RIP, MY CABLE TV BILL

Hello, WORLD!! Smokkee here again. Living in Chicago, you see how most utility options are limited because there's a monopoly running almost every major utility here. For example, Commonwealth Edison doesn't have much competition. I'm trying to figure out if there is another option for electricity in Chicago. For the life of me, I can't think of another supplier. Ditto People's Gas. At least when I stayed in Hammond, Indiana there was also a company called NIPSCO for natural gas. It's no joy for a consumer to have to buy something or get service from a company because it's the only game in town. That's why the CTA is able to do whatever it wants to with bus fare prices, which is typically raise them every year or so. 
For a long time, the phone companies were this way too. Thanks to cell phone technology, this is no longer the case.

I just wanted to throw my 2 cents out there again on this subject before I moved on to the true purpose of this post. I've given up on Comcast, both cable and internet. For some reason, each and every time I've went with Comcast as my provider and I got quoted a set monthly price, I have always had to pay more than that said set price. Ditto AT&T, and that goes all the way back to when they were Ameritech and then to when they were Illinois Bell before that.

I've been hearing about WOW Internet for about 5 years now but they never were in my area before. Since I've recently moved and was thoroughly fed up with Comcast after this last go round ended up being close to $300 a month, I decided to push my luck and try them. Lo and behold, I finally lived in an area that they serviced. I'm sorry I forgot the sales reps name. He was great at this customer service thing, and that's from another great customer service agent - me, LBVS. How good was he? Well, not only did I get internet, I wound up getting cable TV even though I won't use it. I still wouldn't miss a show even without the 250 channels the basic cable package includes because of my next purchase: a stream TV player. 

I call myself trying to stay in the loop about a lot of news but it's an impossible task; there's always a next big thing, always somebody working on something new.  Stream TV players aren't exactly a new thing. I do remember hearing about one, Apple TV, and was not impressed by it at all. For the uninitiated, these players stream internet feed like YouTube and World Star Hip Hop directly to your TV.  Yeah, turns your TV into a phone, lol. Seriously, YouTube is good for what, maybe 15 minutes before you're bored of it, right? When it first came out it was a different story. Now, it's just ho-hum. 

So forgive me for not seeing the bigger picture at first. That didn't happen until this year when this internet only show, Orange Is The New Black, became so popular that I had to see what the hubbub was about myself. You can only watch OITNB on Netflix for now so that meant I had to try it again. Mind you, the first time I tried Netflix was on my Android phone a few years ago. I thought it was cool having all these movies at my disposal...until my phone had to buffer every other minute or so. So I uninstalled it. 

This year, I have switched back to an iPhone, infuriating all of my fellow Android users who think I jumped ship in the process (LOL), and I've barely had to wait for buffering on it at all. (SN: I haven't jumped ship, Droid world. It's a best of both worlds type deal since I still love my Galaxy Tab. Forgive me for not wanting to carry it everywhere when my phone works does basically the same thing on a smaller scale.) So I was able to watch maybe 3-4 episodes a month ago before Verizon sent me a text about I'm almost me almost used all of the data I'm allotted per month....I pay for 10 gigs though! I contacted Verizon and they say that each movie you watch uses about a gig itself. So 10 movies for 10 gigs? Thanks but no thanks. 

So I had to find an alternative means to watch this series, which led me to inquire about how can I watch internet on the TV, which led me back to Apple TV, and finally seeing the big picture to it, as well as learning more about it's biggest competitor, Roku. Now my assignment for this week is figuring out which of the 2 I should buy sometime this week. From what I've read so far I should roll with Apple TV if I want the most out of my Apple experience because of the easy interaction between Apple products, and let me just add that if it works the way it claims to work then Airdrop will be that shiznit! I hear that if you don't own any Apple products, then Roku may be your best option.

Now I hear I have another major option from Google called Chromecast. I'll just assume that it comes packed with Android app capabilities. Again, this is just an assumption for now. Well, that's it for now, WORLD. I got reviews to read.