Bowman is the public affairs manager for Wilson, N.C.

Brian Bowman reports from Save North Carolina Broadband that S1209, Senator Hoyle’s municipal broadband killer bill, was yanked from yesterday’s meeting, apparently to “study the issue some more.”  Perhaps elected officials are studying the implications of passing this anti-consumer nightmare on their chances in the next election.  Let’s deliver the death blow to S1209 by getting on the phones and e-mail again today!

You need to keep the pressure on with calls and letters to all of these officials, reminding them you are watching this bill very closely and are waiting for them to cast their “no” vote, but will also at least accept a vote that yanks the bill from consideration for the rest of 2010.

Remind them this bill was quickly foisted on the Senate Finance Committee, and its wide-ranging implications are too important to North Carolina’s high tech future to let this bill rush into law.  Tell them the only real assault on your wallet comes from big telecom providers who will stop at nothing to make sure municipal competition never sees the light of day — municipal competition that is the only realistic way many North Carolina towns and cities can deliver 21st century broadband service that will help get them back on track for economic success.

Don’t sit back and think someone else will do the writing and calling for you.  We made a difference last year because everyone called and wrote.  We need that to happen again!

Here is the list:

Thursday’s Winston-Salem Journal featured an editorial calling on the North Carolina legislature to get out of the way as municipalities across the state take control of their broadband destinies.

The piece, Broadband Battle, echoes what Stop the Cap! has been writing for more than a year now:

• More than decade after the Internet became a household word, too many households in the state still don’t have broadband access to it;
• “High-speed,” as defined by many of the state’s providers, doesn’t meet today’s definition of multimedia-ready broadband that can support today’s high bandwidth applications;
• When private providers cannot or will not meet a community’s needs, they shouldn’t have to wait indefinitely for that to change.  If municipalities want to establish high-speed service at the behest of their residents, let them!

The Journal sees through a transparent effort by Senator David Hoyle and others to ensure protectionism for a marketplace duopoly.

Fifteen years after Internet use became common, the telecoms still do not provide high-speed service to much of North Carolina. They can’t expect people to wait any longer.

The telecommunications industry wants the legislature to make it more difficult for local governments to offer high-speed Internet service. The giant companies say they can’t compete with local governments in towns of a couple thousand people.

If the telecoms don’t want local governments to establish these Internet services, they should rush into these areas and establish service now.

The newspaper points out the yoga-like stretching Hoyle and his allies are doing to justify their obstacle course for municipal broadband, noting they are demanding a higher standard for financing municipal broadband than exists for most other government borrowing. And legislators would look hypocritical in passing such legislation because they’ve been borrowing without bond referenda for many years.

The newspaper takes a common sense attitude about such projects — if providers really want to stop them, they should rush into the areas where they are proposed and deliver the world-class 21st century broadband service consumers want and prices they can afford.  Instead, they divert subscriber’s monthly bill payments to high-priced lobbying efforts to kill potential competition.

The editorial’s advice to the General Assembly?  Ignore the telecoms on this issue.  Unfortunately, for some legislators, that means ignoring campaign contributions.  The best way to strengthen their resolve is to let them know they won’t get any more of those checks if they aren’t re-elected.

A retiring state senator wants to throw North Carolina consumers under the bus with new legislation that could cost residents millions in savings on their cable, telephone, and broadband bills.

Senator David Hoyle (D-Gaston), has introduced S1209 — what Hoyle calls “The Nonvoted Local Debt for Competing System Act.”  We call it “The Anti-Consumer Muni-Killer Act,” representing little more than a lavish parting gift to telecommunications companies that have supported Hoyle for years.

As we have been reporting here, here, here and here for the past few months, the telecom industry has pulled out all the stops looking for friends in the state legislature to do their bidding.  This year, the industry is following the game plan it has used successfully in other states to kill potential community-based competition for their broadband duopoly.

The state’s cable and phone companies (and their legislator lackeys) argue that taxpayers should not be on the hook for municipally-owned networks.  In the guise of “protecting consumers,” Hoyle and his bill’s co-sponsors would compel municipalities to fund municipal broadband projects with General Obligation B0nds — a regulatory minefield that includes referendums held at taxpayers’ expense and direct taxpayer involvement in the funding process.

As we’ve discussed earlier, Hoyle’s proposal would compel endless referendums for everything from system construction and financing to basic system upgrades and repairs.  The implications of such legislation:

• It makes municipal broadband projects untenable. What local government would consider a municipal project that would require endless referendums?  The only thing Hoyle didn’t include in his bill was a mandatory public referendum about where the engineers should order lunch.
• Someone has to pay for the referendum process — North Carolina taxpayers.  So much for protecting the taxpayer!
• The legislative minefield Hoyle lays for local communities is tailor-made for well-financed telecom industry opposition campaigns that are designed to demagogue municipal competition while tying the hands of communities to fight back.

