Cordkillers 65 – Spoiler Alert: Susie Dies in this Episode

Cordkillers / April 6th, 2015

Netflix sort of brings back Mr. Show, Sling TV beefs up and apologizes, and Roku gets a big upgrade.

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CordKillers: Ep. 65 – Spoiler Alert: Susie Dies in this Episode
Recorded: April 6, 2015
Guest: Andrew Zarian

Intro Video

Primary Target

  • Netflix says House of Cards season four is coming in 2016
  • Netflix may be reviving Full House as… Fuller House 
  • Netflix orders sketch comedy series from Bob Odenkirk and David Cross
    – Netflix confirmed Season 4 of House of Cards will come in 2016.
    – Netflix also ordered a supernatural drama called Montauk, set in the ’80s and involving a boy’s disappearance and secret government experiments
    – TV Line, Hollywood Reporter AND The Wrap all say Netflix is considering a 13-episode Full House Spinoff called Fuller House, starring a grown-up Candace Cmeron Bure as DJ Tanner And Andrea Barber as Kimmy. Apparently Bob Saget, John Stamos and Dave Coulier would all make guest appearances.
    -Bob Odenkirk and David Cross have begun production on a sketch comedy show called “With Bob and David” that wil include four half-hour episodes and an hour-long making of special. Tim & Eric are listed as EPs. 

Signal Intelligence

Gear Up

Front Lines

  • George R.R. Martin is working on a new HBO series
    –George R. R. Martin is developing a second HBO series called Captain Cosmos, which will tell the story of a visionary sci-fi writer in 1949. Given that George R.R. Martin is not your bitch, how excited are you for this?
  • HBO is tweeting at all the people who wanted HBO Now years ago
    –HBO’s Twitter account began replying to tweets from people who said they would pay for an Internet-only HBO subscription and often used the hashtag HBoTakeMyMoney. Some of the tweets are as old as 2012. Is this an effective use of the HBO social media manager’s time?
  • Apple Asks TV Programmers to Supply Their Own Streams for Apple’s TV Service
    –Some industry executive are telling ReCode that Apple is asking TV networks to handle the streaming responsibilities to become part of a rumored Apple TV streaming service. Is this Apple letting the experts do the streaming, a way to stop ISPs from blocking services both or neither?
  • YouTube star Michelle Phan has officially outgrown YouTube
    –YouTube fashion celeb Michelle Phan has launched her own network called ICON which means in addition to YouTube, videos will appear on DailyMotion and Roku as well as social media, apps and the Web. Is THIS the future of video networks?
  • The Twin Peaks Revival Is Happening Without David Lynch
    –Well Twin Peaks may still come back to Showtime but it looks like it will be without David Lynch. He tweeted Sunday, “After 1 year and 4 months of negotiations, I left because not enough money was offered to do the script the way I felt it needed to be done.” Is anyone here besides Tom sad?

Under Surveillance

Dispatches from the Front

Hey guys, love the show and I’m really looking forward to tonight’s episode but I do have a request;

When talking about The Walking Dead or other shows based on comics or books, can you please not talk about the original source material. For instance I have purposely been lagging behind on The Walking Dead comics so that the story in the TV show doesn’t get spoiled for me (it’s fun not knowing what’s coming). But when talking about things that happened in the comics that haven’t happened in the show yet it gets dicey because the show will probably use the story or character, just in a slightly different way.

Anyway, keep up the great work!

David from hot then cold then hot then cold then hot then cold St. Paul
Just one of the Bosses (we are legion).

 

 

Nathan wrote in how he used his phone in 3G mode in a hotel hoping it would limit bandwidth usage but still be watchable for Game of Thrones. Here’s what he says: “For the first two episodes we used 800 Megabytes of data. The next night we watched two more episodes and I left my phone on LTE, for the 3rd and 4th episodes, we used over 2 Gigabytes of data! I have only done this once so I don’t know if this will continue to work or not. While the hotspot was on “3G only” it did buffer a couple of times, but it was still watchable. I did not observe a difference in picture quality either. So this worked great, it does require two devices, but if you travel with a tablet or a spouse you would have that anyway.

