Basically because of the public outcry they’re “re-evaluating the testing” in favor of providing bandwidth tools so you too can measure the amount of bandwidth.  They are still “testing” just not charging anyone for it, they want you to know how much bandwidth you use so they can charge you for it and that way by the time we get to the point you’ll be used to seeing your bandwidth amount.  It’s not that they are going to stop the program, they still plan on capping bandwidth.  They just want to shift focus because of the bad PR.

(New York, NY) — Time Warner Cable (NYSE:TWC) today announced it would alter plans to test Consumption Based Billing, shelving the trials while the customer education process continues.

Time Warner Cable Chief Executive Officer Glenn Britt said, “It is clear from the public response over the last two weeks that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about our plans to roll out additional tests on consumption based billing. As a result, we will not proceed with implementation of additional tests until further consultation with our customers and other interested parties, ensuring that community needs are being met. While we continue to believe that consumption based billing may be the best pricing plan for consumers, we want to do everything we can to inform our customers of our plans and have the benefit of their views as part of our testing process.”

Time Warner Cable also announced that it is working to make measurement tools available as quickly as possible. These tools will help customers understand how much bandwidth they consume and aid in the dialog going forward.

Britt added, “We look forward to continuing to work with Senator Schumer, our customers and all of the other interested parties as the process moves forward, to ensure that informed decisions are made about the best way to continue to provide our customers with the level of service that they expect and deserve from Time Warner Cable.”

I have measurement tools already, its called a router with DD-WRT.

Whose bright idea was this?  Time Warner has spent years pushing their current speed packages – faster internet etc. explaining that faster internet meant we could stream better larger movies and other cool things that take up LOTS of bandwidth.   So someone there came up with the bright idea “You know how we’ve got them all hooked on the higher bandwidth, which we advertised about and told them it was unlimited, lets start charging when they go over 40GB of bandwidth.”

In an ongoing series of articles  I’m going to cover ways to cut costs in our shrinking economy.  When it comes to trying to save money many people are going to elect to spend more time not going out, eating, shopping, or doing general entertainment.  They are going to elect to stay in during the normal work week and allow themselves to vegetate in front of the TV.  That’s right, the real American past-time.  Couch potato.   And let me tell you I am king of this sport.  Sure I like to go out and do stuff.  I spend a lot of my time running around and you know…working. But… chilling in front of the TV with my laptop, surfing the web, is good stuff.

I don’t have cable TV.

I haven’t had it for over 2 years.   I always get looks when people ask me and I tell them that I don’t have it. But I can usually watch everything I want online through various options.    The interesting thing is that the quality of TV shows in the last several years has gotten much better on the regulars: NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX.  If you have an HDTV and a pair of rabbit ears you can watch your favorite shows in HD and surround (if offered).  And if you’re like me, you might have your TV connected to your computer so you can download and watch any of the other shows you missed.

If you forget about all the reality TV crap, there are some quality shows that come on the regular channels that you can get over the air.  Not only that, if you have a TV capture card you can set your computer to record like a DVR and you don’t need a cable box/tivo combination.  I covered how to build a budget Media Center PC here in Part 1 and Part 2 if you’re interested in doing this yourself.

Here is an example of what the weeks programming looks like:

Monday: House, 24, Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, Two and 1/2 Men

Tuesday: Fringe, Scrubs

Wednesday: Lie to Me, Lost

Thursday:  Bones, Hells Kitchen (what can I say, I like the show.. reality or not), Grey’s Anatomy, My Name is Earl, The Office, ER (Final Season), 30 Rock.

Friday:  Numbers, Friday Night Lights

A lot of these over-lap in the same time frame as well.  So this is where your computer with a DVR comes in.  You record everything and then on the sparse days that there isn’t much on – watch what you have recorded.   Or if you don’t have anytime during the week, play catch up on the weekend and watch every show you missed.

The other thing is that most of the networks have the TV shows available on their websites now and/or they may have put them on Hulu.com.  Which, if you’re interested is a great place to watch old re-runs of the A-Team.

If your like me and are stuck on Burn Notice which comes on USA Network, then guess what, you can still watch it as they post it online as well.

What is the real cost savings?

In most markets Cable TV is about $40-$60 a month.  But if you have a DVR you most likely have some additional channels so its a bit more.  If you have internet through them its now $80-$100 bucks.   And of course if you want to get HD channels through your cable provider (forget about the fact that you can get them for free with a pair of rabbit ears) you have to shell out an extra $20-$30 bucks. Per month.  So your monthly cable bill is $130 bucks with taxes fees, save the dolphins and pay for the DTV change surcharge charges.

I have cable internet.  So I’m saving almost $100 bucks a month for not having cable TV.  That’s about $1200 bucks a year.  What could you do with that? Let’s average it to $1000 at 12% interest.

5 Years: $7,100
10 Years: $19,630
15 Years: $36,000
20 Years: $80,000
30 Years: $270,160

That’s right if you plan to retire in 10 years and didn’t watch cable TV and saved the money you would have spent on it instead you’d have an additional $270,000 (based on theoretical 12% interest gain).  Oh and in case you are 15 years old right now and emancipated from your parents; at 65 you would have 1.5 Million dollars just from not paying for cable TV.

Tune in next time where I discuss how to save money on your phone bill.