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Cable TV has been around in the U.S. forever.

Or about 1948, if you believe Wikipedia.

As a result, everyone is accustomed to saying things like “cable channel” or “cable TV network” when referring to networks appearing on cable. But with the rise of IPTV, the notion of calling networks “cable TV” needs to change.

First of all, it’s inaccurate. For example, last year, the NY Times had a headline that read “NBC Purchases Oxygen Cable TV Network for Women“.  The addition of “cable” was unnecessary and not quite accurate since it’s also available to cable, satellite and IPTV providers. So why call it a cable network? It’s an outdated term for an age with multiple TV providers.

I don’t have anything against cable providers (although I am an IPTV analyst and editor of the IPTV Bulletin), but I’m just tired of seeing writers and editors still using that outdated term. Lots of industry folk say “multichannel service provider” when they refer to cable, satellite or IPTV providers. But, um, I don’t think that’s the right term for everyone.

Even regular folk not in the TV or media industries, tend to still say things like “I was watching cable TV” or “it’s on cable”. More often than not, people are subscribing to cable, over satelltie or IPTV. Cable is still the most popular way consumers get their TV content.

Old habits die hard, but I think it’s time for a change.

ландшафт
• rent a car bulgariaInstead of cable TV, say just TV.
• Instead of cable TV network, just say TV network.

But maybe I’m just being a stickler.

It seems that cable companies are finally getting tired of competing with all the free TV shows that are streaming over the Internet. According to an article in AdAge.com, Time Warner Cable’s CEO Glenn Britt said that they do care when TV networks put their full-length content online and essentially bypass cable TV.

This is a fight that’s been a long time coming. Hollywood studios and networks are finally realizing that they want to reach the most number of people as possible and not be constrained by traditional broadcast TV models. For example HBO has hosted many full-length shows online, as have ABC (Desperate Housewives, Lost), NBC (Hereos) and others.

Studios are embracing this new “Hollywood 2.0″ mentality that they want wider options for their content, and different mediums rather than trying to keep everyone tuned into their TV sets. In fact, a Time Warner cable spokesperson said they are prepared to withhold some subscriber revenue from the networks.

“Our point of view is that there is a segment of our audience that is living more primarily online than they are living on other platforms,” said Erik Flannigan, exec VP-digital media of MTV Networks’ Entertainment Group. “As some of our actions have made clear, the consumer will have many places they want to consume content. As long as we’re putting forth that experience and getting the lion’s share of the advertising, everybody wins.”

I don’t think that it will come to that, however. Cable companies are scared, and are trying to say and do anything to make people understand that they feel threatened by the Internet. Broadcast TV is being threatened–by DVRs, Internet delivery and even DVDs. But any major change to the established broadcast cable TV systems won’t happen for many years.

Some cable providers, like Comcast, have embraced the Internet and have developed web properties (like FanCast.com). It seems that other TV providers will have to learn how to adapt in the face of the growing Internet menace.

[tags] FanCast, Comcast, Advertising, AdAge, Ad Age, Cable TV, cable [/tags]

For anyone using a DVR and HD, it’s the classic dilemma: Do you use your cable or satellite provider’s DVR box or buy a Tivo? It’s like “Sophie’s Choice”.

On one hand, your cable provider offers a low cost DVR that works with HD content for just a few dollars a month–Comcast charges me about $5 per month. You also get just one box, rather than having to use a cable set-top and a separate DVR. Plus cable companies don’t charge you for buying the box; you usually rent the box for just a few dollars a month.

Going with Tivo means, higher initial cost of buying the HD DVR (about $600 to $800 for a Series 3 DVR).  It also means higher monthly costs–I pay about $20 per month for the Tivo service.

So lots of people are going through these issues when they upgrade to an HDTV and HD service. One blogger called “Dog Monster” wrote about this dilemma after deciding to go with a Comcast DVR, rather than buy an HD Tivo DVR.  And he writes that his frustrations with the Comcast DVR happened in less than one day of using it. He writes: “I loved watching television until I got my cablebox DVR.”

He goes on to list his 20 reasons why he decided to dump Comcast’s DVR and buy a new Tivo Series 3 box. Here’s the quick list:

1. Comcast DVR has no predictive fast-forward.
2. No Start From Beginning When Reaching the End of a Recording.
3. Not Recording Shows.
4. Searching for Shows is Clunky and Slow.
5. Finding Your Favorites Shows is Difficult.
6. The Cable Box Doesn’t Show the Time When Recording.
7. No Way of Knowing if A Show is Being Recorded.
8. Button Lag.
9. No Sound Effects like Tivo.
10. Not Intuitive Interface.
11. No Recommendations.
12. Recording Same Episode Multiple Times.
13. Doesn’t Know What Shows Are New.
14. Cannot Change Recording Quality.
15. Not Being Able to Exit the Play Timeline.
16. Doesn’t Warn About Conflicting Recordings.
17. Accidentally Recording SD Channel Rather than HD.
18. Comcast Doesn’t Group Shows Together Like Tivo.
19. Remote Control Is Not Easy to Use.
20. No Scheduling Shows Online.