Thanks from Salt Lake City!

Nathan

 

Scott in London uses his Chromecast mostly for music and says “For me, the biggest problem I’ve found with using the Chromecast in hotels is the lack of a HDMI port on the TV. Maybe it’s different in America or maybe it’s saying something about the hotels I usually stay in, but I’d say about 60 – 70% of the hotel TVs I’ve come across in the last few years didn’t have a HDMI port. “

Scott

Message: Hey, Tom, when you said, “Hey, Alexa, add oil to my shopping list”, my Echo added it! But I don’t mind because I’ve been meaning to get sewing machine oil for my electric razor. Can you repeat that, but for Diet Coke this time? 🙂

Bob

 

 

You guys are sure hard on SmartTVs. I love my 50 inch Vizio SmartTV. Having 1 remote rules. It has Netflix, YouTube, Amazon Instant, and Huluplus and the Cast button on the apps on my phone launch the apps on my TV just like on a Chromecast. It will also play any MP4 and AVI files off a flash drive if I plug in to the USB port. One remote, and only one thing to have plugged in FTW!
Kevin from Cali

 

 

I never expected to tune in for Walking Dead spoilage and hear from a trio of people who find the subject of Scientology as fascinating as I do. Alex Gibney and HBO did a fantastic job. I’ve also been working on a documentary that I plan to have finished later this year. It’s called Knowledge Report: Scientology’s Spies, Lies and the Eternity Prize.

My film’s going to take a closer look at how people get into Scientology and the control issues that keep them in what I consider to be a skillfully designed mind-control factory. There’s a bunch of clips on the movie website:

http://www.knowledgereport-themovie.com/

I cut the cord about 5 years ago and have never looked back. And thank you for mentioning Movie Pass again several months ago in passing. You guys weren’t sure it was worth it but I checked it out and love it. I routinely see more than ten movies a months and AMC gives me full ticket price credit on my loyalty card which gives me back $10 so I am essentially paying $20 a month for all the movies I can see. I wouldn’t have done it without you guys.

All my best,
Mark
Wise Beard Man

 

 

My cousin’s wife, Astra, had to escape in the dead of night, a harrowing ordeal. She helped set up the website Ex-Scientology Kids ( http://exscientologykids.com/) to help others transition out of the organization. 

Mark

 

2015 Winter Movie Draft
draft.diamondclub.tv

  1. GFQ: $147,187,040
  2. Night Attack: $0
  3. DTNS: $0
  4. Frogpants: $0
  5. Amtrekker: $0
  6. Cordkillers: $0

Links
patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box
 

Cordkillers 64 – Cold Indifference

Cordkillers / March 30th, 2015

Is there enough in Vessel to win? Sling gets more complicated. The Fire TV gets hotel friendly.

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CordKillers: Ep. 64 – Cold Indifference
Recorded: March 30, 2015
Guest: None

Intro Video

Primary Target

  • Former Hulu CEO Jason Kilar’s Vessel Launches To The Public
    –Scam School is one of the launch programs 
    –    Vessel launched to the public March 24
    – Exclusives at least 72 hours early.
    – Adding a total of 135 creators to its current 30 and offered a 12-month free subscription for anyone who signs up in first three days.
    – You can still get 30 days free then it’s $2.99 a month
    – Vessel creators could get CPMs of about $50 through the service, versus an average of $2.20 per thousand views on YouTube.
    – $7 a user bounty for converted subscribers

Signal Intelligence

Gear Up

  • Amazon Fire TV Stick adds hotel-friendly Wi-Fi sign-in
    –Update to Fire TV Stick and Box
    – WiFi authentication systems
    – Hide access PIN from kids
    – Employ shortcuts to sleep and mirroring
    – Easily accessed Curated Prime music playlists
    –Fire TV Box Only
    – USB port enabled for storage drives
    – Bluetooth headphones

Front Lines

Under Surveillance

Dispatches from the Front

Hey guys! As someone who runs a website that produces a lot of local shows (http://trianglelife.tv) I think Meerkat and Periscope are total game changers. We now have the ability to do interviews, cover concerts and other live events with a mere cellphone! Who needs a tricaster, satellite hookup, and other expensive equipment? And don’t forget what this means for events like the Ferguson riots and the Arab Spring.

