Cable-cutting is the act of cutting cable TELEVISION, not just cable service outright. It surely can be done but not if you're addicted to watching all the same programming as cable has.

A smart cable company will view themselves as an ISP who is also a TV service rather than a TV service who is also an ISP.

I haven't had cable TV service for years. I generally abhorred most content on cable TV, even on the "cerebral" channels. NatGeo, Discovery, and History all went toward more "reality" programming. I found myself watching PBS more and more. I don't have a local PBS affiliate that I can get over the air, so I got a small Ku-band FTA satellite dish and pull in a PBS feed that way [it doubled as an Outernet receiver dish]. (Though much of PBS' content is also available online for free.) Other than the occasional free streaming documentary, I just don't watch TV and save about $50-60 a month. [I did put an antenna in my attic so I could watch the Olympics, but even then I found streaming them online was still a better experience. Because, my god, the commercials!]

Also, here's a non-paywall version of the story: http://news.morningstar.com/all/dow-jones/us-markets/2016113...