Print Page
A Broadcast Cloud in our Future
6/26/2012
Dear Editor,
 |
| Mark Aitken |
I am writing to clarify,
for your readers, some
positions and proposals
that can be directly attributed
to me, and more
broadly, the organization
for which I work (
“LTE
Tempts With Advanced
Services,” May 30).
As the vice president
of Advanced Technology for the Sinclair
Broadcast Group, I make every effort to
take in the technological surroundings of
our industry in order to advise my organization
regarding the possible future realities.
Some of those realities are unavoidably
easy to see.
First and foremost….big stick broadcasting
is not dying. In fact, local television
broadcasting is where the future of wireless
lives! Our transmitters and antennae
on tall towers, when coupled to the spectrum
through which we serve the public,
have the potential to best serve the American
public with the most widely demanded,
efficient and cost effective wireless services.
As an industry, we supply the world
with more mass consumable bits than any
other entity.
We are presently severely disadvantaged
by our digital television standard. When
our “over-the-air service” is held up alongside
the other relevant wireless providers
of services, we lose. Yes, we provide the
best and highest quality HDTV. Yes, our local
news, weather, traffic and local community
programming is the most sought after
viewing. But we are no longer a provider
of what was once a ubiquitous service.
In the not so distant past, local broadcast
television was ubiquitous by virtue of its
presence in almost every living room of
America with programming that was available
from no other provider. That is simply
not today’s reality.
To be both relevant and competitive,
we have to change the means by which
we do business. Of primary and immediate
concern, to be ubiquitous tomorrow, we
must be able to reach our audience wherever
they may be, on whatever device they
are using, with the content that they want,
when they want it. All of this is possible
only with a new and fully capable broadcast
platform.
This new broadcast platform will most certainly not be backwards compatible
with today’s television broadcast standard.
However, by harmonizing with many
of the world’s underlying global wireless
technologies we could provide benefits
to consumers, device manufacturers and
broadcasters alike.
The idea of LTE-Advanced being a part
of our future was first introduced to American
Broadcasters by me and a great friend,
Mike Simon, at an ATSC Symposium on
“Next Generation Broadcast Television”
18 months ago. It was introduced within
the context of what we have referred to
as a “Broadcast Overlay”, which envisioned
the use of our broadcast spectrum and facilities
to off-load DOWNLINK traffic from
wireless carriers. The premise is a simple
one: use our current facilities with an upgrade
to a new broadcast platform (new
standard), to deliver bits for the wireless
carriers.
By virtue of our licensed “ERP” emanating
from tall towers, we carry an advantage
in being able to cover large areas from a
single broadcast site. But again, to be both
relevant and competitive, we must be able
to offer a QoS (quality of service) which
rivals that of our wireless competitors.
That will require some additional towers/
repeaters be added over time, but nothing
near the hundreds and thousands required
by the wireless phone companies. With a
fully capable new broadcast platform, the
ability to seamlessly extend and complement
our service area can be accomplished
with a handful of strategically placed “SFN”
(single frequency network) transmission
facilities. They “embellish” the QoS, but are
not required to start.
Vinton Cerf, considered one of the fathers
of the internet for co-designing the
TCP/IP protocol, when asked what he’d
like to see next, is quoted to have said “…a
vision that includes internet packets raining
down from the sky.” I like to think of
Television Broadcasting of the future as the
“cloud” from which that raining of internet
packets flows. Imagine people pulling
from the “Broadcast Cloud” the bits they
wish to consume—live real time or cached.
The terms “Broadcast Overlay” and
“Broadcast Cloud” are interchangeable;
they are one and the same. They represent
what and who broadcasting needs to be to
remain relevant and competitive. We can
deliver “bits” to consumers wherever they
may be on whatever device they are using,
with the content that they want, when
they want it, with the right broadcast platform.
Let’s all make sure our heads are in
the cloud—the “Broadcast Cloud”!
Mark Aitken
Vice President, Advanced Technology
Sinclair Broadcast Group
Hunt Valley, Md.
Print Page