Cable

Nowadays, when people use the word "cable," they are most likely referring to their television or Internet service. Cable TV is a type of TV system that gives programming to viewers by using radio frequency signals that are transmitted via fixed optical fibers or coaxial cables, rather than transmitting programming the over the air in the way that traditional television broadcasting systems do. Unlike traditional television broadcasting systems that require you to have an antenna, cable TV does not.

There are many cable companies out there today that provide services to consumers. Some of the most popular are Comcast, Cox Communications, Charter Communications, and Time Warner Cable. Not all areas and regions have access to the same cable providers, but most regions will have at least two to choose from.

Cable Providers Also Provide Other Services

Many cable companies provide other services that are not specifically related to actual television. Since the coaxial cables that cable system uses are capable of bi directional signal carriage as well as the transmission of large amounts of data, cable TV companies often offer as many added services as they can, like digital telephone services, high speed Internet services and more. Cable television signals only use a fraction of the bandwidth that coaxial cables can handle, leaving plenty of space for those cable Internet services, cable telephone services and wireless services. Having cable television, cable telephone and cable Internet together is often offered by cable TV providers in a package called a "triple play," since you get them all at once for one price.

Cable Networks and More

The customer's location has to have access to a cable network in order for them to get cable service. Laying and maintaining that cable is expensive, so cable TV is a service that you must pay for, whereas traditional over the air broadcasting did not generally cost the viewer anything other than the TV set and antenna price. However, it requires more than one company having to invest in laying and maintaining a lot of what are basically identical cables to the same location, which can mean increased costs for them. This leads to only one or two companies in any one area being available to consumers, which prevents the companies from having to spend a lot of unnecessary money in competing with each other.

Consumers can find this to be unfair, since they do not have the choice of going to another company when their original provider is not doing as well for them as they would like or keeps raising prices. Market regulators step in to try to prevent this by requiring the companies to broaden the consumer's choices from that single provider. This is why you can often find many different levels of cable service available in a wide and varied price range, offering you different choices in how many channels you get. Then you can pay what you can afford, and pick the package that best suits your needs.