Photo by K. Ciappa for GPTMC

The city of Philadelphia will witness a three-way battle for your broadband dollar in the coming months as three competitors race to upgrade their networks to deliver the kind of “blazing fast speeds” only dreamed about in much of the rest of the country.

Comcast, the dominant cable provider in Philadelphia, today announced 50Mbps broadband service for greater Philadelphia residents for $99 a month.  The new, faster speeds are available because Comcast’s Freedom Region has been upgraded to the DOCSIS 3 standard.  Comcast’s Freedom Region includes metro Philadelphia and the counties of Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery, as well as northern Delaware and southern New Jersey.

Comcast also doubled the speeds of many of its broadband customers today.  Here’s a roundup of the affected tiers:

Performance — 12Mbps/2Mbps — $42.95/month
Performance Plus — 16Mbps/2Mbps — $52.95/month (no change of upload speed from previous tier)
Ultra — 22Mbps/5Mbps — $62.95/month*
Extreme 50 — 50Mbps/10Mbps — $99/month*

*DOCSIS 3 modem upgrade required.

Meanwhile, cable overbuilder RCN, which serves parts of Philadelphia and the Lehigh Valley to the west announced it was aggressively moving to upgrade its own network to DOCSIS 3, and is taking the dramatic step of dumping all of its analog channels from the lineup, switching to all-digital cable, starting in Allentown.  RCN has already confirmed it will offer up to 50Mbps service in upgraded areas, but has the capacity to expand to 100Mbps service if needed.  RCN had been planning to launch upgraded DOCSIS 3 service starting in New York and Boston, but market conditions in Philadelphia will make it necessary to expand there as well.

The newest player in town is Verizon, whose fiber to the home FiOS service is capable of the fastest download and upload speeds in the marketplace.  Verizon has offered packages with equal download and upload speeds (20Mbps/20Mbps being the most common) in the past, but is capable of achieving even faster speeds.  It currently provides 50Mbps/20Mbps service in many areas.

“We have a lot of work ahead of us. We will wire the entire city with the nation’s most advanced fiber-optic network, starting with Chestnut Hill, and we expect the first customers to have FiOS services by later this year,” Verizon spokesman Eric Rabe wrote in a blog post. “Other neighborhoods where we will begin building soon are Brewerytown, East and West Mount Airy, South Philadelphia, and the Kensington sections of the city.”

Verizon expects the entire city to be FiOS-ready by 2016, reaching about 660,000 houses and apartment buildings. It is already available in 182 communities surrounding the city.

Blair Levin, broadband czar

Blair Levin is a broadband czar with a lot on his mind, and he unloaded a lot of it at a public conference this week.  He’s been spending his summer wading into more than 8,500 pages of comments the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has received on the question of how to formulate a national broadband plan.  Individual consumers using the submission form like a blog’s comment section was the least of his concerns.  Levin has grown far less optimistic about the value of the comments as he digs deep into the pile before him.  His conclusion: at least some of the companies and groups that can afford the most expensive lawyers and professional presentations essentially pulled off an all-nighter let’s-wing-it-effort.

Levin particularly called out a “large telco” that submitted an extensive paper promoting its position loaded with intellectual sloppiness, right down to including a slide that contradicted the phone company’s own arguments.

Levin also claimed a lot of the submissions were loaded with platitudes and consensus about a model broadband society everyone would like to see, with no road map to actually achieve that goal.

The broadband czar reserved special criticism for the locust-like lobbyists who have descended on the comment process with self-serving proposals that are crafted with a “mine first” mentality that cuts out other players.  Levin claimed providers are much more interested in protecting their existing market and business plans before they consider how changes in the marketplace can increase the number of customers available to them.  That’s a mentality consumers are familiar with as broadband providers attempt to protect their video business models with attempts to limit or overcharge for broadband access.

He was upset that plans to open up new spectrum for next generation broadband services were met with resistance from other providers.  Wireless spectrum expansion for broadband projects was promoted as “essential” in one proposal, and attacked as a dangerous threat in another.  Levin characterized the turf war as, “get [the spectrum] from somebody else.”

