A draft NPRM on preserving FM6 stations -- low-power channel 6 TV stations receivable by FM radios and focused on audio content -- is expected to be unanimously approved with few changes at Wednesday’s commissioners’ meeting, FCC and industry officials told us. The owners of the stations -- sometimes called “Franken FMs” after the fictional Frankenstein's monster -- are optimistic about the FCC allowing them to continue broadcasting but concerned about proposals in the draft to make their licenses nontransferable or bar new entrants. FM6 stations serve underserved communities, said FM6 broadcaster Paul Koplin, CEO of Venture Technologies Group: “Wouldn’t it be in the public interest to let as many people do this as possible?”
A draft further NPRM that was circulated to FCC commissioners’ offices last week would seek comment on whether to allow the sunset of the requirement that stations broadcasting in ATSC 3.0 also offer an ATSC 1.0 stream that is “substantially similar,” industry and FCC officials said (see 2204250021). That requirement is set to sunset July 17, 2023, a date that was set by the 2017 order that authorized ATSC 3.0 broadcasts. The draft item is seen as broad and isn’t expected to feature many tentative conclusions, industry officials said. The FNPRM seeks comment on the state of the NextGenTV transition and on the scheduled sunsets of two rules adopted in that order, an FCC spokesperson told us. The 2017 3.0 order included sunsets on both the substantially similar requirement and on the requirement that broadcasters use the A/322 standard on physical-layer protocol for 3.0 transmissions. The 2017 order said the agency would monitor the 3.0 transition and a year before the sunsets were to expire would seek comment on whether marketplace conditions warranted an extension, the spokesperson said. Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel told the NAB Show in April that she sees the current framework of 3.0 as the correct one right now, and she and Media Bureau Chief Holly Saurer mentioned concerns about the standard’s lack of backward compatibility (see 2204250067). Pearl TV and other broadcast organizations have argued that allowing the sunset to occur won’t lead to viewers being disenfranchised because of market forces -- adoption of 3.0-ready devices isn't yet widespread and stations need viewers to sell ads.
Evoca went live Thursday with its 60+-channel lineup in Portland, Oregon, and includes Root Sports Northwest, TV home of the Trail Blazers and Timbers in Portland, the Kraken, Mariners and Seahawks in Seattle, plus the Gonzaga University Bulldogs, said the ATSC 3.0 pay TV service. The basic Evoca service costs $25 a month, plus the receiver, and newly added Sling TV programming options enable Evoca customers to access all their content through the Evoca channel guide at higher-priced tiers (see 2205250001).
New and current Evoca customers can add one of three Sling TV programming options to their subscriptions and access all their content through the Evoca channel guide, said the ATSC 3.0-based pay TV service Wednesday. Evoca subscriptions with either Sling Orange or Sling Blue cost $55 a month, plus the receiver, and include a $5 discount on the bundles. Evoca subscriptions with both Sling Orange and Sling Blue cost $70 a month, plus the receiver, also with the $5 discount. The stand-alone Evoca subscription is $25 a month, plus the receiver.
FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel isn’t proposing rules on improving how wireless 911 calls are routed to the appropriate first responders but instead is seeking a record refresh. A notice of inquiry casts a wide net on what the FCC should do to address offshore needs for spectrum. Also on tap is an NPRM on channel 6 TV stations, which primarily broadcast an audio signal receivable on FM radios. Drafts for all three were posted Wednesday, for votes at the June 8 commission meeting.
