[87] in Resnet-Forum
RE: Residential Hall Cable TV
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (BILL SINGLETON)
Wed Dec 1 08:53:45 1993
Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1993 8:40:46 -0500 (EST)
From: BILL SINGLETON <SINGLETON@MINNIE.HOLLINS.EDU>
To: resnet-forum@MIT.EDU
Cc: SINGLETON@MINNIE.HOLLINS.EDU
> I want to follow up on the question on cable TV. The local cable
> company here is no longer willing to cover the cost of room
> wiring, instead offering training in TV production for students
> and a few minor benefits. They only are offering to provide a
> cable to the buildings, with Pomona College covering the
> individual room wiring. The cable company apparently feels they
> got burned when they provided room wiring at a neighboring
> college, but only got about 2 dozen subscribers out of 500
> students. As a result, they're not offering us as good a deal.
If their experience is that they will get only a 5% return on their wiring
investment, they shouldn't be willing to pay to wire your rooms. One way around
this problem is for the college to contract with the CATV provider and guarantee a
specific number of connections. Our experience is that 75-80% of the students
will use the service if it is provided (and covered through the room rate). We
are charged about a third of the residential rate for enhanced-basic service plus
HBO in our rooms (we do have to pay for 12 months/year, but its still much cheaper
this way).
> We did a survey of students at fall registration that indicated
> about 40% of students were interested in getting cable (given an
> estimated price of about $25/month.) I would expect the actual
> number to be lower than that as students split costs for a single
> feed, etc.
This is a real problem for you and the cable provider if cable is contracted
individually to students. You will have CATV cable spread all over the place as
students provide underground CATV throughout the halls. You will probably be
charged with enforcing the one connection/one room rule for the provider.
> We're looking at this cable also for its AV potential rather than
> possible data needs, since we've run plenty of twisted pair to
> support Ethernet, serial, and voice needs.
Our contract gives us 3 channels (one low in the range, two above the last channel
the company is using) for our use and we could probably get more it we pressed.
>
> Kurt Tiedtke
> Academic Computing
> Pomona College
>
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