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posted by cmn32480 on Tuesday November 10 2015, @12:46AM   Printer-friendly
from the cord-cutters-unite! dept.

The cable box, a crucial part of home theaters for decades, might be on the way out. Casual TV watchers say it's easier to find something to watch through online services such as Netflix and Hulu than it is to flip through hundreds of channels in hopes of finding something interesting. Other viewers complain that the boxes are poorly programmed and difficult to use. Even Congress doesn't particularly like the cable box: Senators Ed Markey (D-MA) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) recently decried the high cost most customers pay to rent one from their provider.

Cable companies are of two minds about this trend. Some, such as Comcast, are trying to find ways to make cable boxes better. Instead of ugly units with clumsy remote controls, they're scrambling to produce sleeker boxes loaded with software that makes it easier to get straight to TV shows and movies.

Are the cable companies missing the forest for the trees?


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 10 2015, @01:27AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 10 2015, @01:27AM (#261016)

    > No box at all has been possible for some time, if your TV has tuners capable of tuning all the cable channels

    Not anymore. A few years ago the cable companies lobbied the FCC to let them encrypt everything. Even local broadcast channels. They lied their asses off about how it was actually better for customers to make them rent a box for every set in the house so everything would be "consistent." Yet one more reason to be a pirate.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 10 2015, @02:07AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 10 2015, @02:07AM (#261033)

    And now besides a cable card, which my cable company rents out for $2 per month, you also need a tuner adapter to get all the channels.