The FCC should promote increased use of IP-based emergency alerts rather than overhauling the legacy emergency alert system to increase accessibility, said NAB, NPR and alerting equipment manufacturer Digital Alert Systems in reply comments posted in docket 15-94 Wednesday. Common alerting protocol messages have “superior accessibility capabilities,” NAB said. While pushing CAP, the FCC should preserve the legacy EAS system “as a redundant, more resilient pathway when internet connectivity is disrupted.” Digital Alert Systems (DAS) said it doesn’t agree with some commenters that adding some additional text or embedded ancillary data to alerts would substantially increase the length of time a message plays. “We feel that such representations may overstate any potential issues,” said DAS. “One must consider the actual length or time an ancillary data frame might require, which may be a scant few seconds in practice, against the real-world spoken length of EAS messages.” Media that have a limited ability to display visual information -- such as many car radios -- may be able to increase alerting accessibility using symbology, DAS said. NPR and DAS said the FCC should let broadcasters adopt new technology to increase alert accessibility on a voluntary basis. The FCC should convene a multistakeholder initiative to “consider voluntary avenues for improving emergency alerting and informing in the United States,” said the Advanced Television Systems Committee and the Advanced Warning and Response Network Alliance in joint comments. As alerts exist now, deaf or hard-of-hearing individuals “often have to cobble information together through several different sources to learn vital information” in emergencies, said the National Disability Rights Network.
Gray Television’s Tallahassee ATSC 3.0 station is using Pearl TV’s Run3TV app, not Sinclair’s open-source broadcast application (see 2204260057)
Multiple stations are using Sinclair's open-source broadcast app and it's being used to offer ATSC 3.0 viewers interactive content, said Rob Folliard, Gray Television senior vice president-government relations and distribution, on an NAB Show panel Tuesday. Folliard said Florida stations are using the app, and So Vang, One Media vice president-emerging technology, said it's running on every Sinclair 3.0 station. When the app is in use, “essentially a browser appears on your TV set,” Folliard said. U.S. broadcasters are looking to Europe for use cases and applications that can be adapted to 3.0 from Europe’s hybrid broadcast broadband TV (HbbTV) internet television standard, said Francesco Moretti, CEO international for Italy-based Fincons Group. HbbTV has close similarities to 3.0 and its IP backbone, so systems built for the European standard can be made to work with 3.0 in just a few days, said Kerry Oslund, E.W. Scripps vice president-strategy and business development. The app also enables broadcasters to collect data on viewers and to create “flash channels” offering specialized or geotargeted information for consumers that choose to use them, said Vang. Such channels could be used to convey weather warnings to a small segment of a broadcaster’s market, or offer a secondary camera view of live sports, said several broadcasters. Interoperability between the app and MVPDs is still being tested, Folliard said.
Pearl TV Managing Director Anne Schelle expects the NextGenTV logo for ATSC 3.0-compliant TVs to become “widely adopted,” she said on a prerecorded NAB Show video preview that debuted Monday on ATSC’s YouTube channel. “Once we get past 80% household penetration” on 3.0-compliant sets, “you’ll see some of the big-box retailers really jumping in” to promote and support the logo, Schelle told ATSC President Madeleine Noland in an interview on the video. “More and more consumers, with our advertising, are going in the store and they’re asking for NextGen. The more that happens, the more you’ll see the logo out there.” Schelle sees the industry “doubling down” on 3.0 marketing in 2022 and into 2023” she said. “It’s incredibly important that we get that message out there, to let consumers know. We need that consumer pull. That consumer pull drives retailers, talks to the TV manufacturers.” The industry needs to “get to scale as fast as we possibly can, because that then brings in the opportunities” for broadcasters' return on investment, said Schelle. “From there, I think you’ll see a lot of the activity around datacasting, which is a longer-term play, but it’s definitely a viable play,” she said. “We need to have a really successful television play in order to get to that datacasting play.”
LAS VEGAS -- FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel kept her cards close on future FCC broadcasting policy during a Q&A at the NAB Show 2022 Monday but pleased many broadcasters by repeatedly emphasizing her admiration for local broadcasting. “Your power is that you’re not like everyone else,” Rosenworcel told NAB CEO Curtis LeGeyt and the broadcasters. “What makes you unique is that you’re local.” Her “appreciation for local was apparent,” said Salem CEO David Santrella in an interview after her remarks: “When two parties get together to negotiate something, if one has no appreciation for what the other brings to the table, the negotiation rarely goes well.”