It's official, folks:
cable companies now have more subscribers for broadband internet than they have for video. Not by much, but still ... it's a landmark, and an important one. Ever wonder why the broadband companies are fighting so hard to do away with net neutrality? It's because they see the same writing on the wall that you do: the days of cable video are over, and they're desperate to turn the new business into their old business.
The top cable guys now have 49,915,000 Internet subscribers, compared to 49,910,000 TV subscribers. And to be sure, most cable customers are getting both services. Still, this is directionally important. The future for the pay TV guys isn't selling you pay TV - it's selling you access to data pipes, and pay TV will be one of the things you use those pipes for. ... Some smart people suggest that the cable guys would not be unhappy if most of their business moved over to broadband instead of video, since there are much better margins - and almost no competition - for broadband.
Deadline.com is reporting the same thing, with some added information:
Cord cutting? Not entirely. Many likely switched to AT&T's U-verse or Verizon FiOS, which together added 290,000 video customers. ... Adjusting for household growth it appears that cord cutting slowed to an annualized rate of less than 400K homes, a meaningful deceleration and well below the peak (but still modest) rates of cord cutting seen in 2012. ... Cable companies had 59% of the wired broadband market. The bottom line: The 'dying dinosaur' Pay TV industry is growing revenue more than twice as fast as the wireless industry.
Cord cutting still takes work, from the initial setup on through the day to day (and hour to hour) selection of what the hell am I going to download and what the hell am I going to watch / stream now. Then toss in multiple providers and being responsible for all your own hardware, and the sheen fades a bit.
I had every intention of finally getting the family off the satellite TV teat, but stuff like XBMC and MythTV still takes work, and in the end you're still picking and choosing what to to watch every damn time. TV Channels are for a nation bred to be cows, and we're still cows. We want to relax a bit after working in the pasture all day (bad analogy I know).
Besides, the newest whole-home DVR setups from the satcos like Da Hoppa and Genie make things disarmingly easy by comparison.
Meanwhile I never even got MythTV set up the way I wanted, let alone order the HD Homerun tuner card(s) and all the gear required for each separate TV setup. I want it to be easier to go DIY. It's still not, as far as I know.
Sorry for the slightly off topic rambling...