Inside the mind of Seth Holloway
I am a PhD student in Electrical and Computer Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin with a broad skill set and an endless stream of thoughts.
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NBC off the air, at least for Time Warner subscribers in Austin
Posted on October 5th, 2008 7 commentsThe local NBC affiliate, KXAN, is no longer being shown on Time Warner cable. Instead of showing the NBC broadcast, Time Warner is airing a one-sided smear campaign that would have consumers believe that KXAN is to blame.
First of all, I don’t have a choice in my local cable and internet provider. Despite the fact that Grande Communications offers great deals all around me, I can only use Time Warner. In the past five apartments I’ve lived in, I had no choice. The cable companies offer their product at a price and the consumer has to take it or leave it. Where’s the free market in that? Didn’t we already learn out lesson with monopolies when Ma Bell operated this way?
Time Warner says that KXAN gets the spectrum for free, but wants to charge consumers to receive the broadcast. Time Warner really points out that KXAN has the infrastructure in place and wants us to be upset that KXAN would charge for it! Which is ironic because Time Warner already has infrastructure in place and they want us to pay for it. TV stations are making big money because there is no competition and the expensive bit (laying the cable) has already been done. Whenever Time Warner charges me $6 a month for a cable box (on top of $40 for standard cable), I cannot take their complaints seriously; they’re both greedy. Stop passing the buck on to the consumer!
Another point that Time Warner makes is that you can watch most NBC shows on NBC.com. The truth is, you can watch most TV shows online using Hulu, YouTube, or Vuze (to name a few). Set up a HTPC (home theatre personal computer) and ditch the overpriced, monopolistic cable company altogether!
7 responses to “NBC off the air, at least for Time Warner subscribers in Austin”
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LIN TV (owners of KXAN) tried this with SuddenLink earlier. LIN TV played hardball and lost when SuddenLink got a NBC affiliate from Waco to replace them. A few days later after KXAN was dropped they were miraculously back on SuddenLink and the NBC affiliate from Waco disappeared. So I wouldn’t be placing all the blame on Time Warner – even though they are outrageously priced.
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Haha! So this has happened before, eh? I imagine LIN TV is losing a lot of advertising dollars but Time Warner is losing very few subscribers.
Let me clarify: I’m not blaming Time Warner, I am pointing out flawed logic.
I think both companies, LIN TV and Time Warner, are greedy bastards. They are charging consumers ridiculous amounts (I say that because there is no free market to determine a reasonable price) to use infrastructure (broadcast spectrum and cables) that the government essentially gave/gives them.
I’m reminded of the argument for watching movies at home. The theatre is selling the wrong thing: movies are not your product–the experience is. Watching TV is not a matter of how you receive the signal.
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Stevie-poo October 6th, 2008 at 11:21
That’s the reason why there are so many “anti-dish” commercials out there. “ooh you can get local channels. Your service won’t cut out on rainy days!” They are losing customers to satellite providers because cable is a total ripoff. I am lucky to have Stanford cable which is actually cheap.
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Free market: Cable companies can’t offer service to places they don’t have lines built to, and unlike the phone companies, they can’t use each other’s lines.
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Cable companies could share lines; they choose not to.
Two weeks ago I heard a presentation from Professor Bill Bard from UT who helped setup the UT-system telecom infrastructure. UT split the cost of installing lines with several other organizations. Once they’re in, there’s very little maintenance required, so infrastructure is largely a one time expense.
Another point, UT hardly utilizes their network despite having over 50,000 computers online in a very small area. Cable companies are throttling bandwidth, or trying to figure out how they can legally, despite the fact that their network can handle the load.
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sethholloway.com » Blog Archive » NBC back on the air and I am underwhelmed October 30th, 2008 at 07:31
[...] seems that NBC is now back on the air here in Austin. This comes after weeks of not getting the local NBC affiliate, KXAN. Andrea discovered the change last night with the always memorable Deal or No Deal. If [...]
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