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from: Multichannel News

Indiana’s TV Law Lauded
by Linda Haugsted -- Multichannel News, 3/3/2008

Ball State University researchers said Indiana’s 2006 telecommunications-reform bill has advanced the deployment of video and broadband services in the state, a finding disputed by incumbent cable operators.

from: Riedel Communications

Friday, February 29, 2008
Blind Alleys

There are people who have contributed greatly to your personal welfare that you will never hear about. One of those is Marston Bates. He studied mosquitoes in South America and his work improved the understanding of yellow fever. You gotta like a guy like that, somebody who does original and actual research. Bates didn’t take himself too seriously either. He is attributed with saying “Research is the process of going up alleys to see if they are blind.”

from: The Times

Losing public access TV harmed right to free speech

Tuesday, February 26, 2008 | No comments posted.

One by one, the Comcast public access TV studios in Mishawaka, Portage, Merrillville and Hammond were shut down. The significance about the Hammond studio was that live, call-in, powerful programming took place on a weekly basis.

from: MultiChannel News

Ball State Study Sees Positive Effects From Indiana Telecom Bill
Finding Disputed by Cable Incumbents

By Linda Haugsted -- Multichannel News, 2/25/2008 1:20:00 PM

Ball State University has released a white paper stating that Indiana’s 2006 telecommunications reform bill has advanced the deployment of video and broadband services in the state, a finding disputed by cable incumbents in the state.

from: Bitch Slappin

Cable Choice and Competition, but only if you’re Rich

Nwitimes.com is reporting that in Indiana, after passage of one of the ubiquitous ‘Cable Choice and Competition‘ state level bills written by the phone companies, and pushed into passage by the phone companies deploying a swarm of lobbyists and handing out lots of chunky campaign contributions at the local level, the only neighborhoods that have been wired for UVerse service are affluent city and suburban neighborhoods. “More than a year ago, Indiana lawmakers supported video franchise reform legislation promoted by AT&T on the grounds that lower cable prices and widespread deployment would occur. So we exempted AT&T from the historic anti-discrimination rules that required cable operators to serve everyone in their footprint. . . . User-generated information on http://UverseUsers.com (probably the best and only public information available) conspicuously shows a dense concentration of U-Verse service in high-income areas and little coverage in low-income and rural neighborhoods. Indeed, it almost depicts a bright line separating wealthy suburbs of Indianapolis and the minority inner city areas.”

from: The Times

Is AT&T avoiding poor, minority neighborhoods?

by Charles Emory | Wednesday, February 20, 2008

With the 2008 presidential primaries well under way, we know this election season will be remembered in large part for its innovative use of the Internet. Fred Thompson and Barack Obama announced their candidacies via Web videos, and when Hillary Clinton unveiled her health care plan to cover the millions of uninsured she claims are "invisible" to the current administration, she did so via Webcast.

from: Our Channels Indiana

Comcast Closes Public Access TV Studios Across Northern Indiana
Written by Andrea Price, on Sunday, 18 November 2007

A year and a half after the enactment of the Indiana Telecommunications Reform Act of 2006, Comcast notified producers in South Bend, Hammond, Merrillville, Mishawaka, Plymouth, Goshen, and Portage -- and Edwardsburg, Michigan - that it would be closing production studios and playback facilities for public access TV.

from: South Bend Tribune

Comcast Closing Public Access in Indiana Cities

October 18, 2007
By Tom Brown

By December, possibly sooner, public access television will go dark in Michiana. Comcast has quietly begun closing public access studios in Indiana.