Along with the points made here, I really miss the integration with the Internet for downloading photos, and other content (like RocketBoom) and the ability to save files on my computer with Tivo Desktop software. I must admit I am hitting my breaking point with Comcast’s DVR. I’ve been using it for about two months now (alongside my Series 2 Tivo for SD recordings) and have been very frustrated with it as well. Since I have multiple inputs on my HDTV set, I have both my Comcast DVR connected to watch and record HD content, and my Tivo for SD recordings and all my previously recorded shows.

But switching between the two is getting tedious. I want HD recording and Comcast’s DVR just isn’t giving me what I want out of an HD DVR.

It’s probably just a matter of time before I buy an HD Tivo and use it 100% of the time and drop Comcast’s DVR.

[tags] Tivo, Comcast, HD DVR, DVR, Comcast DVR, Series 2 Tivo [/tags]

It’s been a big week of news for Comcast and the cable industry. Aside from the new portable DVR and Tru2way announcements, Comcast also said it is now the number 4 provider of telephone services in the U.S.

Not bad for a company that: a) is not a phone company b) is the number one cable TV provider and c) just started offering telephone services three years ago.

Comcast said it has 4.1 million telephone customers, which beats Embarq’s residential numbers. Embarq is countering this claim by saying it has over 6 million phone customers if wholesale and business customers are included.

Comcast also announced other news at CES this week:

• A high-speed broadband service that can download an HD movie in 4 minutes, which will roll out this year.
• The addition of more HD videos for Comcast’s video-on-demand service.
• Fancast, a web site with full TV episodes and movies.

[tags] Comcast, VOIP, telephone, cable TV, cable, Fancast, Embarq [/tags]

The cable industry announced it is standardizing technology, called “Tru2way”,  for two-way interactive services, which essentially means consumers won’t need cable boxes to watch TV.

It also means interoperability between cable providers which can in turn lead to a growth in interactive services. Moving away from closed, proprietary systems into an open technology has been years in the making.  CableLabs, which works as the cable industry’s research division, said it would now be branded as Tru2way.

Comcast said it will roll out Tru2way by the end of 2008, while Time Warner and Cox said they would also have it available this year.

Already new products are being announced at CES.  There’s Comcast’s and Panasonic’s portable DVR player called AnyPlay, and Panasonic’s Viera Plasma HDTV.

In other cable news, Pike and Fischer, a research company, said that cable companies would concentrate on saving money for customers in 2008, rather than adding new features. The reason is because consumers will be worried about their budgets this year because of the economic downturn due to the mortgage crisis.

In fact, I just read that AT&T is cutting residential telephone and broadband customers for not paying their bills. Although cable companies will still lose TV customers this year, they will make up for it via digital voice/VOIP, as more consumers drop residential phones.

[tags] CES, tru2way, DVR, Panasonic, Comcast, Time Warner, Cox, AT&T, cable, cable TV, CableLabs [/tags]

An analysis by the Television Bureau of Advertising found that cable penetration fell to 61.3% of all TV households compared to 62.1% last year. That’s the lowest that cable penetration has been since February 1990.

It’s not a big drop, but it’s a sign that other broadcast TV providers are gaining. There’s no information on how the Internet other VOD systems are affecting cable penetration rates, but it’s likely there’s some cause-effect here.

Meanwhile, satellite and other TV providers are gaining on cable.  So called “alternative delivery systems” went from 24.5% last year to 28% this year.  Broadcast satellite is the leader in this category with an estimated 27.6% of TV households, up from 24 percent a year ago.

The study didn’t look at IPTV specifically, but it should be among the alternative systems since it’s usually delivered via fiber or DSL. But in the U.S. IPTV deployments have been rather small still, unlike Europe or Asia where IPTV is growing at a very fast rate.

AT&T and Verizon are now battling cable and satellite providers with their IPTV offerings in many states and communities, but so far their subscriber numbers are pretty low. AT&T’s U-Verse offering has about 126,000 subscribers, while Verizon’s FiOS TV has about 515,000 as of the end of the second quarter 2007.

[tags] cable penetration, cable TV, cable, satellite, IPTV  [/tags]

Bonus: Press release from the TV Bureau of Advertising.

In a few days, I’ll be getting a 52″ HDTV set for my home. And that means I’ll be looking for more HD content. I have Comcast cable and have already signed up for HD content and have the HD box with the HD DVR.

It’ll be quite sad to lose my Tivo Series 2 DVR, but it’s not HD so I’ll need to use the Comcast HD DVR. I’ll actually have both connected at the same time since I still have lots of content sitting around my Tivo that I haven’t watched yet. Plus, the Comcast HD DVR only has about 30 hours available for HD programming which means I’ll probably be filling that up pretty quickly. Having a backup Tivo for SD programming makes sense until I bite the bullet and buy a Tivo Series 3.

