After YouTube.tv announced their recent price increase my wife an I decided it was time to shut down our account. $35 dollars was about the right amount in our budget. The $40 price was a stretch but could have worked had YouTube.tv decided to migrate its early adopters to that price, but $50 pushed us right out of range. The fact the price increase came with a number of channels for which we had zero interest felt far too much like a Cable move. We just couldn’t do it any more.

We didn’t necessarily want to leave the service, because YouTube.tv is about the best TV experience I’ve ever had, we just couldn’t afford it any more on top of all the other subscriptions we have. I’m not fuming at YouTube.tv for the move that led to the increased price. After all, they’re entering a market that seems almost impervious to disruption. This is why so many content creators are getting away from the TV model and trying to create their own services – if people go out of their way to choose a creator’s service, then they’re more likely to watch their content instead of dozens of other cable channels.

I have to say the biggest hit in losing my live tv streaming is the loss of live sports. During my YouTube.tv run I’d gotten used to being able to watch my local teams again, so losing that ability is a bummer ¹. Why no one charges a solo subscription for the local regional sports network is beyond me. I even contemplated calling Comcast and, gasp, signing up for a two year deal that would get me back to having my local sports ². In the end, however, I just couldn’t. One of the best things about YouTube.tv was the lack of contracts, I have no desire to get back into that nonsense with Comcast.

So, again, we are without a paid live TV in the household. I do miss it. In fact, I miss it more than the first time we walked away from cable TV because I’ve gotten used to treating my iPad as a television. But I don’t miss it enough to get back into hidden fees and random price increases.

Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.