Many of the major providers are treating the national broadband plan as a giant piggy bank, waiting to shower them with cash for vague projects or goals.  “Look I’ve got to say this — we are not going to be Santa Claus,” Levin said. “There’s actually very little in the 8,500-something pages that moves the ball forward,” Levin said.

Consumer advocacy group Free Press, which submitted an extensive pro-consumer broadband plan of its own, which Stop the Cap! supports, agreed with much of what Levin complained about in a new filing today, in response to Levin’s remarks.

Derek Turner, Free Press

Derek Turner, research director at Free Press, said “the FCC should not be duped by the incumbents’ self-serving claims. The national broadband plan must be built on a record of meaningful data and analysis — not on flimsy evidence and discredited arguments.”

Turner was pointing to telecommunications lobbying policies which reach not only the FCC, but elected officials.

Indeed, they are repeats of the same mantra over and over — “deregulation.”

“Incumbents have the largest pool of resources and broadband data at their fingertips, but their comments offer nothing more than the same old tired pro-deregulation arguments. It is clear from their recommendations that the phone and cable companies want the national broadband plan to simply be a ‘do-nothing’ plan — a strategy that has already proven to be an epic failure for consumers,” Turner added.

Incumbent carriers keep that pool of resources and data close to their vests, refusing to make it widely available for detailed independent analysis.  Instead, their “government affairs” lobbyists engage in astroturfing efforts to hoodwink consumers and policymakers with biased data and maps that help sell their agenda of deregulation and public financing of needed broadband projects, with little or no oversight or conditions.  Most important, they universally characterize today’s broadband offerings as excellent and evidence that the “marketplace is working,” even as the United States falls further behind other nations in access, speed, and low pricing.

While Levin is right to be exasperated at the special interest folderol, the FCC’s previous hands-off attitude during the Clinton and Bush Administrations set the stage for the ballet being performed today.  A deregulatory framework, started by the Clinton Administration and embraced on entirely new levels by the Bush Administration, combined with an agency timid to get involved in oversight potentially raising the ire of Congress, made it possible for 8,500 pages of generic happy talk and thinly disguised grant applications to weigh heavily on his desk.

Caught in the middle, as usual, are consumers.  Most of them were the ones typing their comments into the FCC comments submission page in “the big box,” instead of uploading a professionally prepared multi-hundred page PDF document.  Their needs are simple: affordable, fast, widespread broadband, with Net Neutrality embraced and Internet Overcharging schemes banned.  For those who already have the service, they want the FCC to make sure providers don’t leverage their monopoly or duopoly into a Money Party.  For those who don’t, they simply wonder how the most powerful country on earth cannot “get it done” without 8,500 pages and hundreds of millions of dollars potentially flushed away to feed special interest coffers while their needs are ignored or met with “this is good enough service for you” condescension.

Of course, no matter what Levin thinks, a lot of those providers with mixed up slides and Red Bull fueling their all-nighters know the FCC doesn’t have the last word on anything.  They’ll take the dog and pony show straight to Congress, with checks in hand to lubricate the conversation. Making sure Congress ultimately listens to their constituents will be up to voters like you and I.

The city of Binghamton, NY offers free Wi-Fi service to its residents

The city of Binghamton, in southern New York, had an innovative idea in 2008 — to offer citizens free wireless access to the Internet across the entire downtown region, with the help of a private-public partnership.  More than 20 “access points” were installed by the city and Plexicomm, LLC, a private partner in the venture.  The Binghamton WiFi service launched last summer and has caught on like wildfire.

Binghamton WiFi Repeater helps extend the network

In addition to its popularity, which has tripled since 2008 with more than 82,000 logins, it’s also affordable.  The city of Binghamton pays just $3,650 a month on a two year contract, with some of that cost recouped with advertising that users see when first logging into the service.  The state also covered 50% of the cost for the first year.  It’s also unique, because the city encourages area businesses and residents to consider helping spread the reach of the network with the purchase and installation of their own wireless repeater, priced at $199.  Wi-Fi signals are generally better outside than indoors, but businesses can add the wireless repeater, placing it near a window or door, and make that signal available to customers located well within the building.

