OT: TECH...Getting Fired Up

[whaler11]

The Xfinity Stream TV app is awesome too. Ton of stuff you can download for the gym and airplanes where the wifi sucks.

 

[8893]

The Xfinity Stream TV app is awesome too. Ton of stuff you can download for the gym and airplanes where the wifi sucks.

I found out about that from my oldest, who is away at college and uses it to watch her shows. After she left for school I noticed that shows she typically watches were being recorded on our DVR at home. I asked her and she explained that she can set the recordings remotely from the app and then watch them on her computer or phone. It blew my mind, and then the next week when I was out and forgot to record a UConn game I texted her at school and she did it for me...

 

[Waquoit]

The new Fire Stick came out this fall and is neither old nor slow. It also has Alexa support in the remote, which I think would appeal to an elderly person.

Does it let you disable Alexa?

 

[8893]

Does it let you disable Alexa?

Wrong board dude.

Wait, what?

 

[August_West]

The Xfinity Stream TV app is awesome too. Ton of stuff you can download for the gym and airplanes where the wifi sucks.

Yup.....

thats the other thing I use all the time. Download stuff for offline trips. Also use it to just watch TV on one a couple of my Ipads in the house. have one downstairs on the treadmill one in the kitchen on breadbox.

Lol this cord cutting thread turned into an X1 ad. lets face it. Im never cutting the cord. I like all that stuff too much and I will never get all those features at the pricepoint Im paying for X1.

 

[Husky25]

The Xfinity Stream TV app is awesome too. Ton of stuff you can download for the gym and airplanes where the wifi sucks.

They took away the ability to set the DVR away from the home network, which blows and it can't be thrown up to the big screens through Chromecast. Other than that, I like it.

 

[8893]

They took away the ability to set the DVR away from the home network, which blows. Other than that, I like it.

When did they take that away? My daughter did it last month for me.

 

[Husky25]

When did they take that away? My daughter did it last month for me.

About two weeks ago.

 

[methodology]

If it wasn't for live sports I would have cut the cord 2 years ago. Just not an option seeing there no real alternatives for live sporting events.

I hate the price of Comcast but their internet can't be touched unless fios is available to you. Think I pay $225/ month for tv/internet with screen.

Kodi is great if you understand what you're getting and not expecting more/everything. If you want it for watching tv shows and movies already released in DVD then it has everything you can imagine.

With net neutrality expect cable companies to charge per gb or whatever method in the future. Hopefully congress blocks net neutrality. Everyone should be calling their state reps to have them block the fcc ruling

 

[TheChamps990411]

For you and @Husky25, The FTC and DOJ have not gone away. Refusing competing bandwidth is a sure way to get broken up. What they might do is charge appropriately. At night, Netflix is some absurd percentage of all bandwidth. All non Netflix users are subsidizing Netflix and Netflix users right now. So I think about it the same way we think about ala-cart cable. There will be flexibility to build packages. But the targets won't be you and me, it will be the high bandwidth providers like YouTube (Google). They are getting a free ride.

And remember, the cable companies are in on the streaming game too. AT&T owns direct TV. Comcast is NBC/Universal, which has a ton of streaming options, including partial ownership of Hulu.

So youre ok with the FCC getting rid of Net neutrality?

 

[zyron]

For you and @Husky25, The FTC and DOJ have not gone away. Refusing competing bandwidth is a sure way to get broken up. What they might do is charge appropriately. At night, Netflix is some absurd percentage of all bandwidth. All non Netflix users are subsidizing Netflix and Netflix users right now. So I think about it the same way we think about ala-cart cable. There will be flexibility to build packages. But the targets won't be you and me, it will be the high bandwidth providers like YouTube (Google). They are getting a free ride.

And remember, the cable companies are in on the streaming game too. AT&T owns direct TV. Comcast is NBC/Universal, which has a ton of streaming options, including partial ownership of Hulu.

And if the cable companies with their streaming services don't feel like competing with the other streaming companies, they can now throttle them till they are useless. So you won't have that many options.

 

[HuskyHawk]

So youre ok with the FCC getting rid of Net neutrality?

Yep. It has existed less than two years. Was the internet broken in 2015? An open internet can adapt and change more rapidly than one treated like a utility. Do you get a lot of innovation from your electric company?

 

[zyron]

Yep. It has existed less than two years. Was the internet broken in 2015? An open internet can adapt and change more rapidly than one treated like a utility. Do you get a lot of innovation from your electric company?

The internet before 2015 was Net Neutrality. Now ISPs can throttle websites and block them. What a great change.

