An Ignoble Experiment

eBook: TV Everywhere Gets Personal

Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) confirmed Tuesday that it will launch its Google Fiber and pay TV service in Austin, Texas, by mid-2014, where it'll challenge incumbent triple-play providers Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC) and AT&T (NYSE: T).

The Austin rollout indicates that Google has bigger ambitions for Google Fiber, which was considered a small pilot project when it launched last fall in Kansas City. Google said the pricing for its service will be similar to that of Kansas City, where it offers subscribers a $120 monthly package that includes Internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, 200 high-definition cable channels and a Nexus tablet that is used as a remote control.

Austin residents who don't want the full Google Fiber package will be able to get a free Internet service with download speeds of 5 Mbps for seven years if they pay an installation fee, Google said. The Internet giant has a similar free Internet offer in Kansas City, where it charges subscribers a $300 "construction fee" if they opt for its standalone Internet service.

While the fastest Internet speed Time Warner Cable offers in most markets is 50 Mbps, the MSO said earlier this month that it planned to submit a bid to build a 1-gig network in North Carolina, and that it wants to play an "integral role" in the state's Next Generation Network project. AT&T announced last November that it would eventually increase the speeds for its U-verse Internet service to 75 Mbps, which would see it offer maximum download speeds that would be less than one-tenth as fast as Google's 1-gig service.

In January, FCC chairman Julius Genachowski launched the "Gigabit City Challenge," saying he would like to see at least one city in all 50 states have an affordable 1-gig service available to consumers by 2015. Google Fiber VP Milo Medin referred to Genachowski's challenge in a blog post on Tuesday about the Austin deployment.

"We believe the Internet's next chapter will be built on gigabit speeds, and we hope this new Google Fiber city will inspire communities across America to think about what ultrafast connectivity could mean for them," Medin said.

Austin is the 45^th largest demographic market area (DMA), counting 705,280 TV homes, according to Nielsen. The Kansas City metropolitan area has 931,320 TV homes, making it the 31^st largest market.

Austin alone has a population of 820,000 and 354,241 housing units, according to U.S. Census Bureau data from 2011. The median household income is $51,596.

For more:
- see the Google blog post

Read more about: U-Verse, FCC, Kansas City
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2. Verizon CEO hints at a la carte pricing for video

By Sue Marek

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3. Cablevision promotes Kristin Dolan to president of Optimum Services

LAS VEGAS--Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) Chairman and CEO Lowell McAdam said his company is being pressured by consumers to offer a la carte pricing for its FiOS TV service and he believes this is a concept worth considering.

The company, which offers FiOS TV service to 5.5 million customers, can track how much a customer watches each channel and McAdam hinted that this would make a la carte pricing feasible.

Speaking at the National Association of Broadcasters conference here Tuesday, McAdam also said he does not envision implementing data caps for Verizon's FiOS broadband service, although the company does enforce data caps on its wireless data service. "Because we did fiber to the home, it doesn't matter," he said. "I don't see a horizon with data caps being put in place."

However, he did leave the door open to having different data pricing tiers for customers who might want to pay a lower monthly fee because they use only a small amount of data.

McAdam's appearance at the NAB show was interesting considering that broadcasters have always had a fairly contentious relationship with telecom operators over spectrum. Perhaps that was why there were so many empty seats at McAdam's one-on-one discussion with NAB President and CEO Gordon Smith.

McAdam also used the NAB show to sooth broadcasters that may have some concerns about the company's plans for LTE Broadcast technology. At the Consumer Electronics Show in January, McAdam publicly discussed his desire to use LTE Broadcast to broadcast live events like the 2014 Super Bowl to Verizon's customers.

McAdam said he doesn't plan to replace traditional broadcast TV because the majority of people will want to watch the 2014 Super Bowl in their homes over their existing television. "We don't want to get in the way of broadcasters," McAdam said. However, he added that there may be specific events like the Super Bowl where Verizon could "add a dimension and it becomes better."

Read more about: FiOS
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By Steve Donohue

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4. DirecTV throws bone to DogTV

Cablevision (NYSE: CVC) said Tuesday that it promoted Kristin Dolan to the new position of president of Optimum Services, and it also assigned new titles to company veterans Brian Sweeney and Wilt Hildenbrand.

Dolan

Dolan, who had been senior EVP of product management and marketing, will also oversee sales for Cablevision's video, voice and high-speed Internet products. The 23-year Cablevision veteran is married to CEO Jim Dolan.

Hildenbrand

Cablevision promoted SVP Brian Sweeney to senior EVP of strategy, and said that he will also serve as chief of staff to Jim Dolan, who is Sweeney's brother-in-law. Sweeney will oversee corporate strategy, long-term planning and growth initiatives, according to the MSO.

Hildenbrand, the former Cablevision CTO who came out of retirement last year, was named senior advisor of customer care, technology and networks. Hildenbrand joined Cablevision in 1976 and has led its rollout of advanced products, including digital cable, its network-based DVR, WiFi and its cloud-based interactive program guide.

The executive shuffle follows the resignations in late 2011 of Cablevision COO Tom Rutledge and John Bickham, who was the company's president of cable communications. Rutledge is now CEO at Charter Communications (Nasdaq: CHTR), and Bickham is Charter's COO.

Sweeney

Several top Cablevision executives left the company after Rutledge and Bickham resigned, with several taking jobs at Charter and Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC). Last March, Cablevision named former SeaChange International President Yvette Kanouff EVP of engineering and software design. Kanouff reports to Hildenbrand. Cablevision said Kristin Dolan, Sweeney and Hildenbrand will report to Jim Dolan.

For more:
- see the release

Read more about: Brian Sweeney
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By Steve Donohue

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5. Moonves: CBS exploring cable-only distribution to thwart Aereo

DirecTV (Nasdaq: DTV) said it plans to launch DogTV, a network focused on programming that can soothe or entertain canines while their owners are out of the house, in the third quarter of 2013.

Source: DogTV

Rather than package DogTV with networks programmed for humans, DirecTV said it will offer DogTV as a premium channel, charging subscribers $5.99 monthly.

The DirecTV agreement is the biggest U.S. carriage deal yet for DogTV, which is owned by Israeli media company Jasmine TV. Cox Communications distributes DogTV programming on its free video-on-demand channel on cable systems in California.

DogTV spokeswoman Beke Lubeach said Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC) tested DogTV on its San Diego, Calif., system last year, but that the MSO no longer offers the channel. Israeli cable operator Yes carries DogTV, and it is also has a channel on Roku's streaming video platform and on YouTube.

Programming on DogTV includes videos of dogs playing outdoors and relaxation videos showing dogs and humans outdoors, accompanied by new age music.

For more:
- see the release
- see sample DogTV video

Read more about: Time Warner Cable
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By Steve Donohue

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