The dissection of the long-awaited National Broadband Plan has officially begun, and the outlook for cable companies could be bleak, according to some industry reports. The Federal Communications Commission reportedly aims to make it easier for consumers to buy TV set-top boxes, not lease them from pay-TV firms, and wants future boxes to pipe Web content into living rooms, Investors.com reported.

“Both proposals, which would hurt cable TV companies such as Comcast, Time Warner (News - Alert)Cable and Cablevision, are part of the FCC’s national broadband plan submitted to Congress,” according to the article.

Part of the plan calls for “affordable access in every American community to ultra-high-speed broadband of at least 1 gigabit per second at anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals, and military installations so that America is hosting the experiments that produce tomorrow’s ideas and industries,” according to FCC (News - Alert)officials.

Early reactions from the big phone and cable companies that dominate the U.S. broadband market were positive, the Associated Press reported earlier this week. US Telecom (News - Alert), a trade group that represents phone companies, praised the FCC for recognizing that “it will be through private sector investment and innovation that America’s broadband deployment goals will be met.”

Erin Harrison is a senior editor with TMCnet, primarily covering telecom expense management, politics and technology and Web 2.0. She serves as senior editor for TMC's (News - Alert)print publications, including 'Internet Telephony', 'Customer Interaction Solutions', 'Unified Communications' and 'NGN' magazines. Erin also oversees production of TMCnet's weekly iPhone (News - Alert)e-Newsletter. To read more of Erin's articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Erin Harrison