Updating the ATSC TV standard to allow for advanced compression technology and the ability to offer Internet content over broadcast is a worthy long-term goal, NAB CEO Gordon Smith told the ATSC at its annual meeting Tuesday, according to his prepared remarks. “Any new system will need to have a companion transition plan that takes broadcasters, manufacturers and especially consumers into account so they can benefit from the new system in a manageable way,” he said. “I know that’s not the issue now, but if a move to a next-generation system is eventually seriously contemplated, the transition plan will be a make-or-break issue,” Smith said. “We are fast moving past the age of linear television … into a new world that is on-demand, interactive, Internet-enabled and three dimensional,” he said. “Finding a way for broadcasters to take part in that new world isn’t optional. It’s a necessity in order to stay competitive with other media.” Smith said he understands that the ATSC technology is 15 years old, and “a transmission system designed with today’s technology could do a lot more.” Broadcasters need to understand how much more can be done “so we can make a judgment as to whether it’s ultimately worth it to migrate to a new system,” Smith said. Stations will also need spectrum to continue to serve viewers, he said. “It’s the necessary ingredient,” he said, “so we'll continue to fight to ensure broadcasters have the spectrum they need."
A U.K.-based TV technology vendor said it’s working with Granite Broadcasting to test an over-the-air pay TV service in the U.S. this year. Motive TV will use Granite’s KOFY-TV San Francisco to test its TV Anytime Anywhere products in a U.S. market, CEO Leonard Fertig said in an interview. “We'll set up a series of experiments with different segments of the market, to see what can be done in the U.S., using the over-the-air digital frequency Granite already uses,” he said. The test will include VOD and DVR capabilities, pay-per-view, as well as the ability to view programming on multiple Web-enabled devices in the home, he said.
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."