On Demand Online: Reason to Stick With Comcast?
By Harry McCracken | Tuesday, July 14, 2009 at 11:59 am
I keep talking about dumping Comcast, but I’m beginning to think it’s more inevitable than death or taxes. (I recently tried to cancel my Comcast phone line, and they told me that doing so would raise my monthly bill by $4. Checkmate!)
If I stick around with Comcast, I might as well enjoy it–and I’m guardedly optimistic about On Demand Online, the Web-based service which the company is cooking up. It’s signed up a respectable list of content providers: Time Warner, A&E, Starz, and others–and, most recently, CBS. They’ll provide programming for a Hulu-like site that’s supposed to start testing this month.
Unlike the free, ad-supported Hulu, Comcast’s service is apparently going to be available to paying Comcast subscribers only. I hope that means it’ll be ad-free and have access to some shows that Hulu can’t get–in other words, that it’ll be a true Web-based version of Comcast’s On Demand video-on-demand service. (Which, incidentally, I can’t get–it’s not compatible with my TiVo HD box.)
I persist in being perfectly willing to consider paying for content on the Web when opportunities arise–in part because vast amounts of content are simply going to disappear unless the people who own them figure out how to convince consumers to pay up. So even though I continue to flirt with the idea of canceling Comcast and subsisting on a diet of Hulu and iTunes, I’m actually rooting for On Demand Online to be really good. So good, in fact, that I stop talking about kissing Comcast goodbye.
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40Tech Says:
July 21st, 2009 at 4:08 am5 Critical Reasons to Root Against Comcast’s Online Television…
Over at Technologizer, Harry McCracken recently contemplated whether Comcast’s On Demand Online service was reason enough to stick with Comcast, if you are considering dropping your television service. On Demand Online is a Hulu-like service s…
July 14th, 2009 at 11:50 pm
I canceled my Comcast service (if the overpriced and unreliable product they provided could in fact be called “service”) three years ago, and have never regretted it. I have a set-top antenna (rabbit-ears) that brings in quite clearly all the local broadcast channels (and now, all their digital variations — I get something like 12 PBS stations now) for free. For everything else, there’s paid iTunes and free Hulu. And for those who say they don’t want to watch TV on their computer — It only takes a cable or two to hook up a laptop to a TV. I’m so used to this that I habitually reach for my mouse to control the TV now.
Why on earth would I ever go back to cable TV?
July 15th, 2009 at 5:29 am
I can’t cancel comcast, because I like having an internet connection. Also, this sounds like an anti-competitive action. Let me guess, any downloads from their service wont’ count against your monthly transfer cap. Well, golly, I better cancel my Netflix account then because I can’t afford to suck up all my bandwidth watching a couple netflix movies every day when I can watch Comcast’s stuff and not have it taken away from my transfer limits!