Naysayers should explain themselves.....
I've noticed a a number of people thinking they are being "nickel and dimed" by dish, and this is the latest example of that. I haven't read much as to why they think that.
There are a few issues I see wth this.
First, does anybody remember why we are charged this VOD fee every month?? The 508 wasn't charged the VOD fee, the 721 wasn't charged the VOD fee. Do you remember why?
The VOD fee is charged monthly BECAUSE OF THE HARD DRIVE! Specifically, it has been charged on DVRs with a hard drive bigger than 100GB.
This makes me leary of what is going on here. 1st, it could be argued that we are being charged again for adding hard drive space to something we are already paying a monthly fee for.
Second, it makes me wonder if they might decide later on to start charging a montly fee for external hard drives over a certain size. The DVR fee might not be $6/mo, it might become $12/mo, or $18/mo or whatever they decide. They can charge now based on how many drives, or how big the drives are.
The next issue is development cost.
How many of you would gladly pay Microsoft $40 every time you added a hard drive to your computer?? Maybe you would pay Apple? How about a $40 donation to Linux? External hard drives are supported on all three platforms. You can add external hard drives to an HTPC without this cost. I a pay $5.98 DVR fee, a $6 HD Enabling Fee, a $6 access fee, locals don't cost me $5/mo, they cost me an extra dollar, $6/mo. These fees add up to pay for infrastructure, customer support, development, etc.. We all pay most of them, the access fee is hidden in the AT package for most.
An OEM version of Windows XP costs $140, that money included software updates and patches for over five years now (they are still being developed and will continue for years to come). Windows has a lot more users than Dish network does, but Mac OS is far more comparable. Their market share is less than 5%, and they sell about 20 million computers per year, mostly to their installed base. A copy of OS X costs about $130 and is also supported over many years.
The DVR software is not as complicated as an operating system. A free HTPC DVR program, Myth TV, which is more full featured than the 622 was written by a single person on his spare time.
Development costs are well paid for by the $6 DVR fee. They even developed software before there was a DVR fee, when Dish said there never would be a DVR fee after they got rid of the Microsoft agreement.
I would not be surprised if this does not turn out to be the last external hard drive fee. Charlie was a professional poker player wasn't he? He treats his vendors and his customers like he is playing poker. Remember the Viacomm standoff when we lost CBS for a few days?? That was called a bluff!
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