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According to an April 8, 2005 column by Andrew Kantor in USA Today the future of television is at stake in the FCC v. Brand X case.

The column begins with a short summary of the details of the case:

“In 2002, the FCC said that cable broadband is an information service, not a telecommunications service. The difference is crucial: Telecom services, like your local phone company, must allow competitors to use their lines; that's why you have a choice of local and long-distance companies no matter who actually owns the line.

But the FCC doesn't regulate information services. So cable companies don't have to let other companies lease their lines.

But a Santa Monica, Calif.-based ISP named Brand X didn't like that. It sued the FCC, demanding the right to lease the local cable company's lines. In October 2003, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, and it overruled the FCC. The FCC and the Department of Justice appealed the decision.”

The column gets to the bottom of the cable companies motives, “The home of the future will have a single, ultra-high-speed connection (cable, fiber, something else) that will carry all its data. And by "data" I mean voice (i.e., telephone), Internet, video (e.g., television), and who knows what else.

The Brand X case is not about cable companies defending the ISP model. It's about them defending the television model.”

Kantor goes on to explain what the future could bring; “[t]wo devices: your television and your computer. Two connections: to the cable company and to the Internet. Two separate models.

Now imagine them merged.

Imagine turning on your TV and having an Internet's worth of programming to choose from, just like when you start your Web browser. I'm not talking about Web pages — I'm talking about television content delivered through an Internet-like model.

Today, if you want to watch "Battlestar Galactica," you tune to the Sci-Fi channel on Friday evening as provided by your cable company. But tomorrow you'll go right to the Sci-Fi Network "page" and choose the episode you want to watch.

Want a pay-per-view movie? Go to the Universal or MGM site and get it from there. Want to hear the Springsteen's "Born to Run" album? Go to Springsteen's page — or maybe Amazon's or Sony's.

In other words, you'll be cutting out the middleman. Your data provider will give you the pipe, but then you'll use that connection to go directly to whatever content you want: TV networks, music stations, Web pages, photos… whatever.

The channel model will be gone.

And that is what cable companies see on its way, and that is why they want to be considered information providers.”

Learn more about the Brand X case by reading what’s at stake. And stay tuned to HearUsNow.org to see what the Supreme Court decides.