I’d like to hear your thoughts on the legal issues surrounding this technology. It’s fine if my friend let’s me live stream his band’s concert at a bar downtown, but what if I go to a Metallica concert or a pro wrestling event? There was a lot of talk last year about people’s rights to record the police during an arrest and the cops’ right to seize and access the phone to get the video off it. All that’s a moot point if the video is being streamed live on Twitter.

To your knowledge, how do the laws stand now and where do you think they will go in the future?

Thanks for a great show!

Bob.

 

Thanks for the great show. I thought I’ll let you know about my cord cutting experience here in Saudi Arabia. Just to clarify something, in Saudi we didn’t have cable until about 3 years ago with the two fiber providers started providing such a service. We rely on satellite tv, there are almost 300+ free channels and a couple of paid networks. I was able to stop using all of them. I currently have only internet and Netflix, for Netflix I am using a service called UnoTelly that acts as proxy to mask my connection as if I was in the USA or any other Netflix country. I also occasionally use iTunes and YouTube. My main box is an AppleTV after my WD Live device broke down. I just bought a Roku 3 and got Amazon Prime so will see how that works out. Being in a country where Torrenting in common and no one really cares I do use it a lot. Mainly for CBS, HBO stuff and Movies. I am trying to be all legal but its difficult here as there are hardly any legal services in Saudi at the moment. I am looking into seeing if I can get sling TV or might just wait for the Apple rumored service.

Hope this gives you an idea and keep up the good work

Turki

 

 

 

Longtime viewer, second time writer. My number came up and I am currently a Nielsen panel member in Chicago. It infuriates me to no end that nothing I watch via my Apple Tvs gets Nielsen credit. Not sure what to do with my anger except channel it your way in hopes some thing will change Nielsen corporate practices

As I’m sure you can guess, I’m not meant to reveal to anyone my status as a panel member, so please do feel free to cite anything you wish but please keep my name confidential 

Anonymous

 

 

 

Hi Brian and Tom: In general, I agree with Tom’s assessment that Kimmy Schmidt is two things at once: a great show and something that Brian just isn’t into.

Brian, I’m not going to tell you that you should like something you don’t, but please don’t say it’s a bad show just because you don’t like it. There are many shows on TV that I can tell are good but I just don’t like them.

What I do take issue with is that you’re mad at a show for doing what it’s trying to do, and telling it that it should do something else. I notice that you do this often and it’s the only thing that’s ever bugged me about your opinions on various media properties. You’re always saying “this show shouldn’t be about/doing this, it should be ____.” Well, maybe it doesn’t want to be ____. You really should judge the show for what it’s trying to be/do, not what you want it to. And if you don’t like what it’s trying to do, then maybe it’s not for you.

What I will say, Brian, is that Kimmy Schmidt might be doing more than you’re giving it credit for (particularly after watching three episodes). This article from the New Yorker does a great job at looking at the darker side of the show that’s hidden under the extreme bubbly exterior. It brought up some things that made me – someone who already loved the show as a comedy – think about it on a different level, and gave me a greater appreciation for what it’s trying to do.

In the end, I agree with Tom. Maybe you just don’t like shows like this. But again, it bothers me if you say it’s not good just because you don’t like it.

Matt from Sterling, VA

ps- personally, I laughed through all of the episodes and found one or two gut-busters in each.

 

 

 

Hey Tom and Brian,

Just some thoughts about The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. My goal isn’t to change Brian’s mind and get him to love it, but I think even he has to admit that NBC screwed up big time by not picking up the show and letting Netflix get it.

