Deano’s answer to: “Will telecom companies ever be able to deliver cable television to consumers homes wirelessly, instead of over a wired connection?”

In a word? No.

The question completely mis-frames the practical use case and outcome – that "cable TV" itself will instead be replaced by more efficient/flexible Internet delivery, which can then route as closely as possible via cables, only switching to wireless for "last mile" or even "on premise" transmission.

Of course, this is not necessarily desirable on the part of cable networks, who would like to stand up a separate wireless infrastructure for a variety of reasons. But due to the difficulty in obtaining spectrum, and rights to tower placement within communities, it's far more likely that the consumer-side pressures will finally force the abstraction of tv content from delivery mechanisms and telecom providers.

Put even simpler: it's much more likely that what a consumer imagines as "cable over wireless" looks like an AppleTV 3, or a Roku-HD-1080-ng+ sitting on a "smartdumb" IPv6 pipe, than it does like a contemporary cable/telecom subscription package.

Will telecom companies ever be able to deliver cable television to consumers homes wirelessly, instead of over a wired connection?