National Cable & Telecommunications Association
| Founded | 1952 |
|---|---|
| Type | Trade association |
| Location |
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President and CEO
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Michael Powell |
| Website | ncta.com |
NCTA – The Internet & Television Association (formerly the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, and commonly known as the NCTA) is the principal trade association for the U.S. broadband and pay television industries, representing more than 90% of the U.S. cable market, more than 200 cable networks, and equipment suppliers and providers of other services to the cable industry.
The NCTA is one of the largest political lobbying organizations in the United States, and has been a vocal opponent of net neutrality and municipal broadband.
NCTA first was organized as the National Community Television Council in September 1951, when a small group of community antenna (CATV) operators met at a hotel in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. They gathered in response to concern over the Internal Revenue Service's attempts to impose an 8% excise tax on their operations. These business people quickly became aware of other common interests, leading to a series of organizational meetings during September and October 1951 and January 1952. In January 1952, the organization's name officially was changed to National Community Television Association.
NCTA's growth kept pace with the rapidly expanding CATV industry. Within its first year, nearly 40 CATV systems joined the organization. Membership then grew into hundreds by the end of the 1950s and thousands by the end of the 1960s. In the 1960s, the term "Community Antenna Television (CATV)" gave way to the term "cable", reflecting the industry's expanded categories of service – including local news, weather information, and channels of pay television. Accordingly, in 1968, NCTA – while retaining its acronym – changed its official name for the first time, to National Cable Television Association.
Following the introduction of global telecommunication satellites, the late 1970s and 1980s saw initial explosive growth in cable content, as entrepreneurs gave birth to such networks as CNN, ESPN, MTV, BET, TBS, USA, Discovery, Lifetime, C-SPAN, and eventually hundreds of other channels. During this period, virtually all of the nation’s major programming services also joined NCTA, providing a new dimension to the organization’s representation of cable interests in Washington.
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