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BECause The Choice is Yours

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The numbers don’t lie, more Americans are cutting the cord when it comes to cable. By the year 2020, 40 million former cable subscribers will have cut the cord and switched to streaming video via the internet.

When we spoke with local residents, we found that many folks in Bandera have already put the scissors to the wire leading to the television. The services they use the most are Hulu with Live TV, Netflix, DirecTV NOW, YouTube TV, and PlayStation Vue. If you already have a smart TV, and all you will be using local programming for is watching the news, then you already know that you’re set because most smart TVs have free local news apps. (No you don’t get the full line up of network programming, just your local news).
 
Those of us who grew up watching conventional TV (when there were only three networks) remember the Nielson™ Service. They measure a viewers watching habits so that networks could know what shows were number one, at what hour on what nights. They also measured which local newscasts were the most watched. (Which in turn allowed those way cool news promos featuring some fella with a really deep voice saying: “Its ten o’clock and you’re watching the number one rated newscast in “insert your hometown newscast here.” – Oh the good ole days.)
 
The most recent metrics released by the Nielson™ group found that Americans are now streaming nearly 8 billion hours per month on connected TV devices like Roku, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV
 
What’s more is that consumers ages 13 to 34 will spend twice the time streaming when watching on connected TV devices, compared with watching on the computer or mobile devices. All this proves that the winds of change continue to blow when it comes to how Americans choose to watch their favorite programming.
 
One last thing, if you’re thinking of cutting the cord, you’re going to have to select a streaming video service. Here’s how the top five rank according to money expert Clark Howard.
   
All of these streaming services offer free trials to allow you to “try before you buy.”
 

Posted: 12/6/2018 10:00:00 AM
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