[opendtv] Re: FCC Opens TV Spectrum for Broadband Use
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2010 06:52:15 -0500
At 8:50 PM -0600 12/6/10, Manfredi, Albert E wrote:
The common approach to any of these industrial standards is that the
industries themselves participate actively in their development, but
then the government, usually, or some other entity with clout, has
to enforce the standard.
This may have been the common approach for industries that the FCC
regulates, but it is not the common approach for non-regulated free
markets.
The FCC isn't expected to actually DEVELOP these standards, just as
they did not DEVELOP ATSC. They're involved in the process, and then
they mandate, after the final decision has been made.
The FCC totally abdicated any advisory role in the ATSC standards
process. They gave a former FCC Chairman and HIS CE industry clients
almost absolute freedom to create a standard that would enrich them
and doom the broadcasters to failure. The broadcasters played along
because they just wanted to keep their government supported oligopoly
gravy train running for another decade or two...
If you leave this up to the industries entirely, the results are
what we have seen. And may see more of in the future.
I see standards in use in other non-regulated industries all the
time. We talk about them all the time. Some are better than others,
as we have seen with the Wintel monopoly vs Apple. The IETF seems to
be working quite well without government supervision or enforcement.
The problems start when the politicians are brought into the mix to
help an industry protect itself from competition.
DOCSIS, which by the way could just as easily have been built over a
cable version of ATSC, is certainly not a given over time. As of
today, cable systems use it for broadband. Their STBs still have to
be proprietary for the regular non-IP TV channels anyway. But if
enough people cut their cable TV service, there's no reason to
expect cable systems to rely on standard cable modems (for broadband
only) that people can buy and pay for only once. Why would cablecos
voluntarily lose that STB rental revenue? I don't believe that for a
minute. They've gotten used to this way of operating.
Some entity with clout has to enforce this sort of operation, if
that's what you really want.
It's not what I want Bert. And the only TV standards enforcement I am
aware of that the FCC has done is when they cited TV stations for
narrow blanking.
We will all be better off if we get government out of the regulation
business. When a politician says he/she wants to protect consumers...
RUN!
Regards
Craig
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