The irony is, the current system already in place in North Carolina protects state taxpayers.

Both proposed and operational municipal broadband systems rely on Revenue Bonds that have to be approved by the North Carolina Local Government Commission.  These Revenue Bonds are not taxpayer-funded, and local residents are not on the hook should something go wrong.  The financing agreements with investors are designed to pay off the costs of such systems over time and they then become self-supporting.  But even from day one, municipal broadband represents an asset to a community’s efforts to attract digital economy jobs.

They also save you money.  Just ask the residents of Wilson, who didn’t face a rate increase outpacing inflation and finally had an alternative for “good enough for you” broadband from current providers.

Unfortunately, the current system is no good for Senator Hoyle because it doesn’t protect his friends in the phone, cable, and broadband industry, threatened with competition that would derail their duopoly gravy trains for good.

Hoyle should be willing to admit as such, considering his friends in the cable industry already have.  Marcus Trahen, a lobbyist for the North Carolina Cable Telecommunications Association told legislators at a Revenue Laws Study Committee meeting, “We don’t care if cities have internal systems; what we are worried about is competition.”

Under the guise of “protecting” taxpayers, Hoyle only manages to guarantee fat profits for Time Warner Cable, AT&T, and CenturyLink (formerly Embarq) without better pricing and service for you.  Perhaps Hoyle forgot North Carolina is ranked 41st out of 50 states for its comparatively-mediocre broadband services, mostly provided by those three companies.

Hoyle also argues that publicly owned systems harm private industry, despite the fact many in private industry support municipal broadband.  Several letters of opposition to S1209 have been sent to legislators from companies like Google, Intel, Alcatel-Lucent, and five private provider trade associations.

Hoyle doesn’t plan to stick around and watch the damage his proposed bill would create for North Carolina’s economic and high tech future.  After he retires from public office, his bill would leave a legacy of tied hands among local communities from Asheville to Greenville, and all points in-between.  Doesn’t your community deserve a better option?  If you want a third option that could dramatically lower prices and offer better service, shouldn’t local officials have the right to offer it if current providers won’t?

The fact is, none of these municipal projects would even be proposed if the cable and phone companies delivered the service communities want at fair prices. Cable and phone companies don’t need to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to defeat these projects — they could simply lower their prices and offer the kind of service consumers demand.

For Hoyle’s part, he’s shocked…  shocked to discover consumers are offended by his telecom-friendly attitudes.  He told Indy Weekly, “the lobbyists don’t influence me; I’m in the pocket of the people that provide jobs for this state, and Time Warner Cable employs 8,500 — I can’t imagine anyone that would want to compete with that.”

Senator Hoyle weighed the interests of Time Warner Cable against 9.4 million North Carolina consumers and sided with the cable company.

Let’s push the scale in the other direction.

What You Need to Know

The author of S1209 is  Sen. David Hoyle (D-Gaston).

The bill currently lists five co-sponsors:

• Sen. Peter S. Brunstetter (R-Forsyth)
• Sen. Clark Jenkins (D-Edgecombe/Martin/Pitt)
• Sen. Jerry W. Tillman (R-Montgomery/Randolph)
• Sen. Dan Blue (D-Wake)
• Sen. Fletcher Hartsell (R-Cabarrus/Iredell)

The latter two, Sens. Blue and Hartsell were formerly on our supporters list, and we’re reaching out for clarification as to why they are listed as co-sponsors on this bill.  We’ll update our readers about whether they will stand with North Carolina consumers or the telecom industry as soon as we hear back from their offices.

Your Action Alert

You must immediately contact legislators on the Senate Finance Committee, set to consider Hoyle’s bill this week, most likely on Wednesday.  But don’t wait until then.  You should be making contact today, just in case the bill gets voted on earlier, before opposition has a chance to build.

Tell the senators to oppose S1209 for the benefit of North Carolina’s economic future:

• Make it clear voting for this bill is just another way to stop municipal broadband from delivering the kind of broadband service North Carolina wants and needs to grow its economy.
• S1209 was custom-crafted to protect the interests of incumbent phone and cable companies, not North Carolina consumers.
• The current system already protects taxpayers because they are not paying for municipal broadband projects.  S1209 forces local governments to spend taxpayer funds on endless referendums.
• Explain you are already empowered to stop unwanted municipal projects through organized vocal opposition at town meetings as well as at the ballot box.  But your town would not be empowered to offer services private providers refuse if S1209 becomes law, because the legislation forces such projects into miles of red tape.
• Worst of all, S1209 gives phone and cable companies plenty of time to demagogue such projects, spending ratepayer funds in a hopelessly mismatched fight.
• Let them know you see through S1209’s anti-competitive intent, and you’re prepared to vote for those who stand up for North Carolina consumers and oppose these types of telecom industry-friendly bills.

