than there used to be on broadcast TV (which were limited by law), with cable you are required to receive multiple all-commercial channels that can't be blocked.
Point #3: movies are routinely censored and trimmed for time because cable eventually adopted the same on-the-hour scheduling format as broadcast TV. Some titles never get played for political (or PC) reasons. 
Point #4: where did the educational content go? It's all Bigfoot, ghosts and UFOs now. It seems educational content doesn't sell enough advertising.
Point #5: the cheapest package I can buy here is over $100 a month, and includes none of the channels I'd watch.
 
So the cable industry is in a tizzy over the rate at which they are losing subscribers (11% in the last 5 years, and accelerating). When I went into the Comcast store to return my equipment, there were 20 other people there - none were buying, all were returning their equipment like me.
 
Cable stocks are falling, and we'll see even more consolidation as the trend continues. Pretty soon there will not only be just one cable company in your town, but only one across the entire nation. As the number of cable companies dwindles, so does the chance that the remaining providers will adopt the innovation needed to survive.
 

jimusic
I've looked at digital antennas and would really like to hear which ones some here have tried.

Jim,
 
I have the 'Winegard Sensar TV Antenna' Amplified Model GS-2200. I have it outdoor mounted on my chimney. Works fine when I use it. I see it currently on Amazon for about $48.00. You really don't need to spend a whole ton of money on it. In fact, if you currently have an existing VHF/UHF antenna, try that one first. 
 
OTA depends on your location. If you are close to the source transmission towers, you might even get away with  an indoor antenna (hmmm....sounds like the old days again).  
 
There are a number on websites where you can see what should be available OTA in your area. For example try:
 
    http://homeantenna.org/di...nna-reception-map.html

@ KenB123
Great - Thanks Ken!
 
I've found some on Bestbuy for $15. Seems you're right about the location and local interference.
So we'll try that one first. The reviews on it are as good as any.
 
@Bit - I was born in 1961 and remember our tall antenna tower out back, and Dad taking it down when cable came to town. We still had a black & white TV then.
 
I also remember ads being only squeezed in when there was time for them on Johhny Carson. He'd hold up a can of soup and say a few things about it, and that was it!
 
My how things have changed. Now among all the other things we've all seen and discussed in this thread, they squeeze a banner here and a runner there even during the very shows we're paying cable to watch - and that's between the commercial breaks FFSakes!
 
Even on the weather channels they've got something up in one corner or another.
And in the hockey games all along the boards, and even under the ice surface with the rest of the lines for the rink - Sheesh!
 
I wish Google hadn't purchased Youtube, because their ads and pop-ups are equally annoying.
At least with the small ones on the actual video display, they can be clicked off with the 'x' in the corner once the clip starts.
 
 
 

jimusic
I wish Google hadn't purchased Youtube, because their ads and pop-ups are equally annoying.
At least with the small ones on the actual video display, they can be clicked off with the 'x' in the corner once the clip starts.
 

 
Just install AdBlocker to your browser, video ads will become a thing of the past. 
 

bitflipper
...
Cable companies countered consumer resistance on these main points:

• signal quality was better
• there were no commercials (yes, kids, really)
• movies were not censored or edited
• having many channels made room for niche interests and educational content
• it was cheap, around $10 a month

...

 
You forgot the PSA's, for which they will plug in some quasi religious this and that (some of it questionable of course) so that it satisfies the FCC demand for a certain amount of these in every 24 hours. Most stations will cram them on a Sunday morning, or a late night thing, that has the smallest audience possible, to prevent losing commercial revenue.
 
Movies, have another issue. The versions are different for various reasons. The releases are like this ... prime/theaters, airlines, this and that, and then pay per view, and then DVD. The airline version has to be G rated, regardless, so a lot of words and this and that are muted, and passed over. The pay per view market is the same, since it is on people's homes, and they do not want any bad publicity from parents or the FCC.
 
Thus, now you can see another bad side of things ... the inevitable "remaster" (just like music!) so that you can add the other details that otherwise got taken down. And in some cases, it's still missing stuff.
 
But "music" is no less different. I saw the experimental show of "The Wall" in SF with quadraphonic sound and all that, and it was 20 minutes longer. Because of the LP limits, this got cut down to 80/84 minutes to fit in the albums ... and the rest of the material for the most part is half of the next album "The Final Cut" ... and some of the visual/video  material came from the film, and if you take a look at its "story", it all fits inside "The Wall" very well ... but everyone seems to ignore that! The TV side of things is even worse than that when it comes to movies and shows!
 

bitflipper
...
Cable stocks are falling, and we'll see even more consolidation as the trend continues. Pretty soon there will not only be just one cable company in your town, but only one across the entire nation. As the number of cable companies dwindles, so does the chance that the remaining providers will adopt the innovation needed to survive.
 

This is, actually, the scary side of it for me ... and one day the FCC busted up AT&T, and it continues to grow and control the whole phone environment. because they had the money for the infrastructure that no one else had. Cable is tougher, because ... all that is left ... are addresses and portions of new areas that do not have cable and it costs anywhere from 20K to 25K (sometimes not including all the labor) to get ONE BLOCK's worth of houses wired ... thus, the return has to be favorable and the density very important to your investment survival.
 
Now you know that the FCC are a bunch of junkies and stooges, because they know that 10 to 15% of ALL Americans can not get cable, and NEVER will since no one can afford to wire those far out of reality locations, and the big corporations will not allow WIRELESS Internet, to those areas, because you will have a gross and indecent fight for every single company out there, not to mention that one of them has to put somewhere within reasonable distance, an antenna that costs over 75 million to be able to bring service to you! In a big city, that's is not an issue ... in NY/LA/SF and the like, you just replace the antenna with a better one because the cash flow is there ... out in the country? No such thing!
 
But this is the weird part ... wireless was invented more than 120 years ago ... and we still on wires?
 
That ought to tell you what you need about the FCC and the Government!