Showtime: Cable Playing 'Catch-Up' On HD

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Showtime: Cable Playing 'Catch-Up' On HD
A top network executive says cable operators are behind DIRECTV.
By Swanni

Washington, D.C. (December 3, 2007) -- Several cable TV operators, such as Comcast and Time Warner, have said recently that their high-def offerings are equal to or better than DIRECTV's new expanded HD lineup.

But a top Showtime executive says that's just spin.

"They're trying to spin the best story they can in terms of matching what DIRECTV has put up there," Showtime Networks executive vice president Tom Christie says in this week's edition of Multichannel News.

Christie tells the publication that "everything" will be in HD in five years but cable is now "playing a catch-up game."

Showtime's high-def channel is carried by most cable operators, but many other HD channel simulcasts can't find spots in cable lineups due to bandwidth constraints.

DIRECTV, however, launched a new satellite this year, enabling it to expand its national HD lineup from nine to more than 80 channels. Most major cable operators carry between 20 and 30 HD channels.

Cable services "are saying, 'I want to launch HD networks, but I’ve got to find bandwidth,’ ” Coleman Breland, Turner Broadcasting System's executive vice president of sales and marketing, tells Multichannel News.

Top cable operators say they are trying to expand their capacities with new technologies such as Switched Digital Video. But they also maintain that their current lineups are as good as DIRECTV's because they offer HD On Demand programming.

DIRECTV does not have an HD On Demand service.

However, Showtime's Christie says that cable has a tough job of selling a lineup with fewer HD channels than DIRECTV.

“Cable is in a terrible political situation with their customers,” he said.

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Swanni (Phillip Swann) is president and publisher of TVPredictions.com. He has been quoted in dozens of publications and broadcast outlets, including CNN, Fox News, Inside Edition, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Financial Times, The Associated Press and The Hollywood Reporter. He can be reached at swann@tvpredictions.com or at 703-505-3064.

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