A NEW LOOK FOR ATSC
The ATSC debuted a new organization logo at the May 10th Annual Meeting in Washington, DC.
"This new logo conveys a sense of forward motion and focus on the future," Mark Richer, ATSC President said. "This is a perfect mark for the organization as we move into the development of new standards and recommended practices."
A version of the new member’s logo is available for member use on presentations and your organization’s website or other promotional items. Please contact
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for the file.
NABSHOW 2011 in REVIEW – KEEPING CALM, KEEPING MOBILE
The 2011 NAB Show in Las Vegas, Nevada was a huge success for the ATSC. Quality booth visitors in ATSC sponsored locations and many important and exciting papers and presentations were presented in tandem at the conference itself.
The ATSC and NAB were located in adjoining areas in the North Hall - ATSC/OMVC Mobile DTV Pavilion and the ATSC TechZone, which also hosted the CALM Place.
The Mobile DTV Pavilion featured a variety of new consumer products being introduced this year for Mobile DTV reception, along with compelling technology demonstrations from well-known broadcast industry companies.
Participants in the ATSC TechZone were Harris, ETRI, and all sponsors of the CALM Place – ATSC, DaySequerra/DTS, Dolby, FOX, Linear Acoustic, NAB, NBC Universal, IneoQuest, NCTA and Univision.
Thanks to all of our members who were NABShow attendees and supporters - we look forward to seeing you at NABShow 2012!
2011 ATSC Annual Meeting in Review
The 2011 ATSC Annual Meeting was held on May 10th at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, DC. The event was kicked off by a cocktail reception at the same venue on the evening of May 9th. The next morning, after welcoming remarks from ATSC President Mark Richer and John Godfrey, Chairman of the Board of Directors, Sen. Gordon Smith, president and CEO of the National Association of Broadcasters, delivered the morning’s keynote address.
"We are fast moving past the age of linear television only [and] into a new world that is on-demand, interactive, internet-enabled and three-dimensional, with a public that has an insatiable need for more high quality content," said Smith. "Finding a way for broadcasters to take part in that new world isn’t optional; it’s a necessity to stay competitive with other media in this complex and unpredictable digital world. I believe that the role of ATSC is pivotal for insuring the vibrant future for television broadcasting."
Smith’s thoughts on television’s future were just one element of the day’s program, which also included a report on next-generation broadcasting by PBS’s Jim Kutzner, an afternoon keynote speech by the NHK’s Dr. Keiichi Kubota, a summary of the status of 3DTV by Dolby’s Craig Todd, and a whimsical "cooking" presentation highlighting the potential of ATSC 2.0 DTV featuring "chef" Sam Matheny of Capitol Broadcasting. Former FCC Chair Richard Wiley shared his thoughts regarding future directions for ATSC standards development.
Of particular interest to many was a panel discussion moderated by TV NewsCheck’s Harry Jessell and featuring PBS’s CTO, John McCoskey; David Lougee, president of Gannett Broadcasting; and Richard Ducey, chief strategy officer at BIA/Kelsey. Panelists entertained such hot topics as multicasting, news in HD, spectrum issues, ATSC 2.0 and 3D television broadcasting.
Photos from the event will be available shortly – please continue to check the ATSC website!
Thanks to our Gold Sponsors: Harris, IEEE BTS, LG Electronics, and Samsung; our Silver Sponsors: Ericsson and Thomson; and our Demo Sponsor, Dolby.
Jim Starzynski Honored with 2011 Bernard J. Lechner Award for Outstanding Contribution
NBC Universal’s Jim Starzynski was recognized by the TV broadcast engineering community today with one of its highest technical awards. The ATSC named Starzynski the 2011 recipient of the Bernard J. Lechner Outstanding Contributor Award. The presentation was made today during the 2011 ATSC Annual Meeting at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.
"Jim’s leadership in audio loudness activities is vital to the ongoing work of the ATSC and the television industry," said John Godfrey, chairman of the ATSC board of directors.
Starzynski led the effort to develop the ATSC A/85 Recommended Practice "Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining Audio Loudness for Digital Television." The Commercial Advertising Loudness Mitigation, or CALM Act, requires the FCC to mandate use of A/85 for commercial advertisements.
The Lechner Award is bestowed once a year to an individual representative of the membership whose technical and leadership contributions to the ATSC have been invaluable and exemplary. The title of the award recognizes the first recipient, long-time broadcasting technology leader Bernard Lechner, for his outstanding services to the ATSC.
