A couple of recent reports indicate that the cable TV industry may be in decline when compared to their rivals in the satellite television business.

A study by SNL Kagan found that the cable provider’s subscriber base dropped nearly 4% of their subscribers in the nation’s top 15 markets during the first quarter of 2011.

Although one report stated that satellite providers increased their subscriber base 0.1% to 10.6 million in those markets, other reports seemed less certain about the actual numbers of new satellite TV subscribers gained during the quarter, but I suppose the main point of this study is that cable lost a significant number of customers.

The competition between the various pay-TV providers has been fierce for years, and for a number of reasons cable always seemed to come out on top. The reasons for that are varied – perhaps the most important one being the fact that cable is more deeply entrenched in the market since the technology has been widely available to consumers since the 70’s or 80’s while satellite probably wasn’t a practical alternative for the vast majority of consumers until the 90’s.

Satellite has been working to overcome disadvantages like that for some time now. Cable also had the edge when it came to features like on-demand programming but that’s changing now. The internet is allowing satellite providers like DISH Network to offer a much larger selection of on-demand programming that was not previously available directly from their satellites.

DISH Network’s so called “Seinfeld Strategy” also suggests that satellite companies are working towards expanding their business into new areas which will level the playing field even more when compared to some of the features that were unique to cable for quite some time.

Another report suggests that satellite may ultimately defeat cable and take the lion’s share of pay-TV customers in the future.The reports cites a study by Digital TV Research that suggests the days of cable TV dominance may be coming to an end.

Now that this new data has come to light, expect the cable industry to dig their heels in and fight even harder to keep their customers. It would be nice to see them drop the deceptive advertising regarding the reliability of satellite TV, but if history is any indication, they’ll probably ratchet the deceptive rhetoric up a few notches as they see their business being overtaken by satellite.

As it stands now, I receive at least one mailing from Comcast every month trying to convince me to sign up with them. The only way I could ever see that happening is if they lowered their rates dramatically, and I really don’t see that happening. Let’s face it, in the end it’s all about the money – for consumers as well as service providers, and for my money DISH Network beats cable hands down.

Anyone who watches television these days knows that competition among the various pay-TV providers is fierce to say the least. It’s great for the consumer to have more choices, but for the companies, it can make operating at a profit a bit of a challenge. Especially when the tax man comes knocking!

The state of Ohio levied a 5.5% tax on satellite TV service. I don’t live in Ohio, but I suspect – if my experience is any indication – that this tax is something that is passed along to customers. As a consequence, customers likely saw their satellite television bill go up in 2003 when the Ohio legislature approved the new measure.

Although the new tax likely hit Ohio satellite customers in the pocketbook, cable TV subscribers were bypassed since the new tax was not imposed on cable operators. Needless to say, that was something that did not sit well with DISH and DirecTV but likely put smiles on the faces of cable executives who operate in Ohio.

The new tax law was challenged in court by DISH Network and DirecTV who initially met with success when a Franklin County court ruled in their favor, but an appeal eventually landed the case in front of the Ohio Supreme Court where the satellite operators’ luck ran out.

The court ruled 5-2 that the tax did not “discriminate because satellite and cable companies deliver TV through different means.” I think an appropriate action to that statement might be: “Huh?”

The court further stated that, “’The Ohio General Assembly imposed a sales tax that makes no distinction between local and interstate commerce, but rather distinguishes based on the mode of distributing television programming.” At the risk of sounding a bit redundant: “Huh?”

OK, so here’s what I’m getting out of this: You have two competing services; cable TV and satellite TV. Again, I do not live in Ohio, but I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume that some of the companies operating in Ohio are not based in Ohio. I know that DISH Network is based in Colorado and it appears that DirecTV us based in California.

Since cable TV and satellite TV are offering essentially the same service to the end-user, the satellite companies naturally felt singled out and discriminated against by the the new tax and sought to even things up in court.

The Ohio Supreme Court decided to maintain the status quo based on a decision regarding how the competing services broadcast their programming. That’s an interesting decision, if not a bit odd, but who among us mere citizens can question the unbiased opinion of a Supreme Court decision?

Although the Ohio Supreme Court’s explanation of their ruling may seem a bit lopsided to some of us, the state’s Attorney General, who was charged with defending the tax in court delivered the best punch-line when he was quoted as saying that his victory, “levels the playing field” in the subscriber TV market and ”recognizes and preserves the state’s ability to enact reasonable and fair taxes.”

Let’s see. We pay a tax on our satellite TV service, a tax on our telephone service, a tax on our gasoline, a tax on just about anything else we buy (here in New Hampshire we have no sales or income tax which is nice, but believe me, they make up for it with high property taxes!) or the income we earn and fat cats like Ohio’s Attorney General (can you even get elected or appointed to an office like that if you’re not wealthy?) pats himself on the back for defending a “reasonable and fair” tax on people who just want to watch TV?

