The FCC should extend a video description deadline for TV stations and cable operators, and the agency’s proposed Jan. 1, 2012 start is too soon, those industries said. The commission proposed in March to require Big Four broadcast network affiliates in the 25 largest markets and multichannel video programming distributors with more than 50,000 subscribers to have descriptions by then. NAB sought until Oct. 1, 2012, and NCTA asked the rules take effect in the fourth quarter of next year.
Mobile DTV signals are being broadcast from 76 stations in 32 markets, and the industry is on track to reach about two-thirds of U.S. TV households within 12 months, the Open Mobile Video Coalition said. Along with the ATSC, OMVC’s members are demonstrating mobile DTV technology and devices at a special area of the NAB Show this week. New applications such as datacasting, VOD, mobile DTV recording, polling and couponing are on display, ATSC President Mark Richer said in a press release.
LAS VEGAS - The FCC would do a thorough rulemaking before beginning any incentive auction for TV broadcast spectrum, Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake told the NAB convention Monday. The rulemaking would address broadcasters’ concerns about repacking the TV band and other consequences of the potential auctions, he said. But the agency can’t work out those details before congress acts to give it the authority to do the incentive auctions in the first place, he said. Broadcasters want those details now, said Alan Frank, CEO of Post-Newsweek Stations. “We need to start by defining not how the auction works, but what it means for the broadcasters who don’t participate in the auction,” he said.
Much more research on 3D TV health issues is needed before widespread terrestrial 3D broadcasting can begin, said the interim report on visual sciences that recently was released by an Advanced Television Systems Committee planning team (CED March 24 p1). It exposes huge gaps in knowledge and understanding, along with the Catch-22 issue of what meaningful research can be safely done on viewers of all ages when little is known about possible side effects.
Makers of set-top boxes that stream online video to TVs are taking a close look at adding ATSC receivers to their devices and may unveil new hybrid ATSC-online video products soon, industry executives said. Some devices could be announced as soon as the NAB show April 9-14 in Las Vegas, said Doug Wills, vice president at Minerva networks, an IPTV middleware company. Adding over-the-air TV reception capabilities to online video devices presents new challenges, such as reception problems and software integration hurdles, executives said.
An Advanced TV Systems Committee (ATSC) “planning team” published a request for information on new 3D TV technologies that could be available to terrestrial broadcasters within five years, the organization said Wednesday. The team published an “interim report” on the “benefits and limitations” of known 3D TV transmission technologies and wants information by April 20 about technologies not mentioned in the report, including those under development, so its final report will be as complete as possible, ATSC said.
Blair Levin was “way off base, yet again” in his suggestions for broadcasters, a group representing low-power TV stations said Wednesday. Levin, coordinator for the FCC’s National Broadband Plan, told investors late Tuesday that TV stations needed a route to migrate to the MPEG-4 standard, an issue they seem to be ignoring and a decision which, if made, would lead to much more efficient use of spectrum (CD March 9 p13). “MPEG-4’s benefits are already recognized by the broadcasting industry, which already used it as the video encoding protocol for mobile/hand-held ATSC,” said the low-power TV group, Spectrum Evolution. “It is also part of the more advanced CMMB digital TV technology,” the group said of MPEG-4. But the standard “does nothing to increase the available `bits per second’ and so does not significantly advance the efficiency cause that Levin is advocating,” it said. “All it does is compress the video stream to use fewer bits to send a given image.” NAB, too, responded to Levin’s comments. “There have been discussions about the move to MPEG-4, but it would require replacing every TV set sold over the last few years,” a spokesman for the group said. “That would be a daunting challenge for both broadcasters and our viewers so soon after the” 2009 full-power broadcast DTV transition, he said.
The FCC Media Bureau denied an experimental license application from low-power TV (LPTV) operator WatchTV that sought to test an OFDM-based broadcast transmission system popular overseas with an in-band broadband service. The applicants had complained the request wasn’t getting the attention it deserved (CD Jan 14 p4). But the request appeared to seek authority to introduce a new service that doesn’t comply with FCC rules and would appear to be more akin to a developmental license rather than an experimental license, bureau Chief Bill Lake wrote Watch TV Chairman Greg Hermann, who’s also president of the LPTV group Spectrum Evolution. Developmental licenses should be accompanied by petition for rulemaking, Lake wrote. “Where a new service would employ technology inconsistent with the existing ATSC standard, any rulemaking most likely would be accompanied by industry standards development."
John Godfrey, Samsung, elected chairman, ATSC board … Vicki Hadfield, ex-Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International, becomes TechAmerica senior vice president-global public policy … Jeanne Jackson, Nike Inc., joins Motorola Mobility board … Cox Communications changes, as field systems cut to nine from 11: Jill Campbell, senior vice president of operations, gets oversight over all systems; Bill Geppert retires next month as general manager of San Diego system, being combined with Southern California operations to be led by David Bialis; Duffy Leone now senior vice president of operations for California service; Janet Barnard to run Omaha, Sun Valley, Kansas and Arkansas operations; David Blau becomes vice president of new growth and development for the corporate strategy group … Hearst TV promotes Jordan Wertlieb to executive vice president and Dan Joerres to president-general manager, WBAL-TV Baltimore.
Content protection firm Nagra-Kudelski will provide conditional access technology to the Mobile Content Venture, a joint venture of Fox, NBC Universal, Ion and nine top TV station groups, the MCV said Wednesday. MobiTV will manage the operational aspects of the service for MCV and build a single client that blends broadcast and unicast content, MobiTV said. The planned service includes both live and VOD content, delivered over different paths to mobile devices Salil Dalvi, senior vice president of NBC Universal and co-general manager of MCV, said in an interview. The inclusion of conditional access means the service won’t be viewable on devices that aren’t updated with Nagra’s software.