Announced in a third quarter earning report earlier today, Comcast informed investors that the company lost approximately 165,000 cable subscribers between the months of July through September of 2011. While cable subscribers continue to remain the most profitable portion of Comcast business, more consumers are dropping cable service for alternative options including over-the-air channels and set-top boxes like the Roku. The average Comcast cable subscriber spent approximately $138.58 per month during the third quarter or a bit over $1,650 a year. With the combined cost of Hulu Plus, Netflix and Amazon Prime Instant just over $270 a year, it’s clear that some consumers are moving away from cable due to financial constraints.
However, Comcast saw an increase of about 261,000 high-speed Internet subscribers during the same time period. This brings the amount of Comcast high-speed Internet subscribers to just under 18 million while video customers have fallen to just over 22 million. It’s likely that a portion of the cable subscribers picked up Comcast high-speed service to access online video sources. While video subscribers have decreased, the rate of decline has fallen since the previous year. During the third quarter of 2010, Comcast lost about 275,000 cable subscribers. Overall, the company posted a profit during the third quarter from a combination of cable, high-speed Internet and voice sales.
According to claims by Time Warner, the rival to Comcast believes that the majority of consumers that cancel service are doing so for financial reasons rather than moving to online video sources. However, Time Warner lost about 128,000 video subscribers in the third quarter of 2011 and gained about 90,000 high-speed Internet subscribers as well. It’s also possible that consumers have started to split services between companies. For instance, using DirecTV to provide satellite access throughout a home and signing up with Time Warner or another cable company for high-speed Internet access.
Personally I use my DISH Network DVR to record and watch all my shows. I mean you do have the option to stream shows online, but newer shows are often risky and usually only available from sites that will harm your computer. I used to have cable until I started working for DISH and realized that there are lots more affordable packages with DISH. There’s even The Blockbuster Movie Pass for streaming movies and a one disc by mail service that I added to my subscription for only $10 a month. I pay a total of $46 a month (plus tax) for DISH which is about 1/3 as much as I was paying cable.
How many of you guys are going online for all your video entertainment? I haven’t made the leap for a few reasons:
- i like my dvr. record shows and sit down and watch when i want all through my tv
- seems like a pain hooking up a device to the tv, be it my laptop, google tv, etc.
- it sucks going to multiple places to find different shows IMHO.
What are people doing to make it easy?
I still use my DVR for most recordings. Then its Netflix for older shows. I don’t use Hulu because its not available on the PS3.
Comcast HD quality sucks and their DVR’s are pretty darned slow too.
I don’t even use netflix anymore after their pricing model changes.
I haven’t had cable for over 3 years and no one in my family has complained. Between netflix on the ps3 and a streaming DLNA server on a pc in the closet to serve up HD movies and TV shows that i’ve ripped from disc there has never really been a moment where we’ve had nothing to watch. Shows that are not available via streaming are always available through alternative channels online. Why would I pay for advertisements, endless repeats of syndicated shows, censorship. I’m not much of a tv watcher so I don’t miss a lot of the poor quality programming that the networks shove down their pipes but my wife is and she has told me she doesn’t miss it.