Please Mr. Ohio Attorney General, I’d love to hear your definition of “reasonable and fair.” Furthermore, with all the taxes we pay, why is it that our Federal Government and most state governments are going broke? I’d love to hear him defend that in court.

By the way, the new tax has raked in a reported $44 million since it was imposed, but I’m sure that had nothing to do with the recent ruling.

It’s pretty clear that the cable companies still see satellite broadcasters as a threat. As a result, they tend to stretch the truth (to say the least!) in order to make consumers believe that satellite TV is unreliable. This is a tactic that the cable companies have been using for quite some time.

I’ve seen advertisements from Comcast that highlight the alleged shortcomings of satellite TV and received ridiculous advertising via the mail from the now-bankrupt Adelphia, which provided cable TV service in my area before the company collapsed as a result of criminal greed on the part of the company’s top officers.

This time it’s Charter cable that’s taking shots at satellite TV with radio ads that appeal to satellite customers who are tired of missing “hours of programming” due to rain. That one is actually laugh-out-loud funny! But I suspect the folks at Charter are not laughing too much these days since the cable industry just endured two straight quarters of subscriber loss. This is the kind of loss the industry has not seen for a long time.

Charter, having lost 5% of their customers in the third quarter and expecting more losses during the fourth quarter, has decided to reach back into their dusty old bag of tricks and attack the satellite industry with ridiculous claims about reception problems due to rain.

I’ve been a DISH Network subscriber for more than a dozen years, so I have first-hand experience with how the weather affects reception. Has the rain ever disrupted my reception? Yes, it has. But the question that cable companies like Charter don’t want to ask is: How many times has it happened?

I can answer the question that Charter does not want to ask. Fewer than 10 times over a period of 12 years. That’s not an exact count – just a good estimate on my part. The only times the rain has knocked out my satellite reception is during exceptionally heavy rain or when a particularly strong front moves through the area. In a nutshell, losing my satellite reception due to rain is very rare.

It’s certainly possible that a satellite TV customer could be adversely affected by the weather if their system is not installed properly or they live in an area where the signal from the satellite is being interfered with. Think of it like your cell phone. There are areas where it might not work well because of obstructions like hills, mountains, valleys or whatever.

Generally speaking, you need a good clear, unobstructed path between your satellite dish and the satellite in order to get optimal reception. I suspect that improper installations are a primary cause of consumer complaints regarding satellite TV. I say this because I’ve been very satisfied with DISH Network for a long time and have not been tempted to switch to cable despite the numerous offers I’ve received from cable companies through the years.

So, am I saying that Charter is lying about losing satellite TV reception when it rains? I’m sure Charter has its legal eagles watching out for the company by preventing them from making claims that could get them into legal trouble, but I won’t hesitate to state that they are surely stretching the truth based on my personal experience.

A properly-installed satellite system will suffer very rarely as a result of rain. On the other hand, a poorly-installed system might get knocked out by a light drizzle. Therefore, Charter’s advertisements might resonate with some unhappy satellite TV customers who really do miss hours of programming due to an improperly installed system.

I suspect Charter knows that as well, but I suppose their service sounds more appealing than satellite if you believe satellite subscribers lose their signal every time it rains. If that were the case, could DISH Network and DirecTV even stay in business? I think not.

It may not be terribly surprising for some of us that relied on cable TV for our television programming for years, but the most recent Michigan American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) survey, which was conducted in May, found that customer satisfaction among cable customers was lower than satellite and fiber broadcasters.

Among cable companies, Cox Communications led the pack with a score of 67 Comcast and Time-Warner tied at 61 and Charter came in last with a score of 60.

Among Satellite providers, DISH Network edged out DirecTV with a score of 71 compared with DirecTV’s 68. DISH has reportedly been working on improving customer service recently and it appears to be paying off.

Topping the list were the fiber-optic TV provider. Verizon’s FiOS scored 73 and was followed by AT&T’s U-verse that was just one point behind with a score of 72.

One of the main reasons I switched from cable TV to DISH Network satellite TV was the frequent price increases I was experiencing. It seemed like they were edging the price upwards every couple of months or so.

Well, for those who are reluctant to believe that, I urge you to check out the like I have included below. I think that says it all.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine-archive/may-2009/viewpoint/overview/cable-rates-ov.htm

Well, it sure wasn’t a pleasant way to see my point proven with regard to cable TV’s susceptibility to weather when compared to satellite, but our experience here during the ice storm of 2008 reveals the truth regarding cable TV’s susceptibility to weather-related outages.

On Friday, December 12 at around 10:00 PM we lost the power at our house. It was something that was expected since a serious ice storm had moved in. It turned out to be a lot more serious than we expected.

Our power was restored on December 23, making for 11 days and 12 nights without power. Fortunately, we have a wood stove and enough dead wood around our heavily-wooded lot to keep it going, so we were able to hold down the fort here at home while others had to resort to shelters to avoid freezing to death in their own homes.

