It's been a while since I've posted here, but I thought I'd take the time to share some of my recent experiences in digital streaming. I am a TV junkie... (there I've said it). I love great tv, plain and simple. It's a bit of a challenge watching great tv, without actually paying for cable, but that just makes me a bigger advocate for streaming everything online. I thought I'd start to blog more regularly here by sharing a few of my thoughts about the state of streaming from a casual, non-techy user experience perspective.
Just to explain why I'm so passionate about streaming - I moved to Belgium in 2009 for graduate school. While there, I wanted to continue watching some of my favorite shows and I was able to do so with some of the early streaming site aggregators (although some were & remain quite nefarious in nature). I was frustrated by the lack of legal ways of seeing the content (I tried Hulu, etc), but had to remain conscious that I was living on a limited budget. In fact, when I moved back to the states and eventually back to NYC, it was my limited budget status that caused me to realize I had to make some tough decisions and I realized I'd rather eat dinner each day than pay for a super expensive cable bill!!
Unfortunately the marketplace doesn't have a great, simple, legal streaming solution for those without cable - yet! There are companies that are working to change this, but if you have kind parents who will share their username and passwords to their TV Everywhere online streaming platforms, then you've won half the battle. One that I'd recommend trying is the Dish Hopper.
My thoughts on the Dish Hopper: Overall the stream is pretty solid here, love the fact that watching live is available on all their channels. I think their search functionality on the iPad app is horrible, it seems to be a much better experience when using my computer! It's difficult to find shows on their On-Demand Platform here. I also hate that Dish now has some very limiting legal language about the number of devices you can stream on...I tend to stream from my computer and my iPad depending on how fast my ISP (internet service provider) is pumping my (very expensive) connection to me.
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| Channel Guide |
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| DVR Recordings Display (on Computer) |
Overall I give the Dish Hopper a solid A- on the overall experience. If they came up with a lower priced web only a la carte solution, I'd be willing to give it a try. Take note all of the other MPVD's (Multi-Channel Video Programmers) out there!
I'll try to blog next week about my experiences with some of the other streaming options out there next week. As always, thanks for reading and I'd love to hear from you in the comments section if you've had any experiences with other platforms.
Mwuah,
Georgia Peach
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