A major milestone happened four years ago in the world of cord cutting. If you had told cord cutters four years ago that ESPN, FS1, CNN, and pretty much every cable TV channel would be legally available to cord cutters they would have likely laughed at you; however, four years later not only do cord cutters have access to these great channels but also many of them will soon be available from seven different streaming services.
This milestone that changed cord cutting forever was the announcement in January 2015 that Sling TV would be coming to the US market. Even if you are not a fan of Sling TV, you should thank the service for changing the future of cord cutting. If Sling TV had failed, it is likely that many of the services cord cutters enjoy today would have had second thoughts about coming to market.
Sling TV has come a long way from when it launched. In January 2015, Roku was the only streaming media player supported. Now almost every streaming player imaginable is supported. At launch every channel only offered one stream. No,w most of the channels offer three streams. From just a handful of channels to now offering over 100 channels including many of the most popular like FS1, FX, Hallmark, and Pac-12 have joined the service.
We could go on about all the changes Sling TV has made, but what is clear is Sling cleared the way for all the other live TV streaming services that followed. Sling TV set the standard of what streaming services would be graded on for years. Sling TV is still the largest streaming service when you look at the number of subscribers.
Being the first into a new market is often harder than being the next one up. The success of the first company often clears the path for new services to have an easier time making new contracts and reveals many of the pitfalls for future services to avoid.
So, no matter what you think of Sling TV as a cord cutter you do have to appreciate how it changed the face of cord cutting. Now four years later cord cutters have access to channels and sports that before Sling TV we could only dream of.
Looking Forward
As we sit here four years later, we likely have not seen anything yet. Cord cutting is changing rapidly and over the next five years we are likely to see new services that cord cutters today can only dream of. Just like how cord cutters four years ago could only dream of a legal way to watch Showtime or access ESPN for their favorite sports coverage what will come is something cord cutters likely cannot even imagine now.
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