Comcast Moving Turner Classic Movies into a Higher Price Tier Causing Heads to Explode!

This has really pissed me off. TCM is one of the channels that I watch the most on Comcast. I think it's time to get rid of cable.

Yep. Just dropped them as my cable service. Fuck you, Comcast.

I'd love to know whether they expected this sort of reaction and decided it still made more sense, financially. Regardless, they've made it a practice of removing channels (TCM, MGM) and expecting users to sign up for additional packages/tiers in order to keep those stations. Ridiculous.

Watch stuff on Tubi, Plutotv and borrow DVDs from the library.

They had just brought it back down within the last year (it was part of the standard package for years and a few years ago they elevated it).

[quote] Watch stuff on Tubi, Plutotv and borrow DVDs from the library.

None of this replaces the TCM experience, which includes movies not available on DVD, informative introductions by the hosts, or just turning the channel on at any given time and watching what they're showing. A lot of us, especially older people, don't want to have to "work" to watch content.

We got rid of dish a couple years ago and hooked up a rooftop antenna. It works great and the picture is beautiful, even better than with cable OR dish. I get CoziTV and MeTV and PBS and I don't watch much TV anyway. For movies, I have Hulu and Amazon Prime. When I get a hankering to see a classic movie, I rent it from Amazon, where old movies are cheap (usually 2 bucks for 24 hours).

I was sick to death of paying a fortune to subsidize ESPN/sports, which I never watch. Over time, more and more specialized channels are becoming available. For example, if you like British TV or mysteries, there's Britbox or Acorn TV. I hope that someday soon TCM will become available as a separate stream and we'll be able to subscribe, because it's the one thing on cable that I truly miss. (Then again, nothing can bring back Robert Osborne. Sigh.)

In an ideal world, sports fans wouldn't have to pay for "All About Eve," and classic movie fans wouldn't have to subsidize sports. That seems fair.

[quote] I really wonder how this will all hash out in the end.

The smaller streaming services will get eaten by the bigger streaming service, or services. My guess, Disney will be a giant streaming monopoly in 15 - 20 years dictating what the masses are allowed to view for their giant Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, etc. back lot archives.

sorry, ... are allowed to view FROM their giant ...

[quote] A lot of us, especially older people, don't want to have to "work" to watch content.

But eldergays are also notoriously cheap, and can't have it both ways - can't have cheap/free and plentiful.

I’ll miss TCM if only for it not having any idiotic and annoying commercials.

Check with your local libraries, as most offer you movies via streaming these days. My local library offers them through hoopladigital.com.

We have a better option in the UK called 'Talking Pictures TV' which is supported by advertising and broadcast for free on Terrestrial and Satellite TV.

They have some really rare unavailable movies and TV shows. Nobody here would pay a premium for TCM.

Yes, R12, you have such wonderful free TV and nobody would deign to pay for programming!

Er, except for the License Fee that all Brits under 75 have to pay every year just to watch TV. Any TV, receiving any broadcast or cable programming at all, with or without an antenna.

Oh, the annual fee? £154.50. Just about 200 bucks. And then you see ads anyway.

Some "free TV."

We have to pay the £154.50 to fund the BBC (no Ad's). But we do get the BBC Iplayer streaming service included.

We also get another 80 terrestrial channels (inc movie channels) and free access to ITV Hub, All4, My5, UKTV Play, CBS Catchup and Horror Channel streaming services as long as you have a half decent TV or Roku.

Doesn't seem like too bad a deal compared to US offerings. Cable isn't really essential unless you are a total couch potato who watches TV 18 hours a day.

Just like other American corporations, Comcast only cares about squeezing every last dollar from its subscribers so that its CEO can keep pocketing $35 million a year.

CUT THE CORD!

Other subscription services include TCM, including Hulu (which is partly owned by Comcast, unfortunately.)

How does TCM work with Hulu? Do you select a specific movie to stream or can you watch it live?

I have a million channels with Comcast, including HBO and Showtime, and thought this change wouldn’t apply to me since I give them so much money every month. At contraire. I just turned to TCM and saw that I need an upgrade if I want to watch. Fuck you, Comcast.