Important! When writing, -DO NOT- simply carbon copy everyone on a single e-mail message.  Those mass mailings are discarded, unread.  For maximum effectiveness, send an individual e-mail to each legislator and another to their legislative assistant. Calling the legislator’s office can be even more effective and immediate.

Here is the list:

Time Warner Cable is convinced subscribers are confused about the enormous number of channels that occupy today’s cable dials.  With today’s rapid growth in HD channels, the cable company is introducing some dramatic channel realignments for its customers in the Carolinas.

Next month, customers in the Triangle will join Time Warner Cable’s Common Digital Lineup, a project to align channel assignments throughout the two states.  When complete, all digital channels will be located in the same place on the dial throughout the Carolinas.  The company is also switching to a theme-based channel lineup.  Each category will have its respective channels grouped together.  Among them: news, general entertainment, sports, children’s programming, music, and movies.

For those in the northeastern states, this doesn’t represent anything new for the cable company — Time Warner Cable systems in New York, for example, have grouped digital channels into categories for years.

But the Carolinas realignment does make it considerably easier to locate HD channels, which will be aligned with their standard definition counterparts.  For example, CNN will soon be found throughout the Carolinas on channel 400.  Finding CNN HD becomes effortless – just put a “1” in front of the channel number — 1400.  The Disney Channel is on channel 200.  Disney Channel HD is easy enough to find — it’s now on channel 1200.  Even local channels are easier to deal with.  In Greensboro, for example, WXII, the NBC affiliate, will be on channel 120 for standard definition viewing or channel 1120 for HD viewing.

Complete channel lineup guides for the Carolinas are available from Time Warner Cable’s website.

[flv width=”432″ height=”260″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/News 14 Carolina In Depth Melissa Buscher TWC digital lineup changes 3-2010.flv[/flv]

Time Warner Cable’s House Organ, News 14 Carolina, delivers plenty of airtime to spokeswoman Melissa Buscher, who gushes about the channel alignment changes completed in Charlotte this past March.  (3 minutes)

The new lineup will take effect for North Carolina customers on the following dates:

The new channel lineup will be grouped as follows:

• 100’s – Local Broadcasters & Local Programming
• 200’s – Kids & Family, Learning & Discovery, Faith & Inspiration
• 300’s – Entertainment, Home & Leisure, Shopping
• 400’s – News & Information, Music
• 500’s – Sports
• 600’s – Movies
• 700’s – Premiums, Pay-Per-View Events
• 800’s – International
• 900’s – Music Choice
• 1000’s – On Demand
• 1100 and above- High Definition

Meanwhile, a lot of other Time Warner customers would prefer to share their continued displeasure with Time Warner’s “new and improved” program guide and DVR configuration menus.  Mystro Navigator has mystified a large number of customers who can’t stand the software and don’t understand why Time Warner radically changed it in the first place.

One Raleigh customer complains the software upgrade turned his DVR’s fast forward and rewind buttons into mud.  The upgrade dropped the 4x fast forward option which rapidly scanned through recorded programming.  Fast forwarding through commercials has become a nightmare because the box automatically rewinds about 10-20 seconds behind the point where the customer stopped fast-forwarding.

Buffalo and Rochester, New York customers have also given the software a hostile reception.  Some customers in Buffalo have canceled Time Warner Cable over the upgrade and switched to Verizon FiOS. In Rochester, a few residents have noted it has become much more difficult to manage manual recordings or setting the DVR up to record series properly.  The most common complaints:

• No apparent “jump to end” in playback
• Fast forward and rewind are not accurate
• Finding shows by title is laborious at best
• Recording shows and series has become needlessly complex by the changed menu structure
• No apparent 4x fast forward and reverse
• Program descriptions are heavily truncated on DVR recordings
• Erasing and managing recorded shows often drops you out of the DVR menu
• DVR recording is not consistent
• Configuring Navigator to work with HD sets is confusing for the uninitiated
• Extremely sluggish channel changing, responsiveness

Dealing with Navigator and the Time Warner Cable remote control, especially in the dark, should be an Olympic event.  One Buffalo resident has thrown up his hands:

Time Warner reminds me of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Both have severe technology handicaps. I watched the governor get fired on The Apprentice because he couldn’t use a cell phone or send an email or use the simplest technology.

Time Warner can’t seem to design a clicker that works. Mine has 63 buttons and looks like part of a 767 cockpit console. Hello? All I want is channel, volume and on/off.

