Stop Pushing - I’ll Pull: new promise for cable technology
"Did you see that great cooking show on Channel 35 last night?"
"Cooking show? What do you mean? Channel 35 is the Cartoon Network!"
"No. It’s the cooking show!"
That short snippet of conversation between two cable TV subscribers in adjoining counties highlights a pitfall in today’s cable TV technology. But, because of a sea change underway in the cable industry, there are some tremendous new opportunities for county and city governments to provide more and better government programming to constituents.
Is it analog? Is it digital?
While many cable operators boast that they offer digital channels today, in most cases those digital channels are limited to some satellite-delivered tier and premium channels. Due to current federal regulations, virtually every cable operator transports broadcast and public-educational-government channels to its customers in the traditional analog format.
All that’s about to change.
Those legacy regulations are likely to be eliminated as cable operators follow the lead of broadcasters into an all-digital age. As the Federal Communications Commission requires broadcasters to switch to a fully digital format, cable operators are following, planning to convert their hybrid present-day analog-digital cable plants to an all-digital transmission system.
Migrating to all digital systems will permit cable operators to introduce hundreds of new, distortion-free programming channels. More importantly, however, will be the introduction of sophisticated, interactive on-screen menus to select the channel to watch. Gone will be traditional channel numbers and the community-to-community confusion created by different channel line-ups.
Also gone will be the days when you could use cable without a converter. In the coming modern cable system, every TV set connected to cable will have an external converter, or a cable operator supplied plug-in ‘smart card’ to take the place of the external converter.
What’s on the menu today?
Soon, instead of entering "0" then "4" then pressing "Enter" on the remote control to tune Channel 4, subscribers will turn their TV sets on and be greeted by a menu that offers programming selections by category such as: "Local Broadcast Channels"; "News Channels"; "Sports Channels"; "Premium Movie Channels" and more. Using arrows on the remote control, the subscriber will select the desired category of programming.
Let’s say our subscriber wants to watch a local broadcast channel. Point, click, and a new menu will appear on the TV screen that offers all of the local broadcast channels by call sign and network affiliation or independent status. Point and click again and the desired channel is displayed, along with an on-screen box that describes the current program, and the next few programs to follow. Some of the new digital video recorders (DVRs) will permit you to select current and future programs to record for later playback.
Because all-digital cable systems will most likely use the same basic data protocols as the Internet, cable operators will change the way channels are actually selected and travel over the cable system.
Stop pushing me!
Today, traditional cable TV technology requires a cable operator to "push" all of its channels to every cable TV converter. Actual channel selection occurs at the converter, with the desired channel traveling over a short jumper cable to the TV set (or VCR). This is quite inefficient, since it requires that all the channels be available at the back of the converter at all times just in case the subscriber wants to select one particular channel. This is called "pushing" channels to the subscribers.
In tomorrow’s cable system, selecting a channel on the converter’s remote control will send a data signal back to the cable operator’s "headend", where the desired channel will be digitally encoded and sent to the subscriber. Here, the subscriber is actually "pulling" the one channel of interest from the source, or "headend."
By only sending the desired channel to the intended converter, rather than all channels all of the time, a significant amount of system bandwidth can be reclaimed and used for other purposes such as high speed Internet, telephony or security services.
Just say "Yes" to government programming
How will e-savvy governments benefit from the coming change in cable technology?
As governments grant and renew cable franchises, they should require that government access channels (including education access channels) be accessible from the first Ð highest-level on-screen menu. This is the same level where broadcast, news and premium movie channels are offered. Technically sophisticated governments should also require access to the cable operator’s converter menu system.
When a subscriber selects the "Government Channels" option on the highest menu, the next menu is generated by the local government. Programs selected should come from the government’s server and be sent to the subscriber via the headend.
By crafting their own second-level menus, governments can add and remove programming links at will, and offer current and past programming to many subscribers. Gone will be the days of having just one or two government channels. In its place will be the on-demand delivery of programming using technology pioneered for and used on the Internet.
Savvy cable operators will recognize that opening up their menu system to governments and allowing governments to directly serve programming to cable subscribers is a good thing. It’s free locally based programming not available from cable competitors such as satellite, and it helps to foster an open ‘e-government’ environment.
(Jonathan Kramer is the principal of Kramer.Firm, Inc., based in Los Angeles. Since 1984 the firm has advised nearly 500 federal, county and city governments regarding cable system picture quality, technology, institutional network, and safety issues. The firm’s web site is www.CableTV.com/)
|
