Dust-Up Over DTV Spots
Martin, NAB At Odds Over PSAs In Primetime
By Ted Hearn -- Multichannel News, 10/21/2007 6:00:00 PM MT
Washington — Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin is endorsing rules that would force TV stations to run digital-television educational messages during peak nighttime audience hours, putting him at odds with the National Association of Broadcasters.
“What I concluded is that they need to be doing public-service announcements during each daypart,” Martin told reporters after testifying before a House subcommittee on the cutoff of analog TV on Feb. 17, 2009. “We divided the day into different parts, and one of those parts does include primetime.”
The NAB has resisted making any specific, concrete promises about running DTV public-service announcements in primetime, when ad revenue is typically at its highest level. In FCC filings, the NAB time after time has urged the agency to refrain from mandating the use of airtime to educate the public about the DTV transition.
| PSAs FOR DTV: Martin’s Mandates |
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| FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is mandating TV stations carry these amounts of public service announcements informing Americans of the impending requirement that stations can only transmit signals in digital form after Feb. 17, 2009. |
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SOURCE: Multichannel News research |
| Effective November 2007: TV stations would have to air four PSAs a day. Each has to be at least 15 seconds long and each has to run at least once in all four dayparts (12 a.m to 6 a.m.; 6 a.m. to Noon; Noon to 6 p.m; and 6 p.m. to midnight). Stations would have to run at least one 60-second crawl (text-based information) in each daypart. |
| Effective May 1, 2008: Eight PSAs and crawls per day, with two PSAs and crawls in each six-hour daypart. |
| Effective Nov. 1, 2008: Twelve PSAs and crawls per day, with three PSAs and crawls in each six-hour daypart. |
“We would respectfully submit that maximum flexibility is necessary to ensure that this education effort succeeds, and that a 'one-size-fits-all’ approach is unnecessary,” Dennis Wharton, NAB’s executive vice president of media relations, said in a statement.
At a press conference last Monday, a reporter asked NAB president David Rehr to outline broadcasters’ plan to run primetime PSAs. Rehr took four seconds to respond before backing away from the podium.
“We will run ads, we will run DTV action spots in primetime,” Rehr said.
When the reporter asked for more details, Rehr returned and added: “We will be running DTV action spots in primetime, but it will really depend on the market and the needs of the market. It would be premature for me to stand up and say, 'X number of spots will run in primetime.’ ” The action spots are 30-second PSAs.
All five FCC members have Martin’s draft rules that would impose quantifiable and measurable primetime PSA mandates on TV stations. Ideally, Martin wants the rules to take effect on Nov. 1 and run though the end of the transition.
“It’s important that it not be just limited to public-service announcements at one time of day. We want to make sure that those announcements are being run at all different times of day, including primetime,” Martin said.
In his rules, Martin would equally divide the broadcast day into four six-hour segments, called dayparts, starting with 12 a.m. to 6 a.m.
Since the three-hour primetime period couldn’t constitute its own daypart, TV stations in theory could avoid running primetime PSAs in lieu of lucrative advertising. But an FCC official said TV stations would not be complying with the rules if they totally bypassed airing primetime PSAs.
In his House testimony, Martin said the rules would require cable companies to include DTV transition educational announcements in monthly bills sent to subscribers. Cable has already volunteered to do that, in addition to airing PSAs in primetime as part of $200 million DTV education program announced in early September.
Later, Martin signaled that there shouldn’t be too much of a political struggle at the FCC to gain approval of the primetime PSA mandate.
“I’m actually pretty optimistic that I think that the commission will support me,” Martin said.
Last Monday, the NAB unveiled a DTV education plan that it said was worth $697 million. Rehr outlined a six-point plan, but five of the points had nothing to do with using the broadcast-TV medium to educate the public about the demise of analog TV in 484 days.
Although the NAB plan includes a vaguely defined PSA program, the majority of the plan relies on either low-cost or no-cost components, such as generating news stories, sending a truck made up to look like a giant TV screen to 600 locations, forming a 700-person speaker bureau, and creating English-Spanish Web sites.
“All of these efforts will ensure a smooth and successful transition,” Rehr said.
The legal requirement that TV stations send signals only in digital format in early 2009 could render 60 million to 70 million analog TV sets useless if they don’t get hooked up to cable, satellite TV, or digital-to-analog converter boxes.
Lawmakers, regulators and industry stakeholders are working on a united campaign to raise consumer awareness so that the transition is seamless.
Martin, NAB At Odds On Primetime PSAs
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08/21/2007
