Backchannelmedia

Rural Telecommunications

By Brown, Rachel

Make sure all the different vendors are interoperable. "They'll all say they are-don't take their word for it ... make them prove it."

Talk to folks in rural America and most can cite a mile-long list of why it is better to live in the country than in the city: cleaner air, less traffic, less crime, slower pace, more space. The list goes on and on, but the channels I on the TV do not. Cable is one ' area where the city trumps the country, because most cable companies are not willing to run their lines in sparsely populated areas. However, industry innovators like Heart of Iowa Telecommunications Cooperative (Union, Iowa) and Pioneer Telephone Cooperative (Kingfisher, Okla.) are changing that with their early adoption of IPTV, defined as digital television delivered over a broadband connection. Heart of Iowa first started deploying IPTV in 2002.

Promotional postcard advertising Pioneer's DTV service.

"Our strategy was to make it a triple play-landline, Internet, video," explained David Schmidt, general manager, adding that the timing was ripe for a number of reasons. "We had not been offering cable television. INS [Iowa Network Services, a consortium of independent telcos throughout the state] put in the headend, so it was not a lot of cost for us to get into this. We were running fiber to the home, so it was the ideal time for us to do this."

Despite the ideal timing, it took Heart of Iowa nearly a year to roll out the service. "This was a pain to get up and going," Schmidt said. "We had five different vendors, and everyone points their fingers at someone else."

Originally, the co-op used Advanced Fiber Communications (AFC, which Tellabs has since bought) transport equipment in the field over copper, but now it is using Calix transport equipment over fiber. The middleware by Myrio Corp. has not changed, but the set- top boxes have changed several times over the years to accommodate encryption requirements and foster better interoperability.

It's all about interoperability

Interoperability proved to be a key point for the entire project. "I had all the vendors come here, and I brought them into my office and said, 'We either make this work, or I take it all out and you're going to pay me for it,'" he said. "It was very frustrating-I just wanted it to work."

In the end, Schmidt asked that one person be responsible for the overall installation. "None of the vendors wanted to do that, but one man from AFC stepped up to the plate and made it work," he said. Schmidt said his biggest advice for other telcos and co-ops getting into IPTV is to make sure all the different vendors are interoperable. "They'll all say they are-don't take their word for it," he said. "Make them prove it-make them show it to you."

A changing market

Today, Heart of Iowa has more than 487 IPTV subscribers out of 4,405 total customers (they have not launched television service in their largest exchange). They get 105 channels, plus an additional 45 music channels. The market has changed so that a small cable provider instantly went out of business when the co-op rolled out its service.

"They were out of business in one day," Schmidt said, adding that the satellite TV companies are not taking this lying clown. "The dish companies are getting very aggressive. They're going door-to- door in towns before we get there."

Another concern for Heart of Iowa is the fact that Mediacom Communications Corp., a nationwide cable company, is trying to get into the voice market. "That's a concern for us," Schmidt said. However, the biggest concern with IPTV is the need for continued investment. "We had to buy encryption software and update the settop boxes-that was an extra cost that we didn't know about," Schmidt said. "We're worried about the future in terms of changes and extra costs."

So far, IPTV has not been profitable. "I told the board that we were offering this as a service, not as a money maker," Schmidt said. "We will do this and never make a dime." Despite this viewpoint, Schmidt said his company's foray into IPTV has been a tremendous learning experience. "For the techs, for me, for the people in the office-this is preparing us for VoIP and that's something that we're experimenting with now."

Myrio setup screen.

A pioneer in Oklahoma

Pioneer Telephone lived up to its name and became one of the first companies in Oklahoma to provide IPTV when it first started its deployment in July 2004. "The goal was to deploy IPTV to 72 of our 76 exchanges in two years," said Cindy Gore, director of public relations. "We wound up taking a little less time."

For Pioneer, the strategy behind this move was very simple. "We did this to help save the landline," Gore said. "We're running the risk of losing this because everyone is going to wireless phones."

Currently, Pioneer has 6,000 IPTV customers out of its total 53,000 subscribers. Customers receive 169 channels, including digital music channels and premium channels.

"We can't reach all 53,000 subscribers-we could only potentially reach 30,000 subscribers," explained Scott Ulsaker, video business manager for Pioneer. "Right now, we're limited by loop lengths of 8,000 feet from the plant. We're now testing new technologies that may allow us to extend that reach by almost double."

A Heart of Iowa technician installs the system.

At the start of the deployment, Pioneer used asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL). "At that bandwidth, we could deliver two streams of video and data," he said. "Now we've upgraded to ADSL2+, and that additional bandwidth gives us three streams of video and data."

Pioneer uses Calix for transport, Myrio for its middleware and Amino for its set-top boxes, and these have not changed since initial deployment. Ulsaker noted that there are no standards for IPTV, so that means that working together on integration is key. "We talked weekly with everyone involved," Ulsaker said. "We identified any issues, assigned responsibility and resolved any problems along the way."

Pioneer also has to work with programmers in the television studios. "We must gel their approval to display the content and verify that the network is secure," Ulsaker explained, adding that the co-op used TVN Entertainment Group as its video on demand aggregator and distributor. "We also worked with Widcvine [Technologies], an encryption firm, to ensure security of the content for our video on demand, as well as regular programming content."

In addition, Pioneer is working with Ruckus Wireless, a wireless equipment supplier in Mountain View, California to eliminate the need for internal wiring in the home. "This is one of the major expenditures in offering video services," Ulsaker said. "To install a new customer takes one tech 3.5 hours. With wireless, it takes 45 minutes to an hour, so this increases the number of orders we can do in a day."

Ulsaker added that it is a lot less intrusive to subscribers because they do not have a tech crawling through the attic and around the house to fish cable. In addition, subscribers can move the TV around the house without the need to run new cable or put in a new outlet. "Again, this separates us from the competition," he said.

Similar to what happened in Union, Iowa, Pioneer has seen the small cable television providers close up shop. There is competition from direct broadcast satellite providers, namely DIRECTV and Dish Network. "We rolled out video on demand on the first day of 2006," Gore said, adding that this, too, helped separate the teleo from the competition. Ulsaker noted that now the DBS providers are looking into offering this.

Gore also said Pioneer is in the process of talking to area schools about televising football games and other local events. "We've earned good bragging rights with this product," she said, including coverage from "USA Today" in August 2005. Ulsaker added that Pioneer's pride does not interfere with its business plan. "We're proud, but not so much that we aren't constantly making upgrades and improvements," he said. "We want our subscribers to enjoy what the metro area subscribers enjoy."

Rachel Brown is a freelance writer. She can be reached at rachelb@aol.com.

Copyright National Telephone Cooperative Nov/Dec 2006

(c) 2006 Rural Telecommunications. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.