Sponsor the 2011 ATSC Annual Publication
The Advanced Television Systems Committee is in the process of creating the 2010-2011 Annual Publication. This full color, approximately 20 page "yearbook" will be provided to the entire ATSC membership, as well as outside organizations, and will be used as a recruiting tool for new members into our Standards family - an approximate circulation of 500+.
Feature stories about the past year’s work, as well as updated member lists, organizational charts, many photos, and other vital basic information about the ATSC are included in this publication.
Sponsorship levels available to members include:
- $2500 Full Page ad and logo in member directory
- $1000 half page ad
- $500 quarter page ad
Please contact
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today to become a sponsor! Publication goal is early June.
ATSC Activity Report
This document summarizes current work within the ATSC relating to Standards and Recommended Practices, and Planning Team projects.
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TSG/S4- Specialist Group on ATSC Mobile DTV
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The A/153 Scalable Full Channel Mobile Mode (SFCMM) Proposed Standard is currently at membership ballot, having been approved by TSG on 22 April 2011. SFCMM is designed to add increased capacity in a scalable manner up to the complete channel bandwidth usage for certain applications. SFCMM is described as an amendment to A/153 Part 1 and a new Part 9 to A/153.
The A/154 Recommended Practice on ATSC Mobile DTV has been approved by the ATSC membership. An interim publication version has been posted on the ATSC Web site. Work meanwhile continues to develop draft text on presentation layer issues, which may be rolled into the RP as an amendment at a future date.
A Working Draft Amendment to A/153 Part 2, "RF/Transmission System Characteristics," has been approved by TSG as a Proposed Standard. Comments were received during the ballot and resolved. The planned changes are substantive and will be submitted to TSG for reballot. At the same time, additional adjustments to A/153 Part 2 were identified based on work underway in TSG/S9 on A/53 Part 2, "RF/Transmission System Characteristics." TSG has approved rolling those changes into the reballot, which is pending.
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TSG/S5- Specialist Group on Transmission Infrastructure
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The ATSC membership has approved a standard for studio-to-transmitter link (STL) systems used to support ATSC Mobile DTV. The system is documented as a revision of A/110, "Synchronization Standard for Distributed Transmission. An interim version of A/110:2011 has been published on the ATSC Web site. The new title of A/110 is "ATSC Standard for Transmitter Synchronization."
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TSG/S6- Specialist Group on Video and Audio Coding
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A proposed amendment to A/85, "Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining Audio Loudness for Digital Television," is currently at a ballot of the ATSC membership. The new annex identifies elements of the RP that are vital to controlling loudness variations among program elements. The membership ballot closes on 25 May 2011.
Work is underway to draft a second amendment A/85 to address issues relating to the use of non-AC-3 audio codecs. Technical work has been delegated to the S6-3 AHG. S6-3 hopes to have a Working Draft Amendment 2 ready for consideration by TSG/S6 by the end of May.
Work continues to update A/52:2010, "Digital Audio Compression (AC-3) (E-AC-3) Standard," to more completely describe E-AC-3 and reflect current practice. Draft text has been developed and is under review. Liaison with the effected SDOs continues.
In an effort to support ATSC 2.0 and other potential applications, work has begun to update A/53 Part 6, "Enhanced AC-3 Audio System Characteristics," to document constraints on E-AC-3 for use in the "main stream" rather than for E-VSB "fallback" (as currently written). In addition, the 2010 Revision of Part 6 removed some functionality that may be restored to support certain audio services.
Work is underway to consider the differences between A/72, "Video System Characteristics of AVC in the ATSC Digital Television System," and SCTE-128, and to develop a recommendation for changes to A/72. This effort will also involve some work by TSG/S8 on transport issues. To support this effort, a TSG-level AHG has been established to identify what ATSC should do about AVC in the main service from a requirements point of view. Work is pending to merge A/63, "Standard for Coding 25/50 Hz Video," into A/53 Part 4, "MPEG-2 Video System Characteristics."
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TSG/S7- Specialist Group on Security
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A Proposed Amendment to A/153 Part 6, "Service Protection," is currently at a ballot of the ATSC membership. The ballot closes on 23 May 2011.
Changes are being considered to the A/70-2 Candidate Standard, "Conditional Access System for Terrestrial Broadcast," which is currently set to expire on 4 August 2011. Agreement on draft changes is expected prior to the next TSG meeting (28 July 2011).
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TSG/S8- Specialist Group on Transport
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A sub-group within TSG/S8 is developing a Working Draft RP on the broadcast station workflow aspects of handling local live updates to PSIP-related metadata. A date for completion of the Working Draft has not yet been set.
