Each time I pick up ScreenPlays Magazine I’m reminded to read it more often. The reporting staff often go deeper than many folks in the broadband industry – digging up fantastic little nuggets that, unfortunately, seem to get passed over by the broader industry and mainstream technology press.
In the April issue (PDF), Fred Dawson cites insider sources who say that Comcast has secured a deal with programmers permitting them to broadcast channels from the analog basic tier digitally… and in the clear for two years. There seems to have been trepidation amongst operators regarding how well digital terminal adapters (DTAs) would fare if they required any kind of content decryption technology. Public discussion has always centered on the fact that DTAs don’t need those decryption capabilities found in ‘regular’ set-tops boxes, freeing them from the FCC’s separable security mandate (i.e. CableCARD).
So the question has been: How would providers broadcast encryption-free content from a licensing perspective? And now we know how it’s all going down. Bottom line: Cablecos have a blessed method to make it easy for consumers to access basic digital content. Another step in migrating analog subscribers to digital service, and ultimately (they hope) to premium tiers with VOD, DVR, and the like.
Of course, it’s yet to be seen exactly what this clear channel lineup would look like. But here’s to hoping we end up with a larger set of semi-premium clear QAM channels. And all the more reason for TiVo to revisit the idea of allowing customers to manually map channels… as Moxi does.
dave, dream on. Tivo would never do something so consumer-friendly. If they did, people would buy their boxes, and they couldn’t explain why they are still losing money.
The good thing about this is that after two years of DVR and TV owners with clear QAM tuners enjoying HD, they’d have a hard time turning on enryption.
Wait, so in two years, people might need to replace their existing DTAs? Ugh.
Jolly good news, Dave! It’s too bad that my (current) only TV that has a QAM tuner is the one I’ve got a box on.
Of course…I now realize that only Comcast has made this deal, and Verizon has transitioned to basically all-QAM, and I think they’re all encrypted. Oh well, at least there’s no extra compression.
Two years is the period for deploying the DTA’s right, not how long they will be a supported service for those migrated off of analog cable?
Verizon FiOS is broadcasting the local channels and music channels in Clear QAM for those digital ready sets. However, channel numbers for all but the networks (4.1, 5.1, 7.1, 9.1, etc) make no sense. They channel numbers are like 100.543, 245.65, etc). And the content is limited to just the local tier and music (audio) channels.
If we could hook cable to our secondary and tertiary sets without a box (kitchen, guest room, etc.) and still get all or many of the channels it would be nice. Hey, like we used to do with analog cable. What a novel idea!