Four tips for lowering your internet and cable bills

Do you want to cut your monthly cable and Internet bills, but can't live without "Pawn Stars" or streaming cat videos? You're not alone.
In fact, the cost of digital service packages that include cable, Internet, and phone jumped from an average of $48 in 2001 to $128 by 2011, according to data from the research firm, SNL Kagan.
And while services have improved over time to include options like high-definition channels and lightning-speed Internet, these costs can still take a toll on your wallet.
If you think your cable and Internet bills could use a trim, read on to learn how you could save - without completely sacrificing your digital lifestyle.

Tip #1 - Bundle Your Cable, Internet, and Phone

Looking to save a bundle on your digital services? Purchasing everything from one company - known as "bundling" - could get you a better deal.
Why? Because digital service companies want your business, and competition for customers can be stiff, according to "Save a Bundle," a 2010 survey from Consumer Reports. It also found that many companies often package their most popular services at a lower rate, while others try to tempt consumers by offering additional perks, like free installation, gift cards, and DVRs.
Steven Zussino, president of Canadian consumer savings website GroceryAlerts.ca, offers similar insight.
"You can most likely get your television, Internet, and telephone all through one company, which can lead to some big savings," says Zussino.
[Find the best digital services bundle for you. Click to compare rates now.]
These bundled packages can include anything from "double-play" or "triple-play" options that offer combinations of two or three of those services. As if that weren't enough, some providers also offer "quad-play" packages that include a cell phone plan.
"Bundling can potentially result in significant monthly savings," says Andrew Schrage, editor of the consumer-savings website MoneyCrashers.com. "Just be sure to fully investigate the offerings before signing up to make sure you won't spend more money by receiving services you don't actually need."
According to Consumer Reports, bundling has satisfied 50 percent of their surveyed readers.

Tip #2 - Shop Around and Negotiate

We know, switching service providers can be a pain in the butt. However, shopping around for a deal that can save you money...well, that should always be worthwhile.
Perhaps that's why Schrage offers this suggestion: "If you can handle the inconvenience, switch companies whenever you see a cheaper rate."
You should also try to negotiate a deal without a contract so you can switch companies easily if you find a better deal, he adds.
But what if you have a certain amount of loyalty to your current provider? Totally understandable. And if you fall into this category, Zussino suggests talking to your provider to see what they can do for you.
"If you're considering leaving for another company, talk to the retention department first to see if they can offer a better deal," he says.
For example, ask your provider if they'll match a competitor's price on Internet service, or if they'll upgrade your Internet speed at a discounted price. See what they're willing to offer to get you to stay with them.
If they won't budge, then it might be time for you to consider your other options.
"Sometimes a relationship has run its course and there's nothing left to do to save it," says consumer-savings expert Andrea Woroch of Kinoli, Inc., a company dedicated to online and mobile money-savings solutions. If your provider is unwilling to budge on a better price, it may be time for a break-up, she says.
Woroch suggests using a comparison tool to find standard rates from the top providers in your area.
[Want to switch Internet or cable providers? Get rates from multiple companies now.]

Tip #3 - Opt for the Basics

If you're serious about saving money and could live without cable, it's worth considering this option, according to Schrage.
But if you think giving up on cable means giving up on your favorite TV dramas or reality shows, think again. Even without cable, there are plenty of ways to see your favorite shows, says Zussino, who advises you to see if the shows you watch are available online.
If they are offered online, then giving up cable and investing in higher-speed Internet might be a smart money-saving option for you.
While it might seem crazy, there are quite a few people out there living without cable. According to "Cutting the Cable Cord," a 2012 survey by the consumer website TechBargains.com, 29 percent of consumers don't have either cable or digital satellite service. What's more, an additional 17 percent said they were planning to end their cable service within a year.
Of course, if you're a TV-fiend, cutting cable from your life and streaming TV shows online may not bring you as much satisfaction.
The Bottom Line
Whether it's cutting premium channels, downgrading to a slower Internet speed, or simply shopping around for the best rates, it's up to you to determine what the right option is for your digital lifestyle - and wallet.

