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FCC Rejects Cheap/Fast Internet Device
Tech.Luver writes "ABC News reports that a group of technology companies including Google, Microsoft, and Dell, have failed to convince the Federal Communications Commission of the utility of high-speed internet access via television airwaves. The FCC concluded the potential to disrupt consumer image quality was too high, in a statement released Wednesday. 'The technology companies say the unlicensed and unused TV airwaves, also known as "white spaces," would make Internet service accessible and affordable, especially in rural areas and also spur innovation. However, TV broadcasters oppose usage of white spaces because they fear the device will cause interference with television programming and could cause problems with a federally mandated transition from analog to digital signals in February 2009.'"
Interesting the timing of this article given Ofcom's recent approval of Ultra Wide Band for consumer devices in the UK.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6938941.stm
biopowered.co.uk - catalytically cracking triglycerides for home automotive use since 2008. Just say no to big oil!
Ignorant as I am, I'd say all they need to do is to just up the frequency until outside TV spectrum. As an added bonus, all you'd have to do to cook your food would be to place it near your wireless router.
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
I'm guessing you need a phone-line sos yer requests can be transmitted?
Blar.
And we all know that that "February 2009" deadline is actually going to be upheld.
But aren't TV broadcasters mostly on cable now??
Oh, and sattelites, of course!
gtkaml.org
*COUGH*BULLSHIT*COUGH*
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
It's interesting to see that th FCC is taking the stance that they are with this one.
They're pushing ahead w/ the BPL approvals despite the known and measured interference that the ARRL has presented to them. (They've shown that it's not just the hams that are effected too.) Yet they are concerned about interference on a new system before it's even tested because of the possibility of interference.
It's sounding like the power companies using BPL and media companies may have purchased a few FCC employees to look after their corporate interests.
Heck, many TVs can't reliably detect unused TV spectrum as can be witnessed by tuning your TV into the airwaves (instead of your cable/satellite) and watching the screen turn blue on stations that come in fine, but have a slightly weak signal. (like say, Windsor, Ontario's Channel 9 in Detroit).
Anyway, I say the whole broadcast TV thing needs to just die anyway. Seriously, how many people do you know personally who don't have satellite or cable? I know of one person, but that's it.
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It is a case of Big Money vs. Big Money because both sides have huge amount of money to throw into it they figure regecting change will be the easist choice.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Anyway, I say the whole broadcast TV thing needs to just die anyway. Seriously, how many people do you know personally who don't have satellite or cable? I know of one person, but that's it.
I think this is the first time I've seen someone on slashdot advocating the elimination of the FREE option and requiring people to pay money for something.
This guy's the limit!
-- This is just like broadband over powerline (BPL). The FCC makes sure the requirements are inadequate, such that there is guaranteed interference with somebody (with Congressional influence). The FCC then quashes it, in order to help it's telco friends.
-- BPL still exists for the moment, as, there is not enough influential pain being relayed to Congress yet. Don't worry, BPL will be quashed.
-- Gotta protect the telco's, so that the commissioners have lucrative future position and employment.
That's a feature of the television/tuning device so that people don't have to watch/hear static. I've had a few VCRs and whatnot where you could disable the blue screen and watch/listen to as much static as you wanted.
This guy's the limit!
I can see the TV people's point. It's not like those frequencies are a big truck you can just dump stuff on.
Meta will eat itself
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you know, if you're gonna "censor" all the "bad" words (fsck, idijts) you better just avoid them in the first place.
it looks silly.
Sigs are for the weak.
I don't have satellite nor cable, and I don't see why I should lose them just so some geeks can have better Internet access.
Or maybe you have a vested interest in everyone being subject to cable/satellite corporate monopolies...
Putting wireless internet on the freed-up TV channels is a particularly poor use of the spectrum. Each TV channel is only about 6 MHz wide (4.5 plus some guard space). That would accomodate maybe 50 million bits per second of service, across the propagation range of VHF and UHF, which depending on power and weather, can range from a few hundred meters to several hundred miles. If you use a few hundred watts you could cover a few square miles, but so can the current Wifi channels. Covering a large rural are is impractical as you'd need many watts of power transmitted at the user's end, and only a limited number of users could be handled.
They'll have to give up their entertainment monopoly in parts of the country that don't enjoy broadband yet. Then those people won't watch Must See TV, which is interference the way NBC measures it.
