Verizon is charging into NYC with its HD guns a-blazin’. Starting this week it’s offering 100 high-def channels to FiOS TV subs in the New York metro area.
"Time’s up, Time Warner," the telco snipes as part of its marketing campaign, Pali Research analyst Rich Greenfield noted in a blog post yesterday.
Kudos to the Verizon folks for getting to the magical triple-digit number of 100. But that still means it has 50 more to go before it hits its promised year-end target. Meanwhile, DirecTV has moved the goalposts again, to push up to 130 HDs next month.
And Cablevision has already pointed out to some reporters that the FiOS TV HD lineup includes a number of duplicates.
It’s a fair point. I counted 16 channels that are simply East or West coast feeds of another channel already in the lineup. Verizon’s reaction: "The industry counts these feeds as separate and distinct channels," spokesman Eric Rabe wrote in a blog post.
[UPDATE: As noted by comments below, both DirecTV and Dish use this same logic to pad their HD channel counts — see Cable Needs To Tout Its Best HD Offers: Panel.]
Are there too many duplicates? You can decide for yourself. Here’s the full list, in alphabetical order, from Verizon:
* A&E HD
* ABC Family HD
* ABC HD
* Action Max
* Action Max West
* Animal Planet HD
* At Max
* Big Ten Network HD
* Bio. The Biography Channel HD
* Bravo HD
* CBS HD
* Cinemax HDTV
* Cinemax West HD
* CNBC HD
* CNN HD
* CW HD
* Discovery Channel HD
* Disney Channel HD
* ESPN HDTV
* ESPN2 HDTV
* ESPNews HD
* Five Star Max
* Food HD
* Fox Business Network HD
* FOX HD
* Fox News Channel HD
* FX HD
* Hallmark Movie Channel HD
* HBO 2 HD
* HBO 2 HD (West)
* HBO Comedy
* HBO Comedy West
* HBO Family
* HBO Family West
* HBO HDTV
* HBO Latino
* HBO Latino West
* HBO Signature
* HBO Signature (West)
* HBO West HD
* HBO Zone
* HBO Zone (West)
* HD Net
* HD Net Movies
* HD Theater
* HGTV HD
* Lifetime HD East
* Lifetime Movie Network HD
* Mav TV
* MGM Channel HD
* MHD
* More Max
* More Max West
* MY NETWORK HD
* National Geographic Channel HD
* NBC HD
* NFL Network HDTV
* Outdoor Channel 2 HD
* Outer Max
* PBS HD
* Planet Green
* QVC HD
* SCI FI HD
* Sho2 HD
* Sho2 HD West
* Showcase HD East
* Showcase HD West
* Showtime Extreme East
* Showtime Extreme West
* Showtime HD West
* Showtime HDTV
* Smithsonian HD
* Speed HD
* SportsNet NY HD
* Starz Comedy HD
* Starz Edge HD
* Starz HDTV
* Starz Kids & Family HD
* Superstation WGN HD
* TBS HD
* The History Channel HD
* The Learning Channel HD
* The Movie Channel HDTV
* The Science Channel HD
* The Travel Channel HD
* The Weather Channel HD
* Thriller Max
* Thriller Max West
* TMC HD - West
* TMC Xtra East
* TMC Xtra West
* TNT HDTV
* Toon Disney HD
* Universal HDTV
* USA HD
* Versus / Golf HD
* Wealth TV HD
* Wmax
* World Fishing Network HD
* YES HD
