I was into defeating addressable decoders, and building pirate decoder boxes for Preview Subscription television in 1983, and ONTV was used for Preview's programming in 1984. This is my video tape recording for one of the transmissions decoded through one of my Zenith SSAVI modified pirate decoders: ruclips.net/video/Ao56ZJ-rJnk/видео.html
The Cincinnati service has a completely different logo and soundtrack when it signed on in 1980. It switched to this look around 1984 or so. It went off the air in mid '85 after being relegated to late nights.
I remember this from Cincinnati! The logo was more colorful at first. Channel 64, (WIII at the time, if I remember correctly, now WSTR?). The station ran syndicated stuff during the daytime, and switched over to scrambled ONTV content at like 7 or 8pm. I seem to recall a glitch in their system that allowed some subscribers to access the premium stuff without a subscription, and it led to some complaints because it 'leaked' some adult material....lol. ONTV was only viable in some of the 'burbs, IIRC, because QUBE hadn't strung wires in those areas yet. ONTV cost almost as much as QUBE but didn't offer nearly as much, so if you were in an area serviced by QUBE, it was really a no-brainer. And as QUBE continued to expand, ONTV's market share in Cincinnati dwindled pretty much on a weekly basis. The final weeks, they didn't even bother to scramble the signal at night. And then it was gone. The TV station that hosted it went fully independent and nobody even bothered to come by and pick up the ONTV converter box.
@@ccateni28 I got a notice with the bill that they were discontinuing service on such-and-such date, but nothing by way of any special programming or anything. The station didn't bother scrambling the signal, as I said, in those last days. Then.... poof, gone. It wasn't entirely unexpected. By that time, QUBE had finished stringing most of the neighborhoods, and QUBE offered a lot more programming in its basic package for only a slightly higher price than ON, plus the option of HBO and so forth. Satellite was an option, but at the time the sat dishes were rather large and ugly and actually not permitted in some neighborhoods. It's remarkable how much the technology has changed. Okay, granted, it's been 30-odd years now, but....
Sad, spectrum at least had a messenge to their subscribers and had selectv until September (not sure how since ONTV died in early 1985 and spectrum went down in 1984 causing this rebrand for ON to happen). Also, what ever happened to QUBE anyway?
Wish you could put on more ONTV material...
I was into defeating addressable decoders, and building pirate decoder boxes for Preview Subscription television in 1983, and ONTV was used for Preview's programming in 1984. This is my video tape recording for one of the transmissions decoded through one of my Zenith SSAVI modified pirate decoders:
ruclips.net/video/Ao56ZJ-rJnk/видео.html
The Cincinnati service has a completely different logo and soundtrack when it signed on in 1980. It switched to this look around 1984 or so. It went off the air in mid '85 after being relegated to late nights.
I remember this from Cincinnati! The logo was more colorful at first.
Channel 64, (WIII at the time, if I remember correctly, now WSTR?). The station ran syndicated stuff during the daytime, and switched over to scrambled ONTV content at like 7 or 8pm. I seem to recall a glitch in their system that allowed some subscribers to access the premium stuff without a subscription, and it led to some complaints because it 'leaked' some adult material....lol.
ONTV was only viable in some of the 'burbs, IIRC, because QUBE hadn't strung wires in those areas yet. ONTV cost almost as much as QUBE but didn't offer nearly as much, so if you were in an area serviced by QUBE, it was really a no-brainer. And as QUBE continued to expand, ONTV's market share in Cincinnati dwindled pretty much on a weekly basis.
The final weeks, they didn't even bother to scramble the signal at night. And then it was gone. The TV station that hosted it went fully independent and nobody even bothered to come by and pick up the ONTV converter box.
upn & wb dual
@@xaenon Interesting, so ON was just dropped with no fairfare or goodbye?
@@ccateni28 I got a notice with the bill that they were discontinuing service on such-and-such date, but nothing by way of any special programming or anything. The station didn't bother scrambling the signal, as I said, in those last days. Then.... poof, gone.
It wasn't entirely unexpected. By that time, QUBE had finished stringing most of the neighborhoods, and QUBE offered a lot more programming in its basic package for only a slightly higher price than ON, plus the option of HBO and so forth. Satellite was an option, but at the time the sat dishes were rather large and ugly and actually not permitted in some neighborhoods.
It's remarkable how much the technology has changed. Okay, granted, it's been 30-odd years now, but....
Sad, spectrum at least had a messenge to their subscribers and had selectv until September (not sure how since ONTV died in early 1985 and spectrum went down in 1984 causing this rebrand for ON to happen).
Also, what ever happened to QUBE anyway?
Is this guy even alive still?
Did you write the Tele1st stuff?
what films are they playing
I think I saw Annie and Halloween III clips in the last one.