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Cordkillers 66 – HBO Now or Later?

HBO launches on Apple, Cablevision and Sling TV, and YouTube to sell subscriptions.

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CordKillers: Ep. HBO Now or Later?
Recorded: April 11, 2015
Guest: None

Intro Video 

Primary Target

Signal Intelligence

Gear Up

Front Lines

Under Surveillance

Dispatches from the Front

You guys were talking about how the Tivo Romio was the ultimate cord cutters box because it combined OTA DVR with apps. Well sirs! I submit to you that now that Microsoft is finally getting around to supporting an OTA tuner for the Xbox One here in the US, I saw they just went and beat Tivo and Channel Master to the punch! Just hold on and let me explain my case:

Before you say the price difference to too much it would take you about two years to pay the same amount of money you gave Tivo for the subscription that you spend to get the Xbox. Yes, the initial cost would be higher, but the Tivo option just spreads that out over two years. And over that two years, the Xbox One will continue to get more updates and capabilities, the Tivo will be just as slow and frustrating as it was on day one and you just keep giving them more money!

Dustin

 

 

Hey Employees. Quick question here.

I’d like to get into the Breaking Bad universe and I’m wondering as someone thats only ever seen the pilot of Breaking Bad should I watch Breaking Bad first or since Better Call Saul is a prequel should I watch that first?

-From your boss, Nik.

 

 

Given the recent news regarding Sling TVs hiccups during the final four basketball games, I’m curious as to what expectations for downtime for live internet-delivered TV are?

No downtime is certainly best, however I know personally I have held higher expectations for traditional broadcast methods compared to internet-streamed video. Although always annoying when streams fail / buffer / etc., I always expected it at times as it was new technology and/or rarely time sensitive material to watch. Sling TV is new tech itself and still maturing, but will viewers (from tech savvy to my grandparents) be expecting ‘traditional broadcast stability’ or ‘internet broadcast stability’?

Of course there have always been technical issues with the ‘old’ methods as well. However I cannot remember the last time a major live TV event went down for more than a few seconds over traditional broadcast methods (perhaps I’ve been lucky). At the moment, these major live TV events, and high viewer counts, must be massive quality concerns for IP-delivered TV streams. Quality and stability are even more vital given the events themselves are a major reason for purchasing services like Sling TV in the first place.

This will hopefully become a non issue as tech improves of course.

Keep up the fine work!

Your boss down under,
Steve

 

 

I thought I was the only one! After paying and seeing a terrible movie in 2007 (REDACTED) sitting through an hour and half to find out that he still dies (ohh yeah spoiler alert, but it doesn’t even matter it’s so terrible Do Not Watch It!) I seek out every movie and TV show plot before I invest my time watching it. I have sympathy for the spoiler-phobic and try not to spoil things for my friends and family but personally I’m not paying for something if I know I won’t like the end.

You guys are great, I love your show, and I’m thrilled to be a patron! 🙂

Thanks,

Steve B.

 

Hey guys,

Just thought I would chime in on the spoiler discussion.

I would have to admit I am definitely closer to the Andrew Zarian spectrum when it come to spoilers (maybe its a Queens thing).

I tend to enjoy spoilers and never try to avoid them unless I know I am about to see something soon anyway, and would of course not seek out a show called spoilerin time if I was afraid of possible spoilers.

I will admit, if it wasn’t for you guys spoiling Breaking Bad every week on Frame Rate, I probably would not have taken the plunge to binge watch it all. And I still greatly enjoyed it, despite knowing *blank* is blown up using *blank*

By the way Brian, if you do read this on the show it might need to be in spoilerin time. Despite the blanks people will still get upset.

Cheers!
Byron

 

 

Employees, fellow owners, stop complaining about spoilers if you don’t like them don’t listen! I get tired of hearing about should we have spoilers, shouldn’t we have spoilers, oh my God we need to do this about spoilers no no we need to do this. I don’t listen to here 5-10 minutes of debating spoiler protocol weekly!

Ryan

 

 

I am a long time supporter of cordkillers and shaved the cord down to only my local channels.

My question is about Yahoo! Screen and their recent original programing. I am a big fan of community and love that they are giving it a second life. Since I was in the app I also decided to check out Sin City Saints, which appears to be another solid show. I now see that they are bringing in some show called Other Space. The thing is that Yahoo! has been providing these shows without any visible commercials on the roku or apple TV apps. Is the plan a future subscription service or is there something else going on? With some of this quality programming, I would hate to see it all vanish because they are not getting a return on their investment. Just wondering what Tom Brain and guest might think about what is strategy.

Love the who bro.

Anonymous

 

 

 

Do you know of a way to get an alert when your favorite team is the free game of the day on MLB.tv? Maybe by using iftt.com? In this case I know what I want to watch. I just don’t know when it is available to watch.

In case you don’t know what I’m talking about, as part of the MLB.tv streaming service they offer one game a day for free. I don’t pay for the service, but when my favorite team, the Chicago Cubs, is the free game of the day I would like to seize the opportunity. I have WGN America on cable and unfortunately this year the Cubs games that are on WGN are only on the broadcast version of the channel available in the Chicago area, but not WGN America the cable channel available via cable throughout the country.

This is similar to what TBS did a few years ago when it separated TBS the cable channel from TBS the broadcast channel available only in the Atlanta area. However, in that case the broadcast version became known as Peachtree TV with separate branding and programing, while the cable version stayed TBS (very funny). The Braves games that were available on TBS are essentially now on Peachtree TV.

In WGN’s case both the broadcast version and WGN America have the same programing as far as I can tell except for the lack of Chicago Cubs games. And the subtle difference in branding between WGN and WGN America confuses most consumers.

Bill near Athens, Georgia

 

2015 Winter Movie Draft
draft.diamondclub.tv

  1. GFQ: $252,522,000
  2. Cordkillers: $13,500,000
  3. Night Attack: $0
  4. DTNS: $0
  5. Frogpants: $0
  6. Amtrekker: $0

Links

patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box

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