Tip #4 - Trim the Extras

Do you really need 500 channels and three paid movie services? What about high-speed Internet and HDTV? If you're not using these services to their full potential, cutting them from your plan could save you big.
In fact, "The best way to lower your cable bill is to examine your cable package and determine services and channels that you can cut," says Schrage. He suggests figuring out which channels you view the most and downgrading to a less expensive package.
The same applies to high-definition channels, says Woroch.
"Getting high-definition channels comes with an extra charge as well as an extra equipment rental," she says. If you casually watch a couple hours of TV each week, Woroch suggests sticking with the standard definition package.
[Find the best digital services package for you. Click to compare rates now.]
As for cutting Internet costs, Schrage says that unless you're a heavy Internet user - someone who streams HD videos, for example - "consider reducing your connection speed." Even if trimming this service results in only $10 of monthly savings, he says, that's a total annual savings of $120.

Get Mad, Live 2 Years Longer

Let it out, girl!Madonna was onto something when she sang, "Express yourself, don't repress yourself"—a recent study showed that releasing your anger can lead to a healthier, longer life.
More on Shine: 6 Reasons Your Friends are Good for Your Health
People who express their anger—along with other negative emotions, from fear to anxiety—can expect to live up to a full two years longer than those who keep it bottled inside. That's according to the results of the study, authored by Germany's Marcus Mund and Kristin Mitte, of the University of Jena, and published in the journal Health Psychologies.
The researchers looked at more than 6,000 patients, and found that those who internalized their anger had elevated pulses—a condition that could lead to high blood pressure, and in turn raise the risk of heart disease, cancer, kidney damage and many more life-threatening issues, according to a report on the study in Medical Daily.
"These people are distinguished by the way that they attempt to conceal outward signs of fear, and also by their defensive behavior," Mund told the Daily Mail. "They avoid risks and always seek a high level of control over themselves and their surroundings. For instance, when exposed to a stressful task they exhibit a higher heart rate and pulse ratio than non-repressors and show other objective signs of stress and anxiety."
The news may be particularly noteworthy to women, who, as a rule, are taught by society to repress their anger.
"Women get the message that expressing their anger is ugly, that they are unattractive and sexually unappealing—and threatening," notes Deborah Cox, a Springfield, Missouri-based psychologist and co-author of The Anger Advantage: The Surprising Benefits of Anger and How it Can Change Your Life. Though there are plenty of "angry femme" movie characters, Cox adds—fierce women who wield weapons while wearing stilettos—our culture still lacks "strong role models, where a woman makes herself vulnerable by saying, 'I am so angry, I can't believe you did this.'"
More on Yahoo!: Vitamin May Increase Women's Risk of Dying, Research Finds
In her research with co-authors Karin Bruckner and Sally Stabb, Cox found that women who held in their rage suffered from a high rate of headaches and stomachaches. Those who were more conscious of their anger and who talked about it, on the other hand, felt better about themselves, and also did things that they were afraid to do, whether changing careers or buying a home.
"There's a huge difference in the way women express and suppress," she adds. "Some take it and take it, until one day they lose it. They tend to do and say things they regret, and feel horrible shame about it later."
That's a key difference between healthy and unhealthy venting, says anger management expert Shannon Munford, of Daybreak Counseling Services in Los Angeles. Not all expressions of anger are positive, or good for you. "You can express your anger in a way that does lead to heart disease," Munford notes. "Expression of anger in any type of volatile way—screaming, destroying property—that type of anger doesn't help anybody."

Email Share 6 Print Barnes And Noble Christmas Earnings AnalysisBarnes & Noble Barnes & Noble (BKS) warned about the Christmas quarter a while back, so we knew things were heading south. Yet the numbers still have the power to shock. As a Nook owner, I am now starting to get that queasy Betamax feeling; Nook volumes actually declined year-on-year. The true horror here is that Nook revenues declined by more than 12% — a steeper slide than what B&N’s total sales showed. This means that combined digital content and Nook device sales are now shrinking faster than traditional hardcover and paperback sales. [More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes] This is fairly disastrous, because B&N launched a highly ambitious and well-reviewed tablet version of Nook for the Christmas season to complement its eBook lineup. The cheapest Nook HD+ tablet costs just $269, which should be appealing for a 9-inch tablet with a 1,920 x 1,280-pixel LCD display. The Glowlight Nook with great new E-paper display technology was priced at just $119 for the winter shopping season. [More from BGR: RIM teases BlackBerry 10 launch with image of first BB10 smartphone] These are really, really low prices. Barnes & Noble is the last national chain of book stores in America. And its eBook strategy simply isn’t working. This was the Christmas when the earlier collapse of the Borders chain should have boosted Barnes & Noble’s fortunes. Instead, Nook volumes declined and retail segment revenue crashed by 10.9% compared to the previous Christmas. Now, both brick and mortar as well as digital sales are spiraling down. It is now clear that Barnes & Noble is about to be demolished by Amazon (AMZN). The Kindle Paperwhite is priced at $119 and the Kindle Fire HD is priced at $299. These price points are nearly identical to the directly competing products from Barnes & Noble… and Amazon is winning big with rough price parity. Could Barnes & Noble perhaps cut eBook and tablet prices sharply to compete? No. It simply cannot afford a price war against deep-pocketed Amazon. It’s a pretty pickle. Damn, I should jumped into the Kindle camp two years ago.

