[mythtv-users] FCC will allow encryption of basic cable, offers measures to protect open access

[Michael T. Dean]

On 10/16/2012 11:00 AM, Ronald Frazier wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 11:22 PM, Ben Kamen wrote:
>> http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/15/3506030/fcc-allows-basic-cable-encryption-protects-consumers-open-access
> I saw that on slashdot yesterday. It's pretty much crap in my eyes.
> The 2 concessions are garbage. A box that is free for only 2 years and
> then you've got to pay, or a software solution that will only work for
> certain systems and only if the vendor pays a licensing fee. So their
> concession is that they get to make more money? That's laughable.
>
> And it says smaller providers are exempt from these restrictions. I
> take that to mean that they are free to encrypt the signals while
> giving nothing back in return. WTF? How about if you can't meet the
> full mandate then you don't get permission to encrypt?
>
> " NCTA applauds the measure for hastening the industry's transition to
> an all-digital framework and shielding providers from cable theft."
> Huh? Hastening the transition to all-digital? Hasn't comcast already
> done this and encrypted everything but OTA channels? So there's a big
> problem of "cable theft" where people steal ONLY the free publicly
> available channels? I'm not quite sure what's being stolen there.

Service.  The "free" channels are only free to receive OTA.  Using the 
cable service, or its rebroadcasts of the OTA channels, isn't free (not 
even for people who have Internet-only cable service).

Now, if you go to the trouble of installing your own antenna to receive 
the OTA channels, you can get them without a subscription charge, but 
only through your antenna.  And please don't say, "It's the same thing," 
because if it were, there would be no reason for people to use the 
cable.  Obviously using the cable service saves a few dollars (possibly 
a couple hundred dollars on antenna and tower) and some effort--and that 
cost and effort is the cost of the free-to-receive OTA channels, so you 
pay the cable company to save that installation cost and effort when you 
subscribe to cable.

> Eventual fees aside, the "network-connected converter box" does sound
> kind of interesting. Sounds like a device that would decrypt the
> encrypted signal and just send an unencrypted IPTV stream within the
> household. That could be cool, but I'm probably just being naive in
> assuming that it will truly be THAT open.

The worst part of the change is that as soon as the FCC finally sells 
off the TV spectrum to the wireless companies and gets rid of OTA TV 
broadcast, we'll lose our choice to avoid the locked-down cable system.  
Until then, I'm going to continue voting with my wallet--I haven't had 
any pay TV service since 2006, and I've saved a ton of money using OTA 
only and buying DVDs of the cable-only shows I want to watch.  
Unfortunately, I haven't yet convinced 100M of my closest friends to do 
the same and make the cable TV industry take notice (so far I've only 
convinced 1).

Mike