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NAB asks for ATSC 3.0 mandate by 2030

I never recorded anything on VHS to keep permanently except the New Year's Eve countdown for 2001. I didn't have VHS in 2000. I may have made an audio recording then because it was a historic night.

I have lots of cassette recordings that I'd like to put online, if there is not already a recording for some of what I have. I haven't figured out how.

I once copied a cassette and somehow knew how to send it by snail mail to someone who posted here at the time. The recording was never posted.
 
The FCC yesterday released a fact sheet on the first batch of "outdated regulations" to be considered for deletion at the August meeting of the Commission:


It includes a draft of the agenda item (about the only thing missing is the date of adoption and other references that cannot be added until passage) and has a reference to the regulations under which the FCC governed OTA subscription TV, in footnote #4:

47 CFR § 2.1400 (specifying procedures for applying for advance approval of a subscription TV system). See
Amendment of Part 73 of the Commission's Rules to Update Television & Class A Television Broad. Station Rules,
& Rules Applicable to All Broad. Stations, MB Docket 22-227, Report and Order, 38 FCC Rcd 8706, 8737, para. 65
(2023) (“With the elimination of analog service, there are no full power television stations operating pursuant to the STV rules and LMS does not permit the filing of applications or requests to operate in an STV mode. Accordingly, these STV rules and references to them in parts 73 and 74 are obsolete and we eliminate them.”).

To me, this reads like open season for broadcasters to reintroduce same under ATSC 3.0, with no backwards reference to the analog rules to base a challenge upon ...
 
The FCC deleted most of the Subscription TV rules in 2023 because the analog subscription TV rules don't apply to digital stations anyway. Those rules in Part 2 were overlooked.

This is clean-up, not a conspiracy.

- Trip
 
tripinva said:
The FCC deleted most of the Subscription TV rules in 2023 because the analog subscription TV rules don't apply to digital stations anyway. Those rules in Part 2 were overlooked.

This is clean-up, not a conspiracy.
Click to expand...

I don't disagree with the cleanup of those rules, Trip. Every regulation that applied to the now-dead and buried analog television technology should be taken off the books.

But I still cannot help but note that (at least so far) there is nothing that would require a ATSC 3.0 station to file for permission to operate a modern-day version of subscription television, and given the decline in OTA viewing of network television, I would be surprised if ABC, CBS, CW, NBC and Fox don't have people researching the possibility of moving their programming to a pay platform. They would probably see that as better complementing the streaming model.
 

Federal Register :: Request Access

www.ecfr.gov www.ecfr.gov

73.624(b).

Obviously, that wouldn't stop them from providing some minimal programming for free and moving sports or whatever behind a paywall, but they could move that programming to, say, streaming right now, so that's not really a change.

- Trip
 
tripinva said:
73.624(b).
Click to expand...

Right now, that regulation is already being violated by several stations nationwide. Here in L.A. the ATSC 3.0 feeds -- according to your invaluable site -- for KCBS-TV and KNBC are encrypted. My reading of that regulation would appear to dictate that, since those stations have only one 3.0 feed each, everything else being 1.0, those two simulcasts (for lack of a better term) of their primary 1.0 feeds, should be in the clear.

I'd like to know what legal basis they would have for doing that.

tripinva said:
Obviously, that wouldn't stop them from providing some minimal programming for free and moving sports or whatever behind a paywall, but they could move that programming to, say, streaming right now, so that's not really a change.
Click to expand...

At the very least, I would like to see the major networks continue to provide their prime-time schedule and news coverage in the clear. I don't care about sports, but knowing that they have rights payments and the like, I would not object to those being behind a paywall. Maybe it will be a renaissance of pay-per-view.
 
"In particular, the Bureau affirms its ability to consider additional factors and supportive materials that demonstrate that a specific transition has minimal negative viewer impact and is in the public interest.”
Click to expand...

I, for one, do not believe encrypting OTA streams has "minimal viewer impact".
 
cordcuttersnews.com

The FCC Will Allow ABC, CBS, FOX, & NBC TV Stations to Shutdown Free ATSC 1.0 & Switch to ATSC 3.0 Only | Cord Cutters News

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today issued a Public Notice to facilitate the transition of local broadcasters to ATSC 3.0, the next-generation television standard designed to enhance viewer experiences with improved picture quality, immersive audio, and interactive features. The...
cordcuttersnews.com cordcuttersnews.com

For expedited processing, the FCC requires transitioning full-power and Class A stations to simulcast their primary video programming stream in ATSC 1.0, ensuring at least 95 percent of the population within a station’s noise-limited service contour (NLSC) retains access to the signal.
Click to expand...

I think my market is going to struggle to meet this; a decent portion of the viewing area is terrain-blocked by the mountain the signals are originating from. Thus, translators have been used for decades to get useable signal into this corner of the area.

@dhett might have further insight.
 
kwthom said:
cordcuttersnews.com

The FCC Will Allow ABC, CBS, FOX, & NBC TV Stations to Shutdown Free ATSC 1.0 & Switch to ATSC 3.0 Only | Cord Cutters News

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today issued a Public Notice to facilitate the transition of local broadcasters to ATSC 3.0, the next-generation television standard designed to enhance viewer experiences with improved picture quality, immersive audio, and interactive features. The...
cordcuttersnews.com cordcuttersnews.com
Click to expand...
Drivel like this makes me feel like simply giving up on everything related to modern TV (it already became unspeakably boring after the analog shutdown, but at least it was still freely accessible up to now). There's no innovating going on. Just the creation of yet another way of making life harder and more expensive so the top execs can make more money for their investors, if not themselves.