Barnes & Noble

Barnes & Noble (BKS) warned about the Christmas quarter a while back, so we knew things were heading south. Yet the numbers still have the power to shock. As a Nook owner, I am now starting to get that queasy Betamax feeling; Nook volumes actually declined year-on-year. The true horror here is that Nook revenues declined by more than 12% — a steeper slide than what B&N’s total sales showed. This means that combined digital content and Nook device sales are now shrinking faster than traditional hardcover and paperback sales.

[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]

This is fairly disastrous, because B&N launched a highly ambitious and well-reviewed tablet version of Nook for the Christmas season to complement its eBook lineup. The cheapest Nook HD+ tablet costs just $269, which should be appealing for a 9-inch tablet with a 1,920 x 1,280-pixel LCD display. The Glowlight Nook with great new E-paper display technology was priced at just $119 for the winter shopping season.

[More from BGR: RIM teases BlackBerry 10 launch with image of first BB10 smartphone]

These are really, really low prices. Barnes & Noble is the last national chain of book stores in America. And its eBook strategy simply isn’t working. This was the Christmas when the earlier collapse of the Borders chain should have boosted Barnes & Noble’s fortunes. Instead, Nook volumes declined and retail segment revenue crashed by 10.9% compared to the previous Christmas. Now, both brick and mortar as well as digital sales are spiraling down.

It is now clear that Barnes & Noble is about to be demolished by Amazon (AMZN). The Kindle Paperwhite is priced at $119 and the Kindle Fire HD is priced at $299. These price points are nearly identical to the directly competing products from Barnes & Noble… and Amazon is winning big with rough price parity. Could Barnes & Noble perhaps cut eBook and tablet prices sharply to compete? No. It simply cannot afford a price war against deep-pocketed Amazon.

It’s a pretty pickle. Damn, I should jumped into the Kindle camp two years ago.

The Google Maps of the Future Sounds Useful but Creepy

The Google Maps of the future will be a very smart computer program that knows you very well, which sounds part useful, part annoying, and part creepy. "The dialogue with the map is becoming much more personal," Google's Michael Jones told The Atlantic's James Fallows in a Q&A in this month's magazine. "Personal" means it knows what we want—"It’ll be like you’re a local everywhere you go," added Jones—but at what expense? Jones says the Maps app of the future will make us smarter: 

In the future, the phone will signal you—go left or straight ahead—in words or sounds in your ear, or visually through your glasses, so you can just look where you’re going and walk... You’ll know your way through the back alleys and hutongs of Beijing, you’ll know your way all around Paris even if you’ve never been before. Signs will seem to translate themselves for you.

That all sounds convenient and helpful, if not a bit irritating. ("Isn’t this just like the voice in the car GPS telling you, annoyingly, where to turn?" asks Fallows.) But, in practice, it also sounds a bit too-personalized. 

RELATED: Google Maps Will Soon Let You See Inside Buildings

Take a current example of what the future might look like. Jones points to an Android app called Field Trip. It follows you while walking around, not only pointing out landmarks, but choosing things it thinks you will like. "Around the corner behind you is where a scene from your favorite movie was filmed," the app might say. But how does it know that?  "It is using your location to search in a database of 'interesting things,' and it learns what kinds of things you care about," says Jones. Again: That can come in handy. Maybe I do want to check out that landmark. But, it's all about how Google gets that information. Considering we just learned the shady way it has decided to get our information via enforced Google+ usage, we don't expect too much transparency. 