NBC recently announced that they are going to launch paid subscription internet streaming channels, and that the first offering would be a comedy channel. In promoting it they touted such great NBC comedy hits as The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, SNL, and … that’s about it. For a channel with such a great history of great sitcoms it seems like a huge mistake to not even be able to name a current hit sitcom. I think this shows why broadcast networks are in serious trouble. It appears they’re paying “so much” attention to cord cutting and potential internet distribution they’re forgetting the other half of the equation: shows that people actually want to watch.

Keep up the good work,
Your Boss Ben

PS – your thoughts and opinions on the matter are in no way tied to any potential future raises 😉

 

 

I think you guys with your fancy unity remotes are forgetting how great the CEC functionality is on the PS3. This means that you can have one box, hooked up to one tv, using one remote acting as your game system, tv, netflix, hulu, twitch box, music streaming box. This could be the death of the universal remote.

John W

 

Hello Brian & Tom, I wanted to send a message to let you know about something interesting I noticed while listening to your last show. While Tom & Anthony were trying to activate all my toys, I found myself suddenly panicking thinking I was going to need to tell everything to disregard. To my surprise, my Amazon Echo did not activate when Tom kept saying “Alexa”. I then proceeded to run my own experiment and rewind the podcast a few times to see if it was a fluke. My echo never awoke. I then asked Alexa for the weather and it immediately responded. I tried three more times to get Tom’s voice via the podcast to wake up my Echo to no avail. My assumption is the Echo is learning my voice and distinguishes between me (a legit query) and some podcast. Perhaps the next generation of voice interaction Anthony was asking for is closer than we all think!
Thanks for all you do and for the great show. Be well

Gunnar

 

Links
patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box

Cordkillers 63 – Cheese and Sausage

Cordkillers / March 23rd, 2015

Apple might be coming with a service, Sony launches PlayStation Vue, and Chromecast gets friendlier

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CordKillers: Ep. 63 – Cheese and Sausage
Recorded: March 23, 2015
Guest: Anthony Carboni

Intro Video

Primary Target

Signal Intelligence

  • Sony launches PlayStation Vue as bigger, pricier Internet TV
    -Sony launched PLayStation Vue in Philadelphia, Chiago and New York on Wednesday
    – $50 a month after a 7 day free trial
    – Live on demand (3 day on some) and DVR (28 days) over PS3 and PS4
    – IPad app in the works, will add more deice support
    – Channels CBS, NBC, Fox, Discover, Scripps, Turner, Viacom. 60 channels in base package
    – AMC coming next month/ No ABC(Disney ESPN), A&E, or PBS
    – $10 packages: sports nets/lifestyle (26 channels)
    – Can stream to 3 devices at once (but only one PS4)
  • Internet TV’s Big Chance to Oust Cable Is Almost Here
  • Dish, Sony Web TV Services Provide Test for ESPN
    –Peter Kafka at ReCode: Do people really care enough about sports, and ESPN specifically, to pay for it? Or are they happy to pay for lots of other stuff but not ESPN?

Gear Up

Front Lines

Under Surveillance  

Dispatches from the Front

Don’t know if you guys have seen this. i consider it big. in canada, crtc ruled cable cos. must offer 25 dollar basic cable and pick and pay for other channels on top of that.

CrucialWax

 

 

To Brian & Tom:
I miss the Movie Draft! It was one of my favorite parts of the old Frame Rate Show and I love when you have it in Cordkillers! I wish you did Movie Draft four times a year: Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter.
Bring Movie Draft back soon!

Michael

 

 

 

Hello my employees.

Now that Netflix has launched in Australia as of 1 hour and 20 minutes ago and I’ve checked out the library I thought I’d give first impressions.

First, I think the old guard of the Australian streaming industry Quickflix and Presto should be concerned. Theres enough overlap with Netflix and Stan (the other new competitor here) that their services with their smaller libraries will probably struggle going forward.

Second, I will be keeping my Stan subscription. Tho Netflix has what seems like the largest library Stan has picked up exclusives like Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, Star Trek and Amazon.com originals that Netflix will not be able to get here for the foreseeable future.

Third, while my new Australian Netflix account’s library is not as big as my US Netflix accounts ,it is big enough with most of the check boxes ticked that need to be.

