Prism TV is an American

IPTV Internet Protocol television (IPTV), also called TV over broadband, is the service delivery of television over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. Usually sold and run by a Telephone company, telecom provider, it consists of broadcast live telev ...

service owned by

Lumen Technologies Lumen Technologies, Inc. (formerly CenturyLink, Inc.) is an American telecommunications company headquartered in Monroe, Louisiana, which offers communications, network services, security, cloud solutions, voice and managed services through ...

. It is based on the same technology as the U-verse service deployed by

AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...

History

Around the time that

Sprint Nextel Sprint Corporation was an American telecommunications company. Before being Merger of Sprint Corporation and T-Mobile US, acquired by T-Mobile US on April 1, 2020, it was the fourth-largest mobile network operator in the United States, serving 5 ...

spun off their landline division to form

Embarq Embarq Corporation was the largest independent local exchange carrier in the United States (below the Regional Bell Operating Company, Baby Bells), serving customers in 18 states and providing local, long-distance, high-speed data and wireless s ...

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc. ( ), is an American telecommunications company headquartered in New York City. It is the world's second-largest telecommunications company by revenue and its mobile network is the largest wireless carrier in the ...

, and

began work on their own IPTV services to compete with the local cable companies. Embarq was no different, and had started work on a similar service called Embarq TV. Details were scarce, but the service was rumored to have been an IPTV fiber-to-the-node service similar to AT&T's U-verse. The service was going through

beta testing Software testing is the act of checking whether software satisfies expectations. Software testing can provide objective, independent information about the quality of software and the risk of its failure to a user or sponsor. Software test ...

when CenturyTel agreed to purchase Embarq to form CenturyLink in 2009. CenturyLink (still known as CenturyTel) began rolling out what was to eventually be known as Prism TV in October 2009 in

Jefferson City, Missouri Jefferson City, informally Jeff City, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital of the U.S. state of Missouri. It had a population of 43,228 at the 2020 United States census, ranking as the List of cities in Missouri, 16th most popu ...

. It adopted the Prism TV name in 2011, based on the Embarq TV infrastructure. Over time, CenturyLink began rolling out Prism TV in markets as they were upgraded from the old copper-based services to

fiber-optic communication Fiber-optic communication is a form of optical communication for transmitting information from one place to another by sending pulses of infrared or visible light through an optical fiber. The light is a form of carrier wave that is modul ...

, eventually offering the service in markets in

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

Iowa Iowa ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the upper Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west; Wisconsin to the northeast, Ill ...

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

Missouri Missouri (''see #Etymology and pronunciation, pronunciation'') is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it border ...

Nebraska Nebraska ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Ka ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

North Carolina North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

, Washington, and

Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...

. Other markets were to follow once their lines were upgraded to be able to carry Prism TV. In the interim, markets that did not offer Prism TV had a

triple play In baseball or softball, a triple play (denoted as TP in baseball statistics) is the act of making three out (baseball), outs during the same play. There have only been 739 triple plays in Major League Baseball (MLB) since 1876, an average of ju ...

option through CenturyLink with

DirecTV DirecTV, LLC is an American Multichannel television in the United States, multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital Satellite television, s ...

. Some CenturyLink customers also had

Dish Network DISH Network L.L.C., often referred to as DISH, an abbreviation for Digital Sky Highway, is an American provider of satellite television and IPTV services and wholly owned subsidiary of EchoStar Corporation. The company was originally establ ...

as their TV provider through CenturyLink under a grandfather clause, as Dish was the legacy provider through CenturyTel and Embarq; CenturyLink switched to DirecTV as part of its acquisition of Qwest, who had partnered with DirecTV. In 2018, CenturyLink stopped offering Prism TV to new customers. Instead, CenturyLink it began promoting

for new customers. In late 2020, CenturyLink began the process of discontinuing Prism TV completely starting in Minnesota and Nevada. As of March 2021, several other markets have stopped offering the service to all customers including Arizona, Colorado, Washington, and parts of Florida.

Reception

Reception for Prism TV has been generally positive, with many observers feeling that giving consumers the option in areas where they might have been stuck with the local cable company if they weren't able to receive

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

(due to either technical reasons or not being allowed through their landlords if they rent their homes) combined with

cord-cutting In broadcast television, cord-cutting refers to the pattern of viewers, referred to as cord-cutters, cancelling their subscriptions to multichannel television services available over cable or satellite, dropping pay television channels or reducing ...

would ultimately help push pay TV prices lower. While CenturyLink has been slower to roll out Prism TV compared to Verizon Fios and AT&T U-verse, it has gotten praise from some consumer advocate groups that they are at least putting forth the effort to upgrade their landlines and offer the service. Verizon, and to a lesser extent, AT&T, have both received criticism for all but abandoning their landline infrastructure to focus more on their wireless divisions, something CenturyLink doesn't offer on its own. (CenturyLink does offer bundling services for

Verizon Wireless Verizon is an American wireless network operator that previously operated as a separate division of Verizon Communications under the name Verizon Wireless. In a 2019 reorganization, Verizon moved the wireless products and services into the div ...

.) Verizon has in fact faced lawsuits from the city governments in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

and

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

(both of which offer CenturyLink in parts of their suburban areas, though neither currently offer Prism TV) for failure to deploy Fios throughout their respective cities. While AT&T has mostly deployed U-verse throughout its 21-state landline territory and has maintained its landlines, they have shown a lack of commitment on U-verse and plan on merging U-verse into DirecTV, which AT&T acquired in 2015.

References

External links

* {{CATV USA Fiber-optic communications Video on demand Lumen Technologies

History

Reception

See also

References

External links