Scrap the FCC. Use frequency hopping spread-spectrum devices to avoid interference. Create grid networks for data. Forget telephone, television, etc. Just let me get data. Look, I'd even accept a tiered pricing model: one price for low-latency traffic (voice, games), one price for high-latency traffic (large data downloads).
The "intelligent" network with its walled gardens gets on my nerves.
Use the Firehose to mod down Second Life stories!
I wonder how many more years it will be before the airwaves are worth more (in terms of dollar value) as a medium for generic data transmission than they are as a medium for a specific technology (TV, radio, cell phone...)
I think it's mostly for the hearing part. The noise from the static can be significantly louder than any of the TV programs that come in clearly. Probably the blue screen ought to be traded for a "mute" function when the a weak signal is detected AND the peak volume exceeds a certain threshold.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
COFDM, the modulation used in Europe, may be more robust in that area than 8VSB used in the US, still I don't believe it would be a serious concern.
I think the biggest fear for those broadcasters is, as usual, money : if those bandwidths, which they are given free and exclusive access to by the FTC, were to be auctionned off to telco operators, they might eventually have to pay to remain on air.
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
Whatpornifpornallpornwhitespaceporninporncommentsp ornwaspornusedpornlikepornthis ?
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
The person responsible for that "feature" is definately on my list of people to meet before I die.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
Pick Any Two.
I know, I know, the "fast" in that old adage refers to how quickly you want it produced, not how fast the device actually is. This is just a play on the article title.
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Er, $20 per month is the _lifeline_ offering?
Over here, 15 (less that 20$) is considered expensive for cable...
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Or maybe you have a vested interest in everyone being subject to cable/satellite corporate monopolies... Too many people take for granted the $40~$50 per month they spend on their cable/sat TV bill.
Even people in serious debt will keep paying for their Cable/sat TV (& cell phone( until the very end.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Well, there was one good CPU design, but unfortunately the 6809 just never took off...
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I live in a big city and only get free over the air TV. Its enough for me. I like it.
I don't think DVB is the worry. Analog interference is, and with the power required, even DVB can be overpowered and interfered with.
Video Production Support
It's true, TV spectrum is afforded more protection than in areas right now that are being bombarded with unintended RF from the BPL trials. BPL is given almost a 'do what you want' license right now for testing, when the FCC knows it's causing problems.
AT&T, Sprint or whomever wins the auction will provide some form of high speed Internet on that 700mhz pie they won. There's already speeds of greater than 1gbps on the gigaherz spectrum, and claims of 54mbps on around 20mhz of 900mhz.
I'm not going to speculate too much, but I'd garner that with the 700mhz auction coming up, the FCC isn't likely to go 'easy' on any device that uses TV spectrum, lest they scare away record numbers for that auction.
In any case, this partnership helps one key thing: smart radios that pickup and re-use spectrum not being used. There's too much waste, even the cellular companies are guilty of this, and it's the next generation to detect and re-use.
It's time the radios get smarter, and start talking to one another.... coordination by the radios themselves is the only way to assure the spectrum is used all the time.
Rain/snow/brimstone may affect your reception so why can't that be exploited?
I guess the difference (i.e. why those TV sets are allowed) is that TVs rarely if ever actually transmit if they can't detect that a channel is in use. At worst, they show black/blue, but they don't think it's fine to use the channel for transmissions.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Anyway, I say the whole broadcast TV thing needs to just die anyway. Seriously, how many people do you know personally who don't have satellite or cable? I know of one person, but that's it.
Well, since it seems completely impossible to find any market for figures for the US, I'll just talk from my experiences from Norway. How you get TV is very dependent on where you live, if you live somewhere central you typically have cable and it seems like "everyone else" does too. Go a little bit further out and you'll find there's a good mix of satellite or broadcast reievers. Once you start talking cabins, very few have satellites but many will put up a simple aerial antenna. By moving to digital, DTT will offer pretty much the same package as cable/satellite and would make it a lot more attractive again. Besides, using broadcast systems for pushing Internet, while using the networks for pushing IPTV seems like the least sane switch in history, at least if you're talking IPTV over wireless. Broadcast TV does a smashing job of sending the same content to everyone. Leave broadcast to be broadcast and start pulling cables so there'll be some decent internet connection instead.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Fuck television. I want decent internet up here in the forested hills. The FCC does a great job at smacking down anything that might be useful.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
Well that's nice, but I know a lot of rural areas that still don't have access to any cable at all. And depending on what side of the hill they are on, some don't even have a "clear view of the southern sky" either. Basically, over the air TV is the only option. (My parents can't get cable or DSL, but at least they can get satellite. Some neighbors can't.)
