Gathering around the TV to watch a movie has become less about searching for the right channel and more about searching for the HDMI cord.
National data shows a trend toward “cutting the cable,” which refers to consumers choosing to forgo purchasing broadcast television services. The number of people without cable in their homes is more than 5 million — double that of 2007 — according to a Nielsen report.
Cory Nye, a junior studying integrated language arts, recently moved into a house on Union Street. She and her roommates decided to purchase wireless Internet but not cable.
“Most people aren’t getting cable,” she said. “We need Wi-Fi for school … Cable is an unnecessary expense.”
Like Nye and her roommates, many households without TVs are still plugged in to programming but access it using different sources.
67 percent of people without broadcast television watch programming on their computers, TV Internet, tablets and smartphones, according to the Nielsen study.
Time Warner Cable, a prominent cable and Internet provider in Athens, is noticing the trend of fewer cable customers. “In general, across the industry, Internet sales have outpaced cable sales,” said Mike Hogan, spokesman for the company, in an email.
Time Warner Cable released its second quarter earning reports in July, which showed a decrease in residential video revenue, landing at a 3 percent drop in earnings from that point in 2012. However, high-speed data sales experienced a 14.8 percent increase from last year.
At Ohio University, where students are required to spend their first two years living in residence halls, cable is provided through CatVision. The service is provided by OU Residential Housing and offers general interest programming through an agreement with Time Warner Cable.
Josh Bodnar, assistant director of residential housing, said in an email that he generally receives positive feedback about CatVision.
The price for CatVision is not calculated per student but is instead included in room fees, much like utilities. Consequently, it’s impossible to opt out of the service.
Those who want to use the Internet for additional programming in the residence halls are in luck. For example, Netflix generally requires a three megabit upload speed for high definition video. OU’s wireless network operates at speeds up to 11 megabits, according to the Office of Information Technology’s website.
However, residence halls all operate on the same cell, which can limit the bandwidth available and slow down streaming.
Since moving off campus, Nye said she hasn’t minded going without the university’s cable and Internet package.
“We (aren’t) really missing out on anything,” said Nye, citing Netflix and Hulu as other sources for programming. “Why pay for (cable)?”
eb104010@ohiou.edu