I wrote Comcast a snotty letter and they want to talk! Haven't made contact with them yet to hash things out, but fuck them! Try something like this:

As a Comcast customer since 1992, I am writing to express my immense aggravation with the recent snatching away of the TCM channel to package it with a bunch of unwanted sports channels, in an attempt to force customers to pay extra for what they want (TCM), coupled with a bunch of crap they do not want (the rest of the crummy package).

Since Comcast has decided to downsize the services I have been paying for under a guise your excessively greedy corporation describes as, “We…sometimes make changes to ensure we’re offering a wide variety of programming at the best value…”, I will likewise be immediately downsizing the expendable features I’ve paid for far too long. I’ve begun shopping for my own modem and will be returning Comcast’s rental modem as soon as possible. I will also be canceling the HD viewing option.

I’m pretty busy, but my next step will be to cut out Comcast entirely. I am looking into packages offered through Dish Network and Direct TV. Even if the pricing is similar, I am so annoyed with Comcast, I will happily move to one of your competitors. Expect to hear from me in the next few weeks about canceling your services entirely.

As only one customer writing a private email, I don’t expect to make much of an impression on a behemoth like Comcast. But I did a little online research about Comcast’s TCM extortion Sunday morning, and it looks like many customers who formerly enjoyed TCM are united in their anger about this change, and blasting their displeasure on Twitter and other social media. May they keep spreading the word.

Everyone has noticed that Comcast’s so-called “best value” is only what’s best for Comcast, while the customer is continually gouged into paying more for less. I hope all your disgruntled customers refuse to pay extra fees for TCM and that they, like me, eliminate extra features and eventually find other options for their television viewing, resulting in massive revenue losses for Comcast. It’s what you deserve.

Patsy Kelly would be mortified. I can still hear her saying "Hey Toots, don't do that."

TCM is pirated like crazy on European satellite TV, I must have 8 different options to watch it with my motorized dish (card sharing).

Same With HBO.

I live in a semi rural (but rapidly changing) area,and comcast is our ONLY option for internet. Satellite was horrible,so I basically have zero choice if I want the internet. I would give anything to have an option,so I could call comcast and tell them to stick it right up their greedy asses,but alas.

Comcast's customer experience has always been so horrific that they had to rebrand as Xfinity in an effort to shed its bad image.

I cancelled cable but unfortunately have to keep their internet until 5G finally pops up, then I can completely "cut the cord".

Bundling TCM with a sports package seems like a hilarious prank to provoke the elder gays and ältere Frauen.

R17 Hulu offers a Live TV service for about $45 a month, which has 60 channels including TCM. It also includes your local network channels such as ABC, NBS, CBS and Fox. Premium channels such as HBO are add-ons.

What's great about it is there's no contract, you can cancel at any time.

I also have Amazon Fire TV, which is a one-time charge. It offers a wide array of movies and TV shows and original programming from Amazon.

As you can see from R45, you might end up spending almost as much money on streaming services as on cable, if you're not careful. An internet connection and a few small streaming subscriptions and you're easily at $150 a month.

Er, R25.

I called Comcast and told them I was looking at other cable providers. They made me a deal where I got TCM and other channels, but I had to give up HBO and Starz (which I rarely watched anyway).

Just curious what everybody is paying for cable. I'm up to $205 a month. Is that typical, or am I being ripped off?

Turner Classic Movies is now owned by AT&T's WarnerMedia since their purchase of TimeWarner Entertainment. Since AT&T is a direct competitor of Comcast with their ownership of DirecTV and AT&T Uverse they really don't want to be giving AT&T any revenue.

Comcast which owns MSNBC doesn't provide MSNBC on their cheapest cable package, you have to pay more if you want MSNBC but Comcast provides FOX and CNN (which is also now owned by AT&T) for free with their cheapest package, this makes zero sense. You would think they would want as many viewers as possible for MSNBC since they own it.

If I didn't call and complain my basic plan would run over $300/month R28. I'm talking about their package plan with phone/internet/cable. Right now I pay around $165/month for all three services with HBO, but that is after calling and complaining about their rates. The only reason I keep the phone is I don't want to give out my cell phone number.

Why anybody pays for TV in this day and age is ridiculous. Just pirate everything.