I stopped paying for cable TV over a year ago, and I'm far from the first person to do so. I currently have an OTA (over-the-air aka broadcast) high-def setup in my house, 100% free after the antenna purchase (40 bucks). I'm in a valley, no problems getting all the local channels, not even during "weather". The rest? Well, I only watched a couple of them to begin with
Here's an idea for the cable broadcasters
I refuse to pay even $2/month for ad supported TV. I love the 8 OTA-HD channels that I get at my home using just a small antenna. I have a HD-DVR and watch shows like CSI-Miami, 24, House, Criminal Minds, Numbers, etc without paying a dime to anyone. All in glorious 1080i or 720p HD and no extra compression. Now, why would I give that up to pay some sleazy company like Comcast.
I don't have satellite nor cable, and I don't see why I should lose them just so some geeks can have better Internet access.
You're using the TV version of free dial-up access if you're relying on terrestrial TV signals for entertainment. If you had access to wireless, high-speed internet, you could watch streaming video instead. I should even have to into the difference in choices of entertainment available between the two. Plus, most UHF stations in the upper numbers are really low-quality programming.
By the way, it's not just geeks that use the internet anymore, just so you know. They're replacing the generation that uses UHF anyway.
Or maybe you have a vested interest in everyone being subject to cable/satellite corporate monopolies...
I dunno. Sounds to me like maybe you have a vested interest in everyone being subject to cable/phone corporate monopolies. <g>
Opening up wireless spectrum to high-speed, two-way internet access might provide us with at least as much competition as there is in the cell phone market right now. At least, we'd no longer be dependent on whichever two companies run two types of wire to our houses.
There were even proposals on the table from a group that wanted to do free, ad-supported access, so if their long-shot proposal wins you'd get much of the same experience of free TV you have now if price is your concern. Even Google is making rumbles of ad-supported devices.
Still it's a shame their device wasn't properly engineered.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Check out how much TV spectrum goes unused across the U.S., and not just in rural areas. Unbelievable waste. Does this look like a free-market allocation of resources? Does the FCC realize it is making earnest citizens literally sick with disappointment? How many people would welcome a movement to just seize the airwaves, creating wireless ISPs that don't ask for permission to broadcast? Bring on the interference?
The difference is how many people care about the two. Ham radio operators are mostly obscure hobbyists that most of the people in charge of the FCC may have never had any encounter with. Terrestrial broadcast TV watchers are a bit more ubiquitous, and so the FCC cares about them more. Plus, they tend to be from an elderly demographic that's a bit more politically active, especially in terms of contacting officials and donating to campaigns.
It's really no surprise that the FCC can brush one of them off but have to pay attention to the other.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
The fcc is trying to postpone their inevitable end by trying to maintain their unconstitutional choke hold on Americans' free speech. Of course the RIAA have been trying to maintain their chokehold (albeit constitutional) on music, and this is their excuse for alienating their customers, and committing financial suicide.
If RIAA wanted to stay in business, they would work on getting their musicians songs (concert advertisements) exposure, not trying to cover them up, and litigate their customers.
If the FCC wanted to avoid being trampled by pirate data transmitters, they would end the unconstitutional practice of licensing free speech, and set down some standard ground-rules about amplitude (dependent on number of transmitters nearby), not jamming thy neighbor, standard protocol (mesh), and network neutrality.
But instead, the federal censorship commission has opted to die slowly as the airwaves turn into an invariable screaming match amongst TV stations, and pirate internet broadcasters. soon it will not be uncommon to see an antenna throwing lightning bolts whenever it is humid or rainy, we will have to Faraday cage everything, and everything is gonna hum. What interesting times we live in.
BTW: you can still buy soviet 1 kilowatt, = 1 megahertz triodes on ebay for like 25 bucks. 10 otta do it, and one burly generator.
Yeah growing up, we didn't have cable because it was too expensive. And yet my friends that were worse off than we were financially, did have cable because of the community service.
