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** ABOUT SATELLITE TV **
It is often noted that the entire satellite communications industry can be traced back to the futurist and author, Arthur C. Clarke. Clarke wrote an essay entitled "Extraterrestrial Relays" which was published in 1945 by "Wireless World Magazine". In the essay Clarke wrote that by placing three space platforms into special orbits 22,300 miles above the equator, worldwide communications could be received. His essay was quite in depth and well ahead of its time.
Flash-forward to 1976 when Home Box Office (HBO) made history by initiating satellite delivery of programming to cable with the heavyweight boxing match known as "The Thriller From Manila". Then, in 1977, Pat Robertson launched the first satellite-delivered basic cable service called the CBN Cable Network. However, credit for the first consumer Satellite System goes to Stanford University Professor and former NASA scientist Emeritus H. Taylor Howard. Howard and others like him, working from within their own garages, gave birth to an industry that sold approximately 5000 systems in 1980.
In 1980, a satellite system cost approximately 10,000 dollars and by 1985, the prices on the systems dropped to about 3000 dollars each. The programming was free during these years. People made a one-time purchase of a system and received more than one hundred channels, including every basic and premium cable service at no charge. However, several cable programming providers announced plans to encrypt their satellite feeds under the authority granted to them by the 1984 Cable Act. On January 15th, 1986, they made good on that promise. Free satellite programming was no more.
While the hit to the satellite sales industry was hard, in December of 1986, the Satellite Broadcasting and Communications Association (SBCA) was founded. During the early part of 1987 the new association took form and sparks of optimism returned to the satellite industry. While the industry was back on the upswing, a new threat emerged - satellite signal theft. Of close to two million VCII units manufactured between 1986 and the mid-1990s, less than 500,000 were legally receiving services. The SBCA created a task force that finally seized a good hold on the problem in 1993 and was able to severely impact the amount of people stealing satellite signals.
Today the satellite industry has grown by leaps and bounds. According to telephone surveys conducted by the CEA, as of January 2002 DTH satellite systems had penetrated 17% of households across the US.
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