Content Providers

Isn't that what life is all about: Content Providers?

The mailman provides content to my life in the form of junk mail, bills, magazines and the occasional handwritten letter. The phone company provides the content of my remote voice conversations. Heck, you could even argue that my friends and family provide content to my life.

In the traditional modern (is that an oxymoron?) meaning of content providers, it's usually taken to include internet service, TV services, etc: The electronic content that is piped into our homes. It is in this sense that we decided to reshuffle our content providers at home.

We had local and long-distance phone service ($0.05/min) with Verizon, Verizon FiOS internet, and DirecTV. Our Verizon bill averaged around $85 per month, depending on long-distance usage, and our DirecTV bill ran about $55 per month.

We chose to switch to Verizon for all of this content: Phone, FiOS internet, and FiOS TV. The primary reason for the switch was dollars and cents -- all three services bundled for $99/month, which really turns out to be around $110 per month with service for two televisions -- saving us at least $30 per month. But there were other benefits, too. Chief among them is the fact that this bundle includes unlimited calling within the USA. So expect us to call more frequently, if we like you. :)

Verizon came yesterday and set up the TV service, and I'm already hooked. There are a number of channels that were not included in our DirecTV service (ESPNU, Science Channel, Discovery Times, Military Channel, more MTVs and VH1s than a seventh grader would know what to do with), plus a few other nifty gadgets like Video On-demand, much of which is free, and weather and traffic widgets that are customized to your zip code and appear right on-screen.

I called DirecTV today to cancel our dish service. I feel no ill will toward them - I was very happy with our experience. But the service, which started out around $45 per month, has crept up to $55 per month - and offers fewer channels than Verizon. Their "retention specialist" didn't put up much of a fight once I explained the reason we were switching, although she did offer $10/month discount for a year.

Side note: Verizon and DirecTV must have an interesting business relationship. In most of their territory, Verizon offers phone service and DSL internet bundled with DirecTV, so they can serve as a single-source provider for all three services. However, in the few but growing places where Verizon has installed FiOS networks (and won the necessary approvals to offer TV service), they're probably stealing a good number of DirecTV customers. I wonder if the contract between the two companies offers any compensation to DirecTV when Verizon steals one of their customers.