The National Institute of Standards and Technology is accepting comment through July 19 on a draft plan for “federal government engagement in advancing artificial intelligence standards for U.S. economic and national security needs,” the agency announced Tuesday.

The FCC should exempt noncommercial educational TV stations from the simulcasting requirements of the ATSC 3.0 transition, PBS and America’s Public Television Stations told Media Bureau staff Tuesday, according to a filing posted Friday in docket 16-142. Only low-power TV stations currently are allowed to “flash-cut” to 3.0 -- full-power broadcasters must continue broadcasting substantially similar content in the current 1.0 standard along with a 3.0 broadcast stream. Commercial broadcasters are cooperating to host each others’ broadcasts to make the shift, but public TV officials argued NCE stations will have difficulty finding transition partners. “Without such an exemption, the simulcasting mandate will preclude many public television stations from pursuing a transition to ATSC 3.0,” the filing said. That will disproportionately affect noncommercial stations and rural communities, it said.

Fox Television Stations became the first owned and operated station group to join ATSC 3.0 alerting group the Advanced Warning and Response Network Alliance, AWARN said. “We support the Alliance’s broader mission to develop a framework for providing emergency information beyond the initial alert,” said Fox Executive Vice President-Engineering, Operations and Technology Richard Friedel in the release Thursday: “ATSC 3.0 will enable FOX Television Stations to use its local news assets as never before." AWARN said it will hold roundtable discussions with “TV news thought leaders” in the months ahead: “The goal is development of a voluntary framework for packaging a TV station’s news assets and using ATSC 3.0 to engage with viewers as their trusted information source across multiple devices.” Also last week, a 3.0 conference was held in Washington (see 1905310007).

Sinclair is “learning quite a bit” from “the actual RF capabilities” of its ATSC 3.0 single-frequency network in Dallas now that it’s “fully operational,” said CEO Chris Ripley on a Q1 earnings call Wednesday. By adding three more SFN sites to the Dallas deployment, “we dramatically enhance the quality of reception through the entirety” of the designated market area, “to the level of quality that you’d expect from a wireless carrier,” he said. “Most of the testing right now is actually on the physical characteristics of that RF signal and reception.” Sinclair’s work with Korean joint-venture partner SK Telecom to develop 3.0 services globally (see 1901080045) is launching “as we speak,” said Ripley. “There’ll be more coming out of that venture in terms of the consumer-facing iterations of 3.0,” he said. “It will undoubtedly be an app-based experience that will include much more in the way of programming choice and VOD assets and targeted advertising,” plus “premium subscriber-based content,” he said. Many in the industry are working to develop similar 3.0 services, he said. “Our horse in the race there is our joint venture with SK.” Sinclair is “on plan to initiate” 3.0's deployment in 20-30 markets this year as part of the industry’s drive to debut 3.0 services in the top 40 U.S. TV markets by the end of 2020 (see 1904080071), said Ripley. “Great strides are being made” in 3.0 with “broad support from leaders within the NAB and the FCC,” he said.

A look into the FCC’s ATSC 3.0 commercial license application process will be a featured session during ATSC’s 2019 Next Gen TV Broadcast Conference May 29-30, said a preliminary agenda. “The hope is that the FCC will be ready to share more details" about the license application by the end of May, "but regardless we will preview the process,” emailed spokesperson Dave Arland Thursday. Lack of an FCC license application form to commercially deploy 3.0 services is a serious impediment for broadcasters, last month’s NAB Show was told (see 1904100043). The form may come before June, we were told there (see 1904080066). Other sessions planned for the ATSC conference include a “case study” from the Pearl TV-led model-market project in Phoenix on how stations can work with MVPDs in launching 3.0 services. Automotive uses for 3.0, which retiring ATSC President Mark Richer said in Las Vegas was an increasingly hot topic inside his standards organization, will be another conference session, as will a look into “branding plans” for 3.0. “Your Guide to an ATSC 3.0 Station Transition” is the theme of Day 1, “Ramping Up for the 2020 Launch” for Day 2.

New America Open Technology Institute opposition to allowing TV white spaces to be used for the ATSC 3.0 transition runs counter to its previous position that consumers should be protected during the transition, NAB said in a meeting Tuesday with the FCC Media Bureau and Incentive Auction Task Force, per a filing Thursday in docket 16-142. OTI opposed the 3.0 order on the basis of consumer protection but now opposes allowing broadcasters to use TV white spaces to maintain service during the transition, NAB said. OTI has “lost track of its own positions,” NAB said, comparing the advocacy group with Moby Dick’s doomed antagonist Captain Ahab. OTI also acts as though the FCC never sought comment on the use of the white spaces for 3.0 before Sinclair-owned One Media lobbied on the issue, NAB said. “OTI was aware of this at one point, because it joined comments addressing this issue.” The FCC should allow the white spaces to be used for the 3.0 transition, NAB said. "We obviously know the FCC asked a question about it, but the proposal we oppose was initiated by Sinclair’s OneMedia," emailed Michael Calabrese, New America Wireless Future Program director. "Awarding broadcast licensees free, exclusive access to vacant TV channels would violate the Communications Act," impose costs on wireless mic users, and "derail" efforts to expand broadband to rural areas, Calabrese said. Letting broadcasters use the white spaces would "subsidize the broadcasters’ ambition to compete with mobile carriers who, unlike broadcast licensees, paid for their spectrum at auction.”

Broadcasters should keep an open mind about how ATSC 3.0 will be monetized, said Nexstar CEO Perry Sook at a Media Institute lunch Tuesday. Responding to a question about whether he thinks 3.0 chips will make it into smartphones, Sook compared ancillary use of broadcast spectrum to landowners in his home state of Texas profiting on their mineral rights. It took years to develop techniques to extract oil from shale, and it could take many attempts to figure out the future of the new standard, he said. “We believe the flexibility of the platform will enable broadcasters to provide future services not conceived today,” Sook said. NAB later posted his remarks.

There’s “big news afoot” involving the ATSC 3.0 commercial rollout at a Pearl TV-organized news conference planned for Monday at the NAB Show (see 1904040075), said a spokesperson Thursday. NAB President Gordon Smith, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr, plus “a large group of U.S. broadcasters, and other industry participants,” will be on hand to discuss “near-term deployment plans” for 3.0, said a media advisory. It’s scheduled for 11:45 a.m. at the 3.0 presentation stage in the Las Vegas Convention Center’s North Hall.

Tribune Media's WJW Cleveland transmitted a Nielsen audience measurement watermark using ATSC 3.0 last week, NAB said Wednesday. The outlet is a 3.0 test station that NAB and CTA agreed in 2017 to run jointly as a 3.0 "living laboratory" (see 1711070038). The inaudible signals in a program’s audio help identify a show for audience measurement, NAB noted now. Nexstar is buying Tribune (see 1903200058). Opponents to the deal don't present fresh facts, the combining companies said (see 1904030072).

The FCC shouldn’t let broadcasters use vacant spectrum channels for the ATSC 3.0 transition, said Consumer Reports and the Open Technology Institute at New America in a meeting last week with an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, recounted a filing posted Tuesday in docket 16-142. Doing so would harm the public interest and prevent TV white spaces from being used “to bridge the digital divide,” the groups said. Comparing the use of vacant channels to “doubling a station’s free spectrum assignment,” the groups said letting broadcasters use the spectrum isn’t needed to protect consumers, even if it would help broadcasters. The FCC should instead adopt a further notice to allow the use of location data to determine what sort of interference protections are needed to protect WMTS operations on channel 37, the filing said.