🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <3943@eastman.UUCP> lsls00@iliad.Kodak.COM (Ilia Levi) writes:
>Actually this makes sense. The telephone company may not charge fee for the
>extra extentions because you still have one line, you cannot call two people
>at the same time. Whereas with cable extensions each TV can be tuned to
>a different channel. So you may get significantly better value with additional
>outlets, and the cable company is on the ball wanting to charge you extra.

You're right that the cable company should WANT to charge you for it given
your interpretation.

But lets try another one... I pay for the ENTIRE frequency spectrum that
happens to come across on my phone line.  I also pay for the ENTIRE
frequency spectrum that comes across my cable TV line.  I should be able
to do whatever I want to with that spectrum.

Besides, your argument is silly from the practical perspective -- if we
buy it, you'd be telling us that the cable company should be able to charge
us more if we have picture-in-picture TVs or VCRs so that we can record
one channel and watch another at the same time.

If the cable company wants to charge me for a _channel_, then fine -- they
should provide the equipment to ship _only_ that channel into my home.
But as it stands right now, I have a wire in my home, and I should be able
to do whatever I want to do _any frequencues whatsoever_ that appear on
that wire.

Notice that this argument of mine implies that descrambling cable is
OK.  Legally, I think this should be the case.  Again, if scrambled HBO
shows up at 55MHz on that cable and I can manipulate the voltages in such
a way as to get unscrambled HBO, I think that this ought to be legal.
I should note, though, that I have severe MORAL problems with this idea,
and would therefore never do it personally.  But the law should NOT
legislate morality!  

If the cable company doesn't want people to see HBO without paying something 
for it, they shouldn't ship it down the line.  Putting filters inside the
cable box is a cheap way to do this, but some cable companies are so
profit hungry that they won't even do this.  (And tampering with the cable
company's boxes is obviousy a crime.)

Well, that's my $.02...

						---Joel Kolstad