Posted on the 1st but published on the 31st, so presumably not an April Fool’s joke. My immediate reaction is that their markup on satellite dishes must be unconscionable if they can afford to do this.
It is not the initial expenditure, it is the monthly fee. Very similar to cell phones. They give away the phone to get you on the monthly fee. $50 a month is $600 a year, which is roughly equivalent to a net present value of $10,000. To put it another way, in order to have a regular income of $600 a year, you would need investments of about $10,000 or more.