Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
San Francisco over-the-air channel like ONTV via KTSF-TV. Named Super Time during the late 1970s and Star TV in the early 1980s. SuperTV: Subscription TV of Greater Washington, Inc. March 31, 1986: Launched on November 1, 1981. Z Channel: American Spectacor June 29, 1989: Launched in 1974. Wometco Home Theater: Wometco Enterprises: 1986
HBO was the first true premium cable (or "pay-cable") network as well as the first television network intended for cable distribution on a regional or national basis; however, there were notable precursors to premium cable in the pay-television industry that operated during the 1950s and 1960s (with a few systems lingering until 1980), as well ...
ON TV was an American subscription television (STV) service that operated in eight markets between 1977 and 1985. Originally established by National Subscription Television, a joint venture of Oak Industries and Chartwell Communications, ON TV was part of a new breed of STV operations that broadcast premium programming—including movies, sporting events, and concerts—over an encrypted ...
Early television evolved from the network organization of radio in the early 1940s. Three of the four networks that rose to dominance, NBC, CBS, and ABC, were corporations that were based in the business center of New York City; the fourth was the Mutual Broadcasting System, a cooperative of radio stations that, though its member stations entered television individually, never had a ...
However, a lawsuit ensued with a court ruling that contracts with the movie studios stipulated that the service be commercial-free. Out of options, the channel was sold to Cablevision and NBC on March 16, 1989, who were partners in the joint-venture SportsChannel and set to launch Consumer News and Business Channel (now CNBC ).
"Free" variants are free-to-air (FTA) and free-to-view (FTV); however, FTV services are normally encrypted and decryption cards either come as part of an initial subscription to a pay television bouquet – in other words, an offer of pay-TV channels – or can be purchased for a one-time cost. FTA and FTV systems may still have selective access.
Also called Optical Systems, it was one of the first all pay-per-view cable TV channels. It used a box manufactured by TRW, in which a user inserted separately purchased punched plastic cards for access. In 1972, Mission Cable in San Diego became the first cable company to use the Optical Systems arrangement—under the name “Channel 100."
Internet television (Internet TV), (online television) or IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) is the digital distribution of television content via the Internet as opposed to traditional systems like terrestrial, cable and satellite, although internet itself is received by terrestrial, cable or satellite methods. Internet television is a ...