Unclear Picture
Broadcasters Must Still Resolve How They Will Actually Deliver Digital Signals to TV Viewers
By Ted Hearn -- Multichannel News, 9/16/2007 8:00:00 PM
Washington — Imagine the headlines if the Federal Communications Commission’s home office, a short stroll from the Washington Monument, lost over-the-air reception of ABC and CBS signals as a direct result of its own policies.
It could happen.
For almost two decades, the FCC has micromanaged the details of the transition to digital television signal transmission at the country’s nearly 1,800 full-power analog TV stations. The end of the transition, set by federal law, is 11:59 p.m. on Feb. 17, 2009.
With 519 days left, an industry-sponsored, multimillion-dollar education campaign is preparing consumers for the age of the digital TV.
The FCC, for example, is alerting broadcast-only homes that their analog TV sets won’t function without digital-to-analog converters attached. The Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration has $1.5 billion ready to subsidize consumer acquisition of such converters.
But before the analog transmissions that have been the lifeblood of broadcasting for 80 years are turned off, TV stations must resolve an assortment of problems — ranging from what channel their signals will be on to whether their digital antennas can be tilted downward to the core of a TV market — to be sure that they don’t all of a sudden lose viewers who can’t receive a digital signal.
| Significant Digits |
|---|
| Key facts and figures in the digital-TV transition: |
|
SOURCE: FCC, companies. |
| 1,703 digital-TV stations have been authorized |
| 1,603 have begun broadcasting |
| 600 need to find new channels to continue broadcasting |
| 8,000 cable headends need to receive digital signals from local broadcasters |
| 175 EchoStar markets need to switch to local digital signals |
| 143 DirecTV markets need to make same switch |
CHANNEL CHANGES
For instance, hundreds of stations are broadcasting on a digital channel assignment that is going to change after Feb. 17, 2009. And when they move to their new assignments, their signals will potentially collide with those of other stations already operating in the spectrum that will become the core of digital-TV broadcasting in this country.
Beyond that is the not-so-simple matter of antenna placement. Hundreds of stations need to take down or relocate an analog “stick” from the tops of their transmission towers and move up side-mounted digital antennas to those roosts. A top-mounted digital antenna would, in theory, allow the new signals to reach as many homes as the old analog signal.
Cold weather could hamper that effort in many parts of the country and paralyze it in others.
“It’s tough to do that in Minnesota in February. Tower crews don’t work in the winter up there, because you die,” said David Donovan, president of the Association of Maximum Service Television, a TV-engineering think tank for broadcasters.
That means some stations want to reduce their analog coverage months in advance of the deadline, so they can put digital antennas in place in plenty of time to maximize coverage before the deadline arrives. And cable-television operators need and want to know well in advance exactly where the new digital antennas will be placed, how far their signals will reach and other technical details, so they can pick up the new digital signals as required by law and distribute them to their customers once Feb. 18, 2009, arrives.
All of this means cable operators, both major direct-broadcast satellite providers, commercial and public-TV stations and low-power TV stations are preparing for an enormously challenging coordination effort. Otherwise, the public won’t receive the eye-popping picture quality and ear-pleasing audio that they will be promised in the months running up to the switchover.
“Everyone’s talking to everybody, big time, at least in our markets,” said Alan Frank, president of Post-Newsweek Stations, owner of NBC affiliate WDIV in Detroit, two stations in Texas and three in Florida.
Comcast, for instance, is the main cable operator in all of Frank’s markets.
“Using Comcast as an example, they know what’s coming,” Frank said.
All involved know there will be no turning back, because the U.S. government is reclaiming 108 Megahertz of spectrum in the transition, counting on the efficiency of digital transmission of pictures and sound. Some of that spectrum will be sold at auction next year for an estimated $10 billion or more, and some will be allocated for free to emergency first responders who need better and faster wireless communications.
PICKUP LINES
The manner in which digital antennas are mounted may have a direct effect on the FCC itself. Depending on how a pair of Washington, D.C., stations are allowed to point their transmitters, commissioners and their staff members may or may not be able to pick up digital TV signals in their offices.
