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ATSC 3.0 Disruptive?

Public TV Shouldn't Fear Funding Battle, Butler Says

America's Public Television Stations President Patrick Butler conceded Washington is "rife with rumor" that President Donald Trump will recommend a budget that doesn't include funding for the CPB (see 1702230060), and noncommercial educational stations shouldn't "fear the battle that will come." Along with public TV's extensive support in Congress, 70 percent of Trump voters support funding CPB and would tell the president to "leave public television alone," Butler said at an APTS conference.

Butler and Sinclair Executive Chairman David Smith discussed potential opportunities for public TV with the impending ATSC 3.0 television standard. The benefits that NCE stations would be able to offer public safety entities with ATSC 3.0 have been a major selling point for the new standard, and 3.0 still could be implemented if public media were to suffer a funding hit, Smith responded to us. If that were to happen, public TV stations may be able to use the revenue opportunities of the new standard to help make up the funding gap, Smith said. He didn't think that would be a problem: "I think Pat's got that figured out.”

Trump shouldn't seek to defund public TV because he and it have similar goals, Butler said. Trump was elected to be the "tribune" of "what he calls the forgotten men and women of our country," Butler said. That goal and Trump's focus on finding a trusted media source "mirror the mission of public television," Butler said.

That the incentive auction's end coincided with FCC movement toward approving 3.0 "couldn't have worked out better" for public TV, since the repacking reimbursement fund should subsidize NCE stations upgrading to 3.0 compatible equipment, Butler said. Prior to the auction, public TV entities had raised concerns about their translators getting displaced in the repacking, and he's "hopeful" the FCC under Chairman Ajit Pai will reexamine those worries. Though only some stations have announced their results, Butler said it "appears" that no market will find itself without public TV service because of the auction.

ATSC 3.0 will be the "most disruptive" development in information distribution in U.S. history, Smith said. The most effective way for public broadcasters to take advantage of the technology will be to aggregate their "bits" with those of commercial broadcasters to form a nationwide network, Smith said. Each market could become a "pipeline" using the aggregated spectrum of all broadcasters there, allowing all to profit when that network is used to transmit data for applications such as autonomous cars, Smith said. Public broadcasters should ask legislators to loosen up restrictions on how NCE spectrum is used, to allow them to use ATSC 3.0 to better contribute to their funding, Smith said.