We have a nice 50” plasma TV. To go with it, we have the absolute minimum digital TV package from Comcast.

This month our “intro” package expired and our bill went up to the normal price of $70. Seventy @#$% Dollars!! $70 (which includes $10 in "taxes") to see high quality commercials. I find such a price simply outrageous.

We have cable TV for only one reason: Watching sports – Basketball for me; the Tour de France for Angela.

We used to have cable for our Tivo so we could record first-run TV shows like Battlestar Galactica but earlier this year, I made the switch to Netflix. If I wait 6 months, I can watch the shows in good quality WITHOUT commercials for FREE. Angela started to watch more shows on her Mac as streaming content straight from the network websites.

The price was just the last straw. Earlier in the month I had another Comcast is the Devil experience.

All the major networks offer free over-the-air HD broadcasts with better quality than Comcast provides. The FCC requires Comcast to provide the same free digital channels on cable (called “clear QAM”) for people that get the basic analog cable. We used that service because Fox does not come in well at our current house. Last month, Comcast shut down the clear QAM channels and filed a lawsuit with the FCC to stop providing such “free” content. I thought my PC was broken because the channels stopped working and inappropriately got irate with Microsoft…

Hey Comcast, go fuck yourselves. You are a government-sanctioned monopoly but exhorting your customers is not a good long-term business model. We will find alternatives.

For now I will pay for your service during the sports season but only because I have to and I wont be happy about it. The rest of the year, you wont get my money. I may be a customer but I am not a happy one.

And I am not alone. More and more, people are leaving cable to save money and finding plenty of entertainment out there that is cheaper or free.

So fix your pricing or better yet fix your offering. Customers want ala cart offerings – pick individual channels for less money. If you don’t, you will be replaced by digital alternatives.

I was really excited to get digital cable for the first time this basketball season. Now I am equally excited to see cable turned off on Monday and have them pick up their gigantic cable box. Good riddance.

The future means less CATV.