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Article: The giants take over cable television.
- Article from:
- American Journalism Review
- Article date:
- May 1, 1995
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1995 University of Maryland. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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TCI and Time Warner are in the midst of an acquisition frenzy.
Anyone who lived through the era of only three television networks celebrates channel surfing. Cable offers so much, from 24-hour news to uncut movies to complete weather forecasts every 15 minutes.
But cable TV has always been caught in a contradiction. With all of its choices, there is, with a few exceptions, only one corporate gatekeeper per local jurisdiction. Your cable company is a legal monopoly. If you do not like what your cable system does or does not offer, your only choice is to move or pay much more for an expensive satellite hook-up.
Economic logic dictates that such local ...