Cable Management
Program Services
Local, Over-the-Air Stations
Local stations have two options with regard
to their carriage by cable systems. Stations may opt,
according to the Communications Act of 1994, for must
carry---which requires the cable operator to carry
that local over-the-air signal if within fifty miles of
the cable operator's headend; or compensation,
which requires either a cash payment to the local station---
which few operators agree to pay...or an agreement with
major station chains to carry a cable network owned
by the station group. For example, ABC negotiated the
launch of ESPN2 in 1993 on cable systems in exchange for
granting cable operators the right to carry the owned-and-
operated stations of then-ABC/Capital Cities. Similarly,
Scripps-Howard Television negotiated the launch of Home
and Garden Television, in exchange for granting carriage
rights to its stations (at the time including WMC-TV in
Memphis).
A local station may demand market exclusivity from
carriage by another out-of-market station affiliated with the
same network. Federal legislation would permit WBBJ-TV
to demand removal of WPTY from the R-Media system in
Jackson. However, the station has opted not to do so,
because in fringe areas of west Tennessee---WPTY would have the
right to request the same removal of WBBJ. WBBJ does
exercise that right with regard to WKRN in Nashville,
which is not carried on the local system.
Distant Signals
Beginning with the active efforts of
Ted Turner to market his then-WTCG in Atlanta in 1976,
the era of the national superstation was born.
Turner's channel 17 in Georgia was attractive to cable
systems because of his Atlanta Braves, Atlanta Hawks,
Atlanta Flames hockey (at the time), and pre-season
Atlanta Falcons games, as well as a heavy diet of
Southeastern Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference
basketball. WTCG (later renamed WTBS, now TBS
Superstation) also featured a popular package of
syndicated evergreen shows, including the
perennial Andy Griffith Show and Leave It to
Beaver.
Eventually, cable operators would add other big-city
independent stations (not affiliated at the time with
networks), which offered major sports packages. WGN in
Chicago, with its Bulls, Cubs, and White Sox games,
became the second most desired superstation. Others
which still exist and are selected across the country
are WWOR (New York), WPIX (New York), KTLA (Los Angeles),
WSBK (Boston), and KWGN (Denver).
Local stations fought the expansion of superstations on
cable. The primary reason was over syndicated programming.
Many of the superstations imported by cable systems
carried syndicated shows for which local stations had
paid expensive licensing fees to carry in a specific
market. Station managers feared ratings erosion would
occur if viewers could see three or four airings a day
of Andy Griffith and other series on stations
other than one in the local market.
Cable operators are now required to offer local
stations syndication exclusivity for the first
cycle of a series' syndicated reruns. If a local
station owns the rights to a syndicated show in a market,
a cable operator is required to black out the same show on
a superstation, or the superstation's distributor is
required to cover the show with another program,
for which it has paid national rights.
The exception to the rule is if superstations pay
national rights fees for shows, rather than license fees
merely for their market of origination. WTBS is the only
cable network which offers a blackout-proof schedule,
because it now pays license fees based on the entire
United States, rather than just the Atlanta market. WGN,
on the other hand, airs Frasier in the Chicago
market---but the show is covered on cable systems with
repeats of Family Matters, which has passed its
first cycle.
Cable systems in smaller markets are limited in the
number of distant signals they can carry. Rules governing
Jackson, Tn., limit R-Media to three distant signal
outlets. For many years, the cable system was restricted
because, in addition to TBS, WPTY and WLMT (both carried
on local cable) were both considered distant signals,
because they were independent stations serving the
Memphis market. When WPTY became an ABC affiliate in
1995, the station no longer qualified as a distant
signal independent, which opened the door for R-Media
to eventually add WGN to its lineup. WLMT, though
affiliated now with UPN, still qualifies as a distant
signal---because UPN is not, under FCC rules, a full
network until it airs fifteen hours of programming
per week.
Local Origination
Cable access channels are either owned by the cable
system itself, or by the local governing body which grants the cable
franchise. Government-owned access channels typically air live and
videotaped coverage of government meetings and community affairs events.
Cable-owned access channels tend to offer more entertainment, as well
as community-oriented program offerings.
Each model of cable local origination has the right to lease time to
local agencies, or production groups, for airing programming. Some
cable operators will lease the entire channel to a local production
entity to provide local origination programming, in conjunction with
their agreements with their franchising body.
In Jackson, Total Reach Television is leased Channel 6 by R-Media, the
local cable operator. In return for the leasing rights, TRTV is required
to produce or air original programming for twenty-five per cent of its
program hours, or an average of four hours per week. That committment
is aided, in part, by Union University's productions of I've Heard
That Song! and Jackson Tonight!, which provide one and one-
half hours per week of that programming, when both are in season.