Apartment owners and even charitable consumers who believe in sharing the good fortune of free Internet are purchasing and installing repeaters to improve reception for their tenants or neighbors.  In addition to the “viral network” of Internet enthusiasts sharing and expanding the network independently, the city has also been able to afford officially extending the network with additional rooftop wireless “access points.”

The project has enthusiastic support from city officials, who continue to dedicate resources to it even while other city services come under review for budget cuts.

It also allows the city to get important civic and public information out to city residents who use the service.

Binghamton’s Wi-Fi business model is based on the premise that the most successful Wi-Fi public-private partnerships are free and open to the public, sustained with “captive advertising” as customers login to the service.  Customers are forced to view ads for 15-30 seconds while logging in, giving advertisers a better chance of having their messages seen by the online user.

The service is also not designed to directly compete with private providers, which include Time Warner Cable’s Road Runner service and Verizon DSL.  Although the maximum speed of the network is comparable to DSL – up to 3Mbps downstream and 768kbps upstream, Wi-Fi can suffer signal-related slowdowns as well as congestion.  The service is designed for web page browsing and e-mail, and light access of higher bandwidth applications such as online multimedia.

Several videos detailing the ongoing development of Binghamton WiFi can be found below the jump.

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Preston County, WV

Verizon issued a press release this morning celebrating the availability of DSL service to nearly 200 new lines in Albright, West Virginia.  They even pinpointed the service expansion to “areas along Coal Lick Road near the intersection of Route 22 and 26.”

Satellite image showing the sparsely populated Coal Lick Road/Rt. 26 Intersection (click to enlarge)

While that presumably makes residents on Coal Lick Road happy, vast areas of West Virginia remain unserved by DSL or any other broadband service option, except for prohibitively expensive satellite Internet.  Preston County has 30,000 residents spread 0ut over 651 square miles, and is typical of many sparsely populated counties in West Virginia.  The nearest large city is Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Verizon has stopped referring to its broadband solution for copper wire telephone networks as “DSL,” now marketing it as “Verizon High Speed Internet” instead.  Speed is in the eye of the customer, however.  Like most rural areas with Verizon DSL, the entry level tier offers speeds only up to 1Mbps downstream and 384kbps for the upstream.  Customers willing to pay more can select the “premium” service offering up to 3Mbps downstream and 768kbps upstream.  In larger towns and smaller cities, service up to 7.1Mbps may be available.

“Verizon is enabling more residents and businesses across West Virginia to make the high-speed connections that are important to them,” said B. Keith Fulton, president of Verizon West Virginia.  “Verizon’s investment in the Albright area means that more customers have access to affordable High Speed Internet service, backed by the reliability and security of Verizon’s network.”

Verizon is also demonstrating its commitment to West Virginia by leaving the state, intending to sell off its telephone service to Frontier Communications, a deal still pending regulatory approval.

For West Virginia, broadband expansion to just a few hundred homes, warranting a press release, demonstrates the incremental, slow progress of broadband expansion outside of urban America.

Petawawa and Laurentian Valley township are located in eastern Ontario, Canada.

The days of dial-up are finally coming to a close for large portions of two rural Ontario communities — Petawawa and Laurentian Valley Township, with the announcement that the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has approved a grant application to help expand broadband access to reach at least 95% of residents.

A joint broadband project committee met Monday for the first time to review the project’s budget and rollout plans.  The two communities joined forces to appeal for broadband connectivity, and now will work together to administer the project.  Laurentian Valley Councillor George Hodgkinson will serve as committee chairman and Petawawa Councillor Treena Lemay as vice-chairwoman.

The broadband project budget is $2.1 million dollars: $708,908 from the Canadian government and an additional $1.8 million dollars from Bell Aliant, which will be spent on additional towers and switch equipment.

Laurentian Valley township (population 9,265) and Petawawa (population 14,651) are located west of Pembroke, the nearest city.  Mayors from both communities praised the project.  Petawawa Mayor Bob Sweet is pleased the broadband issue is being addressed.  It’s an issue he heard about “constantly” from town residents.  Laurentian Valley Mayor Jack Wilson also feels broadband access is long overdue in his community, particularly because residents’ tax dollars helped construct the nation’s broadband infrastructure.  His residents have “waited a long time to get high-speed Internet at their homes.”

