Adventures in Cord Shaving

            Tired of paying Comcast slightly over $30 a month for 5 broadcast networks and little else, I embraced OTAR: over the air reception of television.  I built an antenna, ascended a learning curve and 90% of the time the signals arrive “free to air.”

            I do not recommend such self-help for anyone living in an area considered fringe at best.  Penn State is centrally located “in the middle of nowhere” with only one local broadcast television signal translator.  The other stations lie from 20-75 miles away, typically separated by a line of mountains.  Digital signals appear crystal clear, but can evaporate for no apparent reason.  Actually, the reasons include a slight reduction in signal strength, weather conditions, or a change in antenna angle, a risk anytime a cold front comes barreling from the northwest.

            Prior antenna designs did not work for me, because they combined VHF and UHF reception, something I considered necessary because I need to receive channels 3, 6 and 10.  Wrong!  With repacking of television spectrum to accommodate more wireless broadband, broadcasters agreed to change frequencies for a significant cut in auction revenues paid by cellular radio carriers.  I did not know that VHF broadcasters get to keep their low channel designations even though television sets (and antennas) typically need to tune to much higher UHF channels.  Software using the Program and System Information Protocol instructs television sets on which frequency to receive a broadcast television signal and what possibly different channel to display.  Who knew?

            In any event, I needed to build a UHF only antenna optimized for tuning in the higher and more volatile frequencies.  I made the plunge without the anticipated “win back” attempts from Comcast.  I guess they gladly parted company with a low value customer knowing that I still need their 6-18 MHz of broadband access spectrum.

            If only Comcast priced its basic tier at a fair price, I would have stayed.  Instead, they regularly raised the base rate, then added a broadcast channel retransmission fee, then started to charge for the first set top box and also snuck in a few “shipping, handling, shop fee” type charges.  They could have offered a few more channels as well.  Is it profit maximizing for Comcast to include CSPAN-1 in the basic tier, but not CSPAN 2 and 3?  They could have reduced the per channel cost below $4 a month!

Comcast Sneaks in Another Billing Line Item and “Earns” an Additional $1 Billion

            My Comcast bill arrived today with a sneaky new $2.68 charge, $2.50 for leasing one (and only one) set top box and $0.18 for the remote.  This new billing line item, like the many others Comcast has introduced, adds to its bottom line with no additional capital expenditure.  It shows how resisting the obligation to return to accepting set top box free, “cable ready” sets was a smart strategy. Now Comcast can charge for a device rental that it used to provide free of charge (for the first one), because consumers cannot access its service without one.

            Remarkably, the FCC never got around to replacing its CableCard “solution” with a viable, consumer-friendly update.  For their part, cable operators never followed through on a “commitment” to offering “true two-way” consumer access using increasingly versatile and intelligent television sets to handle rather simple upstream commands to the cable operators’ Headends.

            Of course, Comcast subscribers now can use their own set top boxes, such as a Roku, but the company has a perfect, profit maximizing strategy for that as well: charge $9.50 a month and rebate $2.50 for “subscriber supplied equipment.” Brilliant and incredibly greedy at the same time.

            I am well overdue for a return to Over the Air Reception (“OTAR”) of broadcast television even in my quite rural locale, centrally located in the middle of nowhere: State College, PA.  Comcast all but wants me to do this, so it can concentrate on its transition to being a vertically integrated broadband venture combining its owned content and conduit.  Besides, broadband has far greater profit margins, none of which have to be shared with content providers through retransmission consent.  Actually, revenues flow the other way as when Netflix agreed to compensate Comcast for content carriage.

            Subscribers of Comcast should revolt, but I suspect few will even notice the increase.  What’s a few dollars more, especially after Comcast’s now $8.00 “Broadcast TV Fee,” some of which flows to the company’s NBC stations?  Comcast also has a “technology fee” that most high definition television subscribers have to pay.  I guess the company can justify this recurring line item as helping it recoup the costs for upgrading networks to handle high definition signals. 

            You really should examine the line items in cable television bills.  Few companies can quantify and foist onto customers their estimate of having to comply with government regulations and pay local governments franchise fees.  But my bills has line items entitled Franchise Fee and FCC Regulatory Fee.  I call these costs overhead, but Comcast frames them as “fees” that they can pass through to customers.

            Finally, I have reached the tipping point where gouging nudges—makes that pushes—me to old school technology. I expect Neighborhood Homeowners Association opposition to my outdoor antenna. Maybe I can assert a First Amendment right.