TV being transformed

By GINA KINSLOW
Glasgow Daily Times

GLASGOW Sat, May 17 2008

— Video on Demand will soon be available to Glasgow Electric Plant Board customers.
The technology will allow customers to watch television shows whenever they want, regardless of whether they want to watch it in real time or download it and watch it later.
EPB officials voted Tuesday to offer the technology to customers pending approval by EPB’s cable television programming committee.
There are a couple of a reasons why EPB wants to make VOD available.
“It’s heavily promoted by a lot of the premium channels as being an enhancement to their service, (and) a lot of our customers who are technology savvy have already been asking for it for a couple of years,” said William Ray, EPB superintendent.
Channels considered to be “premium channels,” are HBO, Showtime and other similar channels.
To bring VOD to EPB customers, EPD will pay a one-time fee of $105,000, plus the agency will pay $3,000 a month.
The breakdown of the types of programming that will be available via VOD is 50 percent adult programming, 25 percent pay-per-view movies and 25 percent premium cable television programming.
EPB board member Jake Dickinson was not certain EPB should make more adult programming available.
“I’m not fond of putting more adult stuff on there,” Dickinson said, suggesting the issue be brought before EPB’s programming committee before being made available.
Adult programming is available on one or two of the pay-per-view channels off-ered by EPB nearly all day, according to Ray.
He pointed out that he brought the matter before the board of directors first rather than taking it to the programming committee because he saw it as an economic issue for EPB.
“We hope it will generate at least $3,000 per month in revenue to offset the new $3,000 per month cost,” he said.
In order to have access to VOD, EPB customers must subscribe to digital cable.
The more digital customers, the longer EPB can offer basic cable at an inexpensive rate. EPB’s basic cable costs $10.25 per month for Glasgow residents. Glasgow Classic, which is basic plus about 53 additional channels, costs $24.25 per month.
Ray is also hoping the availability of VOD will entice more people to subscribe to fiber to the home.
“If we cannot convince more folks to purchase products like these then it is not feasible to construct FFTH (fiber to the home),” he said.