FCC Delays Vote On Set-Top Box Proposal

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
It looks as though the Federal Communications Commission has delayed the vote on its set-top box proposal. The vote was supposed to take place today but will now have to be rescheduled for a later time. There is no word at this time when that might happen.

The potential rule on which the FCC was scheduled to vote this morning proposed to require pay-TV companies to create free, full-function apps that consumers would be able to use in place of traditional set-top boxes. Not only would that free up consumer choice, the logic goes, but also it could save consumers up to $20 billion annually in those mandatory monthly mental fees subscribers pay.
 
This is what cable cards where supposed to be used for, but the cable companies did their best to not support them.
When setting up my Windows 7 Media center, I was constantly told it wasn't supported, even though their web site said it was. Took multiple calls before I finally got someone on the cable company side to correctly provision the card.

Only "app" that supported cable cards was Windows Media center, and that was removed from Windows 7, and is not even available as an app in Windows 10.

As for people who thinks this will save money, don't count on it. It's likely they will change just as much to "activate" your 3rd party app/cable box as you pay to rent your current box.
 
this. I'm holding on with my win7 + ceton + wmc but I know sooner or later it wont be an option anymore and I'll just be sol because whatever new solution is available wont be as flexible :(
 
There is always a fix to this. Its called cutting the cord. No more fees then. Its been maybe 3 years now since I have had cable TV. I have a nice OTA HD antenna on my roof and use netflix for pretty much everything else.
 
Two months later, mysteriously, the price of your cable package will go up $20.

One way or the other they will get their money until you cancel.
Yeah but they are not very willing to do that, this is the reason why they they advertise $29.95 in super large print, with a tiny little asterisk next to it and even tinier print that lists all the potential fees that will increase that cost.
 
I haven't had cable subscription for 2 years now. I have OTA HD antenna which works great in my area and use a combo of Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime. With this I am able to watch everything I normally did on cable. When I need HBO for Game of Thrones, I subscribe to HBO Now for the few months its on then cancel it.

What I am paying per month currently is $9.99 for Netflix, $21 for Hulu ($7.99 base, $4.00 for No Commercials and 8.99 for Showtime through Hulu) and $8.25 Amazon (Prime @ $99p/y) for a grand total of $39.24 p/m. As soon as Plex gets the bugs worked out with OTA DVR with HD Homerun devices. I will be able to watch all my stuff anywhere at anytime. For all I get now I was paying upwards of $180 p/m just for TV and all the DVR boxes I had. I now use a combo of Xbox One and three Amazon Fire TV's.

Anyone interest in the beta for Plex
Plex DVR for Cord Cutting | Plex
 
This is what cable cards where supposed to be used for, but the cable companies did their best to not support them.
When setting up my Windows 7 Media center, I was constantly told it wasn't supported, even though their web site said it was. Took multiple calls before I finally got someone on the cable company side to correctly provision the card.

Only "app" that supported cable cards was Windows Media center, and that was removed from Windows 7, and is not even available as an app in Windows 10.

As for people who thinks this will save money, don't count on it. It's likely they will change just as much to "activate" your 3rd party app/cable box as you pay to rent your current box.
The problem with that is no other 3rdparty app like SageTV , NextPVR and other could make use it as CableLab wouldn't let any one else used it.
 
Last edited:
That sound you hear is lobbyists driving their dump trucks full of cash towards the U.S. Capitol.

The Guccifer 2.0 leaks have detailed a pay to play relationship with the Obama administration and donors, among them was FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler.

Wheeler contributed over $500k to Barrack Obama, he was a "bundler" for Obama, and he hosted a high priced fund raiser for Obama.


 
Meh. Who has time for shit for the average consumer.
 
this. I'm holding on with my win7 + ceton + wmc but I know sooner or later it wont be an option anymore and I'll just be sol because whatever new solution is available wont be as flexible :(

Same setup here, and I'll be using it as long as I can.

There is always a fix to this. Its called cutting the cord. No more fees then. Its been maybe 3 years now since I have had cable TV. I have a nice OTA HD antenna on my roof and use netflix for pretty much everything else.

That would work if I could get over the air signals, but my home is in a dead zone (on the wrong side of a hill) so even with a 20 foot high antenna, I still wouldn't get any thing.

The problem with that is no other 3rdparty app like SageTV , NextPVR and other could make use it as CableLab wouldn't let any one else used it.

And that was the problem. Cable cards where supposed to be the solution so you didn't need the cable box. The cable/media companies never liked having to open up their systems to cable card devices, so they made the rules so strict, only a company that controlled the signal from end to end could be certified. That pretty much limit their support to products like Tivo and Windows Media Center. That way they could say they where following the law, but at the same time keep most people from using them.
 
I have to be missing something here about this proposal as everything there doesn't fully add up as far as who it helps or hurts.

They are saying that instead of requiring the rental of equipment everything has to run on apps that run on any device. So basically like Netflix. Which right now many have a system like that in place. Isn't that what many have been pushing in their commercials is that you can watch live TV on the go? So this already exist today so I don't see how the losses for everyone are being figured out. Now the one caveat is that these do require you to have a setup box, in some cases that I know of logging into an app to watch TV will treat a set top box as a sling box of sorts meaning that the set top box will be locked out or be set to what ever the remote viewer is watching. The only real change I could see here is that you would just need to treat the app like a settop box. So if anything they would just stop offering that as a free service and instead start to charge you X amount per device. So the customer won't notice a savings.

On the other hand you are fucking up with transport in every place possible. Lets go to the extreme for a moment and say that set top boxes are just no longer allowed. First off that means that all existing networks are no longer needed or able to be used. So Dish and Direct have all those satellites up in the air that are worthless. Comcast's network become for internet and phone only, and anyone that has designed a multicast IPTV network suddenly find themselves being forced to switch to unicast and destroy their network. Which the destruction of IP networks will now be everywhere. Your data caps now will include you being able to watch TV, you also will have to have enough bandwidth to stream all stations that you want to watch. This will in turn bog down many networks for those that already are horrible at upgrading meaning many people will notice shitty TV service that isn't as good due to a lack of priority of data. Netflix can buffer live TV not so much.

Right now I use SlingTV for my service which is pretty much the type of service they are saving that everyone would have to switch to. I am content with it, but it is nowhere as good as actual TV service when it comes to quality. And depending on what I am doing I can make my quality be crap. Downloading games on steam and xbox and trying to watch a show on sling with a 25Mbps connection I noticed the quality go downhill. I am fine with that however as I don't watch much actual tv, that is why I am using SlingTV and not a real service.

So really I don't see this needing to be a thing, and don't see it helping or hurting anyone like any article states. If forced to stop using set top boxes and instead start using Apps you will just be charged per device able to stream which is what SlingTV does right now. On top of that the average person is going to notice a huge decrease in quality especially if they don't have a high amount of bandwidth and if they have data caps will find them eaten up much faster. I personally don't see this helping the consumers any compared to options out there today.
 
That would work if I could get over the air signals, but my home is in a dead zone (on the wrong side of a hill) so even with a 20 foot high antenna, I still wouldn't get any thing.

.

That sucks. I have to have a pretty big antenna to get good signal but it works pretty good. I do pay for TiVo service but it is still cheaper.
 
There is a site where you can enter your address and it will tell you which stations you can receive at that address, and what aerial you'd need.

AntennaWeb.org
 
Back
Top