According to station owners Allbritton Communications and Gannett, FCC headquarters, on a downtown street by the Potomac River, runs the risk of not being able to view their signals with an over-the-air antenna after analog signals have been shut off.
“Allbritton and Gannett are concerned that they will be unable to provide reliable, indoor over-the-air service to some … close-in viewers, an area that extends as far as the FCC’s own offices on 12th Street,” the companies told the agency in an Aug. 30 filing.
Washington’s ABC station, WJLA, is owned by Allbritton; the CBS affiliate, WUSA, by Gannett. The two want new rules permitting them to angle their signals more directly toward the geographic core of the market and to raise power levels so viewers located miles off on the horizon won’t be affected by the steeper tilt of the antenna.
The stations can probably expect favorable action from the FCC, since about 220,000 viewers in the Washington, D.C., market who can see the stations in analog would be in the same boat as FCC staff. Dozens of stations serving big-city markets need the same relief.
“What beam-tilting does is take that antenna and tilt it down toward the core of the market. It’s important for major cities with canyon-type buildings,” said Jerald Fritz, Allbritton’s senior vice president of legal and strategic affairs.
Added Allbritton’s Fritz: “What the [FCC] initially envisioned is that on Feb. 17 the side-mounted antenna is going to move to the top. Well, that’s just not going to happen.”
That kind of consideration is why some TV stations, in a possible negative for their over-the-air viewers, want to reduce analog power levels a year in advance of their official deaths. Other TV stations want authority to shut off their analog signals beginning Aug. 17, 2008 after providing the FCC just 15 days notice.
Looking ahead, these broadcasters want to swap the positions of their digital and analog antennas, moving the analog transmitter to the side of the tower from the top; and moving up the digital one that they will rely on after the transition is completed.
“In order to get the full digital coverage, they are going to have to switch the analog antenna to the side mount, which would reduce your ability to get your [full analog] coverage area,” said Marsha MacBride, executive vice president of legal and regulatory affairs at the National Association of Broadcasters.
FINDING THE WAY
As channel assignments change and as stations reduce or possibly terminate analog service months before the official deadline, the cable industry would like some answers. For an industry with 67 million subscribers located in all 50 states, the transition to the broadcasting of digital signals is going to involve a high level of coordination with 8,000 cable headends, the places where cable operators collect broadcast signals before pushing them to customers.
The National Cable & Telecommunications Association is demanding that each TV station provide the FCC with a plan no later than Dec. 1, 2007 that explains the mechanics of its transition.
“Broadcasters should focus their attention with respect to cable on providing key information to cable systems in a timely manner so that systems may in turn be ready to meet their obligations to carry digital must-carry stations on Feb. 17, 2009,” the NCTA said in an Aug. 30 FCC filing.
Elizabeth Murphy Burns, president of Morgan Murphy Media in Madison, Wis., said none of the cable operators in her five TV-station markets has demanded to meet to ensure a smooth transition.
“They are telling us that they are ready,” the broadcaster said.
Broadcasters have a legal obligation to deliver a good-quality signal to each cable headend to be eligible for mandatory carriage. Some stations actually deliver their signals to cable headends via a fiber connection, but not so much in rural areas where small cable operators ply their trade.
American Cable Association president Matt Polka said his small cable company members are concerned about their ability to receive analog and digital signals as hundreds of stations vary signal power levels and shift the position of antennas in the months ahead.
“Are the broadcasters broadcasting at higher or fuller digital power? And if they’re not, then that obviously affects the reception characteristics of the digital signal,” Polka said.
The time for better coordination is now, he said.
“We think there would be great value in bringing groups together to talk about the operational and technical aspect of the DTV transition, irrespective of what the policy positions are,” Polka said. “If we can find solutions within the industry and the marketplace, we want to make it happen.”
BUMPS AHEAD?
Although the FCC’s digital TV transition plan has a simple design, a bumpy ride could disrupt the finish.
In 1997, every analog TV station received a second license for free to launch digital service. During the transition, analog and digital signals in all 210 local TV markets found a home somewhere on channel 2 through channel 69.
