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Obscure9876's avatar
Obscure9876
New Contributor

New definition for the word 'FREE'

While exploring On-Demand's free content sections, I discovered its Free Movies directory and ultimately the MoviePlex channel's free movie offerings. Filled with almost 100 titles, it appeared to offer of nice selection of movies across a wide variety of genres. Recently our family settled in for a Saturday night popcorn-fest, selected a movie guaranteed to please all ages and punched the 'Run' button on the remote to begin. Unfortunately instead of the expected searchlights accompanied by a booming symphonic score, we were treated to yet another solicitation in what has sadly become this company's ceaseless quest to sell another pay channel. Upon sequent investigation, I found that almost half of the listings offered were in fact similarly unavailable. Since when did the definition of the word 'FREE' change from its original meaning of 'without cost or payment'. As a comparison, when I visit a local multiplex cinema offering free Classic Movie matinees a few days each month, I think it reasonable to assume that if a listing is offered, it will in fact be available to watch ...for free! Likewise I expect to pay to watch all of the latest blockbusters playing in the rest of the cinemas because they are clearly identified as being pay to view. And I don't begrudge the many channels in question from offering additional movies without cost to their paying subscribers as additional perks. Such benefits represent market capitalism at its best. What I do find frustrating however, is that On-Demand and/or Cox are either too lazy or indifferent to identify this simple difference in their Free Movies menus. It certainly appears that in the world of cable television and content providers, FREE DOES NOT ALWAYS MEAN FREE! Maybe its time to read a good book instead.
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  • AllenP's avatar
    AllenP
    Valued Contributor

    What specific movie titles are you talking about?  I tries a couple from Movieplex, War Games (HD) and Raging Bull (SD) and both played and were free.  Give me a title or 2 and I'll try them, could be a market specific issue.

  • Obscure9876's avatar
    Obscure9876
    New Contributor
    AllenP said:

    What specific movie titles are you talking about?  I tries a couple from Movieplex, War Games (HD) and Raging Bull (SD) and both played and were free.  Give me a title or 2 and I'll try them, could be a market specific issue.

    The incident of which I wrote about occurred last Saturday. After reading your offer, I went back to the MoviePlex menu and discovered the first two of the four movies we attempted to watch were no longer listed, the third (Blue Thunder) can be viewed with out problems and the fourth (The African Queen) indicated technical difficulties and to try again later. Experimenting with the first 20 MoviePlex listings yielded the following results: 17 movies could be played however #1 The African Queen, #4 Backstreet Justice and #19 Cops & Robbersons were unavailable due to the aforementioned technical difficulties. What I didn't mention in my initial post was that Cox Tech Support readily acknowledges the irony of including content that is only free to some subscribers in their Free Movies menu. The company subcontracts the service to ON-Demand (though this is not readily apparent in their advertisements) rather then provide it themselves. When challenged with the local cinema's free movies example, they simply blamed ON-Demand and stated that it was beyond their control. In my line of work, customer complaints related to subcontracted services get resolved regardless of who is officially responsible.
  • DustinP's avatar
    DustinP
    Moderator
    Hello Obscure9876,

    As long as there is a subscription to the Networks available in the Free Movies Folder On Demand, you should have access to view without a charge. I regret there were technical errors when attempting to play subscribed movies in the MoviePlex folder.

    Are you finding these errors in the Folder MoviePlex HD or non HD? At this time, I couldn't duplicate any errors viewing the mentioned titles in the HD or SD folders.

    #1 The African Queen
    #4 Backstreet Justice
    #19 Cops & Robbersons

    If there are still technical troubles viewing these titles, we may want to perform some troubleshooting steps. When I receive a technical trouble On Demand like this, sometimes a hard reset to the receiver will help. If this doesn't help, then I would verify the connections-- any splitters connected to the coax between the wall and the receiver?