Cable Television |  |
Chapter Summary| Cable TV has undergone many changes. The system that offered one to three channels during the 1950s offered about 50 channels during the 1980s and promises hundreds of channels in the future. A technology that involved wires strung from tree to tree to bring TV to areas with poor reception now sports fiber optics that can carry a raft of interactive services. An industry that maintained stable, modest, consistent numbers for decades suddenly boasted figures that jumped hundreds of percents in one year and then settled back to modest, slow-growing numbers just as quickly.
Ownership of cable systems changed greatly, too, from the early community-oriented, "ma-and-pa" owned systems to multiple-system owners. These MSOs, in turn, merged and acquired more cable-related properties and then began a consolidation and withdrawal process because they were overextended. Eventually several emerged as major powers in the business. Now companies that were previously not part of the cable scene have become big players in cable.
The regulatory scene has evolved. Early cable TV was essentially unregulated with rules arising only as broadcasters convinced federal governmental bodies of the need to protect them from encroachment by the cable systems. The government's reaction, primarily from Congress and the FCC, was one of confusion and abstention; during the 1960s and early 1970s, however, rules were enacted dealing with must-carry, syndicated exclusivity, and copyright. Cable TV became even less regulated by both federal and local agencies than it had been as the government developed a deregulation policy during the 1980s. The early 1990s, however, brought reregulation, including subscriber fee rollbacks. The 1996 Telecommunications Act then revived deregulation.
The franchising of cable systems was picked up by local governments almost by default and was a sleepy process until cable boomed in the late 1970s. Municipalities were then besieged by cable companies eager to wire the cities. Franchise proposals became huge documents, and the franchising process bred large stakes, complete with a certain amount of corruption. The fervor for obtaining additional franchises abated as the wiring of major cities became complicated and expensive, although some companies did become interested in overbuild.
More than anything else, there was an immense change in cable TV programming. Original cable systems retransmitted both local and imported broadcast programming. A few systems originated their own programming through public access, local origination, or movie channels, but the original attempts at this were largely unsuccessful. Promises, not performance, were the hallmark of early cable. In the late 1970s, the tide turned with the success of the HBO satellite venture, followed closely by the beginning of superstations. The floodgate opened to a raft of programming services produced exclusively for cable TV. Cable programming became a glamour business with material distributed on both a national and local basis. A multitude of pay services and basic services emanated from the satellites, and the cable systems themselves revived the concept of local programming, often with the promise of numerous local channels to meet various needs within the community. The interactive services that were long on talk and short on action began to undergo experimentation, most notably in the Qube system.
The programming concepts of the late 1970s and early 1980s changed the face of the cable industry. A shakeout occurred during the mid-1980s, and many of the national programming services merged, were bought out, or went out of business. Local programming was greatly cut back, and interactive services were virtually eliminated. During the 1990s and into the new century, cable systems began rebuilding to add channels used for pay-per-view and near-video-on-demand. It has hopes for true video-on-demand in the future. The cable industry, which used to be secondary to broadcast TV, in terms of program innovation and quality, now features some of the most acclaimed programs.
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2003 McGraw-Hill Higher Education