Overall I am happy with their offering here and I will cancel my US Netflix account.

From your boss, Nik

 

–Netflix is coming to Australia and New Zealand today for AU $8.99/NZ $9.99 for the single-stream standard definition plan, AU $11.99/NZ $12.99 for the two-stream high definition plan, and AU $14.99/NZ $15.99 for the four-stream 4K ultra high definition “family” option. Too much?

 

 

 

 

I was just listening to last week’s episode and had some thoughts on Verizon’s new “toenail” service.

You talked about the likelihood of it being zero rated and then went on to question whether or not it would be exclusive to Verizon.

I think they will not make it exclusive precisely because it will be zero rated, on Verizon. As an ATT customer with a pitiful data cap they would be happy to allow me to sign up for their service, get fed up with my ATT cap and then try to entice me to switch to Verizon so I can watch all I want without having to pay for a bigger data plan.

That’s just my two cents.

 Dan in finally almost not snow covered Rochester (NY)

 

 

 

I wanted to share a little tip that I ran into this weekend. I finally killed the cord. I called Comcast on a Sunday. I was expecting to play chicken, as I had in the past, to haggle by bill back on to a promo deal. To my surprise the Comcast operator did not pass me into the retention department. He simply walked through the cancellation process. After this, I asked why I wasn’t forward to anyone else. The operator explained that the retention department was closed on Sundays. I thought this tip could help other listeners that don’t want to go through the ordeal of canceling their cable subscription.

Thanks,
(Your future boss)
Mike from Blustery Bloomington, Illinois

 

 

 

Well, I’ve listened to Brian mention the people who’s credit card has expired on patreon.com and though, “Wow, what’s with these idiots?” Well, it turns out I’m one of them. It had been almost 2 months (8 episodes) since I had been charged and that was about the time I got may new card. Great show and I’m happy to re-apply as a “boss.”

Andy

 

Links
www.patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box

Cordkillers 62 – Toenail, the Service

Cordkillers / March 16th, 2015

Will you buy a game console or a phone to watch cable? Or will you buy your HBO Now from Cablevision? Will you watch Tommy Wiseau’s show Neighbors?

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CordKillers: Ep. 62 – Toenail, the Service
Recorded: March 16, 2015
Guest: Scott Johnson

Intro Video

  •  

Primary Target

  • Sony plans U.S. launch of video-streaming service this year
    -Sony Computer Entertainment President Andrew House said in an interview with the Journal
    – PlayStation Vue will launch within 2 week sin New York, Philadelphia and Chicago
    – Testers in those cities have been using it for months
    – PS3 and PS4
    – 75 channels including CBS, FOX, NBC, Comedy Central, FX, Discovery [[NO ESPN YET]]
    – Store recorded shows in cloud for 28 days
    – Nationwide by end of 2015
  • Verizon Plans Digital Video Service, Signs DreamWorks, AwesomenessTV 
    -CFO Fran Shammo told an investor conference
    – Launch this summer
    – Aimed at people who want to consumer on wireless connections
    – Programming deal with Dreamworks AwesomenessTV
    – 200 hours of news shows – Awesomeness TV aimed at teens and DreamWorksTV for families. 

Signal Intelligence

  • Cablevision to Offer HBO Now to Broadband-Only Customers
    – Cablevision will offer HBO Now to broadband-only subscribers
    – Will provide pricing and other details about how HBO Now will be made available to broadband subs in the coming weeks.
    -Cablevision reported 2.68 million video and 2.76 million broadband customers

Gear Up

  • Roku to introduce two new-ish streaming boxes
    –Janko Roettgers on medium
    -Roku filing with FCC indicates two new models
    – The 4210X and 4230X feature “no change in hardware or in existing RF relevant portion,”
    – No ethernet port

