The Pay TV market has never had greater opportunity. Despite the intense competition brought on by new players there are myriad upsell opportunities. Subscribers can opt for DVR, HD-DVR, slow broadband, medium broadband, blazing fast broadband, HDTV, SDTV, Premium channels, VOD, etc. The opportunity increased this week as Cablevision won an important victory and others announced their quarterly earnings.

Earlier this week, Cablevision won its case – effectively arguing that a network DVR is the same as an in-home DVR. A logical argument that made sense to most beyond content owners. The victory for Cablevision could allow pay TV to become more anywhere. When content was locked on a STB it was not accessible on the go (unless you had a Slingbox or perhaps an Archos and Dish PMP). By moving content on to the network it becomes feasible for Cablevision to offer its own SlingBox solution – creating a PC set-top box ensuring security and providing streaming access to a subscriber of their important content – anywhere. Content owners will need to get on board, but this is a first step.

However it is important to note that while an important victory my colleague Vince Vittore has imparted on me the knowledge that a network DVR presents a challenge as much as an opportunity. The load on the network if all subscribers pull streamed content from the head-end a network DVR could be untenable as a solution for the mass market. Instead, focusing the network DVR on SD content to underserved households while more robust offerings still require a STB could mitigate the problem but would also hinder the anywhere opportunities the victory would enable.

DirecTV which has been focused on HD content as its primary differentiator since CES 2007 is reaping more rewards as well. The company was able to increase its ARPU 7% and lower its churn to a multi-year low. These numbers indicate the power of advanced offerings like HD. Consumers are enamored with taking advantage of their CE equipment as much as possible and the HD offerings of DirecTV allow subscribers to do that. Once they make the switch to advanced services it is near impossible to revert. With second HDTV buying picking up look for DirecTV to continue to show strength as subscribers sign up for additional HD service.

Verizon and AT&T also continued to add to their pay TV subscriber base.

The key lesson from the quarter is that the consumer appetite for advanced technology continues to grow. It will start with DVR and HD but will not stop there. As consumers desire more Anywhere behavior companies like Cablevision (and others) with its big victory are poised at the precipice of further growth by enabling subscribers to realize their anywhere desires. The future looks bright for all of pay TV.