Document maintenance has been completed on A/53 Part 3, "Service Multiplex and Transport Subsystem Characteristics;" and A/65, "Program and System Information Protocol For Terrestrial Broadcast and Cable." This work involves removal of E-VSB elements and collected errata and updates. Coordination of ballots for the E-VSB removal work is under consideration.
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TSG/S9- Specialist Group on Transmission
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A Working Draft update of A/53 Part 2:2007, "RF/Transmission Subsystem," has been developed and approved for TSG ballot. The proposed changes include removal of E-VSB and clarification of existing text. Issuance of the TSG ballot is pending.
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TSG/S10- Specialist Group on Receivers
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A Working Draft Recommended Practice on "ATSC Mobile DTV Receiver Performance Guidelines" has been developed and approved for TSG ballot. This document mirrors the scope of A/74, "Receiver Performance Guidelines," but focus on mobile services. Issuance of the TSG ballot is pending.
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TSG/S11- Specialist Group on ATSC 2.0
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Meetings have begun for this newly formed specialist group, which is charged with coordinating activities within TSG relating to ATSC 2.0. TSG/S11 will draw upon the existing specialists groups working on ATSC 2.0, currently TSG/S7 and TSG/S13 (namely, S13-1 and S13-2), serving in a guidance and coordination role.
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TSG/S13- Specialist Group on Data Broadcast
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Draft changes have been developed to the Candidate Standard on "Non-Real-Time Services." The CS period runs until 10 October 2011.
Work continues to develop elements of ATSC 2.0. Work relating to new NRT features will be done in the S13-1 AHG; other elements of the work will be done in the S13-2 AHG. The requirements for NRT 2.0 have been generally defined in S13-1; requirements are still under discussion in S13-2. The overall work plans for the two groups are under development.
A revision of A/90, "Data Broadcast Standard," is expected to begin soon. Extensive errata developed over the years are being reviewed and the status of that material updated.
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TSG-7 AHG
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The AHG on AVC Requirements was formed at the 11 May 2011 TSG meeting. This group is narrowly scoped to focus on what ATSC wants to do about AVC in the main service from a requirements point of view.
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Planning Teams
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PT-1 – 3D TV: This group has developed and issued an interim report on the potential for 3D television services. The report can be downloaded here. PT-1 is currently studying feedback received in response to the interim report, which focused on human visual factors and 3D technologies. A second report on 3D is planned by PT-1 that will include updates to the current material and new text relating to content issues.
PT-2 – Next Generation Broadcast Television. A draft interim report on Next Generation Broadcast Television has been developed and provided to the ATSC Board of Directors. Release of the document to the ATSC membership is expected soon. Work meanwhile continues in PT-2 to further research promising new technologies.
PT-3 – Internet-Enhanced Television. This group is working to finish an interim report on the current landscape for Internet-enhanced television, focusing on the opportunities and challenges for broadcast services. Some of the information collected has been identified to be potentially useful to the TSG groups working on ATSC 2.0. Liaison with the appropriate groups is underway. Drafting of an initial report is expected to be completed during the summer.
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Ballots
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The following TSG ballots are pending:
Working Draft Amendment No. 1 to A/153 Part 2:2009 – approved for ballot, issuance pending resolution of ballot coordination issues
Working Draft Revision of A/53 Part 2:2007 – approved for ballot following editorial/format cleanup, issuance pending
Working Draft Recommended Practice on ATSC Mobile DTV Receiver Performance Guidelines – approved for ballot following editorial/format cleanup, issuance pending
The following ATSC Membership ballots are underway:
Proposed Standard: Scalable Full Channel Mobile Mode – closes on 1 June 2011
Proposed Amendment No. 1 to A/85:2010 – closes on 25 May 2011
Proposed Revision of A/153 Part 6:2009 – closes on 23 May 2011
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ATSC Membership
In our continual quest for new participants, we’d like to ask current member organizations to encourage non-member companies they may be associated with to join the ATSC – standards work is lead by our active members, and we welcome new faces! For more information on how to join the ATSC, please direct potential new members to the membership area of the ATSC Website.
ATSC Standards…. Available in Print!
The ATSC has setup an online store for those who wish to purchase printed full color professionally bound copies of the A/153 and A/85 standards. We hope to add additional standards documents for purchase in the upcoming weeks – A/74 coming soon!
Save your printer ink and instead, buy copy for the low prices listed online.
All standards will remain available for download online at www.atsc.org
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