Front Lines

  • YouTube may launch subscription video service for a monthly fee
    –A long report on the state of YouTube quotes an unnamed YouTube partner saying they were approached about being part of a subscription YouTube service. Would you pay for top tier YouTube content?
  • Nielsen Charts Reach of Video Streaming
    –Nielsen says 36% of US households subscribe to Netflix, 13% to Amazon Prime and 6.5% to Hulu Plus. What happens when those numbers pass 50%?
  • ‘Firefly’ stars reunite for crowdfunded Web series
    –Alan Tudyk and Nathan Fillion have raised almost $2 million for a Web show called Con Man about two stars from a cult classic sci fi show that was canceled too soon, one (Fillion) has gone on to stardom, the other (Tudyk) pretty much makes his living from Cons. Will this fill the Firefly-shaped hole in your heart?
  • Now HBO Wants 10 Seasons Of Game Of Thrones
    –    HBO programming president Michael Lombardo told Entertainment Weekly he’d prefer to have 10 season of Game of Thrones but he’ll have an honest conversation with the showrunners. QUOTE “If they weren’t comfortable going beyond seven seasons, I trust them implicitly and trust that’s the right decision—as horrifying as that is to me.” Is Lombardo going to eff this up?
  • Twitter’s building a second-screen experience for TV shows
    –Twitter is testing a feature in its phone app call TV Timelines that shows Tweets, videos, GIFs and Photos related to the show broken down into Highlights, Media, and All. Do you want this?
  • Netflix had House of Cards’ third season made in 6K
    –Season 3 of House of Cards was shot in 6K even though the masters were delivered in 4K and the 6K versions merely sit in a production house archive. Forward thinking or a waste?

Under Surveillance

Dispatches from the Front

Brian, Brian, Brian,

Big Hero Six? Really? Dude I can’t believe you bought into that one. “Big Hero Scooby-Doo with Robots” is more like it. One of the most predictable, safe, boring thing I’ve ever seen from Disney. It really did NOT deserve the Best Animated Feature. Looked pretty, but even that was pretty boring too.

Do you want to show your little girls the best animated feature of 2014?? Sit down and watch “Song Of The Sea” with them. I took my niece and she absolutely loved it.

“Song Of The Sea” trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgbXWt8kM5Q

Take it from someone who works in the animation industry. BH6 was not the best. Not even close. Please watch SOTS. You will not be disappointed.

Steve

 

Hi Tom, Brian and random guest. I have been debating for a while on which streaming service to get. Most of my friends have both and are happier with Netflix but also say that there are some things on Hulu Plus that they can’t get on Netflix I can only afford one and am torn between the two any advice would be great. Love the show

Will

 

Some people don’t mind spoilers, so they always listen to It’s Spoilerin’ Time. I try to avoid them, so I only listen to the Spoilerin’ Time segments for shows/movies that I’ve seen.

I emailed you a while back requesting timestamps in the Spoilerin’ Time episode descriptions, and I can’t thank you enough for providing that.

But still, the situation commonly arises that you discuss something on Spoilerin’ Time that I haven’t seen yet, so I skip it. But then, weeks, maybe even months later, I see it, and I would like to go back and see what my favorite hosts had to say about it. In the past, that involved some Google work.

So I went back through all the IST episodes to see what you covered. I converted all the timestamps you provided to timecode YouTube links, for a scrollable, searchable, clickable list of every episode and movie you’ve covered in the segments: 

tinyurl.com/spoilerguide

It’s a bit rough around the edges. The shows are in reverse chronological order, based on when you covered them, but the episodes are in forward chronological order. Hm, that’s a little weird. Also, there weren’t episode numbers in a lot of the show descriptions. In some places, I assumed, in others, I left it blank. And I converted all the timecodes manually, so inevitably, a few will probably be wrong. I probably pasted the wrong YouTube link in a couple places too.

I’m not sure how best to distribute this info, I think it would be best to get it into a wiki format so that others can join in the fun, especially for the older episodes without any timestamp info.

Anyway, the show is fantastic, I love everything. I hope some folks find this useful.

Joe the keyboard fanatic

 

Love the show. Would like to support you on Patreon, but I would have a hard time explaining that expense to my wife. A one time purchase of a product would be easier. Ergo, I would like to purchase a Cordkillers Tshirt or Mug. Any plans?

