I.

Introduction

Cable Television, industry built around the delivery of television programming to people’s homes by means of a cable system. The term is now usually used to refer to broadband cable systems, constructed from coaxial and fibre-optic cable, usually carrying more than 30 analogue channels and—where the infrastructure has been upgraded—potentially hundreds of digital channels.

Most television channels transmitted by cable operators are picked up from satellites, which may also be sending signals direct to people’s homes (DTH, from “direct to home”; sometimes called DBS, “direct broadcasting by satellite”), to be picked up by small individual reception dishes. A DTH-connected home normally receives channels from only one satellite however, whereas cable operators can offer channels from several satellites.

The digitalization of cable systems that started to take place towards the end of the 1990s and the increased use of fibre-optic cable allow operators to offer pay-per-view services (where viewers pay a fee to watch each programme of their choice) and video-on-demand (where programmes from a huge electronic library are on offer). Interactive services, such as home banking, home shopping, and distance learning are beginning to be available. Cable systems tend also to offer high-speed access to the Internet.

DTH satellite can offer some of these services, but does not have the capacity, even with digitalization, to offer video-on-demand or some advanced interactive services. It has been argued that as a result, while in rural areas, where it is too expensive to construct cable systems, DTH will be the main means of conveying multichannel and interactive services. In urban areas cable television should win out.