The cable TV line from the telephone pole to the house had been ripped down by fallen trees and broken in two places. In case your wondering why a DISH Network fan like me has a cable TV line running to his house, it’s because we use it for high-speed internet only. Unfortunately, cable TV offers the only high-speed internet service in our area.

Although I called Comcast the day after the storm – hoping to secure a top spot in line among many other customers who would be calling in to have lines repaired – I did not expect them to be out the next day as the Comcast customer service guy told me. Due to the seriousness of the storm, I expected it would be a while before they could come fix the line. What I didn’t expect was to be completely forgotten.

After power was restored and I still had not seen any sign of Comcast, I called again only to find that they seemed to have no record of my earlier call at all! Adding insult to injury, they informed me that the earliest date they could send a technician to my house was January 22 – a full month away. I was not happy, but I accepted my fate and hung up the phone.

The next day I got to thinking a bit and I realized the situation was not acceptable. I had called within a day of the storm’s end to secure an early spot in line and now they are telling me January 22?

I called Comcast again and explained the situation to them and told them that January 22 was not good enough. After some discussion with a supervisor or manager, the customer service rep told me he could have someone out at my house on December 24, which was the very next day. I found that much more acceptable than waiting a whole month.

Looking down our driveway away from the front of our house

Well, December 24 came and went and nobody from Comcast ever showed up. Big surprise. I knew I would not see them on Christmas, and hoped they would have someone out soon after the holiday.

Sure enough, a contractor for Comcast showed up on December 26 but told me that the wire running from the pole to my house was a heavier type than he had with him and would not work as well. He said someone would be out with the correct wire as soon as possible.

A couple of days later another contractor showed up and our service was finally restored.

OK, I guess that may have been kind of a long way to get to the point of my story.

During the 11 days we were without power we were also without internet, and would have been without cable TV if we subscribed to it. During this time I also had a generator that I would run periodically during the day to keep the food in the refrigerator from spoiling and at night for a few hours so we could watch TV.

Unlike cable, which was out for more than the 11 days of the power outage, we were able to use our DISH Network service the day after the storm when the ice melted off the dish.

I can tell you one thing with absolute certainty: That approximate two-week period when our cable was out of service was a longer period of time than all the weather-related outages we have experienced with DISH Network over the last 11 years or so. Much, much longer.

While our cable TV line lie broken in front of our house for two weeks or so, we were able to watch all the TV programming we usually watch because we have DISH Network service. Ice storms, blizzards, hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes and volcanoes don’t disturb orbiting satellites very much at all.

Now what was it that the cable companies were saying about how the weather disrupts satellite TV?

When you compare customers of satellite TV service and cable TV service, satellite is coming in on top overall.

According to the most recent American Customer Satisfaction Index, the two big satellite TV broadcasters, Dish Network and DirecTV are outscoring their cable TV rivals.

The latest data reveals that DirecTV’s rating was up 1.5% to 68 and Dish Network was came in second with a rating of 65, which was down from 67 last year.

Although some of the smaller cable companies like Cablevision and RCN helped drive the overall ratings for cable TV up a bit, the cable giants like Comcast and Charter Communications held cable’s rating back.

Be Sure To Check Out Dish Network’s Latest Deals

As a satisfied Dish Network customer myself, I have few gripes about the service. I guess the biggest gripe I have is being connected to an overseas call center when I call Dish Network. I’d much rather talk to someone who is a native English speaker and who understands the culture here. Talking to someone half a world away about a problem with my service or equipment can be very frustrating when it is difficult to understand the person who is supposed to be helping you.

So many of these big companies are using these overseas call centers these days that it’s kind of hard to avoid the situation. If Dish Network would go back to using U.S.-based call centers, I guess I’d have to say that I really don’t have any gripes with the service whatsoever.

According to a recent article on CNN Money, consumer demand for HDTV continues to be strong.

There is also a war of sorts that is going on between the satellite and cable companies with each of them claiming the most HD channels. Some folks make the mistake of believing that all you need to do is buy an HDTV set in order to watch HD programming all of the time.

The truth of the matter is that you will not see HD-quality programming on your new HDTV set unless the signal that is being transmitted is an HD signal. As it stand now, most television programming is still being transmitted in standard definition. That goes for the cable systems, satellite systems and local over-the-air broadcasts.

Just the other day I saw a commercial from Comcast that was advertising their superior number of HD channels when compared to DirecTV satellite. I have a hard time believe that, especially since I have seen Comcast commercials in the past they I considered deceptive.

I have heard recently that DirecTV has recently updated their HD offerings and now have about 100 HD channels. I don’t have Comcast cable TV service myself but my relatives in Massachusetts do and the last time I talked to them, Comcast was not offering anywhere near 100 HD channels on the system that are serviced by.

Dish Network currently offers about 75 HD channels but promises to upgrade that to 100 channels this year with the launch of new satellites. I just hope they are able to position the new satellites close enough to the 100, 199 or 61-degree satellites to allow me to catch them with the dish antennas I currently have now. I don’t mind having two dishes on my house but it seems like three might be pushing it a little.