The National Cable Television Cooperative, a group of cable companies located in both large and rural markets, is providing HDNet and HDNet Movies to cable TV companies participating in its member network as part of an HDTV service tier.
NCTC member RCN Corp., with customers in seven of the top 10 U.S. markets, will be launching HDTV service to its digital subscribers in the Boston, New York, Lehigh, Penn. and Washington, D.C., markets in May and June. Midcontinent Communications, which serves the Dakotas, western Minnesota and northern Nebraska, plans to supply HD in Sioux Falls and Rapid City, S.D., and Bismark, N.D., starting July 1. Blue Ridge Communications, a Pennsylvania-based NCTC affiliate, is providing its digital cable subs with HDNet, and Service Electric Cable TV will launch the service to its customers in the next month.
NCTC, a programming and hardware buying cooperative, represents more than 1,000 independent cable operators, their 6,500 systems and more than 14 million subscribers nationwide.
