Cable Television and College Dorm Rooms

I've chronicled in past articles my thorough dissatisfaction with the cable television industry, but let me list a few grievances again:

• In my neighborhood, there is only one source for cable television. So, a monopoly exists.
• That company (Mediacom) has raised my cable rate almost 70 percent in the past year, without expanding my coverage.
• That company was in a heated dispute with a local network station for more than six months, and did not carry the channel for a portion of that time.
• Unrelated (and yet related), as the Iowa Hawkeye football season approaches, it seems unlikely that many of the games will be shown on channels that I currently receive in my home, or that are even available at any price from my cable provider.

The whole thing just disgusts me. But, now there is more.

News from Iowa City this past week is that the dorms at the U of I will receive a cable feed for the Big Ten Network (BTN). The BTN is a new idea that I already dislike. The BTN and Mediacom have been unsuccessfully negotiating for months -- Iowa games airing on the BTN will not be seen in my neighborhood. If the two parties (BTN and Mediacom) do reach a deal, I'm sure it will result in another rate increase (and only available in a new package of networks). But I digress ...

The dorms are getting the BTN, and I'm not. Yet, my tax dollars are surely subsidizing the cost so that a college student can watch something that I can not.

The steep rise in higher education costs have been well-documented. I can understand why. As a student at the University of Northern Iowa, I lived in a small, warm room with a single phone jack and four television channels. Fifteen years later, dorm rooms are equipped with air conditioning, cable tv, and broadband access. I doubt those amenities are donated free of charge by the respective utility company.

So, what is the cost of us non-college students for watching Iowa football this fall? Games could be broadcast on ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ABC, and the Big Ten Network.

• Mediacom does not have, at any price, a package that includes all these channels.
• Dish TV also has yet to sign the BTN. It's package cost for everything but the BTN is $58. Fortunately, for my viewing pleasure, that includes access to a number of Spanish-speaking stations and the "Sirius Metropolitan Opera Channel."
• Want to go the Direct TV route? They've got everything I need (and a whole lotta don't needs) for $70, with a cost increase guaranteed after four months.

Looks like I'll be doing a lot of what I did 25 years ago before the invention of cable -- listening to the games on the radio. So much for modernity and free markets.