Cold shoulder

I’ve left Multichoice; life’s too short for so much gruel and repetition

Finally, despite getting free access from my kind neighbour, I decided that Multichoice has become too expensive. After a decade-long, half-hearted commitment I have made up my mind to abandon it — just as the Independent Communications Authority of SA wakes up to the need to do something about this dismal bullying monopoly.

My decision wasn’t made lightly but it was a long time coming — probably nine years and 11 months, now that I think about it.

Multichoice’s decision to save a few bob by not posting out the printed programme nearly did the trick eight or so years ago. But I held on. Admittedly, the printed programme was just a rough guess at what might appear at any particular time on your screen, but there was some comfort in the structure it pretended to provide to those of us of a pre-digital mindset. And there was the constant reminder that the programme was the best they could do given that the schedule had not been finalised at the time of going to print.

That excuse fooled none of us. We all knew there was absolutely nothing time-sensitive about Multichoice’s programme schedule; it is set years, possibly decades, in advance.

Indeed, its scheduling was one of the things that, for years, persuaded me not to abandon Multichoice. I was convinced these desperate monopolists had outsourced this important function to labour brokers who specialised in providing employment opportunities to forgetful oldsters or, staying with ageism, to distracted youngsters. How else could you explain the constant repetition of programmes if not organised by people who can’t quite remember what they

watched yesterday, or earlier today?

Over and over again, not every few years but every few hours, and on the same channel. After interminably repeating a series or a movie on one channel for the best part of a year, Multichoice would relocate it to another channel and the repeat process would begin all over. And how else do you explain that the “best” programmes are scheduled for the hours between midnight and 5am?

It seems to me that, excluding sports and international news, on any given day Multichoice provides us with about 2% new fare, much of which involves a tedious sci-fi/horror movie with Dwayne Johnson, Bruce Willis or Tyler Perry. On really grim days all three might appear in the “new” movie. Making it all much worse is that in a Trump/brexit era even international news has that rather stale repetitive air about it.

The final straw was the failure to repeat Life Below Zero, or rather the failure to continue constantly repeating it. It’s a BBC Life series, which stalks four individuals and one family who live — separately — deep in the cold wilderness of Alaska. Of course “stalks” in a way you’re expected to believe they are entirely alone and not actually playing host to a presumably large-ish BBC camera crew. Anyway, it was good fun in that slow-paced, meditative way you would expect of life in Alaska, where evidently not much happens unless you’re being threatened by a bear, starvation or the freezing cold.

So repetition was hardly noticeable. And at least it didn’t involve hapless contestants or cooking. Finally I realised it was wasting something much more valuable than money — it was wasting my time. Life is too short for that much gruel and repetition.

Finally I realised it was wasting something much more valuable than money — it was wasting my time