 

[HuskyHawk]

And if the cable companies with their streaming services don't feel like competing with the other streaming companies, they can now throttle them till they are useless. So you won't have that many options.

No, they cannot. The antitrust laws and FTC act would shut that down. And the risk is huge, because these companies have spent a ton of effort integrating vertically, and the likely response to a move like that would be to break them up, so that no Internet provider was also a content provider.

People have short memories. Remember the massive phone bills with landlines in the 80s? Then deregulation and people thought it would be terrible. They were forced to compete and it drove innovation. Now a home phone with unlimited long distance is like $20. Competition among ISPs isn’t strong enough right now, but the research is on on high speed wireless internet to the home. They aren’t even running wires to rural America anymore. It’s coming, and then competition with be intense.

 

[HuskyHawk]

The internet before 2015 was Net Neutrality. Now ISPs can throttle websites and block them. What a great change.

Net Neutrality rule was first adopted in 2015. It did not exist before that.

 

[zyron]

No, they cannot. The antitrust laws and FTC act would shut that down. And the risk is huge, because these companies have spent a ton of effort integrating vertically, and the likely response to a move like that would be to break them up, so that no Internet provider was also a content provider.

People have short memories. Remember the massive phone bills with landlines in the 80s? Then deregulation and people thought it would be terrible. They were forced to compete and it drove innovation. Now a home phone with unlimited long distance is like $20. Competition among ISPs isn’t strong enough right now, but the research is on on high speed wireless internet to the home. They aren’t even running wires to rural America anymore. It’s coming, and then competition with be intense.

They were already doing it in 2015. That's why Net Neutrality was enacted.

 

[zyron]

Net Neutrality rule was first adopted in 2015. It did not exist before that.

The net was neutral before 2015. They put the rule in in 2015.

 

[HuskyHawk]

The net was neutral before 2015. They put the rule in in 2015.

Utterly uninformed nonsense. There was no regulation. They could do what they want, same as now, subject to other laws.

 

[methodology]

There a reason an ex telecom executive shoved this bill through $$$. It is the worst thing to happen to consumers and the internet in 20 years.

 

[HuskyHawk]

There a reason an ex telecom executive shoved this bill through $$$. It is the worst thing to happen to consumers and the internet in 20 years.

There is no bill. The FCC reversed its own rule. Net Neutrality does nothing for you and me. It’s a windfall for Netflix, Google, internet and some others.

 

[zyron]

Utterly uninformed nonsense. There was no regulation. They could do what they want, same as now, subject to other laws.

I didn't say there was regulation, there doesn't have to be when all the data was treated equally. Then ISPs started throttling content, which is why Net Neutrality was enacted.

 

[zyron]

There is no bill. The FCC reversed its own rule. Net Neutrality does nothing for you and me. It’s a windfall for Netflix, Google, internet and some others.

Utterly uninformed nonsense

 

[HuskyHawk]

I didn't say there was regulation, there doesn't have to be when all the data was treated equally. Then ISPs started throttling content, which is why Net Neutrality was enacted.

You’ve got to be kidding me. They’ve been doing it the last two years too. There are huge holes in the old rules. It was first proposed around 2010 and the courts shut it down.

But it’s not worth arguing about it with a NN Kool Aid drinker. Let’s just wait and see. I’m not worried at all. The only “throttling” that would occur would be of companies like Google and Netflix, who already have taken steps to speed their content, including paying ISPs when they didn’t have to. Nothing else even registers. At peak evening hours, Netflix and YouTube are well over 50% of all traffic by themselves.

 

[zyron]

You’ve got to be kidding me. They’ve been doing it the last two years too. There are huge holes in the old rules. It was first proposed around 2010 and the courts shut it down.

But it’s not worth arguing about it with a NN Kool Aid drinker. Let’s just wait and see. I’m not worried at all. The only “throttling” that would occur would be of companies like Google and Netflix, who already have taken steps to speed their content, including paying ISPs when they didn’t have to. Nothing else even registers. At peak evening hours, Netflix and YouTube are well over 50% of all traffic by themselves.

Yup, can't wait until the internet has cable pricing models:

 

[methodology]

NN was put in place because ISPs were already throttling traffic and were starting to offer their own plans. Online gaming, Netflix, YouTube anything the ISPs don't own will be slowed down and buffer more. You will be offered packages from ISPs for their content and forced to pay more to use content that isn't theirs.

This is like striking down free speech and why ISP lobbyist have spent maybe close $100 M to end NN.

Consumers are going to get shafted and the older generations have no clue what ending NN really means and how it will ultimately impact them. Nevermind the impact on the less fortunate who don't and won't have the money to afford to pay for using the internet at its full capacity