Punk Rock or Crazy Talk

From DCTVpedia
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Punk Rock or Crazy Talk
Number 131
Broadcast Date July 8, 2013
Episode Length 1:08:22
Hosts Brian Brushwood, Iyaz Akhtar, Scott Johnson

DirecTV Makes Hulu Bid as Time Warner Cable Seeks Stake, YouTube Pro, and more.

Show Segments

Opening Video

Darth Vaders Voice Before Voice Over

The Big Story

  • DirecTV makes Hulu bid as Time Warner Cable seeks stake. [1]
  • AT&T joins Hulu sweepstakes. [2]
  • Silver Lake, WME to bow out as bidders for Hulu. [3]
  • Hulu bids depend on TV show rights. [4]

Another Big Story

  • Apple reportedly hires Hulu exec to negotiate future media deals. [5]
  • Apple and Time Warner Cable nearing deal to stream cable programming to Apple TV, says Bloomberg. [6]

Yet Another Big Story

Giant Bomb's Ryan Davis dead at 34. [7]

Probably Not Such a Big Story Since It's Our Fourth Big Story

YouTube introduces ‘YouTube Pro’ video series to help turn channel-owning hobbyists into pros. [8]

Slipstream

  • Cloud-based TV operator Magine raises $19M series a round to fuel international expansion. [9]
  • Southwest fliers to get TV for free on mobile devices courtesy of Dish network. [10]
  • USA TV Network launches iOS app to let viewers watch shows from phones and tablets. [11]
  • Global video service Viki hits 10 million mobile app downloads, up nearly 7-fold from a year ago. [12]
  • YouTube confirms renewed VEVO deal, takes stake in company. [13]

Tube Tops

  • Microsoft to shut down MSN TV on September 30. [14]
  • Boxee acquired by Samsung for about $30 million in surprise deal, according to report. [15]
  • Sony says new video players should be internet connected to beat pirates. [16]

Film Falm

  • ‘Orange is the New Black’ debuts this Thursday, positive reviews already coming out. [17]
  • Fox releases minute-long fight sequence from upcoming The Wolverine. [18]
  • ‘Breaking Bad’ creator moving forward with Saul Goodman spin-off, could be prequel series. [19]
  • Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian joins The Verge to host web series. [20]
  • Awesome comparison of music from Superman and Man of Steel. [21]

Summer Movie Draft

Grown Ups 2 and Pacific Rim premiere this week.

What We're Watching

Scott

  • The Lone Ranger
  • Under The Dome
  • Longmire

Iyaz

  • New Girl

Feedback

CHICKEN CHALLENGE ROUNDUP

  • Louis previously won the chicken challenge.

I took the ""Chicken Challenge"" around October of 2012.  It was a very similar situation to what Brian described.  While paying bills, I noticed that my AT&T U-Verse bill went up another 10 bucks, after doing the same thing the previous month...and the month before.  I had been toying with the idea of dropping the TV portion of my plan for a while.  At that moment I snapped and called AT&T to cancel.
Once on the phone, the rep went into immediate retention mode once I declared my intention to cancel cable.  After about 20 minutes of back and forth, I got an offer to add every channel (adding HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, Starz, et al) I would ever need while dropping my bill by $20 a month.

  • Jason followed through with cutting the cord.

I guess it was kismet that the morning before frame rate posted I had contacted U-verse to cut the cord.  They tried to offer me a couple alternatives.  I just told them I only watch a couple show a week and it just wasn't worth it.  They offered me $15 off at first and it gradually went up to $70 off my monthly bill and I turned them down. My kids think Netflix is television so I was really just keeping it around for me. Thankfully in my area that U-verse has no usage caps yet.  I imagine that is going to increase a bit.

  • Scott got ahead with the chicken challenge.

Took the challenge about 2 months ago, with full intention of dropping cable tv and replacing it with an HD antenna, H+ and Netflix. Comcast dropped monthly bill for TV and Internet from $140/mo to $80/mo, and that isnt even a promotional rate, they tell me it wont expire. It also came with a slight Internet speed boost (went from 20mbps to 25mbps iirc)

  • Austin took the chicken challenge with Dish.

I have Dish network, i called and told them i wanted to cancel.  i was paying 54 dollars a month, they offered me a deal of 23 dollars a month, I asked them to put me down to the smallest package and got my (TV only) service to 13 dollars a month.  they were friendly and did not seem hostile about mentioning online content, they just gave me the offers and that was that. Thanks Brian :)

  • John's advice to Brian.

One more thing.  Brian please try hooking up the cable to a tv.  I expect that you will find that they didn't turn off the pipe and you are still getting some cable signals.

  • Joey's got a deal with the chicken challenge, although not immediately.

After hearing Brian's story on Frame Rate, I decided to pause the episode and take the chicken challenge. Almost all of my promotional pricing expired last week and Comcast told me last weekend that there was really not much they could do. However, when I called them minutes ago and asked to cancel TV because we watch many of our shows online, the representative was quick to take my bill from $110/mo for internet and TV to $80/mo while keeping the same channels that we care about. The pricing is locked in for a year.

  • Mike lost the game of chicken after getting called on his bluff.

I live in Eastern PA and called up RCN after I heard the podcast commuting home from work. I said exactly what you told me to say. ""I noticed I can get my tv experience through the internet so I'm going to cancel the cable part of my service and only keep phone/internet"". The customer service worker named Rochelle said ""No problem! what date would you like to cancel?"". I paused and then started a conversation asking how much would the bill cost with only phone/internet. She put me on hold and this is when I thought she was going to talk to her supervisor. This is when she is informing them I'm about to cut the cord and what she can do to keep his service. She came back with ""That would be $88.00 with tax for a 25mb connection, what day would you like us to turn off the service?"" Again I'm realizing i'm losing this game. Then I keep the conversation going, ""When do I need to return the equipment?"" Her respond ""by the termination date that is why you need to let us know what date that would be"". Then I panic and said ""You know what, Wimbledon is still going on so I should wait till that is over"". I guess she doesn't watch tennis and said ""I don't know what you mean"" then I explained and she confirmed that is why you get to pick the termination date. How do you get out of this horrible game of chicken? You make believe you have a bad connection and hang up on them! I was so hoping this would have brought my price down but RCN won the game of chicken.

Great Quotes

Fun Facts

  • This is the first episode where all of the hosts are cord cutters.

YouTube

Links


Preceded by:
"The Chicken Challenge"
Punk Rock or Crazy Talk
Followed by:
"Hulu Gives No Rose"