[LINK] US digital tv switch going ahead -- sort of

[sylvano at gnomon.com.au]

Nielsen Media Research estimates for cable in the the US as at start  
of 2008 was 61% cable with roughly half analogue.

Regards
Sylvano

On 12/02/2009, at 11:07 AM, Scott Howard <scott at doc.net.au> wrote:

> On Wed, Feb 11, 2009 at 3:34 PM, Rick Welykochy <rick at praxis.com.au>  
> wrote:
>
>> <http://broadcastengineering.com/news/Cea-congress-tv-20050515/>
>> in 2005 mentioned that less than 13% of American homes have no
>> cable service and the number is declining rapidly, i.e. 87% of USA  
>> homes
>> are hooked up over cable.
>
>
> Not quite.  That article says that 87% have cable or DBS (ie,  
> Satellite).
> In fact, I suspect the amount using cable is actually decreasing as  
> there's
> been a huge increase in satellite customers over the past year or  
> so.  The
> 87/13% number is also different to the 17.7% number which has been  
> in the
> press here over the past few days, so I'm not sure which is more  
> correct.
>
> What is broadcast over the cable systems in the USA? Digital or  
> analogue?
>> <http://www.cablelabs.com/news/newsletter/SPECS/NovDec_2005/story6.html 
>> >
>> mentions that the US is a 40/60 mix of analogue and digital in 2005.
>
>
> Satellite is 100% digital.  There is still some analog cable, but it's
> shrinking, and in fact many cable companies in the US (mine  
> included) have
> used the digital cut-over for FTA TV as a driver to convert over to  
> digital
> as well - a year ago my cable was 100% analog, and over the period  
> of about
> 6 months they moved groups of channels over to digital-only until  
> about 3
> months ago when it was 100% digital.  The real driver for this is  
> not for
> the consumers good, but to free up bandwidth on the cable to allow  
> for more
> things like on-demand TV and higher bandwidth Internet.
>
> The reason for the low take up rate of cable here? It is an overpriced
>> product that compares poorly with the North American equivalent. Also
>
>
> Price is a part of it.  Mind-set is another.  As I mentioned in a  
> previous
> post my apartment doesn't have an antenna socket on the wall or a TV  
> antenna
> on the roof - but it does have a co-ax cable connection on the wall.
> There's about 150 apartments in my block (low-rise - only 3 floors  
> high),
> and 7 other blocks in the complex so that's around 1000 units with  
> no option
> but to pay for cable.  Can you ever see that occurring in Australia?
>
> Price-wise I probably get a similar line-up to Foxtel's basic  
> service (A$40)
> plus a scattering of other channels from their other packages, so
> realistically a comparable price to what I get would be in the A$50-60
> range.  For that I pay around US$48.  ie, price isn't really that much
> different...
>
>  Scott.
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