Graham Jones Exits NAB

WASHINGTON: Long-time broadcast industry expert Graham Jones announced his retirement today. Jones was senior director of communications engineering, science and technology for the National Association of Broadcasters.

“This is to let you know that I have decided to retire from full-time employment with NAB and my last day at the office will be July 7,” he said in an e-mail. “I would like to thank those that I have worked with over the years. I look forward to keeping in touch with many of you through broadcast industry organizations and I will be available for consultancy work as suitable opportunities arise.”

Lynn Claudy, the NAB’s senior vice president of science and technology called Jones a “great asset” to the organization.

“We’ll certainly miss Graham at NAB on both a professional and personal level, but understand his decision to retire from full-time employment and wish him well,” Claudy said in an e-mail. “In Graham’s eight years at NAB, he contributed much to help move television broadcasting to a higher technical level: Standards work with industry groups such as the Advanced Television Systems Committee and the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, various NAB advocacy efforts in regulatory and industry areas on behalf of broadcasters, author and/or editor of several popular NAB publications, as well as numerous projects in diverse areas ranging from managing new technology demonstrations at the NAB Show to contributing to consumer education efforts associated with the digital television transition. He’s been a great asset to NAB and the broadcast industry.”

Mark Aitken, director of advanced technology for Sinclair Broadcast Group in suburban Baltimore described Jones as an accomplished optimist.

“I have known Graham for a long time, and he has always been the kind of person one could depend on when he said he would get something done,” Aitken said in an e-mail. He credited Jones’ leadership on the ATSC Planning Committee with helping to establish the Mobile DTV Standard.

“Graham is the ‘behind the scenes’ kind of guy who seems to get much pleasure from accomplishments, and very much is an involved member of the Broadcast community that has been a part of many accomplishments. I will miss his direct involvement!”

Dave Donovan, chief of the Association of Maximum Service Television, called Jones “one of the outstanding engineers in this industry. MSTV will miss his wise counsel and years of dedicated service to broadcasting.”

Jones chairs the ATSC’s Planning Committee and is a member of its Technology and Standards Group. He is a SMPTE Fellow, serves on the SMPTE Board of Governors and is active on several committees. He also chairs a subgroup of the FCC’s Technical Working Group on Digital Closed Captioning and Video Description.

Jones authored “A Broadcast Engineering Tutorial for Non-Engineers” and was associate editor of the “NAB Engineering Handbook.” He is a regular contributor to the NAB’s TV TechCheck newsletter and has written numerous papers and presentations for SMPTE and NAB conferences and other seminars and publications.

Jones logged more than 40 years experience in the broadcast industry, beginning with the BBC in London. He was director of engineering for the Harris/PBS DTV Express from 1997-99.

He holds a BSc Honors Degree in Physics from the University of Nottingham, U.K., is a Chartered Electrical Engineer, and a member of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, the Society of Broadcast Engineers and the Royal Television Society. He received the ATSC’s Bernard J. Lechner Outstanding Contributor award in 2004.

-- Deborah D. McAdams