I'm really considering dropping cable when I move into my new place. Cable is taking up way too much coding/reading/doing productive stuff time.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
While I'm sure there is "pressure" from teleco lobbyists on the FCC commissioners and I'm sure this does affect a lot of their decisions (lobbyists "affect" read: pay money for every decision in US government today), I don't think BPL is the best case for you to use for your conspiracy theories. BPL is really, truly flawed. Think about it. You're transmitting high-frequency signals over giant unshielded wires. You are basically sending high-frequency data through an enormous antenna. The interference potential is *huge*, and it shouldn't be allowed to spread unchecked. There are strategies for minimizing interference but they make it so slow as to be pointless.
The media culture is now the biggest challenge to democracy since it's inception. We are both better informed and more easily brainwashed.
Now this is not to say that pay tv is any better for such things. Cable stations advertise just as much as over-the-air stations (with the obvious exception of premium channels), but saying that over-the-air tv is "free" is like saying that gasoline used to cheap. We are now all paying a steep price for that delusion (and I don't mean at the pump). How long before we realize that advertising will do us in faster than global warming and jihad combined?
The real problem with "whitespace" devices is intermodulation interference. Just because there isn't a signal in a "whitespace" doesn't mean that if you transmit there that your signal won't mix with other signals in receivers to create intermodulation noise.
t mlt ml
Unlicensed signals on first adjacent channels next to DTV signals may generate third-order intermodulation product noise in DTV receivers.
There is nothing wrong with trying to set up "intelligent radio" unlicensed systems in their own band, but putting them adjacent to DTV channels is not a good idea.
More info:
http://www.tvtechnology.com/pages/s.0072/t.1598.h
http://www.tvtechnology.com/pages/s.0072/t.2005.h
In a perfect world, there'd be pure digital distribution of television series and movies. All content would be streamed on-demand in a high-quality format, with a basic fee covering access to the network and perhaps a low-cost fee per hour of watching (like $.25 per hour) with no interstitial commercial "messages". I'd be very happy with that.
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
Anyway, I say the whole broadcast TV thing needs to just die anyway. Seriously, how many people do you know personally who don't have satellite or cable?
I'm one of those people. OTA 1080i HD KICKS FUCKING ASS compared to the miserable cable and satellite options. Why pay for shit when I've got beautiful HD coming in for free?
Please don't mess with my broadcast TV. I'm using it.
Pick 2!
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
I think this is the first time I've seen someone on slashdot advocating the elimination of the FREE option and requiring people to pay money for something. I would advocate the hypothetical elimination of freely distributed crack-cocaine to pre-teens. Television isn't much better
My Comcast is running at 10-12mbps sustained right now, if money got tight, I'd be hard pressed to give that up.
Cheers.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
it's not about money, it's about technology.. it'd take free satellite/cable any day..
I don't have cable and satellite TV. I still use rabbit ear and bowtie antennae to get local channels for free. :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Me. I don't have $50/month lying around to pay for 8 channels I'd watch and 100+ I wouldn't. I'll get cable as soon as they offer an a la carte version for under $25/month. Until then, Netflix meets my non-broadcast needs. Sure, I can get "basic cable" for $25, but it includes nothing that's not broadcast, news, or shopping - so I'd be paying for about twenty channels I wouldn't watch, and a dozen I can get with my antenna. Woo!!
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
Yay, I'd LOVE to pay $20/month for what I get for free now! Sounds GREAT! I also eat a ten dollar bill every morning for breakfast, it is TASTY!
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
My wife and children watch TV, I don't and I wouldn't care, but there's less crying if there's a TV around.
Of course, hardly anyone scrambles analog cable anymore. It's just the usual local police training videos during the daytime hours of the local Public Access Channel that get analog-scrambled anymore (actual open public-access programming is between 10 PM and 3 AM).
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
In the long run it would be better to kill TV altogether, use the spectrum to provide wireless Internet everywhere and then provide "TV" over the wireless Internet connections.
Quote: "The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) wants to let wireless Internet service providers (WISPs) to operate in unused spectrum space currently occupied by TV broadcasters. The proposal is aimed at giving consumers an alternative to cable and telecom broadband providers."
???
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
You're assuming that all channels have equal monetary value. If you only watch 5 or 10 obscure, unpopular channels, your cable bill might go down. Otherwise, all of those less well-known channels that you never watch are essentially free anyway. With the amount of television that I usually watch, I end up paying about $1/hour, which I think is pretty reasonable for the channels that I watch.
I've been campaigning for this for years. Ideally, I'd like to see a true a la carte system that let me pick as many or as few channels as I liked, but I'd accept a 5, 10 or 15 channel plan too.
y channels? ;-)
Yes, and here's what would happen if you got what you're asking for:
1) Cable company transmits to you sufficient data for all channels, but "locks" the ones you didn't pick out.
