In its latest status report on nation’s DTV transition, FCC said ...
In its latest status report on nation’s DTV transition, FCC said broadcasters continued to make strides but many challenges remained. Mass Media Bureau Chief Roy Stewart said 38 of 40 stations in top 10 TV markets now were transmitting…
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digital signals, leaving only 2 to go. In next group of markets, number 11 through 30, he said 67 of 79 stations were transmitting digital signals. Overall, he said, there are 190 DTV stations on air, covering 64% of U.S. TV households. He said some DTV markets are particularly flourishing, with 8 operating digital stations in L.A. and 5 in Washington. “We believe the DTV transition is going better than many people give it credit for, although not as fast as some hoped,” he said. “Sometimes, technology takes time.” Stewart said FCC had granted construction permits for 1,090 of 1,688 DTV station allotments, with 598 “nonroutine applications” still pending, largely because of interference or international coordination issues. He said Bureau would “expedite processing for applicants ready and willing to build DTV facilities.” Stewart also cited CEA statistics indicating that manufacturers sold 648,000 sets to dealers last year, up 400% from 1999. But he also mentioned several “caveats:” (1) Sales figures reflect set purchases by dealers, not consumers. (2) Even DTV sales to dealers amount to small fraction of overall TV set sales, which reached 25 million last year. (3) Most sales were of DTV display monitors, not sets with integrated digital tuners. (4) DTV set prices, while falling, continued to be high. Stewart also said that DTV-cable interoperability problems, lack of HDTV and other digital programming and digital copyright protection issues continued to hamper DTV rollout. Comr. Ness welcomed report but chided cable and satellite industries for not doing more to promote DTV transition. “I hope to see some voluntary progress by cable,” she said, noting “lot of reluctance” by industry to carry digital broadcast programming. Ness said she was “pleased” to see discussions between cable operators and public broadcasters about DTV carriage deals (CD April 18 p1). She said she hoped carriage deal between AOL Time Warner and PTV stations would serve as “template” for other carriage agreements.