As
expected, incumbent cable companies and their select group of new allies, such
as Roku, (see http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-fccs-set-top-box-rule-hurts-consumers-1461279906)
have launched a major disinformation campaign pushing back at the FCC’s initiative
to promote set top box competition. In a
nutshell, the rebuttal has offered several remarkably bogus rationales for
maintaining the status quo: it’s a Google-generated ploy to access video
content without charge just as Google has done with Internet content;
regulation is bad; the cable industry has an exemplary record of deploying
cutting edge set top boxes; and there’s no problem requiring government
intervention in light of the fast paced introduction of new video content
access options.
It comes
across as particularly rich to read how Roku now supports the cable industry
after years of struggle with it. Might
Roku’s new found support result from the exclusive deal the company cut with
Comcast to provide a low cost alternative to monthly set top box rentals? Isn’t it amazing that despite years of claims
that there could never be any single, low cost alternative to the cable industry-supplied
set top box, lo and behold the engineers have achieved the undoable!
Here’s another
inconvenient truth: consumers used to access cable without the need for set top
boxes; then they couldn’t. The cable industry
dithered for decades on making television sets compatible for both downstream content
delivery and upstream navigation commands.
Apparently it was technologically IMPOSSIBLE for true “two way” access via
television sets and alternatives to the cable industry rented set top box,
until now.
The cable
industry also disputes the revenue levels they have managed to squeeze out from
subscribers. It rejects FCC and other
estimates of an average yearly cost of about $230, largely because of voodoo
accounting that differentiates what consumers see on their monthly bills.
The cable
industry also congratulates itself on the set top box innovation on display. Bear in mind that most consumers have used
the same box for years. Ask yourself:
how many times has the cable company offered to replace your existing box for new
one? Conveniently Comcast has a new box
available, but I’ve had the same box for over 15 years.
The set top
box debate is rife with disinformation and outright lies. The vilification of Google mystifies me. If you take the cable industry position,
hook, line and sinker, Google amazingly will be able to capture all video
content with no payment to copyright holders.
Worse yet, the company will be able to delete and replace advertising. Google also will rob the cable industry of
any incentive to create content and the cable industry will evaporate as Google
expands its vacuum cleaner, market capture.
Newsflash:
Google has to comply with copyright, FCC and other requirements. By law Google cannot meddle with video
content it processes. Google’s market
entry has raised the likelihood that consumers will have access to a
competitive set top box market as well as the long denied opportunity to access
video content from a wire without a box, an option that used to exist before
the cable industry came to its business senses.