The Bell Aliant broadband proposal envisions traditional DSL service for more populated neighborhoods and community centers and Inukshuk Wireless broadband delivered from existing Bell towers to reach those who live too far away for DSL service or are located in particularly rural areas where DSL is not cost effective.  Inukshuk is an Inuit word that represents a beacon or a familiar place marker.  Inukshuk Wireless is a joint project between Bell and Rogers Communications to provide wireless broadband connectivity in Canada’s rural communities.

Planned for completion by 2010, the joint project hopes to cover 82% of the areas currently unserved with any broadband service.

Netgear's Rangemax™ Dual Band Wireless-N Gigabit Router - Premium Edition (WNDR3700) will be Netgear's first router to include usage monitoring capability built-in.

For many consumers asked, “how many gigabytes do you use on your Internet connection each month,” the answer is often a question: “what is a gigabyte?”

Because of efforts of Internet Service Providers to try and implement Internet Overcharging schemes, consumers who have no interest watching a company-provided web page “gas gauge,” will at least be given an independent way of assessing their monthly usage – through the router that often connects a cable or DSL modem to a home computer.

Netgear will introduce a new router this August that will include built-in usage monitoring tools.  The Netgear Rangemax™ Dual Band Wireless-N Gigabit Router – Premium Edition (WNDR3700) will sell for $190, and is targeted to high end users.  Netgear promises to introduce the feature on new router models going forward, eventually becoming a standard feature on every router sold by the company.  Software upgrades will be available to introduce the measurement tool to older equipment already in use.

Usage monitoring tools aren’t actually new.  Replacement “firmware” such as Tomato and DD-WRT, already measures usage, typically with a monthly consumption total.  That makes it much easier than some software measurement tools, which can only measure usage when left running (and only on a single computer).

Most consumers are not interested in measuring usage, but with the threat of overlimit fees and penalties or service termination, router manufacturers have begun to include measurement tools to help consumers keep track just in case.

Some providers, like Comcast, provide a monthly allowance of 250GB and only actively pursue the top 1% of customers who wildly exceed that.  Others, as have been regularly documented on Stop the Cap!, create very low limits, and then overcharge consumers with penalty fees when they exceed them.  Time Warner Cable met extremely hostile opposition to their roundly-attacked “tier experiment” in April, and quickly shelved the proposal until a company “education” campaign can be run.  The importance of checking usage will vary depending on how draconian of a limit one’s provider sets for its customers.

Netgear’s announcement can be read both positively and negatively.  It’s positive because it allows customers to independently measure their monthly usage and expose any providers who “play with the numbers” and overbill customers for usage never consumed.  It’s negative because it plays into industry arguments that measurement tools are a necessary element to conduct business, and helps establish a foundation to implement Internet Overcharging schemes.  Critics call such schemes unnecessary, considering the highly profitable returns providers enjoy at current pricing.

Cisco Systems, which owns Linksys, another major router manufacturer, is also considering bandwidth measurement tools for its router line in the future.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski

In a dramatic departure from the former Federal Communications Commission’s largely “hear no evil, see no evil” oversight, Julius Genachowski, the new Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, is a downright activist.

Genachowski, over the course of several interviews given this week, has made it clear that he sees major problems in the American broadband industry — it’s too expensive, it’s not competitive enough, and its widespread availability is absolutely critical to the economic success of the United States in coming years.  He’s made it clear broadband will be the most important issue before the agency for the immediate future.

“It’s tremendously important. I’m convinced that broadband is our generation’s major infrastructure challenge, akin to what railroads were, what the highway system was and universal electricity. This is the platform that will determine whether the country can compete in the 21st century. If we get this right, our broadband infrastructure will be an enduring engine for job creation, economic growth, investment, innovation, so it’s essential,” Genachowski said in an interview published today in The Wall Street Journal.

Although short on specifics in most of the interviews given to date, Genachowski has signaled his interest in preserving the concepts of Net Neutrality — providing open and equal treatment of Internet traffic without favoring or throttling traffic.

“The openness of the Internet has been a big driver of that. And it is important that we preserve that openness in order to drive investment, innovation, job creation and economic growth,” he said.

