LAS VEGAS -- Disney believes the studio’s animated content in high dynamic range “isn’t necessarily” enhanced by resolutions higher than 1080p, Cynthia Slavens, director of the Disney-owned Pixar Animation Studios, told us Saturday at the NAB Show’s Future of Cinema Conference. In animated HDR content, “for us, we are very content with a 1080 image,” Slavens said.
Trade groups representing broadcasters, tech companies and others jointly filed a petition for rulemaking Wednesday asking the FCC to allow broadcasters to begin using the new ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard. “This enhanced digital IP-based standard will create the bedrock for continuing innovation by the television industry for decades to come,” said the petition filed by America's Public Television Stations (APTS), CTA, NAB and a group of broadcasters and electronics companies called the Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance, which was officially formed Tuesday (see 1604120069).
Broadcasting groups focused on transitioning to the ATSC 3.0 standard joined with consumer electronics companies to form a group focused on using the new standard for advanced emergency alerting. Called the AWARN Alliance after the proposed Advanced Warning and Response Network, the new entity will support “rapid deployment” of the AWARN system, which can deliver “rich media” such as graphics or video containing emergency information to consumer devices, the group said in a Tuesday announcement. The alliance includes ATSC advocates Pearl TV; Pilot, the former NAB Labs; LG Electronics and Sinclair. The AWARN Alliance will officially launch at the 2016 NAB Show, the group said. The group said it will be headed by John Lawson, formerly of America’s Public Television Stations and an architect of AWARN.
FCC fines and enforcement advisories are “a step forward” on pirate radio, but the commission should increase equipment seizures to truly reduce the amount of unlicensed operators, broadcasters and their lawyers said in interviews Tuesday. That day, the Enforcement Bureau issued a $15,000 forfeiture for unlicensed Broward County, Florida, station WBIG. Now, the FCC should seize the equipment of pirates like WBIG, broadcasters said. The bureau has been stepping up pirate radio enforcement, though a whistleblower was said to claim priorities had shifted away from such activities amid tight budgets, covered in a Special Report on FCC partisanship (see 1512150014).
The Multicultural Media, Telecommunications and Internet Council panned the FCC order on multilingual emergency alert system warnings, in a statement Tuesday (see 1603300064). The order “does not move us even a step closer to ensuring that our nation’s 25 million multilingual Americans, including children, the elderly, and the disabled, actually receive life-saving information before, during, and immediately after an emergency,” MMTC President Kim Keenan said: “If a broadcast license means anything at all, it should mean that broadcasters must deliver to their most vulnerable listeners the life-saving information they need when they need it the most. The penalty for an individual’s lack of English proficiency must never be death.” The FCC order requires state EAS officials to report their multilingual EAS offerings, but doesn't require that they provide an offering. MMTC and other public interest groups had pushed for an order that would offer incentives to broadcasters that provide EAS alerts in multiple languages.
As IoT devices proliferate more rapidly than imagined, potential risks to people's privacy and security could "also emerge at a breakneck pace," which will have to be addressed through comprehensive legislation, FTC Chairwoman Edith Ramirez said during a speech before the American Bar Association's conference on IoT Thursday (see 1603300052). She touted the benefits of IoT devices such as providing real-time diagnostics to drivers and service facilities or monitoring pipeline leaks. But there also have been news reports and studies about hacks into medical connected devices to obtain data that is 10 times more valuable than a credit card number or to change settings that can stop an insulin device from delivering medicine.
The FCC will require state emergency alert system organizations to document their multilingual EAS offerings, said an order approved Wednesday by a 4-1 vote, with Commissioner Mike O'Rielly dissenting in part. The order is a response to “The Katrina Petition,” a 2005 request for multilingual EAS offerings by the Independent Spanish Broadcasters Association, the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council and the United Church of Christ. “We reaffirm our commitment to promoting the delivery of Emergency Alert System (EAS) alerts to as wide an audience as technically feasible, including to those who communicate in a language other than English or may have a limited understanding of the English language,” the order said.
Two more ingredients of ATSC 3.0's physical layer remain to be elevated to final standards now that the A/321 document on system discovery and signaling architecture for the physical layer has cleared ATSC membership balloting as a full standard, ATSC President Mark Richer told us Monday. Though Sinclair scooped ATSC in releasing the news in a Monday morning announcement that A/321 had been approved, “we’re all good,” Richer told us.
Any tech standards that comply with FCC-proposed rules for third-party set-top boxes should “provide for competitive interoperability across all" multichannel video programming distributor systems, said officials from the Computer & Communications Industry Association, Google, Hauppauge, Incompas, Public Knowledge and TiVo, representing the Consumer Video Choice Coalition in a meeting Tuesday with Media Bureau staff and FCC Chief Technology Officer Scott Jordan, said an ex parte filing posted Friday in docket 16-42. The CVCC representatives said device provider certifications are a “feasible” way to “affirm adherence” to rules on privacy, emergency alerting and children's programming. The FCC should act on a pending petition to reinstate encoding rules, the CVCC said. The FCC shouldn't wait for the completion of a diversity study to change the set-top rules, said GFNTV, National Black Programming Consortium, New England Broadband, Townsend Group and iSwop Networks in a letter to Chairman Tom Wheeler Tuesday. “Diverse programmers and cable networks have repeatedly made a compelling case that the current system of little to no minority ownership and programming is abhorrent and deserving of a solution such as that proposed in the NPRM,” the letter said.
Comments on FCC-proposed emergency alert system changes including "securing the EAS against accidental misuse and malicious intrusion" are due May 9, replies June 7, in docket 15-94, the agency said in Thursday's Federal Register. Paperwork Reduction Act comments are due May 23 on the NPRM, which also asks about "ensuring that alerting mechanisms are able to leverage advancements in technology, including IP-based technologies." Commissioners approved an NPRM on EAS at their Jan. 28 meeting. Commissioner Mike O'Rielly partially dissented because the item sought comment on Internet aspects of EAS (see 1601280057).