The end of commercial broadcast radio as we know it.

[N0WVA]

I could get by without a TV in the house and not miss it.  My wife watches some of the stuff on commercial TV like American Idol, but I think it is a waste of time. But she doesn't keep the TV running all her waking hours as many of her friends do.

To put it bluntly, I have just about as much use for commercial radio and TV as I have for 75m slopbucket.

Best investment I ever made was the wireless headphones for the wife. Ten bucks at Big Lots and they are real comfortable. She can watch all the retard TV she wants and I dont have to be tortured with all the screaming and carrying on. I can melt solder in peace.

[W2VW]

Jim:

While we cannot stop progress, the FCC has been promoting other services at the expense of free OTA radio and TV for decades. The FCC was originally an engineering group that was replaced with lawyers creating technical regulation, thus the wireless consortium will win over, at the expense of the consumer.

Having spent 25+ years in broadcasting, I have a historical background while working very hard to stay abreast of the latest technology. From a broadcaster's point of view, the re-mapping of TV spectrum was an economically difficult transition that had no economic gain (actually heavy costs on the average of $10m per station) for the broadcaster.  This latest selling of the public's spectrum is obviously the nail in the coffin for us. And yes, I agree that the NAB provides too little too late. Take for instance the Mobile DTV push that is happening right now (I helped implement it at our station)-I feel this is technically flawed technology (i.e. 8vsb in a moving environment) that is arriving a bit too late, while 3g is already in place serving the iPhone crowd.

The WiMax idea can be a good thing, but I feel they can do it without taking the broadcaster's spectrum. My guess is the re-farming of broadcaster's spectrum is a move to squash competition for entertainment, and at the same time, yet another free service becomes a paid....err "service". How much local content will these Internet providers create?

So those on a fixed income will not be able to get free entertainment, but more importantly access to emergency information and public service as the rules for license ownership were originally based on (yes also originally it was accepted as a blatantly commercial service). WiMax will widen the gap between the have's and the have not's, and allow for more complete surveillance of the end user.

Also it is my opinion that once spectrum is sold in any way, the FCC really has no leg to stand on regarding regulation.

Will the new users of this valuable spectrum be required to hold to the same rules for emergency alert, profanity and public service as the broadcasters currently do? I think not.

Is this proposed re-farming in the public interest, convenience or necessity?

Dan

 

http://www.rabbitears.info/blog/index.php?post/2010/03/18/Opinion%3A-National-Broadband-Plan

[K5UJ]

I have already read that some FCC staffers are proposing to pay DTV stations to voluntarily relinquish their licenses so that the TV band can be repacked and reduced yet again in favor of broadband technologies. In terms of regulatory support, OTA DTV appears to be a dead man walking.  

73, Jim
WA2AJM/3

Dream on.  Broadcast television, over the air TV, will not die until the Congress is convinced it is not needed to run campaign ads and reach the voters and get votes.  They just spent around a hundred million bucks on $40 coupons for converter boxes.   They decided when the changeover would be; not the FCC.  And all it takes to kill a bill is for one senator from a rural state to decide he has no other way to get to his voters in the sticks but over the air tv to get reelected, and it is game over for the whole country.  You seem to think the FCC can just do anything they want.  I have news for you, The Congress tells the FCC what to do through the Secretary of Commerce by calling him in to testify before flood lamps and flash bulbs and making his life miserable.    The Congress ultimately decides what goes into the United States Code; not the FCC.  Most of the time the FCC is allowed to follow their own rule development and procedure but the Congress can intervene whenever they want.   

I watch on average 30 minutes of TV / week.   I tape some public radio shows and listen to them at my convenience.  Most of my live radio is AM.  I love radio when it is analog AM on a good receiver. 

[k4kyv]

One of the more sensible proposals I have heard so far is to re-purpose TV  channels 5 and 6 to expand the FM broadcast band, and give AM daytimers and  local stations hampered by limited coverage the first shot at the new frequencies,  while leaving the AM band to a much smaller number of remaining regional stations, and to clear channel blowtorches with national night-time coverage.

Only a handful of TV stations across the country are still using those two channels, but their owners are screaming to high heaven in opposition to the proposal, and it appears NAB has come down on their side, even though there is plenty of vacant spectrum in other nearby abandoned VHF TV channels that they could easily move to.

This reminds me of the minuscule number of CW operators who still operate in the 40m segment between 7100 and 7125, but who cry holy hell whenever someone suggests expanding the phone segment down to 7100 following the  removal of broadcasters from 7100-7200.