allowed to keep their dishes; half had bought them and half had leased them, however it was unclear who if anyone would provide the service. In October 1984, the U.S. Congress passed the Cable Communications Act of 1984, which gave those using dishes the right to see signals for free unless they were scrambled, and required those who did scramble to make their signals available for a fee. Since cable channels could prevent reception by big dishes, other companies had an incentive to offer competition. Dominion planned inspirational programming, USSB intended to sell dishes with three channels of free programming, and Direct Broadcast Satellite Corp. would be a common carrier airing programming from those who paid. In 1992, nearly all MVPD customers had cable television service. In 1994, PrimeStar, DirecTV and USSB began offering digital satellite service. With one million subscribers in 18 months, digital direct broadcast satellite set a record for the quickest acceptance of a new technology; by comparison, it took four years before the VCR sold one million units. EchoStar and AlphaStar debuted in 1996. 2.2 million people subscribed to C-band service requiring 6-foot dishes costing as much as $1,500; this number remained steady, while digital satellite service with 18-inch dishes experienced phenomenal growth, reaching 4.5 million subscribers by the end of 1996, up by about two million subscribers in a year. Cable television services had 65 million subscribers, but were already starting to see customers switch to satellite. Satellite television offered more channels than cable did at the time due to limited headend capacity, although broadcast networks were not allowed if their affiliates could be received with an antenna. DirecTV and USSB had 2.5 million subscribers, while PrimeStar, with 27-inch dishes that could be rented rather than purchased, had 1.6 million subscribers. Cable companies responded to the success of satellite by adopting digital cable services that offered more channels, and required the use of digital set-top boxes. They also owned a share of PrimeStar, because offering cable in rural areas was deemed to be too expensive. In 1996, the FCC said local zoning laws could not prevent most smaller dishes. Another advancement in satellite TV came with the Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act of 1999 (SHVIA), which allowed local channels to be included in satellite TV packages. Previously, this was only possible if an area had no local broadcast network affiliates. A January 8, 2001 report