When I had an HDTV set earlier this year, I noticed a few rather interesting things.

I Only Watched HD Content. Switching to HD really made me want to only watch HD content. I watched nature shows on Discovery HD, travel shows on the Travel Channel and lots of sports in HD. It really changed how and what I watched on my TV. I thought it was just a phase, but I predict it’ll happen again.

Not Enough HD Content.  After getting an HD set, I was hungry for HD content. But I found that it was severely lacking. Sure there were a few movies, sports and some HD channels, but the majority of channels were in SD. Fortunately, some of my favorite prime-time shows–like Lost, 24 and Heroes–are in HD so I’ll be able to enjoy them in HD mode.

I saw a story recently showing research that said consumers are happy with HDTV picture quality, but want more HD programming. A survey of511 HD households found that 85% thought the quality of their HDTV sets was either above average or excellent. Only 39%, however said the same about the selection of HD programming.

Being happy with the programming usually comes down to how you’re getting your HD programming–antenna, cable, satellite or IPTV.  Cable and satellite companies are battling it out over who has the most HD channels, and it’s hard to know unless you do the research.

The survey found that sports and movies were the most popular HD programming. In fact, ESPN HD was the most-watched source of sports programming, and HBO was tops in HD movies.

Meanwhile, there’s evidence that HDTV is getting more and more affordable. With the holidays approaching and the Super Bowl just a month away, it is a great time to start looking around for HDTV deals.

A new JD Power study found that consumers love their HDTV sets and would buy HDTV again, like the sets a lot and would recommend them to friends.  Among HDTV brands, Sony, Pioneer, and Samsung are top consumer favorites. JD Power’s “2007 Large Screen HDTV Usage and Satisfaction Study” measured customer satisfaction with HDTVs.

In my quest for HD programming, I’ll report back on my search of TV providers in the San Francisco Bay Area on who has the most channels for HD. For now, I have cable but am willing to switch to a new provider if they have a better offering.

[tags] HDTV, HD, Comcast, cable, Tivo, HD DVR, DVR [/tags]

Having problems with Comcast cable? Had a terrible customer service experience with the cable company? Want to air your frustrations to the world (and with Comcast, possibly)? Then check out the Comcast Must Die blog hosted at Blogspot.

There’s a great post that contains a chat log between a customer and a Comcast customer support person. Plus, the site’s author, Bob Garfield, says he will host a podcast on December 11th, which will feature callers and hopefully, a Comcast executive to answer all our questions. I haven’t seen any specific details about it so far, but it seems kind of interesting.

Garfield encourages comments and he even tells them to include their Comcast account numbers when leaving comments because he said Comcast will call them back.

I don’t know about that, but I personally wouldn’t give out my account number on the Internet for all to see. Garfield says it’s ok, since there’s nothing personal about it, but I’m still not convinced.

If you like Comcast, you might want to check out the Comcast Rocks blog, started by a Comcast employee.

Comcast’s Chief Technology Officer, Tony Werner, said that the company plans to begin using multi-room DVRs in 2008 in select markets. Werner was speaking at the keynote for the first ever Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) technology conference.

However, Light Reading also suggests that Comcast is looking to launch a “Start Over” type of TV service that allows customers to watch replays of TV shows. It’s something that has been gaining in popularity in other cable systems since it doesn’t require a DVR box or service.

Multichannel News reported that Comcast is looking to launch a “Start Over” service much like Time Warner Cable’s Start Over.

Start Over, as offered by Time Warner, is a VOD service that provides replays of as many as 22,000 cable and broadcast TV shows per month, available only during the show’s broadcast window. Time Warner has agreements with more than 100 networks for the service.

Aside from these restrictions, Time Warner’s service lets viewers view shows for only a limited time after they’ve aired and does not allow fast-forwarding through commercials.

[tags] Comcast, Time Warner, cable, DVR, on-demand, TV, Start Over [/tags]

The Federal Communications Commission infuriated cable companies last week after saying that cable TV operators had a penetration rate over 70% . Meanwhile, a Wall Street analyst, Craig Moffett, said that the number was not “mathematically possible” and was closer to 60%.

Why is this a big deal? Apparently, if cable companies go over 70% a federal rule is triggered. Explains Multichannel News:

“After looking at the total number of cable subscribers and the total number of homes passed by all cable companies, and after adjusting to exclude vacant households, Moffett determined that cable penetration was no higher than 60.5%.

and

“The FCC gets a booster shot of power over cable when 70% of households are passed by a cable system with at least 36 channels — and 70% of those households, in turn, subscribe to such cable systems.”

This important difference showcases the fallibility of research methods and data. The original researcher said the data is “accurate but not reliable because some cable operators withheld their subscriber and homes-passed totals.” FCC panel members are now closely looking at these numbers as well as those from Moffett.