Women Lose Half Their Weight: How They Did It

At 25 years old and 288 pounds, Ashley Donahoo was depressed.
"I was unhappy with my job, I was unhappy with the direction my life was going, and I had a hard time enjoying the little things that my kids wanted to do," the 27-year-old mother of two from Pace, Fla., said. "My health was failing. My doctor told me that he didn't think I was going to make it to 30 if I kept on [this way]. … It kept getting worse and worse."

Donahoo was concerned, but it was her faithful husband, David, who pushed her on a path to health, starting with a walk around the block.

"His heart was breaking for me," she said. "And he saw how unhappy I was, and he came to me and said, 'We're going to go for a walk.' And I was, like, 'No, we're not.'"

Her husband won that battle, and on the walk, she started thinking about her own choices and future.

"The realization hit me that I made this choice. I made this choice to get where I am right now. So I'm going to start making a different choice," she said. "I put my health and myself on back burner, and I think … it had all caught up to me."

Jumpstart Your Weight Loss: 

Like Donahoo, Caroline Jhingory reached a similar eye-opening realization about her weight.

"I looked in the mirror one day and just realized I didn't recognize the person that was staring back at me," said Jhingory, 32, of Washington, D.C.

Jhingory's struggles with her weight began early. At age 8, she weighed 120 pounds. Taunted by her peers, Jhingory was enrolled in a medical weight loss program, but it didn't work because she would sneak junk food like candy bars.

 "I found a way to be a food hustler and get whatever food I wanted," she said. "Not only did I spend two decades of my life morbidly obese. I spent two decades of my life being taunted and teased in every environment. I never went to prom. I never had dates. I couldn't ride a roller coaster because the safety bar wouldn't go over my stomach."

Jhingory remained heavy until college, when she tipped the scales at 303 pounds and started feeling self-conscious in her new environment.

"I felt like I had a moment when all these difficult experiences were a huge pause button on my life. I finally said to myself, 'I'm tired of this. I want to have a normal life.'"

Jhingory after.Jhingory started walking everywhere. Then, she took up a daily cardio regimen to shed the weight, and she rid her pantry of tempting snack foods she once binged on. Now, ten years later and 149 pounds, she has reclaimed her shape and kept off the weight.

"When I'm on that treadmill I'm thinking about those bad situations but it makes me push harder and go stronger," she said today on "GMA."

Jhingory's amazing transformation, along with Donahoo's and other weight-loss success stories, were spotlighted in the "Half Their Size" feature in the latest issue of People magazine.

RELATED: Is Being Overweight Really Bad For You?

Donahoo after.Donahoo cut out the late-night binges on Chinese food and snacks that brought her down and thanks to her strong support system, lost 137 pounds.

"I knew better, but it was a comfort thing," Donahoo said of her late-night junk food runs. "It was what I had control over. I still indulge because it's not about complete deprivation. It's about moderation and changing things …. I have a turkey burger and I have fat-free cheese, those kinds of changes. It's a lifestyle."

She credited her weight loss success to tracking her food and exercise on livestrong.com and running. She has run two 5Ks.

Leah Fernandez of Atlanta, Ga., found herself at 251 pounds after two pregnancies. The baby weight stuck and she tended to eat emotionally.
"I wanted the food," she said. "It made me feel good, and so I ate it."

 But the motivation to be there for her children helped her turn it all around.

"Thinking about going out to the park with my kids felt like work to me, you know? And at some point I realized that's ridiculous. Not only am I cheating myself but I'm cheating my kids of me," she said.

Fernandez was close to reaching her weight loss goal when tragedy struck.

"I got the news one morning that my husband was killed in a tragic motorcycle accident coming home from work. Just the day before we'd completed our first 5K together, which was a very significant moment in my life," she said today. "He lived passionately and so I continue to honor his legacy and to help my kids."

Fernandez after.Fernandez turned to Jenny Craig in March 2011 and hasn't looked back. Since then, she has lost half her weight by staying active with her kids and incorporating walking into her lifestyle.

"I'm getting my groove back. Leah's getting her groove back," she said. "Life today is amazing. It renders me speechless, honestly. I have energy. I have vitality of life. I take things on without fear now."