by Jason Salas, KUAM News Monday, May 15, 2006 Subscribe to Jason's newsfeed   E-mail this article Printable version KUAM Toolbar Web Widgets Get RSS headlines

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Governor Felix Camacho dramatically triggered the grand rollout of Marianas Cablevision's new digital delivery platform this morning in Harmon by toggling a remote control and launching the much-anticipated service. The event commemorated MCV's pioneering conversion to an all-digital platform, offering time-shifted as well as live cable network programming.

Seven new channels have been added to your basic cable package, at no additional cost, including ESPN Classic, Spike TV, and several flavors of CNN. While the majority of the content is adjusted so local audiences watch mainland content at the same time the next day, chief executive officer Craig Thompson says to help viewers get accustomed to the new changes, MCV Channel 68 provides full programming schedules.

"Channel 68 is going to be adjusted for our timeframe," Thompson told KUAM News, adding, "meaning some of the channels like ESPN Classic and CNN will be passed through live. Old news and sports just aren't interesting, so we'll be bringing them down live. Some other channels we'll be bringing through on a time delay - a six- or seven-hour basis. And Channel 68 will have the full guide, it'll be accurate and on Guam's time."

This means local viewers get their favorite programming at the right time of day. Thompson also commented that this morning's festivities are only the beginning of better things to come, as more than forty channels will be added to MCV's entertainment stable. "In about four weeks, we anticipate bringing on an additional forty channels of digital programming and about forty-five additional channels of digital music. And we're going to bundle that up into what we call our 'digital tier' as an additional charge to our basic service," added Thompson.

And perhaps of greater impact to local viewers is the introduction of Guam's first digital video recorder, which allows for digitally-recorded programming to be burned to CD/DVD, or copied onto a mobile device like an iPod or PSP for portable playback. The total convenience is expected to forever change the way Guam residents receive, store, and share their TV programming. Said Thompson, "The DVR will be ours - it's not going to be like a TiVo, it's going to be ours. It uses a proprietary schedule, it's own guide that doesn't necessarily match-up with Guam's programming guide; we'll be coming out with our own Scientific Atlanta set-top box...you can record content from a channel digital and have it ready for future viewing while watching another channel, or you can record two different channels."

(And for those of you wondering about the ultimate television experience, Thompson said high definition programming is in the works for later release.)