Verance developed a “mechanism” for addressing the risks of fingerprint-based dynamic advertising insertion (DAI) technologies marring subscription VOD content viewing, said the company Thursday. It enables over-the-top services to “privately identify their content to TVs” to safeguard their content against audience measurement functionality while preventing insertion of unauthorized dynamic ads, said Verance. With DAI technologies newly “baked” into smart TVs, subscription VOD services and TV makers worry about the risk of “ads or measurement functions meant for broadcast being mistakenly placed into the streams” of OTT video services, it said. “We believe this will create a path forward for the subscription VOD and ad-supported broadcast worlds to co-exist,” said Verance CEO Nil Shah. Though TV makers are able to deactivate automatic content recognition (ACR) when apps run natively on a smart TV, “they currently have no way to do that for SVOD content played or casted from devices connected to the TV via HDMI,” said Verance. “SVOD content is indistinguishable from broadcast content when each is received from attached devices including media sticks, set-top boxes and A/V receivers.” With broadcast TV becoming more interactive through the advent of platforms like ATSC 3.0, it’s important for TVs “to have more advanced ACR technology,” said Verance. “We not only need to know what content each person is watching but how it is being distributed,” said Shah. “If I am watching Seinfeld on Netflix and hit pause or playback, that shouldn’t be an opportunity for an ad that is supposed to appear in broadcast syndication to play and ruin my ad-free viewer experience on a subscription service.”

The Patent and Trademark Office granted CTA its first six-month deadline extension request for a statement of use (SOU) in its application to register the NEXTGEN TV logo as a certification mark for ATSC 3.0-compliant TVs (see 1909260021), said an agency notice Friday. PTO requires the SOU before a registration certificate can be issued to prevent applicants from hoarding trademarks they have no intention of using commercially. Applicants are entitled to five deadline extensions of six months each but must file the SOU within three years after the issue date of the notice of allowance, which in CTA’s case would be April 21, 2023. CTA has a “continued bona fide intention” to use the logo in commerce, said its Wednesday extension request. PTO doesn’t require applicants to say why they want SOU deadline extensions, and CTA didn’t offer an explanation. The association didn't comment Friday. CTA last landed a certification mark registration certificate from PTO in April 2019 for the 4K Ultra HD logo, but not before the association filed for three SOU deadline extensions over two years.

Insight TV, billed as the first over-the-air 4K HDR broadcast channel in the U.S., launches Thursday in Boise on Evoca, the Edge Networks ATSC 3.0 platform (see 2004030006), said the startup. Insight TV, available 24/7 on the Evoca platform, will feature “original, adventure-focused programming and incredible storytelling,” said the company. “We built Evoca for the more than 50 million U.S. households in mid-sized markets like Boise -- where TV choices are limited and expensive,” said Evoca CEO Todd Achilles.

Don't require stations moving to ATSC 3.0 to HD simulcast or take up proposals from public interest groups to subsidize consumer compatible equipment purchases from broadcasters' ancillary service fees, said NAB in a call Thursday with FCC Media Bureau Chief Michelle Carey. “Rules regarding derogation of service have not proven controversial or unworkable in any way, and there is no compelling reason for the Commission to adjust those,” said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 20-145. Don’t “inject” retransmission consent matters here, NAB asked. “There is simply no reason for the Commission to consider, let alone adopt, regulations to prevent a harm that has not yet materialized associated with services that are not yet being offered.”

Broadcasters will have “a lot" of new ATSC 3.0 deployments over the next five years, NAB Chief Technology Officer Sam Matheny told CTA’s virtual Technology and Standards Forum Tuesday. “You’re going to see a lot of stations that are taking advantage of the benefits of NextGenTV as it relates to better picture, better sound.” Sports broadcasting contracts will be up for renewal, and with that will come “increased pressure to start doing stuff in 4K,” he said. NextGenTV is now a “reality” in the U.S., said Matheny. COVID-19, "unfortunately," is “another reality,” he said. Broadcasters haven’t put NextGenTV “on the back burner” during the health crisis, he said. “Their commitment hasn’t wavered,” though the pandemic “has slowed the rollout,” said Matheny. Nine U.S. markets are live with 3.0, serving about 10% of TV households, he said. Stations in eight more markets have filed 3.0 license applications “with intentions to go on the air in the near future,” he said. “Things are changing rapidly,” though industry likely will fall 50% short of its 2019 NAB Show goal of launching in 60 markets by the end of 2020, he said. The CES 2020 “commitment” of LG, Samsung and Sony to debut up to 20 NextGenTV models collectively this year was “probably exceeded,” despite “quite a few challenges around getting products launched and shipped” during the pandemic, said Brian Markwalter, CTA senior vice president-technology and standards. Models run the gamut from sets priced below $1,000 to the most expensive 8K TVs, available both in OLED and "full-array" LCD, he said. CTA and NAB are “in the process now” of releasing the “next big revision” in the NextGenTV “test suite” for 2021-model TVs, he said. The suite involves 135 tests and more than 150 “unique assertions,” he said. TVs are required to pass to qualify for the NextGenTV logo, he said.

