[opendtv] Re: Sinclair Launches Original Programming Division | Broadcasting & Cable
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2014 00:37:30 +0000
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> The quantity of programming is going to decline anyway, because too few
> are watching.
I doubt that. The consistent theme is, even in this article, that people aren't
watching the old way. You're the one adding in the bit about too few watching.
> The density of the mesh is population AND economics dependent.
No arm waving. The density, in LTE broadcast, determines the spectral
efficiency you can achieve. Very simple.
> And Bert totally ignores the fact that Broadcast LTE will serve fixed
> receivers too.
No, Craig, but I go beyond banalities.
A move to LTE, especially when combined with the loss of channels above 33 (or
whatever the exact one will be), will mean that fixed receivers will get many
fewer program streams OTA. Now, you argue that fixed receivers aren't
important, but my point is, they do exist, and service to them will degrade,
most likely by a lot. In terms of program choice.
At the same time, service to mobile devices will not depend on this broadcaster
spectrum anyway. First, because the wireless telcos have no reason to give
broadcasters this freebie, and second, because live-broadcast-only service to
mobile devices is mostly useless. Except for a really tiny amount of events.
So you're left with a degraded program choice to fixed receivers, and no
credible benefits.
I think broadcasters *should* re-evaluate the roles they play in this TV game.
The OTA broadcast role is certainly going to be less important in the future,
so screwing around with the OTA broadcast standard is risky business.
Broadcasters might just accelerate the demise of a market segment that they
actually have. But if they must, any new standard considered for OTA ought to
be optimized for one-way broadcast, I think, rather than compromised by a
two-way service option that broadcasters will likely never use OTA. E.g., with
DVB-T2, you can get much better spectral efficiency, with much greater tower
spacing in a SFN, than you can with LTE.
Internet presence should be a prime direction for the future. So now the
question should be, how would a broadcaster provide "value added" on Internet
media that they don't own (cabled and wireless)? We've been over some
possibilities.
And then there's always Sinclair's idea of getting into content production. For
sure, that makes sense too.
Bert
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
- Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at
FreeLists.org
- By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
unsubscribe in the subject line.
Other related posts: