phil-news-nospam@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
> On Thu, 8 May 2008 14:24:23 -0400 Tam <t-tammaru@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> |
> | "Chet Bosco" <chet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
> | news:MPG.228cf85d78b30eac9896b2@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> |> In article <UcmdnX3dc-PMrb7VnZ2dnUVZ_uOdnZ2d@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, t-
> |> tammaru@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
says...
> |>> According to the local newspaper here in NJ, Cablevision is dropping
the
> |>> analog feed on TLC, A&E, E!, SciFi, trueTV, Animal Planet, Travel
> |>> Channel,
> |>> CSPAN2, and QVC. Meanwhile, Comcast is dropping analog History
Channel,
> |>> and
> |>> Cartoon Network. Possibly others. Verizon Fios seems to be
eliminating
> |>> all
> |>> analog, and will provide free STBs for the "small number" of analog
> |>> customers.
> |>>
> |>> Tam
> |>>
> |>>
> |>
> |> If you're using the cable company's box then it doesn't matter what
they
> |> do with analog channels.
> |>
> |> CB
> |
> | That's the whole point. Presently Comcast has a lot of customers with
analog
> | TVs and no cable box. They can sign up for either something like 30,
or
> | alternatively for about 65 channels. You need a cable box for each TV.
At
> | one time I had 4 analog TVs hooked up and no cable boxes. Also, people
with
> | QAM and NTSC tuners could get the local stations digitally/HD and a
lot of
> | other stations analog without a cable box.
>
> If Comcast would toss a few more channels into the basic lineup, I'd
accept
> their box. Then they could go digital and make more profit selling even
more
> programming to the people that would pay more for it. If the box was
decent
> I'd consider doing that myself. The channels I'll take for adding to
the
> basic lineup are C-SPAN2 (they only have C-SPAN in basic), C-SPAN3, CNN,
HLN,
> MSNBC, and Fox News. More likely they will just impose digital on all
the
> customers at some time (different times for each system), and make
everyone
> use a box of some kind (a QAM version of the cheap converter boxes that
are
> on the market now, modified to only tune basic channels).
Control of the individual subscriber's channel availability is primarily
accomplished by remotely programing the rental converter to not decrypt
channels that household doesn't subscribe to. To accommodate digital
cable ready TVs the channels included with the most basic tier wouldn't
be encrypted. IF the subscriber is paying attention they COULD purchase
a TV with a slot that can accept a rental card that allows the TV to
decrypt additional channels. Cable companies normally charge a lower
monthly rental rate for those cards than they would for a converter, but
there may be some problems with cable company employees not being up to
speed on installing and configuring the cards.
|