The Time Warner remote doesn’t have a single on/off button — it has two – a ‘system’ and a “power” button. The engineer who designed that monstrosity should be dragged through the streets by a mob of angry senior citizens who must fumble with that thing every day.

Some tips have been circulating informally among Time Warner Cable engineers about how to deal with Navigator’s temperamental behavior:

Navigator Guide Data:

1. Newly installed or downloaded guides can take up to 24 hours for all seven days of guide data to populate. In many cases, new installs may only go out by three days until a full 24 hours have completed.
2. When Setting Up Series Recording for your first week with Navigator: (and even thereafter if you can help it) DO NOT DELETE SHOWS IN THE MIDDLE OF RECORDING THEM! Let Navigator do at least one complete recording of a series. If you need to delete a series, do it through the Series Manager, but before the recording starts. If you delete a series in the middle of recording it, Navigator will think it made an error, and will keep looking out for more episodes to record of that series.
3. Navigator needs to see AT LEAST ONE instance of a series for the populated guide data to be able to record it. Remember, under Record Series With Options you can set up on what channel(s) the series should record, the number of episodes to keep, and set series priorities.

[flv width=”480″ height=”340″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Time Warner Cable Dealing with Navigator 5-2010.flv[/flv]

Time Warner Cable produced these two videos to assist Navigator customers trying to understand how to record programming or set up their televisions to properly display cable programming.  (3 minutes)

Arris WBM760 DOCSIS 3 Cable Modem

Time Warner Cable is demonstrating 290Mbps downstream coupled with 90Mbps upstream broadband in its booth at the 2010 Cable Show in Los Angeles.  A Time Warner Cable insider told CED magazine it was the first public showing of the company’s ability to provide faster service outside of a lab environment.

The new high speeds are achieved using DOCSIS 3 technology which can bond multiple “channels” on a cable system together to create additional bandwidth.

The demonstration relies on an Arris CMTS and cable modems manufactured by both Arris and Motorola, which are connected to Time Warner’s Los Angeles cable headend.

CED notes Time Warner Cable has plenty of room for broadband speed growth.

The company is achieving the speeds using 8 x 4 channel bonding. With TWC’s top tier rated at 50/5 Mbps, the demo shows speed increases of greater than fivefold on the downstream and 18-fold on the upstream.

The TWC engineer compared the MSO’s achievement with the 300 Mbps that Bell Labs demonstrated on DSL recently.

“What they’ve got is something in the lab that goes 10 feet, and what we’re showing is live from our headend 22 miles away. We can compete (using) DOCSIS,” he observed.

Such developments are all part of a larger company plan to develop and market additional services the nation’s second largest cable operator can upsell to its customers.  For now, 290Mbps service is more theoretical than practical at Time Warner Cable’s likely pricing.  But it illustrates cable remains technologically ahead of what most phone companies can deliver over non-fiber-to-the-home networks.

MediaPost’s MediaDailyNews reports Time Warner Cable is about to begin market testing a new super-deluxe package that moves beyond the “Triple Play” packages common in the cable industry today.  Targeting wealthy, premium cable customers, Time Warner’s new “Homesuite” service would include all the bells and whistles:

• Multiple DVRs for several rooms in the house, with can eventually be connected together to let you start a recorded show in one room and finish it in another;
• A full range of premium channels at a bundled discount price;
• Faster DOCSIS-3 broadband with free Wi-Fi in and outside the home;
• Enhanced digital phone service, perhaps with more calling features;
• Concierge-like customer service, which could allow Homesuite customers to jump to the front of the queue for everything from service installation, repair and customer service.

Other options might include access to Time Warner’s wireless mobile broadband (rebranded Clearwire service), extended hours for service calls, discounts on pay per view, more deluxe set top boxes, and in some areas, even home security systems.

For Chief Operating Officer Landel Hobbs, the idea of selling $100 a month Triple Play package promotions just isn’t good enough anymore.  Time Warner Cable, MediaPost speculates, is now looking at $250 a month as a potential target price for Homesuite clients.

Time Warner Cable customers in Charlotte, North Carolina will be the first guinea pigs for super premium cable.  Are there enough customers around in Charlotte to pony up $250 a month for service?

TWC has conducted a customer “segmentation” study allowing it to identify opportunities for up-selling. “Our analysis indicates that certain of our large and profitable customer segments continue to hold substantial untapped opportunity,” Hobbs said earlier this year.

TWC says in a recent government filing that it’s likely to continue to lose video subscribers, but is expecting to make up for it by persuading customers to take DVR service, premium channels and other add-ons.

Charlotte is a key market for TWC — a Time Warner Cable Arena is located in the city center. After launching there, “Homesuite” would presumably then roll out in other TWC principal areas, which include Ohio, New York, Southern California and Texas. The working “Homesuite” moniker could be altered.