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Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Nearly 800,000 U.S. TV households 'cut the cord,' report says

Notice all the HDTV set advertising internet connections. So are blu-ray players, Playstations, XBoxes, and Wiis. Notice how many are offering cableCard connections. None. As consumers have grown tired of their cable provider, they have found respite with broadband. Which means cutting the subscription to cable and perhaps even their hard wired phone and settling with broadband only. With content available through the web there is no need for HBO; rather Netflix, Amazon, Blockbuster, and Apple become their alternative. Hulu for cable and a digital antenna to receive broadcast channels.

"Now, as TechCrunch points out, the estimated 800,000 cord cutters represent less than 1 percent of the 100 million U.S. households (give or take) currently subscribing to a cable/satellite/telco TV carrier, so it's not like we're talking a mass exodus here. But by the end of 2011, the report guesstimates, the number of cord-cutting households in the U.S. will double to about 1.6 million".

It is time for cable companies to wake up and act. Make the internet the friend to your cable box. Add Slingbox and Tivo to the set top box; let third party manufacturers sell a converter box. Stop pretending that the CableCard works. The brick the cable companies require on each of our TV sets makes them look like old, out of touch companies, while Apple and others have built products that are sleek and modern and ergonomically designed. The current cable box is not. Change now or risk more and more cord cutting. Cause once you lose them, it is hard to win them back!

Is 3D TV Dangerous To You Health?

Who would have guessed that watching too much TV was dangerous to your health. Certainly that was a warning our parents' gave us to encourage us as kids to play outside. Perhaps they weren't lying. "Guidelines for Samsung's new line of 3D TVs warn against prolonged exposure to 3D TVs for kids (kids under 6 shouldn't watch at all), teens, pregnant women, the elderly, sleep-deprived people and anyone buzzed on alcohol." Certainly in legally sensitive times, all products have warnings. But now a warning to not watch too much. Will that slow down sales of 3D TV sets? Probably not. Still I am not yet a fan of purchasing one yet. For me a big screen HDTV is exactly what I need, with no glasses required!