Michael

 

Regarding Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: According to IMDB:

The first seven episodes of the series were edited with the assumption they would be aired on NBC and adhered to a 22 minute time limit and included transitions for commercials. After the show was acquired by Netflix the episodes were reedited to remove commercial transitions and jokes that were previously omitted due to running time constraints were reinserted.

Jay in luxurious Katy, TX
 

Links
patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box

It’s Spoilerin’ Time Episode 61

Cordkillers / March 11th, 2015

Better Call Saul (Ep. 5), The Walking Dead (Ep. 12), Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Ep. 1), House of Cards (Ep. 3-6), The Shield (501).

01:46 – Better Call Saul (Ep. 5)
11:55 – The Walking Dead (Ep. 12)
17:07 – Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Ep. 1)
21:15 – House of Cards (Ep. 3-6)
32:13 – The Shield (501)

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Cordkillers 61 – In Time for VEEP

Cordkillers / March 10th, 2015

HBO coming Now to Apple, later to others and Sling TV gets better but how much better?

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CordKillers: Ep. 61 – In Time for VEEP
Recorded: March 9, 2015
Guest: Robert Krekel

Intro Video 

Primary Target

  • HBO NOW to launch in early April
  • Apple first to offer HBO’s standalone online service
    –    Richard Plepler HBO Now – EXCLUSIVE partner at launch (At launch, HBO NOW will be available on iOS devices and on PCs.)
    – All TV and movies
    – Early April $14.99 first month free if you sign up through Apple in April, in time for April 12
    – GoT trailer
    – $69 Apple TV price
    –    Apple exclusivity lasts through July.
    –No word on restrictions to logins etc.

Signal Intelligence

  • AMC, IFC and Epix go live on Sling TV
  • Dish Sling TV Service Grabs 100,000 Sign-Ups in First Month
    –– Sling TV got AMC and IFC Some 3-day replay. I had Better Call Saul and TWD available. None for IFC.
    – as well as a new “Hollywood” pack $5 a month package that gives 4 Epix channels, Sundance TV and on-demand up to 7 days.
    – ReCode sources say 100,000 signed up for SlingTV
    – Tom called and got the Roku Stick for free by pre-paying three months
    – You can now add and subtract service from the website without calling.

Gear Up

  • TiVo revenue, profit beat estimates as subscriptions rise
    -TiVo’s net subscriber additions rose to 340,000 in the fourth quarter from 319,000, a year earlier.
    – Better than expected revenue and profit
    – Customer acquisition cost fell 25%
    – The company sells its products through cable TV partners such as Virgin Media in the UK, ONO in Spain and Com Hem AB in Sweden.
    – AND TiVoo Roamio OTA don’t forget

Front Lines

  • Roku vs. Apple TV vs. Chromecast vs. Amazon Fire TV: Which streamer should you buy?
    –CNET has a great article and chart up comparing Roku, Apple TV, Fire TV, Chromecast and Android TV. Just a tip to check out. We’ll have the link in the show notes.
  • Millennials Find YouTube Content More Entertaining, Relatable Than TV: Study
    –According to a study from Hunter qualitative Research, People aged 13-24 spend 11.3 hours a week watching free online video compared with 8.3 hours of regular TV. They can relate to online video it makes them feel good and helps them relax more than regular TV. Keep in mind the study was made by YouTube content producer Defy media. 
  • Why No One’s Talking About ‘Cord-Forevers’
    –Meanwhile Jay Fulcher, President and CEO, Ooyala wrote an interesting guest column on ReCode pointing out we never hear of Cord-forevers because nobody is saying they will never cut the cord. A recent Nielsen report found that, from 2013 to 2014, digital video grew 53 percent among 18- to 34-year-olds, 80 percent aged 35-49, and 60 percent in 50-64 year-olds. 
  • Video news app Haystack wants to be the CNN for cord cutters
    –GigaOm profiled a an app that is sort of Pandora for news segments that works best with a Chromecast or through airplay.. Called Haystack it collects preferences from you then streams news segments from various sources which you can choose to skip by swiping. It learns from what you skip as well as from offering hashtags of topics that you can star.
  • HBO GO is finally coming to the PlayStation 4 today
    –Game Consoles are getting crippled apps! HBO Go finally came to PlayStation 4 but the tech press is less than pleased as Comcast is not supporting the login yet. And TimeWarner’s app came to the Xbox One but without any live channels, only its on demand offering. Hooray!
  • NBC wants you to pay for streams of Jimmy Fallon, SNL
    –The Wall Street Journal has SOURCES and those sources say NBC is working on a subscription comedy service. It would include full eps of SNL and the Tonight Show as well as other clips and online-exclusive programming for around $3 a month.