2) You and others gripe that this is DRM, greedy, &c.
3) Someone starts a website showing how to unlock those channels.
4) Another good deed goes punished.
Oh, and:
tech/history/science/history channels
Don't you mean redundancy/tech/history/science/history/redundanc
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
"The level of signal redundancy (using Viterbi encoding) combined with the forward error correction (FEC) mechanisms introduced in the signal, practically reduce the risk of interference to none."
I'm sorry, but that's just misleading.
In any channel transmitting digital data, you have a certain bit error rate (BER). Using error correction techniques, you can improve the performance of the channel such that the BER is equivalent to that of a channel with much less noise, or much higher transmit power, or much higher antenna gain. Error correction provides gains that you can measure in decibels, just like an increase in transmit power would.
But a dB loss is a dB loss, it doesn't matter if it's due to weather, interference, etc. If interference causes a dB loss over and above what the channel was designed for, you lose more bits than expected, and quality degrades.
If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.
The FCC have proven time and time again that they are in the telcos' back pockets. Anybody can rig a test to fail, or deny spectrum access on a marginal reading of an oscilloscope. You'll never know the truth, because they'll change the truth to fit the outcome they want. It'll be he-said, she-said between the FCC testers and the product engineers. Besides, anyone in a marginal area for HD broadcast won't get a picture worth watching anyway. That's the big joke, signal loss is much worse than for regular TV. So who cares whether shitty reception degrades another 2%. It's a non issue.
The reason we'll never have decent wide-area Web access is that it hurts the telcos. Anything that hurts the telcos won't fly with the FCC. Just remember: what's good for Verizon and AT&T is good for America. Oh, I almost forgot: you mustn't say the Seven Unspeakable Words on TV. That's bad, too. Sure, you can show a close-up of a mad maniacal sadist chain-sawing the intestines out of a co-ed in slow motion, that's fine. But God forbid you utter a wordy-turd.
You can do that now, its called stealing cable. It probably wouldn't be any harder or any more illegal than it is now.
The a la carte system will eventually happen, just not yet. Once all the broadband connections going into enough homes are sufficient to handle the bandwidth (and likewise the core infrastructure along with it), what you'll see is middlemen (like cable companies) getting eliminated. End users will buy their products directly from the manufacturer, so to speak. I'm just waiting for the day where I can buy CNN, the History Channel, SCI-FI, and, um, the Hustler Channel or something. And that's all. Won't be long now. Any delays will be associated with the broadband itself. That's all that's in the way.
C//
Something needs to be done about it. The public and nonspecial interests need to use another strategy like SUING them to open up. The Fcc is definitely hoarding for the gov & $$Wealthy$$ and we are not getting our share. Those airwaves are like air : They belong to us. The interference problem can be handles way better with better smarter radios. We right now are WASTING our airwaves. Another problem with private ownership is what happens when a crisis strikes like the bridge collapse in Minnesota. No one could use their stupid cellphone.
Well I can stream a TV quality signal at about 340-480 kpbs so if they offered free wifi and a simple device (like the moded Xbox) to convert it to programming it would be cheaper and offer more viewer choice.
I'm not sure we can't have government provided wifi with the TV spectrum intact but apparently we're being told to believe that we can't have either (we'll probably end up with no free TV stations just as we run out of spectrum possibilities for universal internet access.
But damn it I want us to at least TRY to open the spectrum! (And yes I have cable and High-Speed internet... but I want people who don't to have the same capabilities because they should be DAMN cheap).
You apparently don't know many elderly or other fixed-income folks...
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
Thank you for clarifying that relationship. :D
1) Cable company transmits to you sufficient data for all channels, but "locks" the ones you didn't pick out.
2) You and others gripe that this is DRM, greedy, &c.
3) Someone starts a website showing how to unlock those channels.
4) Another good deed goes punished.
Nonsense. My gripe with DRM is two-fold: I don't like my business transactions with a company having any basis in the idea that I'm dishonest; and I don't want to have to deal with restrictive and unreasonable (in my view) usage polices, again predicated on the idea that I'll violate their copyright if given half a chance. I don't think it's an unreasonable stance and I suspect it's a position shared by a large portion of the Slashdot readership. For example, I support the iTunes Plus model because I prefer digital distribution for music with no unreasonable restrictions on usage. I have no intention of filesharing my music library and don't support those who believe that such files should be freely distributed without appropriate compensation to the artists.
