Concerns Emerge on Draft ATSC 3.0 NRPM, Including From CTA on Tuner Mandate

CTA welcomed the FCC’s release of its draft on ATSC 3.0 (see 1702020059) but found language in the document “troubling” concerning the agency's request for comment on a possible receiver tuner mandate, President Gary Shapiro emailed us Friday. “Yesterday’s announcement by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai will help the U.S. transition to the next-generation of broadcast television,” Shapiro said. “The proposed ATSC 3.0 rule will bring 4K Ultra HD, High Dynamic Range, advanced emergency alert information, mobility and other innovations to broadcast television viewers across the United States -- a win for innovation and a win for consumers.”

The draft NPRM, though “well-intended,” contains “troubling language about a TV tuner mandate,” Shapiro told us. CTA stands by its April joint petition with broadcasters “supporting a voluntary, market-driven transition,” he said. “We also support the Commission's tentative agreement that a TV tuner mandate is unnecessary. CTA has long been an advocate for the development of this voluntary rule and applauds the FCC’s swift work to make the most immersive broadcast TV viewing experience a reality. We look forward to working with the Commission to move the proposal forward as originally intended to bring the benefits of this standard to American consumers nationwide.

“Consumer advocates are concerned that there are so many unanswered questions about how an ATSC 3.0 transition will impact viewers,” emailed Michael Calabrese, director of New America’s Wireless Future Project, to us on the NPRM. “Will broadcasters continue to be subject to the modest public interest obligations that partially compensate for their use of free spectrum that other industries pay to license? And will broadcasters continue even their most core public interest obligation, which is a free stream of programming to everyone in their local market area?”

The FCC pilot program on making draft items available to the public before commissioners vote on them should include a “vaguely transparent mechanism” for providing feedback on the items on circulation, spectrum policy consultant Michael Marcus commented in ATSC 3.0 docket 16-142 Friday. “The procedure so far does not give any mechanism for telling the FCC what you think of these drafts,” Marcus said. “Small businesses, consumer groups, and those without a prominent FCBA member as their regulatory representative will be disadvantaged.”

Though he said he supports “the basic idea,” Marcus also took aim at aspects of the draft ATSC 3.0 NPRM. The draft item doesn't mention Section 7 of the Communications Act, which requires the FCC to address new technologies within a year of its being petitioned on them, Marcus said. The petition asking the agency to approve the physical layer of ATSC 3.0 was filed in April. The draft NPRM also doesn't contain enough detail about how the transition will affect digital sub-channels and the viewing quality of simulcast stations, Marcus said. “By packing multiple network TV signals on a single 19 Mbps ATSC 1.0 signal it is very possible that the bit rate of a given network signal will decline from present practice and hence the signal quality will also decline,” he said. “If the remaining ATSC 1.0 stations during the transition previously had multiple sub-channels and the channel's moving ATSC 3.0 also had sub channels, will many of those sub channels and their diversity disappear during the transition?”