With the departure of the former FCC Chairman Kevin Martin earlier this year, Genachowski will mirror much of the Obama Administration policies and their telecommunications agenda.

Martin’s FCC, with a Republican majority, exercised a deregulatory approach to oversight, and was frequently criticized for not protecting consumer interests.  But Martin did routinely clash with the nation’s cable television operators, in his unsuccessful effort to force them to provide a-la-carte cable television programming tiers.  Martin’s leadership also brought about heightened oversight of “decency” policies impacting broadcasters, and resulted in substantial fines for radio and television stations that violated language or decency standards.  Most agency watchers summarize the last eight years of telecommunications policy as generally industry friendly, particularly to telephone companies, and mildly hostile to cable.  The Commission also sought to permit an increase in ownership concentration of the nation’s radio and television services, and approved mergers routinely, including one between former competing satellite radio providers XM and Sirius.

Genachowski’s FCC is expected to substantially change its regulatory approach, but only over time.

Although it will maintain an activist approach to broadband issues, Genachowski believes a top-down ‘agency makeover’ is required to prepare the FCC to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

“There are real challenges given the state of the infrastructure at the agency. As an example, there are literally millions of pages of documents that should be available to the public, and technically are because people can come in and look them up, that aren’t in digital form at all. They’re in paper. Some of these are historical documents, but there’s a huge resource downstairs in the pubic reading room that has something like 7,000 linear feet of paper that we really do need to digitize and put online. There’s a lot of paper that is online but not in machine-readable format, it’s not searchable,” he said.

Most FCC watchers believe the agency will move forward on several issues in the next 12-24 months:

1. A review of the Universal Service Fund (USF), which collects several dollars from every telephone customer in the United States to help underwrite and defray expenses of the nation’s most rural and disadvantaged telephone subscribers.  The USF has been roundly criticized for collecting an enormous amount of money, and squandering it on projects that go well beyond the Fund’s original intent, resulting in considerable waste, fraud, and abuse.  Genachowski’s FCC will be asked to consider using USF money to deploy and/or underwrite broadband service in areas not economically viable enough for private companies to provide service.
2. A review of the state of the competitiveness in the broadband, telephone, and wireless telephone industries, with particular emphasis on the latter.  Wireless phone companies like Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility are already under scrutiny for their exclusivity agreements with telephone equipment manufacturers, and their attempts to hold consumers’ hostage by refusing to permit them to reactivate their phones on other company’s networks.
3. A review of applications and filings by broadcasters relating to low power radio and television, improving reception for digital over the air television signals, indecency complaints, and mergers and acquisitions in the industry.

There is bad, and then there is REALLY, REALLY BAD.

CableOne punishes you if you exceed your daily usage allowance.

CableONE’s new residential broadband Internet Overcharging pricing achieves new lows among American broadband providers – low caps that is.

The company has boosted the speed of its residential broadband services, and lowered the allowance you receive each month to use it.  The “Economy” package, if used to any degree for anything beyond e-mail and a smattering of web page viewing each month, will wreak havoc on any household budget.  Providing just 1.5Mbps downloads and 150kbps uploads for $26 a month, your monthly usage allowance is just ONE gigabyte.  Exceed that at your financial peril.  The overlimit penalty is a whopping $10/GB, and that full $10 is billed whether you exceed your allowance by one byte or 999 megabytes.  CableONE graciously limits their Money Party to a maximum $50 in overlimit penalties, putting your broadband service you thought you paid $26 for at the “reasonable” price of up to $76 a month.

But there is a way to steer clear of the overcharging, if you are a night owl.  The company turns the “meter” off from 12 midnight until 12 noon the following day.

CableONE’s other residential plans now also have lower consumption allowances, designed to limit your day to day use of your broadband service.  Instead of adopting a monthly maximum allowance, the company imposes daily limits that do not “roll over” from day to day.  If you use your connection heavily one day, but not at all the next three, you could still find yourself over the limit.

Standard Service: 5Mbps/500kbps – $49/month – 3 GB Daily Usage Limit
Premium Service: 10Mbps/1Mbps – $59/month – 5 GB Daily Usage Limit

Going over your limit between one and 14 days per month will result in an automatic downgrade in your broadband speed to the next lowest tier.  Exceed it more than 15 days per month, and your account will be terminated.