It's annoying, especially since they got rid of Filmstruck. They need their own streaming service, like Criterion. Too many people are doing without cable these days.

[quote] Why anybody pays for TV in this day and age is ridiculous. Just pirate everything.

Well duh if everyone pirated the companies would have no revenue.

Companies don't lose much revenue to piracy, people who download movies wouldn't have taken out a subscription anyhow.

The bigger problem here is that Comcast in the USA are charging US customers much more than the rest of the world pays. TCM is included in most movie subscriptions in the rest of the world and without sports the average price inc fibre broadband and phone is under $60 a month.

Some countries even give a cellphone package included that price range, usually about 250minutes, 1 GB data and unlimited texts.

Customers in the US are being gouged.

On top of having to pay more for the "sport & entertainment" package that now carries TMC there's a hidden $7 "sport fee" that no one seems to know what's for.

Comcast/xfinity Is one of the biggest rackets currently operating in the U.S.

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I really recommend the app called JustWatch which will show you where any given movie is available via streaming, either for free or to rent.

If you like old low-budget movies, YouTube has a ton for free. Type in a search term like [italic] full movie 1951 [/italic] and browse from there, you'll find quite a few accounts that have hundreds of old movies in full.

A ton of movies are on Amazon's Starz channel which is only an additional $6 a month I think, if you already have Prime.

Tubi is pretty good and free but some of their movies are edited for TV versions, so be aware of that.

I subscribe to Criterion, Fandor, Prime, Netflix and Hulu, for a total of about $50 per month. I'm cancelling Fandor and Netflix because I never use them which will drop my costs down to closer to $30 a month.

R37 unwittingly makes the point that you end up spending as much on streaming as you do on cable if you're not careful. Most of us with internet-only subscriptions from our local cable house pay dearly for them. R37 is probably paying $70 a month on top of his probably more than $50 a month streaming bill.

As he points out at the end of his post, the only way to save money on tee-vee is to not pay for it. This means antennas and minimal streaming services. The good thing about streaming services is you can change them up. Spend a couple months on one service, then drop it and switch to another. Before long you can expect that streaming services will try to lock you in with contracts, just like everything else these days.

Expanded basic cable is $105/month on top of internet R38 and would cost even more than that to the get the movies I like to watch. The $50 a month for streaming is a lot less than $105/month, and will be even less now that I canceled Netflix and Fandor.

I don't even know what I could buy that would get me to $105/month for streaming services. HBO and Disney and another channel, I guess?

Again, R39, people with standalone internet service, not bundled with a cable package, pay much more for it. I pay $70. I cannot obtain a cheaper price locally at this time unless I add a cable package.

It's impossible to say how much the difference would be, because even in my own neighborhood, nobody pays the same amount for their cable and internet packages. But in the before time, I had cable tv, and I paid about $180/month for a lot of options. Cox claimed that $40 of this was for the internet and $20 was for the landline.

But if I changed or removed something, the prices would all rejigger themselves into new contortions. Nothing made sense and I'm certain that is by design. Then they started in with the fees, and before long I was paying $210 a month and I canceled cable.

If you are really spending only $50 on streaming and you have relatively inexpensive internet, then you're doing well. But with the proliferation of streaming services, and the increase in internet prices, one pretty much has to forego some options in order to really save money.

It has been my experience that people routinely underestimate their spending on all sorts of things.

OP sounds old.

R28 Last month, you were paying $205 for cable which included HBO, Starz, TCM, and your regular channels. This month after you called them, you are paying the same price for only TCM, a few new random channels and your regular channels.

If HBO is $15/month and Starz is $13 a month and you dropped them for TCM without a bill decrease, you're essentially now paying $28/month for the TCM tier. That doesn't sound like a good deal.

A friend has Dish (tv only, not internet) and her bill is $116 for the Top 200, which includes TCM.

Elderguy here. I remember when cable was a certain rate for basic, and then each premium channel was an additional set amount, say $11.99 for HBO and $8.00 for Cinemax. Then they started this complicated bundling shit where it is impossible to tell if you're getting it up the ass or not (but you likely are).

Pay $1.50 a month and this is all the entertainment you’ll ever need!