With respect to your point about the cable company transmitting all data to me but locking the unsubscribed channel, I don't regard not having access to something I haven't paid for as DRM, but rather regard restrictions upon reasonable usage as unacceptable DRM. Besides, wouldn't it be far more efficient to simply transmit the data on-demand, or simply transmit the subscribed channels? I think we need to move away from the idea of channels playing non-stop with set program cycles, and push for true on-demand programming. This would obviate the need for Tivo-type devices and free up bandwidth. The caveat is that I'm not remotely technically qualified to speak to the feasibility of this proposal and thus I'm entirely open to being corrected by someone who knows more than I. Don't you mean redundancy/tech/history/science/history/redundanc
Damn, and I looked at that sentence twice before I submitted. In my defense, this is Slashdot and I didn't expect anyone to actually read my comment!
cheers.
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
It seems like a lot of the problems with wireless spectrum are caused by legacy issues.
Suppose you were able to wipe the slate clean and start from scratch. Would it not be possible to get a significant extra amount of use out of the spectrum if it were designed as one big network, 100% digital?
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
Actually, years ago we had a C-Band provider that did offer an a-la-carte plan. This was in addition to all of the free channels on the C-Band satellites, of course. However, as technology progresively got cheaper, their rates seemed to get progressively higher so that they eventually priced their services such that it just made more sense to switch to Dish Network.
If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.
Instead, the FCC has once again overprotected the big bucks incumbent users of the PUBLIC airwaves from the PUBLIC!
The FCC needs to be abolished. They are a place where friends of political hacks can get big buck patronage jobs-nothing more. It has long outlived its usefulness.P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
i think it's more the principle. i know people that see no reason to pay for TV that is full of commercials and a slew of channels they just don't care about (like my mom!). i know people that hardly watch TV except maybe some local news. i know people that are regularly out of town, or working crazy long hours a few weeks a month, so it seems stupid to add an unneeded utility. then i know a few people that don't even own TV, but they are not really part of this mess.
i have cable because i live in a house with a few people that all split it. if i lived alone i would never pay what we do for TV.
They could tether him with a nice and visible wire, and have people on stage at the other end of the leash... maybe people would start to get the hint? Of course with our luck people would just think him brave for admitting he's a puppet.
Gravity Sucks
I hear people balking at a $25.00 cable bill. heh.
:-/
My cable bill last month was just over $178.00 USD.
Yeah, OK, so I have the package with digital phone, internet access, a DVR/cable box rental, every single channel (and every premium channel they have to offer)...
The funny thing is... I'm never home to watch it
"They said I probly shouldn't fly with just one eye," "I am Bender. Please insert girder."
Local advertising is the reason a-la-carte cable will never happen. Your local cable co can sell advertising on all those channels you'd rather not pay for. If you can't shut it off, chances are you'll watch them every once in a while rather than never. Some channels are paid for almost entirely by ad revenue, so there's no reason not to give them to you.
It's a very good question. In my region, and I believe most regions, cable is not a dejure monopoly. It is a defacto one. I.e, it is a purely natural monopoly due to the disincentive to a potential competitor of having to lay down duplicate lines. They don't compete with one another because... they don't. :) Herein lies a great deal of the difficulty.
I view thing's like Verizon's FIOS as to be extremely promising in that regard. Alas, I'm stuck with SBC (now AT&T... whoa, blast from the past... you'd think that we would have learned!).
C//
Apparently, the FCC has not yet realized that traditional broadcast television -- other than for hobbiest purposes -- will not exist beyond the next decade. As evidenced by the success of the TIVO and other DVR devices, consumers want to choose what they see and when they see it, which is incompatible with the broadcast method. Since the existing television spectrum won't be used anyway in a few years, what's the big deal?
Screw that. I /actually use/ a rabbit-ear antenna. As do many people in my neighborhood.
I live in an urban area. All of the VHF stations come in crystal clear on my 30 year old television set, and most of the UHF stations do, too. The Fox affiliate comes in a little bit fuzzy, but that's because they broadcast from a suburb 30 very hilly miles south of here; if I had a proper roof antenna there would be no problem.
