[opendtv] Re: FCC Opens TV Spectrum for Broadband Use
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2010 08:26:24 -0500
At 3:23 PM -0600 12/7/10, Manfredi, Albert E wrote:
Craig, when you make comments like this, or about ATSC being
"archaic," all I can conclude is that you are simply not familiar
with this field.
I have worked on many standards Bert, including the ATSC standard.
This way of operating, i.e. industries seeing a benefit to create a
common standard, and then working to achieve that goal, is
absolutely commonplace. The IETF has always worked that way. Same
goes for 3GPP, same goes for the ATMF (assuming it still exists),
same goes for the many IEEE networking standards. Who do you think
makes up these these standards bodies? They aren't full-time
employees of the standards organization. They are people who work in
industry, and who take on these functions as additional duties.
There was nothing commonplace about the process that the FCC set up
to create the new DTV standard. They established an advisory
committee then appointed a former FCC Chairman with a list of paid
clients interested in creating this standard to run the process. The
ATSC was an expensive organization to join, run by a small group of
members with IP in the standard.
I could spend days discussing how closed and corrupt this process was.
There is absolutely NO COMPARISON between this and how the IETF
works. Even ISO MPEG was more above board than the ATSC, although it
too was co-opted by key members when creating the MPEG-2 standard
that is referenced by the ATSC standard.
> 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
As opposed to what? What standards organization developes anything
without a consensus of the mambership?
It is a big stretch to call the advisory committee and the ATSC
standards organizations. Concesnsus was NEVER part of the Advisory
Committee process, and has been rare in ATSC working groups.
The FCC did little to influence the standards process. I know this
first hand, as I talked with the Chairman and several Commissioners
about the problems with the standard and the opportunities that they
COULD HAVE enabled. In the end they deleted one table from the
standard, then the ATSC partners simply ignored this small omission.
> And the only TV standards enforcement I am aware of that the FCC
has done is when they cited TV stations for narrow blanking.
Oh really? So, for example, you see a lot of kids with walkie
talkies operating over TV frequencies? You see TV stations emitting
5 MW ERP these days? Any TV stations transmitting SECAM here? If
not, why not?
Those are all based in ATSC regulations Bert. But the FCC has no
boots on the ground to enforce ANYTHING these days. Enforcement was
gutted in the '80s.
The government belongs in the regulation business. Once we, the
people, create something to benefit us as a whole, e.g. as
determined through consensus in the standards bodies, it makes
perfect sense to entrust the enforcement of that standard to the
government. It makes a whole lot less sense to entrust the creation
of the standards to the government, or to allow self-serving
industries to just do as they please.
We disagree.
There is a reason so many industries run to the government for
regulation Bert. It is to protect these industries from competition.
Regards
Craig
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