Under Surveillance

Dispatches from the Front

My wife and I were thrilled to see House of Cards show up in our long list of shows just like anything else would. We then sat down to watch the first episode and…. I remembered why we never use the Netflix app on our Tivo. It’s super slow to start up in general, it doesn’t even look as nice as the app on my no-longer-supported Google TV, and the last straw was that when we hit play on the episode it buffered to 25% and just stopped. We tried to play it this way five times, but gave up. I just switched over to the Chromecast and was up and running in about 30 seconds.

I absolutely love my Tivo, but they’re making it SO HARD TO LOVE THEM! 🙂

Matt

 

 

A hobby I enjoy is making the DYI antennas from the internet and the one I built this weekend is the best performance antenna to date. It can be found at http://www.instructables.com/id/Indoors-Fractal-HDTV-Antenna/ This is also one of the cheapest designs I have made. There are no 2×4’s or PVC or reflectors to make. I have yet to try this on a longer run of cable but I was able to get every local channel at nearly full signal in the basement with this one. This weekend i’m going to swap this with my attic antenna for fun and see how it performs there. The design of this one is really designed to be right next to the TV on a short run of cable. I highly encourage anyone looking for a fun project for an evening to try this one out. One complaint is I found the download of the pattern to not be scaled correctly. I had to re size it to get it to print out to proper scale. So just make sure to check the listed dimensions on the print out before you start making it.

Dan

 

I live in the DC Metro area, and I’m paying Verizon about $200 a month for a phone number I don’t want (that I’d rather move to google voice), 300+ TV channels I don’t use (mind you SD+HD count as 2 channels) only because it’s the cheapest tier that has BBCAmerica, and 75/75 internet, which isn’t terribly bad, when I get it.

Mostly the service is pretty good, the 75 down is consistent and often better. Upload isn’t even close (usually more like 15). I try getting fewer channels from time to time, or ditching the phone altogether, but in the end neither really saves me money. Last time I tried, I instead got all of the major pay channels for free for a year (SHO, HBO, STARZ, Cinemax, etc.)

I do have a question that I haven’t heard addressed. The Beeb geofences the iPlayer so only those paying the license fee (more or less) have access. I understand the reasoning here.

Why do they not have an option for those of us not required to pay the fee to sign up for a paid account, thus allowing us to pay the fee. I’m pretty sure I pay more trying to get time-delayed BBC content via BBCAmerica (and even more delayed via PBS) than the license would cost me. That might cut down on the “piracy” even Jeremy Clarkson mentioned in this season’s Top Gear premiere.

Rob

 

I was curious if anyone on the show knew anything about what has happened to Hitbliss? When they started I was more than happy to use their service as an alternative to torrenting and was quite confused when they stated on their blog that they were shutting down the beta to focus on bringing the service back in a few months. I think that this was about a year ago. They gave no mention to any opposition. However, I have never seen a service stop their beta if it was successful unless it had opposition.

Mike

 

 

Hello Tom and Bryan,

I want to know your thoughts on the future of internet since people are cutting the cord. Will this force the cable/internet providers to up their speeds to remain competitive (especially with 4k becoming a future standard), with or without the new FFC law?

Thank you,
John

Links

patreon.com/cordkillers
Dog House Systems Cordkiller box