Calls to use ancillary service fees generated by ATSC 3.0 datacasting to fund consumer purchases of compatible equipment are a “red-herring,” said One Media in replies in docket 20-145 for Monday’s midnight deadline for responses to a June NPRM (see 2008180060). Statute requires the fees be deposited into the DTV Transition and Public Safety Fund, One Media said. Instead, the FCC would be “well-within its authority” to delay imposing fees on 3.0 datacasting for five years, said the company. NAB called the idea from Public Knowledge and the Open Technology Institute “legally questionable.” NAB urged the FCC “to move expeditiously to conclude this proceeding without adding regulatory hurdles for broadcasters.” Don’t nullify broadcaster obligations to pay such fees, said PK and OTI. “Revisit its ancillary and supplementary services rules as applied to Broadcast Internet services to ensure its fees and other regulations provide regulatory parity and reflect broadcasters’ evolving business ambitions,” asked CTIA. The public interest groups and NCTA again said the FCC should upgrade requirements for broadcasters to mandate an HD stream. “In considering whether the provision of such services unlawfully derogates broadcast television services, the Commission should be guided by the current state of technology and consumer expectations,” the cable association said. That the agency should “mechanically define ‘advanced’ with reference to a certain pixel count specified in a 1996 technical standard is obvious folly,” said ATSC 3.0 consortium BitPath. The FCC should “take measures that add protections for LPTV stations during the nation’s progression toward the offering of robust Next Gen TV services,” said the National Religious Broadcasters.

Startup Edge Networks will soft-launch its Evoca-branded ATSC 3.0-based content service Monday in Boise through an “early access” program for the first 200 subscribers who sign up at $20 a month through year-end. The offer includes a Scout-branded receiver and indoor TV antenna, since much of Evoca’s content is broadcast locally from one of two low-power 3.0 stations in Boise being leased from Cocola Broadcasting (see 2003100036 or 2003100042). The service officially starts Sept. 1 at the standard subscription price of $49 a month, offering “60+ channels with more to come.”

Seven TV more stations are in ATSC 3.0, said Nexstar Tuesday: in Oregon, Sinclair’s KATU Portland, Nexstar’s KOIN Portland and KRCW-TV Salem, Tegna’s KGW Portland, Meredith’s KPTV Portland and Oregon Public Broadcasting’s KOPB-TV Eugene, and in Washington state, KPDX Vancouver.

Expansion of the footprint for ATSC 3.0, launched in South Korea in 2017, will continue “in earnest” in the near future, Parks Associates reported, noting launches on Las Vegas stations in May (see 2005260061) and elsewhere. It cited benefits including 4K HDR video support, immersive audio via Dolby Atmos and DTS-X, on-demand video, access to enriched interactive content and an updated emergency alert system. A required tuner could be a boon for smart TV makers such as Samsung, LG and Sony, which are developing 3.0-enabled sets. Data and analytics will drive personalization and search capabilities, and push notifications will play a prominent role beyond just operating system updates, it said: Smart TV’s role will evolve through COVID-19 to remain “front and center” in the U.S. connected home. Technology advances, proliferation of video apps and improved interoperability with other devices have pushed the smart TV to a more central residential role, Parks said. In Q1, 30% of TV owners said their most-used TV has a voice-enabled remote control or voice assistant -- or can be controlled by a smart speaker -- vs. 10% in the year-ago quarter.

Broadcast entities and white space devices proponents accused one another of attempting to seize control of spectrum they don’t own, in replies posted in docket 20-74 Tuesday in the FCC ATSC 3.0 distributed transmission system proceeding (see 2006150060). Microsoft’s opposition to relaxing interference rules to allow DTS systems is “a back door spectrum grab,” said One Media. The proposed changes “will only benefit a subgroup of broadcasters pursuing their vision of Broadcast Internet by allowing them to extend their respective coverage footprint,” Microsoft said. Though a broadcaster, PMCM also argued that DTS supporters’ motives aren’t pure. “The proposal is essentially a grab for new territory at the cost of decades of Commission adherence to community values,” PMCM said. "The only opposition to this proposal comes from parties with secondary or non-existent spectrum rights that ask the Commission to provide them with unprecedented and unwarranted protections,” said NAB and America’s Public Television Stations. Rule changes are premature because broadcasters have “yet to deploy ATSC 3.0 services in any widespread manner” and they aren’t aimed at improving TV broadcasting, said the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute and Public Knowledge. Assertions that broadcasters aren’t seeking those changes to improve over-the-air TV and would heavily invest in single-frequency networks only to compete in a datacasting market that doesn’t yet exist are naive, BitPath said. Revenue and public service benefits from datacasting won’t justify those sorts of investments on their own “for the foreseeable future,” said the company. “While the Commission does not propose granting the DTS spillover area any protection or rights today, based on the history of ATSC 3.0, we know such a request will be forthcoming,” Microsoft said. “It is only a matter of when.”