What caught my eye was this quote from the article:
99% of the nation's 100 million pay TV subscribers lease a set-top box
Every Shaw customer that I know purchased their box a long time ago. Not sure if they still do, but Shaw was offering free replacements whenever a purchased box would no longer work because of changes in Shaw technology.
Did the article author got things wrong or do U.S. cable companies force customers to "lease" set-top boxes?
Point being that cable customers are much more likely to get rid of their set-top box if they rent it, rather than own it.
On a related note, I remember how "Internet-connected" TVs were being pushed so hard 3-4 years ago, at a lot of extra money for equivalent TVs with and without. It was not long after that every BluRay DVD player came with everything you needed to get Internet content on to your non-Internet TV.