Commentary By Paul Maxwell Cable’s Voice … … began meeting in DC last night with a nice reception and a silent auction. But why do they keep it silent? Shouldn’t the Cable Television Public Affairs Association members – every one of them! – be shouting about now? Here we are … tagged with an indecency label. Here we are … with politicians trying to shame us into providing programming a la carte … makes no never mind about the economics or the blatant imposition of a federally generated mandate that flies in the face of the 1st Amendment. (But then, that’s just part of the Bill of Rights and doesn’t seem to matter much anymore.) Here we are … with companies boasting higher market valuations than the entire cable industry whining about having to follow the same rules we did. Here we are … with the NAB saying retransmission consent is just fine. Here we are … having spurred the spectacular growth of programming choices … Here we are … having wired the USA … Here we are … having wired most schools in the USA … Here we are … having created C-SPAN and opened a window into how the Federales do business … Here we are … an American success story … So? So what? We don’t get no respect? Whining won’t help … But we sure need to find a better way to tell our stories! Like, here’s a radical thought, on cable? Random Notes

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Friday–July 11

Next Frontier: CableLabs Explores More than Speed Connectivity Era

Internet speed records are all the rage these days, with two separate breakthroughs making the headlines recently. One is more in the distant future, but the other hits closer to home.

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