The company has suggestions for customers who want to reduce their usage to stay compliant.  Right on top: stop watching those online videos.

Suggestions for Reducing Bandwidth

CableONE’s service counts bytes used during the peak usage period which is defined as 12 noon to 12 midnight.

The following types of usage consume high amounts of bandwidth and should be avoided during peak usage period:

• Movie downloads
• Streaming Video
• Picture downloads or uploads
• Leaving your browser open on pages that “refresh” automatically

Some of the programs you have installed will try to update themselves periodically by downloading files. You can typically set your program to schedule updates during off-peak times. Windows software can be set to update overnight as well. Updates and large downloads done between midnight and 12 noon do not count against your allocation.

Subscribers, particularly in southern Mississippi, have had an increasingly difficult relationship with CableONE.  In March, a subscriber announced a lawsuit against the cable operator for gouging customers on set top boxes, required for digital cable viewing.  CableONE charges its customers $11 a month for a regular Motorola cable box and $23 for its HD-DVR box.  In June, a suspicious white powder was found in the Biloxi CableONE office, that was later determined to be harmless.

An unintentionally amusing CableONE ad follows the jump below.

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The west was won with higher upload speed.

Qwest, one of the nation’s largest telephone companies serving the western half of the United States, has proven that telephone company broadband need not be stuck in the past with slow and unreliable DSL speeds. Today, the company announced it was unveiling new super fast upload speed tiers for its entire lineup of broadband plans.  During the promotional period, current subscribers with a 7, 12, or 20Mbps download tier can upgrade to 5Mbps upload speed for $5 more a month.  That upload speed is far faster than what cable companies are providing customers across Qwest’s service area.

Neil E. Cox, executive vice president of Qwest Product and IT emphasized the growing importance of upload speeds for consumers.

“Faster download speeds are important, but upload speeds are getting more attention. By increasing connection speeds in both directions, Qwest is poised to support user-generated content and simultaneous high-bandwidth applications, like multiple online video streams and downloads or multiple players of online video games,” Cox said.

The company also announced a new super fast 40Mbps download and 20Mbps upload tier in selected cities.

Amy Lind, IDC Research Manager, Consumer Broadband and Mobile Services said that consumers are clamoring for faster speed and their research shows customers aren’t simply passively accessing web content any longer.

“Broadband providers have primarily focused on download speeds because, until recently, the Internet has been mostly a source for content, especially online video. Now, as more people create and share their own content, upload speeds have become increasingly important,” she said.

“Qwest has recognized this rapidly growing user-generated content trend and is encouraging the evolving Internet habits of its customers by adding new broadband tiers that emphasize upstream speeds,” Lind added.

The upgrades are possible because Qwest is deploying VDSL2 technology, a modern version of DSL, across its service area.  The technology works over a combination fiber optic/copper wire telephone network.  As long as a neighborhood is reached with a fiber optic line, VDSL2 can work over existing telephone wiring in the home.  Consumers subscribing to the service are provided with an Actiontec® Wireless VDSL2/ADSL2+/2 Universal DSL Wireless Gateway (modem).  The company warns that although the service is very fast, download and upload speeds will be up to 15% lower “due to network requirements and may vary for reasons such as customer location, Web sites accessed, Internet congestion and customer equipment.”

Pricing of Qwest’s New Speed Offerings

40 Mbps download with 5 Mbps upload, $99.99 a month for the first 12 months when combined with a qualifying home phone package.
40 Mbps download with 20 Mbps upload, $109.99 a month for the first 12 months when combined with a qualifying home phone package.
An introductory rate of $5 more a month for qualified customers with 7 Mbps, 12 Mbps or 20 Mbps speed tiers who upgrade to 5 Mbps upstream speeds.

A fact sheet is available with more information about the upgrade.

Read more and see a company video below the break.

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Bronson Riley realized not long ago that he and his wife were paying way more for cable television than they were getting out of it. They watched only a few shows each week.

At the time, he was reading a book on personal finance. It mentioned purchasing services “a la carte” rather than as a package.