The local cable monopoly has nothing to offer me other than 50 channels I have no interest in, and 5 or so channels I have no interest in paying $49.99/mo for. Their value is going to get much worse when I finally buy an HDTV - all the local channels are already broadcasting HD signals, which I can already pick up on my $14.99 bunny ears - to get HD on cable I have to get the $61.39/mo package. A la carte programming would make this situation somewhat better, but that will only happen over their cold dead bodies (which sounds like a reasonable solution to me).
Basically, screw that idea. Broadcast TV must stay around. If I don't get my Letterman, I get very very angry.
Aside: What is up with cable/sat providers anyway? I pay, but still have to watch commercials? Is there something I just don't understand here?
Legalize recreational marijuana. Seriously.
Well, I myself live in a rural area where we have one cable provider, don't have a clear view of the southern sky, and have no "over the air TV" option. On a good day I might be able to pick up channels 2,4, and 5.
Here's your sig.
"costs us" ? Are you suggesting that you are "cleansing your mind" of thoughts of 4x4s and women chasing you instead of going to work? If so, you appear to be quite stupid and will soon starve to death (or at least lose your apartment..) Most people know very well what commercials are for, and most people doesn't mind being manipulated in regards to what soap or painkiller to buy.. What do you suggest as an alternative to advertising, by the way? A government-mandated ban on brand-names, or a law against talking favorably about products? Both? Advertising is clearly no challenge to democracy at all. But a threat to democracy and freedom is people who want to limit freedom of speech.
Second, I am in no way advocating a ban on anything. Yes, people know what commercials are for, but they do not want to be deluged by advertising, they simply tolerate it because they know it is a part of a liberal democracy. It distorts people's view of the world because it is "offered" in the guise of real information and is at the same time completely biased and unreliable. Do you like listening to someone who you know to be full of shit?
As for solutions, the best way to negate the effects of a lie is to offer the truth. Why not require advertisers to provide sources for their claims, or to explicitly state their intentions, e.g., "we are claiming that our body spray will make women want to have sex with you". How well would innuendo work when you can no longer get away with just a wink and a nudge?
There are very definite repercussions on our culture and our politics from the rapidly accelerating media blitz we now face. Consider the simple fact there was a time when you could go for days or even weeks without seeing any form of advertisement and now we are struggling to keep it away from us for a few minutes of peace. Think talking billboards (some of which actually show real commercials), spam, telemarketers, flyers, magazine ads, tv commercials, etc. It is everywhere and only getting worse.
And if you doubt its effects, consider that most people can tell you more about the iPhone than their senator.
Advertising is clearly no challenge to democracy at all. How was it that you came to this conclusion exactly? Where is your evidence? Have you even given it any thought?
Check this out if you're actually interested. If not, enjoy your Pepsi.
Yeah, captive audience, nuff said.
;p
I've been watching cable pretty often at night staying at my grandmother's, and after about two weeks I realized: It's the EXACT SAME CRAP, sometimes days in a row. Sat/Sun on like TBS or FX or something they were playing the same movies back to back two nights in a row (in one case I think they even had austin powers 1 on twice in a row.) Another example is SciFi, where it's like the same 5 syndicated shows filled in with their crummy made for tv movies during the day till 9-10 at night (later depending on the day, but I only watch them on Fridays usually, the new show lineup and all.)
Anyhow, the only reason it's still in the house is momentum. She had it to watch CNN which she's stopped watching since TBS sold out, and to get clear local TV (which she has no interest in getting a decent antenna to replace, go figure!).
For the amount of money spent yearly on Cable, I could probably get the entire DVD collection of every seasonal show on that year, and still have enough left over for a really nice dinner, a box of condoms, and the prerequisite bottle of liquor to get the girl I took out to go down on me
Hmm, doubtful, at least any time soon. The current setup makes too much money for the cable companies, so they don't have a lot of incentive to change the sweet deal they have for themselves. Essentially, they're reverse ISPs, which package the internet and then spoon feed it to their subscribers.
ABC has already started offering their shows over IP, but it relegates you to watching Grey's Anatomy on a relatively small screen, getting a crick in your neck from staring at the laptop too long.
AT&T is pushing something called IPTV (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPTV) which sounds like it might be a good solution to a lot of problems. But you'll still be paying through the nose for cable service.
At the current rates for cable service (my parents pay something ridiculous), when I moved into a new house I made the decision to not get cable, and have been pretty happy with it so far. Broadcast HDTV gives me a few channels to entertain my girlfriend with when she comes over, and I don't watch TV at all these days.