Next you know, they'll mandate a shutdown of all analog AM/FM broadcasts in favor of digital-only (why hasn't that happened yet?)

No wonder everyone's gone to streaming.

Granted, there's no mention of mandating encryption, but on the other hand, there's no mention of a rule that limits it or prevents it outright either, so it seems that the main networks are going be eagerly going for it at every opportunity simply because they can.

I suppose one way of circumventing it would be to aim a smartphone at the TV screen and record it that way, which is far from ideal, but better than nothing since the programming so recorded will at least be preserved in some form in the clear for fair use viewing and archiving for educational or personal purposes.

c
 
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cc333 said:
I suppose one way of circumventing it would be to aim a smartphone at the TV screen and record it that way, which is far from ideal, but better than nothing since the programming so recorded will at least be preserved in some form in the clear for fair use viewing and archiving for educational or personal purposes.
Click to expand...
VCRs, DVD recorders, and DVRs still work, too. Just get an inexpensive and widely available HDMI to composite or HDMI to component video adapter, which conveniently ignores any digital copy protection in the HDMI signal.
 
Mediafrog+ said:
Another dose of hyperbole and pie in the sky: Price: FCC Must Mandate A 2028 NextGen TV Transition
Click to expand...
Idealistic puffery, yes, but this caught my eye:

Sadly, ATSC 3.0’s biggest innovation, NextGen TV, is stalled and in danger of remaining so because most television set manufacturers would rather promote their own FAST channels than introduce what some see as a competing, more advanced free service. That is simply unfair to the public. Consumers should have access to all video services, not just those in the financial interest of the electronics industry. That is why every new television set must include an ATSC 3.0 tuner.
Click to expand...

I wonder what percentage of the display manufacturing industry's foot-dragging is attributable to this. Because it's an exact echo of the situation the radio industry is in with smartphone manufacturers resisting integrating or enabling their FM chipsets in deference to their own music consumption platforms (or their friends'). Until now, I had believed that the licensing and DRM certification costs, and the sour taste that that DRM was leaving in peoples' mouths, were the only big reasons ATSC 3.0 wasn't blossoming on the consumer electronics market.
 
yeoldeschool said:
Because it's an exact echo of the situation the radio industry is in with smartphone manufacturers resisting integrating or enabling their FM chipsets in deference to their own music consumption platforms (or their friends').
Click to expand...
FM receivers in smartphones went away because headphone jacks and wired earbuds went away... unless you want them to include a pull-out whip antenna to use for FM. (Some early smartphones actually had one, to use with a built-in analog TV tuner.)
 
kevtronics said:
FM receivers in smartphones went away because headphone jacks and wired earbuds went away... unless you want them to include a pull-out whip antenna to use for FM. (Some early smartphones actually had one, to use with a built-in analog TV tuner.)
Click to expand...
Wouldn't FM reception work adequately for moderate to strong signals with an internal wire antenna looping around the inside of the phone bezel?

But yes, I remember the disappearance of the analog jacks being the death knell for full sensitivity reception. The resistance to including or even enabling existing FM chips, however, was going on long before those jacks disappeared.
 
yeoldeschool said:
Wouldn't FM reception work adequately for moderate to strong signals with an internal wire antenna looping around the inside of the phone bezel?
Click to expand...
The problem is the much longer wavelengths of FM radio compared to cellular networks.

The lowest cellular frequency is 614 MHz which is around 48 centimeters wavelength. The wavelength of the middle of the FM band is slightly over 3 meters, or six times the longest cellular wavelength. Tough to come up with an FM antenna that would work in the smartphone physical form.

The old wired earbuds provided what was essentially a quarter-wave antenna for FM, which provided adequate local reception.
 
Mediafrog+ said:
The problem is the much longer wavelengths of FM radio compared to cellular networks.

The lowest cellular frequency is 614 MHz which is around 48 centimeters wavelength. The wavelength of the middle of the FM band is slightly over 3 meters, or six times longer than the lowest cellular wavelength. Tough to come up with an FM antenna that would work in the smartphone physical form.

The old wired earbuds provided what was essentially a quarter-wave antenna for FM, which provided adequate local reception.
Click to expand...
Understood. I never imagined that the reception would be ideal without headphone cables, but given the circumference of your average smartphone, I pictured the possibility of a wire looping internally all the way around the edge at least yielding satisfactory reception in strong signal areas like urban environments.

Here in the L.A. basin, for instance, noiseless, quality reception of almost all the commercial stations is possible on portables with their telescopic antennas fully retracted. Pulling out those antennas only gives me some of the weaker college stations situated near the coast, and a couple of Inland Empire stations on the other side of some hills.

(I live about twenty miles from Mount Wilson and can cleanly grab the ~25 best L.A. FM signals on old bookshelf stereos with nothing attached to their antenna screw terminals. Meaning I'm technically getting that reception with "antennas" consisting only of the short lengths of wire running from their internal circuit boards to the rears of those terminals.)
 


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