Spectrum-Reuse Research Expected from Broadcasters

Some owners of TV station groups are doing their own research on the implications of early-stage requests by the FCC to use TV spectrum for wireless broadband (CD Oct 29 p1), a veteran industry lawyer said. The NAB and the Association for Maximum Service Television may do research or pay for it, others said.

“I'm very sure that between the NAB and MSTV there will be a number of studies done,” said President Paul Karpowicz of Meredith Broadcast Group, chairman of the NAB TV board. Research could be done by economists and could include study of some of broadcasting’s intangible public benefits, he said. Critics of the CEA-commissioned report say it failed to measure that. Studies paid for by the NAB are a possible option, said another broadcast official. There are no plans yet for a study to answer the one by economist Coleman Bazelon that the CEA released Oct. 23 and filed as a contribution to the FCC’s National Broadband Plan.

“It’s not at all clear that wireless proponents, such as the CEA study, take into account at all the value of the public good aspect of free over-the-air transmission,” said President David Donovan of MSTV. They don’t try to put a dollar value on the mobile video standard approved last month by the Advanced TV Systems Committee, he added. “If you look at the demand equation for why you need more spectrum, the bulk of it is to provide video on the wireless side.” Broadcasters have much more capacity than wireless does for video, he said. “This is top of our agenda” at MSTV, he added. “For the industry at large, this is an extremely important issue.”

The CEA-commissioned analysis could be applied to other types of spectrum such as that occupied by the government and private users, Bazelon said Friday. “It sets up a methodology that you should look at all spectrum and what it’s worth in its current use.” Though his study doesn’t account for intangible public benefits from broadcasting, including them likely won’t “change the conclusion,” Bazelon said. “I have not seen any analysis that indicates they amount to very much money.” The study proposed no service rules or band plan and isn’t a “final proposal,” noted Jamie Hedlund, a CEA vice president. “We'll see where this dialog goes to and see what additional analysis might be helpful.” The NAB estimates all U.S. broadcasters donated $7 billion annually worth of air time in public service announcements and raise billions more for charities.

The challenge of the FCC’s broadband work is to “understand the tough trade-offs, come up with creative options” to spur mobile access to high-speed Internet service, wrote Executive Director Blair Levin of the FCC’s Omnibus Broadband Initiative staff. The 50 MHz of spectrum “in the pipeline now” is not well suited for such uses, and “it takes an average of 6 to 13 years to clear spectrum,” he wrote Thursday on broadband.gov. “Spectrum is like height. If you don’t have it, it’s pretty hard to be in the big leagues.”

“A number of broadcaster groups are beginning to study various aspects of the proposal” from the FCC’s broadband team “to get a sense of the potential value of the spectrum and to test the basic assumption that reallocating the spectrum would result in a higher and better use,” said John Hane, a Pillsbury Winthrop lawyer with clients in the TV industry. “When you peel the onion back just a little, you see pretty quickly that the analysis isn’t as simple as the CEA study suggests. The FCC wants data and analysis. I think it will be forthcoming and that a lot of people will be surprised at what it shows.”

Spectrum is seen by NAB members and broadcast lawyers as the biggest TV issue for Gordon Smith, who started Tuesday as the NAB’s president and who visited the eighth floor the next day to discuss media ownership. (See separate report in this issue.) Smith may soon visit commissioners and FCC staff to discuss spectrum, which didn’t seem to come up in Wednesday’s meeting with Chairman Julius Genachowski, an industry official said. Smith wasn’t available to comment.

The issue of spectrum is “something we need to work on” as an industry, said President Robert Prather of Gray TV, which runs 36 stations. “I don’t think it’s been high on NAB’s list but I think it should be.” Smith should take a close look at the matter, he said. “We've done a poor job [by] not educating the public that an over-the-air digital signal is probably better than a cable signal because cable has to go through two or three steps to get the HD to you” and the signal is compressed. Spectrum reallocation has been discussed by FCC staffers and executives for three decades, another veteran broadcast executive said. “This is a long- term issue, but it’s not a new issue and the broadcasters can have flexible use today” under current rules.

Some broadcasters may not oppose reallocation because they hope to profit from giving up spectrum (CD Oct 30 p4), but with few details available from the FCC, the outlook is hard to judge, executives said. “Some people see this as a threat,” Hane said: “Some people see this as an opportunity.” Which is correct remains to be seen, he said. The relationships between affiliates and networks, with many deals coming up for renewal, is an issue of perhaps equal import as spectrum for broadcasters, Hane and several executives said.

The NAB will ask its members about spectrum reallocation “and get a sense of the consensus opinion,” Karpowicz said. “The FCC has referred to a number of broadcasters that they have spoken to that would be in favor of a spectrum-for-cash arrangement, but they're always very reluctant to state who those people are,” he added. “I know many broadcasters that have just the opposite perspective.”

All the broadcast executives that we surveyed said there’s no spectrum shortage. Several said other users could use their frequencies more efficiently than they do. “When this one becomes sort of a non-starter for most people is looking at how much spectrum the military uses,” said a broadcast company engineer. “There is no available spectrum that is free and clear.” Others see plenty of spectrum available beyond broadcasting’s. “There is an awful lot of bandwidth in the hands of an awful lot of people … whose business plans aren’t working out well,” said Chief Technology Officer David Folsom of Raycom Media, which owns 46 TV stations. “We're going to be using what little bandwidth we have left … for mobile handheld” video.

Arguments against giving up TV spectrum are that it would hinder progress toward open mobile video, being tested in some cities, and could make it harder for stations to warn the public of emergencies, said the executives we surveyed. “We just need to engage with the FCC in discussions to determine what they're thinking, how we can help them and express our concern about any plan that would change the table of allocations as it exists today,” Karpowicz said. “We'd like to work with them to help them.”