Because digital broadcasting is more spectrally efficient than analog broadcasting, the FCC is reclaiming 108 MHz of broadcast spectrum after the transition. That will leave broadcasters with channels 2 through channel 51, also known as the DTV Core.
To make its transition scheme work, the FCC allowed 600 digital stations to broadcast on channels 52 through 69. Those channels need to find a slot within the DTV Core after Feb. 17, 2009. Some will get a new channel; others will occupy their old analog channel positions inside the DTV Core.
Even broadcasters know that jamming that many stations in a smaller spectrum band will entail a shakedown cruise to determine whether the digital signals will crash into one another and fail to reach their intended targets: consumers, cable headends, and local signal reception facilities built by DirecTV and EchoStar Communications. The cable and satellite TV providers combined serve about 97 million U.S. households.
“Will the cable headends be capable of receiving those new signals?” MSTV’s Donovan asked. “Have stations and cable operators worked together to ensure that the equipment is there? I spoke with one broadcaster in a New England state that, in his service area, has to deal with 70 different cable headends.”
The two major satellite-TV providers, serving about 30 million homes combined, are just as anxious as cable operators about having sufficient time to prepare.
EchoStar provides 1,500 TV signals in 175 local markets; DirecTV, 1,200 TV signals in 143 local markets. In FCC filings, both have explained that each market must be transitioned manually, with workers yanking out analog reception equipment and installing new digital receivers.
“It is critical to understand that EchoStar will not physically be able to transition all broadcasters from analog to digital at midnight on Feb. 17, 2009,” EchoStar warned the FCC.
DirecTV and EchoStar are united in saying that the FCC must require local TV stations to spell out their transition timetables well in advance.
“We can’t just all of a sudden, overnight, be in every single one of these local receive facilities to swap out our equipment,” said Stacy Fuller, DirecTV’s vice president of regulatory affairs. “What we want to try to do is work with all these guys ahead of time and move over as many of them as we can ahead of time in order to avoid disruption.”
As February 2009 nears, the coordination that cable and the satellite carriers are seeking may not be possible as hundreds of stations move into the DTV Core for the first time.
“Generally, if they are not already parked inside [the DTV Core], then we don’t actually know how they are going to fit,” said the NAB’s MacBride. “There’s a lot of potential interference if things don’t fit the way that the model says they are going to fit.”
BALANCE OF POWER
Last but not least are viewers of programming delivered by low-power broadcasters.
The prospect that analog TVs won’t work after the February 2009 switchover is a source of deep concern to owners of low-power TV stations.
The FCC has about 2,300 licensees that operate commercial TV stations with a limited signal range — a few miles, in many cases, and nothing near the 50-mile radius of some full-power signals. Up to 800 LPTV stations operate in Alaska alone.
LPTV stations have no mandatory cable-carriage rights and no legal right to protect the clarity of their signals from static interference generated by nearby full-power TV stations, such as ABC or NBC affiliates.
Reaching about 75% of U.S. households, LPTV stations provide a range of programming, including shows in Spanish, locally produced fare and religious instruction.
“There is a lot of Hispanic network stuff and a lot of locally based stuff, mom and pop programming,” said Washington attorney Peter Tannewald, legal counsel to the Community Broadcasters Association, the trade group for low-power stations.
When Congress imposed a firm end to analog broadcasting, it exempted LPTV stations, leaving that question to the FCC, which hasn’t proposed a cutoff date. Today, just a tiny number of LPTV stations — no more than 25 — are beaming digital signals, because many stations are waiting to see what the FCC decides.
“Some think that’s just a way of being an idiot and being left behind,” Tannewald said.
Because so many LPTV stations intend to continue analog broadcasting beyond Feb. 17, 2009, their owners are concerned that the massive public-education campaign on the DTV transition will fail to mention that analog TV sets will continue to receive and display LPTV signals. The FCC’s message has been that every broadcast-only analog TV will need a converter.
“You are frightening people who should not be frightened because they are not going to lose their LPTV stations,” Tannewald said. “You don’t say your set is going to be useless.”
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