🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <7380077@hpnmdla.sr.hp.com>
stanb@hpnmdla.sr.hp.com (Stan Bischof) writes:
 
>
>In sci.electronics, davepat@flash.ATC.Olivetti.Com (Dave Patterson) writes:
>
>>Maybe this is a bit naive, but why not forget 'em all, and get a
>>satellite dish?
>
>Don't know if it passed, but I remember the Cable industry trying to get a bill
>through congress that forces dish owners to pay the local cable company
>for the privilege of using their dish. Anyone dish owners out there
>who know? (I believe that this was in the form of a 'tax' on receivers
>which was eventually forwarded to the cable folks).
>
>Stan Bischof
>Santa Rosa
 
This has already a defacto "law."  Cable companies have refused to carry
unscrambled signals.  Most, if not all, uplinks are scrambled.  You must
subscribe to the signal which you may do directly or via your "local"
cable company.  There are a lot of "cable companies" out there that do
not own a foot of coax.  You call them and they cause the program
provider to adress your descrambler.
 
Scrambling was originally developed as a way to deal with slow pay
cable companies.  This is truly a case of making lemonade when life hands
out lemons for the cable companies.
 
I consider tv so corrupted by the requirement to "be interesting" so it can
attract ad revenue, that it should be banned altogether.  Maybe people would
learn to read, play instruments, talk to their family, participate in sports,
etc.  They might even attend to politics for more than 60 seconds.
 
Mike.Coyne@utxvm.utexas.edu