Comcast (cable TV)  refuses to carry HDnet. The story reaches back to over year ago, Dan Rather and Mark Cuban are in the center of ...

a story about a cable content provider HD-net, a company that has been around since High Definition Cable TV began, and a cable distribution subscriber service provider COMCAST, the largest networking of cable access in the nation. The situation unfolding now affects millions of Americans.

www.hd.net - www.comcastic.com

A multi-part story follows:

Firstly, get a taste of HDnet's Producers and Dan Rather, in Action. 55 minute video. You should set aside time to see this entire segment, its that good, and it matters in many ways that you fully understand why it matters that HDnet is doing as it does.

 THE CONSTITUTION IN QUESTION

There is more - here: http://www.hd.net/danrather.html

Note that critical assessments of consitutional interpretation in executive and particularly BUSH administration is the focus. Its a well crafted and balanced piece of Independant reporting, knowlegeable people with experience are at hand thanks to Dan, and Mark Cuban and the dedicated group at HDnet that produces this.

HAS HDNET BEEN REMOVED FROM COMCAST FOR POLITICAL REASONS?

We are attempting to determine an answer. This Article has been revised since initial publication, due in part to the rapid and concerned responses of several editors who were unaware of this situation, and likely during the next days it will expand in content and scope.

Step back to a year ago. Dan Rather launched his new news show on HDnet and it was critical of IRAQ and a variety of other issues that were surely distateful to the republican administration, didnt have the party-spin, but did have plenty of plain and evident facts, and amazingly detailed High Definition Video.

Just after that time HDnet started getting a bit punished by cable provider Comcast who  bought up a few million subscribers from smaller or failing cable operators, removed  HDnet for over 12 million Adelphia cable subscribers. Comcast is the largest cable provider in the nation, and therefore a monopoly in some ways when it comes to wired network access. They add 5 million more news connections per quarter. Huge.

This matters. Comcast controls Cable TV content channels and "last mile" internet access for millions of americans. They could have kept HDnet in a premium package offering along with HDnet Movies, the infrastructue was there and already working when they bought into the neighborhoods of america by gobbling up smaller cable outfits. a huge question looms ... Why remove HDnet?

Lets first try to figure out Comcast's marketing and seek out where they think digital cable is going to see why they might seek to change the usual cable lineup... when we did that things started looking weird...

COMCASTIC.  puppets.

This site is advertized on all Comcast channels.  Go to www.comcastic.com and see for yourself. Something strange and almost off-the-wall spooky is here in the wierd background music and dissonance of this presentation, its somewhat disturbing. We leave it to the reader to connect the various possible implications of the Puppet Paradigm here.

Brian L. Roberts, Chairman and CEO of Comcast Corporation, said, "2006 was simply our best year ever. Powered by our triple play offering and superior products, we added more RGUs* than at any other time in our history and reported terrific growth in cable revenue and Operating Cash Flow ... Looking ahead, we are perfectly positioned to continue to offer consumers the best entertainment and communications value proposition available anywhere, and to continue to deliver significant value to our shareholders."

*Glossary:  RGU= (Revenue Generating Unit). 

So Comcast expanded marketshare in 2006, and they are willing to be weird. Many people did not select or want Comcast, they got stuck with them as a result of Comcast acquisition of Adelphia and smaller cable operations and over 12 million subscribers fell into this situation. Adelphia buy-out deal was about 25% of Comcast's total subscriber-base, carried all HDnet programming. HDNet was (and is)  one of the best video 1080 HD sources for content and quality.

The Comcast claim of "best" and "growth" is a bit hollow when you recognize that they "buy and acquire" as a way into a market-space, and the end consumer is pretty much slammed with a new cable provider. For millions it was Comcast or nothing. Considering that Adelphia was going belly-up at the time (2005) it seemed like a good thing.

But there is more.. should a valuable independant voice be pushed off the information spectrum by a networked monopoly? By what reasoning? Did HDnet pick a fight and deserve this? Cable operations can and do editorialize content in the form of exclusion. There must be a larger reason  ...