Broadcasters, WSD Supporters Point Fingers on ATSC DTS 'Spectrum Grab'

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.”