finally came to my senses (catalyzed by my plan to quit my job imminently) and killed off my cable. of course comcast fucked up everything in the process but ~ another post another day
never was a huge realtime tv-watcher and i've been subsisting magnificently with youtube subs/playlists, netflix, online streams of dubious provenance, chromecast / web-connected tv, TVmobili DLNA local media streaming (transitioning to Plex soon) / torrents & a 5' HDMI cable as last resort.
below are my most profitable subs / sources, but would love to get suggestions from the hubskiverse or whatever yall call this. [infrequent commenter , sporadic lurker here but no other community i'd rly bother asking]
Youtube subs:
PBS Newshour- absolute best / only respectable US-based televised newsource, but nods to Bloomberg & Al Jazeera English. Newshour has the added benefit of being public media, they upload individual segments promptly either after or simultaneous with actual broadcast. I usually build a TV Queue a la carte every few days. Fair Warning: some of the weirdest looking / worst dressed correspondents imaginable.
PBS general channel- gets u the NewsHour webcast extra and occaisionally some good full length-ish documentary pieces but also shitty promo pieces for Downton Abbey etc so , judgement call
the Economist- sleekly produced short-medium newsish segments + bonus super british station ID chirping 'THEE E-CAWNAHMIST' bookending each segment
Big Think- hit or miss (heavy on the 'miss') short pieces on ideas etc, kinda TEDish
TED- not nearly the best way to consume the very low ratio of worthwhile talks, recommend the TED app/site + chromecast but eh
MOTHERBOARD- short tech-related features from VICE, generally actually good
RBMA- Redbull Music Academy. if u can endure the whole corporate cultural cooption thing , the 'lectures' (while not remotely lectures at all) feature a lot of great convos with great interesting musicians, & some duds but: par.
Left/Progressive/Radical economic/policy/news channels:
sites/streams/etc:
Democracy Now- keep a tab of my TV's browser on this page. DN! is what it is, more interested and activist than objective or balanced, often barely competent journalists or conversationalists but it serves a purpose and updates regularly, for free consumption, and regularly features more in depth reporting on less covered issues.
AEON video- short-medium length documentary-ish pieces
r/nflstreams- self-explanatory. NHL also exists but i could never figure out y ;)
also do some playlisting on Vimeo
i have a few live streaming TV sites in pocket but theyre so inconsistent i usually just google "CNN USA live stream" every Sunday morning and have no problem tuning in in time for my ritualistic viewing of Fareed Zakaria GPS, imo the last surviving worthwhile cable news show -- possibly also the first.
lastly i use BeyondPod for android to manage podcast/vodcast subs + playlists, with chromecast compatability. Dont use this that much but the NOVA Vodcast, UNCEF television vodcast, and NYT World News (video) are decent subs.
ok, U GO
(edited for format)