In some cities, an access channel is provided to major news operations.
In Orange County, California, Orange County Cable News is a 24-hour
around-the-clock news service, featuring local coverage for southern
California cable subscribers. Two new 24-hour news services went online
on access channels in Florida in the fall of 1998. News 12 Long Island
in New York is considered the oldest of such services.
Basic Cable
Originally, cable defined basic services as any programming
offered on standard VHF channels two through thirteen. That definition
changed as the proliferation of non-over-the-air services developed in
the late 1970s and early 1980s.
Basic cable is now defined as any non-premium, non-over-the-air cable
network. The networks are advertiser-supported, rather than premium-fee
subscription-supported. The first such service was ESPN, which was
created by Getty Oil in 1979, as the nation's first 24-hour sports
network. Following later in 1979 was the UA-Columbia Network, a
consortium of United Artists and Columbia Pictures Television, which
offered a combination of live sports, Madison Square Garden events,
children's programming, and offerings from British television. UA-Columbia
evolved into the USA Network in 1980. Cable News Network, a brainchild
of Ted Turner, originated in mid-1980. Eventually, the basic networks
served the same function as radio---targeting niche interests of
viewers. Networks such as Lifetime (women), The Nashville Network
(country music), American Movie Classics (pre-1970s films), and Nostalgia
Television (senior citizens, now Good Life TV) have tailored programming
to specific demographics.
Premium Cable
In 1975, a New England-based company delivered a college
basketball game live via cable television for a subscription fee from
viewers. Later the same year, the company purchased a series of
recent Hollywood films to air on a similar subscription basis. The
birth of Home Box Office led to a major sea change in the cable
industry.
HBO was the pioneer in scheduling blockbuster films, live championship
boxing, concerts, and premium sporting events. HBO led the way in the
era of premium cable---program services which offer a mixture of films,
sports, and big-ticket programming for a monthly subscription fee,
which often ranges between $8 and $13 per month, depending on the
competitive structure of a market.
In the early 1980s, HBO was challenged by Showtime. The new service,
owned by Viacom, Inc., battled Home Box Office for rights to major motion pictures
and concerts. However, cable operators did not have to negotiate for
exclusive rights to either service. Cable systems offer both to
subscribers for typically equal fees, though occasional price wars have
emerged between the two.
Eventually, the major premium services developed sister channels. HBO
created Cinemax, which became an almost exclusively film-oriented
channel, as did Showtime's The Movie Channel. The Walt Disney Company
added its own Disney Channel as a family-oriented premium service in
1984; however, Disney has recently been converting the channel to a
basic service in much of the country. In the 1990s, the addition of
Encore and Starz! to the mix has increased the competitive structure of
premium cable.
Pay-Per-View
Scattered trials of pay television go as far back as the late 1950s in
California. Experiments with using over-the-air channels with
scrambled signals, for which viewers paid a fee to unscramble through
a set-top box, to deliver premium movies met with limited success and
frequent failure.
However, the sophistication of cable developed in the 1980s to the point
of adding a new phrase to the cable dictionary: pay-per-view. Viewers
were enticed to pay a subscription fee per-event, rather than per-month,
to receive movies and live sporting events.
As in the origin of television, boxing and wrestling led the way
in cementing pay-per-view's success. The advent of pay-per-view
cable also led to the virtual end of a thirty-year tradition in the
sports world: theater, or closed-circuit television, where customers
would pay big-ticket admission fees to see championship fights on a
big screen in arenas and auditoriums across the nation. Major
heavyweight championship fights have been a mainstay of pay-cable.
However, the most consistent successes have been registered by the
events of the World Wrestling Federation and World Championship
Wrestling. The WWF began its pay-cable enterprise in 1986 with a
made-for-pay event called The Wrestling Classic. However, its first
megasuccess came in 1987 with its Wrestlemania III, which featured
Hulk Hogan defeating Andre the Giant before more than 90,000 in the
Pontiac Silverdome. WCW, a subsidiary of Time Warner and Turner
Broadcasting System, was a distant runner-up in the wrestling pay
sweepstakes until the mid-1990s when it imported former WWF stars
Hogan, Randy Savage, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Bret Hart---combined
with its traditional standouts Ric Flair and Sting (Steve Borden).
The pay-per-view industry is now said to gross $1 billion per year for
cable operations across the U.S. Pay-per-view movies and concerts are
also frequently featured, but have registered less financial success
than sports pay-cable.
Back to Episodes Page
Back to Mr. B's Main Page