SCTE Notebook

HDTV was a hot topic at Expo. SA technical director Gene Canella noted DBS is using HD to win customers over from cable. To beat back the competition, cable needs to offer more HDTV, on-demand and streaming video services, he said. "Subscribers jump at more HD offerings, that’s the #1 initiative, the second is offering more on-demand content. The third initiative is getting the jump on the Web portal guys. They need the content deals that [cable] already have in place." — Sister pub Communications Technology named Comcast Seattle its System of the Year based on the unit’s technical fundamentals. Seattle managed a simultaneous launch of digital voice and all-digital simulcast, but "Seattle also hit exceptional numbers for service calls, outage response and duration, basic subscriber growth and customer satisfaction," CT editor-in-chief Jonathan Tombes said. — "Women are as comfortable with technology as men, which wasn’t the case five years ago," Oxygen chmn/CEO Gerry Laybourne said, citing a soon-to-be-released Oxygen study. And women love tech ads 2x as much as ads for clothing or shoes. But they like their technology to be "purposeful." Of course men admire "frivolous" features and view gadgets as toys. — Asked for final thoughts at a CEO panel, Suddenlink’s Jerry Kent and Laybourne cited cable’s battles with lawmakers as their biggest concern. Liberty Global’s Michael Fries said cable must play to its strength with video and ask consumers what they want.