I need to shop my TV and internet

[dismalist]

Anyone actually know why no American cable operators ever decided to offer a la carte pricing?

Yeah, well, bundling gets those who like Channel A a lot but B only a little, and those who like Channel B a lot but A only a little to pay the same high price for Bundle A + B. If competition were intense enough Channel A would have a low price appealing to those who don't like it so much, and likewise with Channel B.

Competition could get really, really intense if cable providers don't need to own the hardware. I think that's the case. Thus, we should wait and see. Praying for rain won't hurt. :-)

[polly_mer]

Anyone actually know why no American cable operators ever decided to offer a la carte pricing?   

Money and the relationships with the production/distribution companies who insist that their desirable channels also come with the less desirable/too-new-to-have-an-audience offerings.

https://www.techhive.com/article/3296376/why-a-la-carte-tv-still-isnt-happening.html

[Volhiker78]

We switched from Spectrum cable to YouTube streaming earlier this year.  YouTube is 65/month. You can probably shop around for cheaper streaming services than YouTube.  Streaming  is fine as long as your WiFi isn't being heavily stressed.  Pulling the plug on cable saves us about 30 dollars/month.  I think cable and satellite TV are dying - they are certainly losing customers left and right as they are priced too high compared to streaming.

[kaysixteen]

Thanks for that techhive article with all those links.  It is in my to do list for this week, to find alternatives to my current dismal programming options.  Indeed, looking for stuff worth watching, at all worth watching, on my 200+ channel Comcast package is usually a depressing experience.

[polly_mer]

Thanks for that techhive article with all those links.  It is in my to do list for this week, to find alternatives to my current dismal programming options.  Indeed, looking for stuff worth watching, at all worth watching, on my 200+ channel Comcast package is usually a depressing experience.

We use the On Demand search and use the recommendations from 'People who watched X also watched...' list. 

Amazon Prime Video also has suggestions for us based on what we've watched on their service.  That algorithm is getting better, but the new problem is we're familiar with all the suggestions.  Yep, that's a good movie from 1986 and we've seen it so many times over the decades that we can almost recite it by heart; we want something new to us.