Cablevision continues to serve as the cable industry’s pioneer for deploying advanced services, and COO Tom Rutledge isn’t shy about pointing that out.

The Long Island-based company, which serves about 3 million basic subscribers, has the advantage of being one of the nation’s leading MSOs—with all the resources that go with that position—while possessing a uniquely concentrated footprint.  During the company’s fourth-quarter 2009 earnings call today, Rutledge implied that many other cable operators are looking to follow the Cablevision’s lead on new digital services, although they may be slower doing it.

 “We are at that stage where we can do things that some companies will ultimately do several years down the road,” Rutledge said today in reference to the company’s strategy.

The industry will be watching closely in April as Cablevision launches its remote-storage DVR service, a product that it had to cross legal hurdles to deploy. The first phase of the rollout will provide limited functionality, but Rutledge said today that by yearend the company will stop buying physical DVRs and deploy the RS-DVR solution throughout its footprint.

Cable operators watched closely Cablevision’s ultimately successful fight with content owners for the right to launch the RS-DVR service.  Such a product eliminates costly hardware installations in the home, reducing capital expenditures, service installation time and home visits.

Cablevision is also becoming cable’s pioneer in the WiFi space. The company in 2008 started building out its $300 million WiFi network in commercial and high-traffic areas, and by last the network already had 1 million visitors. Rutledge says the network accommodates roughly five million minutes of usage per month.

Now Comcast is following Cablevision’s model by offering select customers free WiFi at train stations throughout its North New Jersey serving areas.

Also in the works at Cablevision is a wireless phone service that would include a dual-mode phone capable of seamlessly switching from WiFi to cellular networks; and a freshly-announced PC-to-TV Media Relay service that will allow users to transfer media from their computers onto their television screens.

“We do intend to have [PCTV] rolled out to all subs, and as part of that product, all digital customers will be able to use the functionality,” Rutledge said. “So there won’t be any specific box that won’t be able to operate it … it allows all of the functionality of the Internet to be displayed on a TV. The TV becomes a monitor for the PC.”

Look for other cable operators to ape these initiatives in the near future.

Filed under: 3G, Cable Operators, Hardware, Video, Wi-Fi, Wireless, devices, streaming media by Scott Sleek | Social tagging: Cablevision > Comcast > RS-DVR > Tom Rutledge