Technology Groups Line Up Behind Barton’s DTV Deadline
Two groups of prominent telecom, wireless and technology companies this week separately endorsed a hard deadline for DTV transition, igniting a debate with NAB. A new High Tech DTV Coalition unveiled Wed. and led by Janice Obuchowski, former NTIA dir. and ambassador to the World Radio Conference, backs House Commerce Committee Chmn. Barton’s (R-Tex.) goal of a firm deadline. Without specifying a date, Obuchowski said her group stands behind Barton. Barton, now pushing a Dec. 31, 2006, deadline, has said he could accept a “slight” compromise. “We want the deadline to be as soon as practicable,” said coalition member Peter Pitsch of Intel.
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The other group, Computer Systems Policy Project (CSPP) includes Intel, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola and Dell. CSPP wrote Barton and other members of Congress Tues., lauding efforts to advance DTV transition with an early date. “Your proposed legislation is critically important to our nation as it frees up prime spectrum for higher value uses, including broadband wireless and public safety services,” CSPP said.
Obuchowski said her coalition’s formation adds momentum to the push for a DTV deadline. She said a deadline is essential to help the U.S. compete in the global economy, as other nations develop spectrum-based technology that outruns U.S. technology. “We have to leverage this spectrum,” she said of the 88 MHz of spectrum that will be freed for technology use once broadcasters vacate the analog spectrum and move to DTV. Vacant spectrum will create technology jobs, advance rural broadband deployment and help balance the budget, since its sale could mean $30 billion in auction revenue for the federal treasury, the coalition said. Obuchowski also stressed public safety, since some spectrum would go to help police and fire radio frequencies interoperate.
The coalition aims in part to support a “viable converter box program,” Obuchowski said. Barton is considering a program that would put DTV converters on the analog TVs of poor people. “If we can put a man on the moon, we can put converter boxes in 15% of homes,” Obuchowski said. However, she said the Coalition isn’t ready to commit to details of such a program, or other specifics behind a DTV transition, such as whether it should incorporate multicast must-carry for cable and DBS operators.
Obuchowski didn’t give the coalition’s budget or staff size. It won’t include a Political Action Committee, but will provide “informational and political capital” to members of Congress. A letter this week to House Commerce Committee leaders supported a hard-date deadline; Obuchowski said the group will pursue that goal in the Senate as well. Coalition members include Alcatel, Aloha Partners, AT&T, Dell, Cisco Systems, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, T-Mobile, the Information Technology Industry Council, the National Assn. of Manufacturers, the National Telecom Cooperative Assn., the Rural Telecom Group, the Business Software Alliance and the Semiconductor Industry Assn.
Meanwhile, NAB said tech companies were putting corporate greed ahead of the public interest in the DTV transition. “The corporate financial interests of a handful of technology companies should not trump the needs of American TV viewers,” NAB said in a letter to members of Congress countering CSPP’s letter. Local broadcasters want a prompt transition, NAB said. However, NAB agrees with members of Congress who have voiced concern that analog TV’s premature end would be “terribly” disruptive to millions of Americans. “Our viewers are your constituents, and we believe that an overriding priority in ending this transition must be the protection of consumers against losing access to local television,” NAB said. The harm to such consumers -- disproportionately in poor and minority households -- must be weighed against the “purely parochial interests of high-tech companies hoping to profit from new uses of this spectrum,” NAB said.