Goodbye TCM From Comcast/Xfinity

I didn’t get the memo.

And apologies if there is a thread already in progress.

Went to see what might be on TCM tonight and it was gone. Google search showed Comcast moved it to a Sports Package, $9.99 a month, I think.

My wife pays the bills, so any notice slipped by. Per the google, something was sent out a couple months ago.

Too bad, it was a nice option. Flipping over between innings, falling asleep to Dr. Strangelove.

90% of my favorite classic films, I have on disc.

But gems like A Letter To Three Wives will be missed, as well as chance viewings of curiosities like Model Shop.

 

We ended up losing it too, which is too bad since we just got it back not too long ago.

 

"Moved it to a sports package"? WTF? Nonsensical on their part.

TCM has always been a basic cable channel. As an enthusiastic movie geek I've found interesting stuff periodically. Even learned to watch some of the silents. Always something different/bizarre on offer. Hope DirecTV doesn't follow suit.

 

Man, I miss the days when a cable company operating within a community would have to get the town council's approval to have a charter, and have its' local services abide by what the council asked, or no go. We've gone too far from that dynamic now that the bigger bundle-products are seemingly "grandfathered-in" a community from the days they were "just the phone utility", or "just the internet utility". Yet now that you can jump ship from one to the other, they can say the old community exclusivity clauses don't matter, and they can pull stuff like this whenever it gives them cover to make a few more dollars out of you.

 

I noticed it was gone a couple of weeks ago - one of the few movie channels in my package that was in HD (well, kind of - 720p). We moved to a more rural area this year and unfortunately I had to switch from Charter (where almost everything was 1080) to Comcast (where about 1/4 of the channels are SD (480p)).

 

You have to buy the Sports & Entertainment package to get TCM on Comcast. And not available on the cheapest package.

 

When Verizon wouldn't/couldn't fix copper & forced us into fiber, the only reason for a land line vanished. So we went with a Triple Play with Comcast, saved about $30 or so a month. When we went with that plan we lost a couple of channels, I didn't expect to lose any others not even halfway thru the contract.

Also this month we got a list of increases on equipment and fees beginning 12/20. No idea what increases we'll see, the last line of the letter was pretty vague and contradictory.

 

We also just lost some of the Starz/Encore channels also, and you have to pay $12.99 a la carte if you want to get them back.

 

Yup, remove long standing, good content, just to add to a specific, more expensive, package.
I am one of those who has little care for the vast majority of sports. While I like to play some sports, I just don't get much from watching sports.
Now they have taken a channel (TCM = Turner Classic Movies) and added it to the Sports Package?
They recently took away Starz too.

Hmmm, lets see. How does that Sesame Street short song go? "One of these things is not like the other." "One of these things does not belong."

I would leave Comcast in a hot second if the others living in this house could see different avenues of TV entertainment.

 

Yeah, I was pissed when I realized I didn’t have TCM anymore. Around the time Comcast made this move, they dropped Cinemax from packages and replaced it with their own ****ty “HITZ” on demand service.

Then, just this week, they dropped Starz and Encore and replaced them with Epix multiplex channels. Epix is okay, but most of their “new release” movies are also available on Hulu and/or Amazon Prime.

Comcast used to be the one cable/satellite provider that didn’t pull crap like this, but I think all bets were off once they were no longer being watched by the government after the NBC purchase.

 

They dropped all the Starz/Encore multiplex channels entirely (they’ve been replaced by Epix), so for $13 all you’d be getting is the main Starz channel and Starz/Encore on demand.

 

You can get the free "Watch TCM" app on Roku, and possibly other smart TV devices. It's limited to a couple hundred classic films on demand, but most of them are good ones.

 

I noticed this was gone for us about a month ago. I used to watch this channel a lot leading up to the holidays. Bummer.

 

I dont understand why they would move it to a SPORTS PACKAGE!!

I didnt realise classis movies were really sporting events!!

Totally stupid...........

 

Yes, I lost those, too. Luckily, I didn't watch them much anyway....

 

I gave up on broadcast TV via Comcast in 2013, when I realized I had the lion's share of TCM on disc already.
Now with my son's paying for Netflix, and me being a Prime member...I'm fine.

My best memories of great TCM go back to 2000. Made a lot of VHS blanks a library of Esther Williams for Mom, and John Wayne for my step-father.
When Robert Osborne passed, I imagined it would never be the same feeling anyway.

 

We didn’t lose all of the Starz/Encore channels, only some of them.

 

The only one I still have is the main channel.

 

In my area, the ones that got lost have been replaced with Screenpix.

 

Remember “gas wars” in the old days? One station would lower their prices by 2 cents/gallon and other stations in the area would follow suit, actually afraid of competition. Doesn’t work that way any more. Now it seems these behemoth conglomerates give worse service and/or raise prices because they know when their “competition” sees they’re getting away with it, boom, they’ll follow suit.

I have Charter. I’m just waiting for them to pull this crap.

 

TCM today has updated Eddie Muller's Film Noir to a Sat.@ midnight and Sun.@10AM.
Essentials came back on a six month cycle(currently in repeats) with filmmaker Ava DeVernay and a round of choices spotlighting much more diverse choices and still sprinkling in some well known and well worn titles. The current cycle ends just before 31 Days of Oscar 2020. Always check out the second feature after Essentials for a surprise or two.
The attempt to an on demand channel featuring Criterion versions,ended last year.
This month's Spotlight of Pets on Sets seemed like a dud,and then they included Harry & Tonto-as '70s as they come.
Meanwhile tonight they find another way to present Gone With the Wind(70th anniversary) but adding the two hour doc of the making of,from 1988. And they follow up that six hour spectacle with-what else-the 1972 reggae classic The Harder They Come. Seems like a natural fit.,right? GWTW comes back next day,12/14,late afternoon. make it stop,Mommy!
New Years combine both the Thin Man films with the That's Entertainment films--tired but it is a low viewer night whatever they program.
The quarterly Disney Night may be over-no night for Christmas,the best time to view something when Disney was Disney. Is Disney+ taking all of that to the paywall? My 2020 resolution is to shed Disny as much as possible in my life.
Until AT&T squeezes again,TCM has some true diamonds in there. Criminal Comcast.

 

CMT, the

It's not called a Sports package, it's a Sports & Entertainment package. There's some non sports channels in this package.

 

I posted this issue last month in the grind my gears thread.
Not all of the Starz/Encore channels have disappeared.
But I'm still not happy about any of this 'Let's squeeze more money out of the customer'.

jerol

 

If you go to a restaurant do they make you have to have salad and wine to order a baked potato? If you go to rent a car do they make you have to rent an exercise machine and sandblaster also to get it? I think it's absurd people can't choose and pay for just the channels they want. Surely the technology is there now. I see my parents with a cable package where they never watch 80% of the channels they are supporting.

It reminds me of a Joe Boyd story in his book where he was new to England, and England to him, and he ordered a ham and cheese sandwich at a cafe. They told him they only had ham sandwiches or cheese sandwiches on the menu. He ordered one of each, took it part and made what he wanted. Now it seems like U.S. companies are the ones stuck in a stone age where what the customer wants is not what they will sell them. Gee, I wonder why people are leaving cable companies in droves? Especially the young.

 

It would appear it's not the technology but is, as always, the money.

Why a la carte TV still isn't happening

Here's Why You Don't Want A La Carte Cable | The Motley Fool