The Lincoln, Nebraska resident knew that wasn’t an option for cable TV. So he cut the cord about two months ago, canceling his cable subscription. Now the couple watch what they want, when they want — online.

The mainstream press has started devoting more attention to the plight of cable television executives pondering what to do about “parasites” like Bronson Riley, who they see as poaching their programming and watching it online… for free.

One of the unintended consequences of the unveiling of TV Everywhere, the Comcast/Time Warner Cable concept of permitting “authenticated” viewers to watch cable programming online, (as long as they already subscribe to a standard “cable package”) is an exploration of the phenomenon of  consumers cutting cable’s cord and doing without.

Riley touches on an issue that has bugged cable consumers for decades now — paying for channels they didn’t ask for and don’t want.  In the 1980s and early 1990s, talk about 500 channels of cable programming was dismissed as fanciful, but has since become reality when one includes on demand and music channels.  What has also become an increasing reality for cash-strapped consumers is the bill at the end of the month, which has grown annually faster than the rate of inflation.

A-la-carte, simply defined as paying only for those channels you watch, is an alarming concept for the nation’s cable television operators.  They have resisted the concept for more than 20 years, when it was first seriously raised in congressional hearings to deal with runaway cable bills.

Unfortunately for the industry, most consumers have suggested they have no need for most of the channels they receive today, and are tired of paying for them.  Many consumers would be happy with just six channels they routinely watch,  eager to pay only for them and nothing else.

With this in mind, some customers who also have broadband service from their cable provider have begun to discover many of their favorite shows are available, on demand, for free.  With more and more shows becoming available, a small, but growing minority of cable subscribers have decided to drop cable TV and watch video online instead, an issue the Omaha World-Herald explored:

Andrea Riley watches “Desperate Housewives” at ABC.com, which streams free full episodes of that and other popular shows such as “Lost” and “Grey’s Anatomy,” often the day after they air. The couple buy episodes of another favorite, “The Soup,” a revamp of “Talk Soup” on E! Entertainment Television, on Apple’s iTunes for $1.99 each with only a day’s wait.

Even paying for the handful of shows they can’t get free legally, Riley figures watching TV online saves money. The only thing they miss is flipping on CNN Headline News and the Weather Channel in the morning.

“It’s all getting to watch the TV shows you want to watch at a cheaper price, at your convenience,” he said.

In making the switch, the Rileys have joined a small but growing number of people who are tuning in online rather than over traditional network, cable or satellite pipelines. Some watch online occasionally to catch up on an episode they’ve missed or to track down old or obscure shows. Others, like the Rileys, watch online routinely.

For now, only a minority of web-aware consumers understand how to watch television online, but that’s changing.

“People are just figuring this out,” Jeremy Lipschulz, director of the University of Nebraska at Omaha School of Communication said. “Once people figure out that all this content is out there, you’ll see a more dramatic shift.”

Bobby Tulsiani, a senior analyst with the market research firm Forrester Research, agreed it’s still tech types who are making the change. Two years from now, more people will be doing it, he told the World-Herald.

Ann Shrewsbury, public affairs director for Time Warner Cable Nebraska, said their business trends nationwide show the same thing.

That leaves cable operators like Time Warner Cable in a quandary, and they’ve thus far responded with a trial to stream cable shows online, on demand, for their customers.  But the catch is one must remain a cable TV subscriber to access it.

Across many parts of Nebraska, served by Cox Cable, they’ll be left out of the online video revolution on offer from Time Warner Cable and Comcast, at least until Cox Cable can negotiate its way into the project being run by its larger brethren.

Riley said he generally doesn’t miss cable, having spent more of his time online or watching movies on demand, except for local weather from The Weather Channel and catching up with news on Headline News.  He doesn’t regret the savings either.  Most standard cable tiers are priced higher than his broadband service.

But Riley does recognize there is one way to put a stop to the revolution and end the parade to true, on-demand television viewing on a “pay per view” or free basis: limits on his Internet service.

With Internet overcharging schemes like usage limits, or charging overlimit fees for “excessive consumption,” cable operators might hope to stop the threat before it gets out of hand.