The Cable Center: Stories From the Headend

S1, E12 DOCSIS 20th Anniversary Panel

DOCSIS celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2015. To commemorate this industry milestone, Larry Satkowiak, former President and CEO of The Cable Center, gathered CableLabs veterans Robert Cruickshank III, Thomas Moore, and Brian Reilly to chronicle their work together on the DOCSIS development process in the early 1990s, leading up to the deployment of cable modems and two-way broadband communications at speeds nobody had seen before. Cruickshank also discusses the lessons learned from the telephone companies’ development of ISDN and the importance of standardized equipment specifications and interoperability.

S1, E11 The Story of DOCSIS

The Story of DOCSIS. Short for Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification, DOCSIS is the international standard for high-speed internet connectivity. In creating DOCSIS, CableLabs, its cable operator members and technology vendor partners, bridged the worlds of cable and digital networking that cleared the path for some of the most innovative ideas and applications in the history of communications – including YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.  For more information, download the free e-book Souls of DOCSIS [https://cablecenter.org/images/files/pdf/SoulsofDOCSIS.pdf], by Robert Cruickshank [https://www.cablecenter.org/resources/exhibits/development-of-docsis-a-history-of-the-modem.html].

S1, E10 The Oral History of Leslie Ellis

Leslie Ellis is one of cable’s leading technology journalists and advisors. She got her start writing manuals for an advertising insertion technology company and quickly graduated to writing and editing for top industry publications CED and Multichannel News and for analyst and publisher Paul Kagan. Today, as President of Ellis Edits, she is in high demand moderating panels, speaking at conferences and continuously writing about the always-changing and complex world of cable technology in a way that makes it easy for everyone to understand.

S1, E9 Technology Innovation

From the early days of building headends, to the inventions that changed society, cable’s technologists have been at the forefront of today’s connected world. Hear stories from Louis Williamson, retired senior fellow engineer at Time Warner Cable, Leslie Ellis, a leading cable technology journalists and advisor, and Mike LaJoie, former EVP and CTP of Time Warner Cable.

S1, E8 The Oral History of Sheila Nevins

Sheila Nevins’s educational background was in English literature and theater. But she found herself drawn to television, and to telling the extraordinary stories of ordinary people. After her early career working for several employers including the US Information Agency, PBS, CBS and Time-Life Films, Nevins found her home at HBO in 1979, where she was hired as the fledgling pay network’s first director of documentaries and given the freedom to produce them with her own unique approach to storytelling. Almost forty years and more than 500 films later, as President of HBO Documentary Films, Nevins is still flourishing, with a body of work that has earned scores of Emmys, Oscars and Peabodys. This interview was taped in July 2001.