WASHINGTON—In a filing with the Federal Communications Commission, The Advanced Warning and Response Network Alliance has come out in favor of the FCC setting a firm date to end current ATSC broadcasts.

In its Jan. 20 filing, the group, which is made up of commercial and public broadcasters, national trade associations, and technology manufacturers backing the advanced alerting capabilities of ATSC 3.0, also backed some of the security features built into the ATSC 3.0 standard and highlighted improved emergency alerting capabilities of NextGen TV that broadcasters will be able to use to keep local communities safe.

“As the Commission has previously noted, Next Generation broadcasting will permit new ways for broadcasters to connect with and inform their audiences, including more targeted, specific, and helpful alerts and information that can be transmitted from TV stations to viewers within reach of broadcast signals,” the filing said, adding that “the AWARN Alliance emphasizes that the full capabilities of the standard are best implemented once the availability of ATSC 3.0 broadcast signals is ubiquitous across the country. This will allow broadcasters to enhance connections with the public safety community and deliver new alerting tools and capabilities that will save lives and property during emergencies.”

“The introduction and widespread adoption of voluntary Advanced Emergency Information that is possible with the ATSC 3.0 standard requires certainty from the FCC about the likely sunset of ATSC 1.0 signals, so that newsroom and production investments can be made to take advantage of the advanced features of the ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard,” AWARN Alliance, executive director David H. Arland wrote in a letter to the FCC.

The filing did not advance a specific date for that sunset. The NAB has proposed that the signals be ended in larger markets in 2028 and the whole country by 2030.

The filing also defended some of the features of the 3.0 standard that are designed to protect content and broadcast signals from piracy.

“Content security has become a common requirement for high-value content, which also means that receiving devices must be fully security verified to tune to most broadcast ATSC 3.0 content today,” Arland wrote. “Without proper security credentials, a consumer cannot view ATSC 3.0 signals from broadcasters that have enabled content security. For more than 18,000,0000 potential viewers who have purchased a TV receiver equipped with NextGen TV electronics, this is not an issue, as the NextGen TV sets are security verified, enabling audiences to access all NextGen TV content, whether encrypted or not, without needing an internet connection or subscription. It is a seamless experience.”

In addition, Arland stressed that “Many of the set-top receivers are also security verified, also delivering seamless access to all content” and that only one product has “not yet resolved security issues, and those customers are able to tune to ATSC 1.0 broadcasts and related EAS messages from local stations.”

“The use of content security does not in any way impede the delivery of EAS messages or Advanced Emergency Information; emergency alerts and related public safety information are delivered as part of the ATSC 3.0 service and are available whenever the underlying channel is receivable,” Arland concluded. “Since the content security system is agnostic to the content being delivered, the Commission should expect that programming content that includes emergency messages would be transmitted in the same secure manner. Properly implemented, all content is equally secure and accessible.”

The filing also urged the FCC to establish policies so that “local viewers should not have their channel choices hijacked by MVPDs during emergencies, as has previously been the case with some cable operators. Rather, cable operators should let local broadcasters inform local audiences with appropriate EAS warnings and information, since local TV stations are typically staffed to provide more information than a pass-through multichannel provider.”

“Local stations are the best option for keeping local audiences informed during specific emergencies, including providing geolocation targeted information, maps, multilingual and sign language services, and other capabilities that are anticipated in the ATSC 3.0 standard,” the AWARN Alliance argued, adding that “news and weather departments at stations staffed with newsrooms will have these new tools available to keep their viewers informed, including those who are referred to local broadcast TV stations by WEA wireless telephone alerts. The Advanced Emergency Information capability of the ATSC 3.0 standard can also be utilized to supplement brief emergency alerts, including potentially the delivery of rich-media content such as maps, video clips, and other advisories…In summary, advanced emergency information and alerts enabled by ATSC 3.0 – and by FCC rules, requirements and policies that foster innovation – further enhance broadcasters’ capabilities to serve their communities.”

The full filing is available here.

It was not a big surprise when word came in late November that John Lawson was stepping down as the executive director of the AWARN Alliance.

(The alliance’s steering committee selected Dave Arland for the role. An interview with Arland is available here.)

A year ago in an interview, Lawson compared his effort to help get ATSC 3.0-based advanced emergency alerting and information (AEI) off the ground as being like “pushing a rock up a hill” and described his decision to try a “for-profit” approach to get the ball rolling while also continuing in his AWARN leadership role.

Now John has given up the alliance’s reins, and he has a few thoughts about his greatest achievements and biggest disappointments while leading AWARN.

On the positive side of the ledger, the most significant thing was the role advanced emergency alerting played in getting the Federal Communications Commission to give ATSC 3.0 the thumbs-up in November 2017. “We were definitely a factor in the commission’s approval of the ATSC 3.0 voluntary transition. It was a three-to-two vote. Every commissioner—even the two Democrats [Mignon Clyburn and future Chair Jessica Rosenworcel] who voted against it—talked about the public-service aspect of advanced alerting. Chairman [Ajit] Pai himself thanked me for giving him the ammunition to get the votes.”

Another important achievement was educating emergency managers about the problems 3.0-based AEI solves for them and building support for it among members of that community.

His biggest disappointment: “That AEI is not deployed widely in the United States and saving lives already.”

Lawson’s biggest hope for AEI is renewed interest among broadcasters. A year ago, station groups like Fox Television Stations and News-Press & Gazette had left the alliance, and Lawson was characterizing the broadcast industry—with a few notable exceptions—as having “dropped the ball” on AEI.

“Since the election, I’ve seen a new commitment by some broadcasters to really do something with 3.0. We could see a sea change there,” he says, cautioning, however, that when it comes to AEI what must be avoided is for “every station group to have to reinvent the wheel.” That is the role he hopes his new America’s Emergency Network company will fill.

“I’m very happy that the AWARN steering committee, of which I am a member, decided unanimously to keep AWARN going, and I really think that its role in terms of education, advocacy and networking between alerting authorities and broadcasters is a necessary complement for whatever happens on the private sector side,” he says.

“I think we [the AWARN Alliance] kept the torch alive for using broadcasting to save lives. It’s still burning, and I am confident that Dave Arland and the AWARN steering committee will find new directions to expand AWARN.”

The AWARN Alliance last month appointed Dave Arland as its new executive director, succeeding longtime leader and ATSC 3.0 advocate John Lawson.

Much like ATSC 3.0, the alliance has had its share of ebbs and flows as NextGen TV continues its slow, steady march in terms of markets covered and sets sold—especially with a tipping point in NextGen TV sales anticipated to be at hand.

Arland comes to the alliance at a crucial time for NextGen TV generally and advanced emergency alerting and information in particular. Nearly 80% of U.S. households are now covered by an ATSC 3.0 signal. But like most everything else 3.0, advanced alerting can’t reach its full potential until a workable 1.0 sunset becomes reality.

The new executive director has a full plate of AWARN priorities to tackle—from shoring up alliance membership and advising the incoming administration on the benefits of 3.0-based emergency alerting to demonstrating to policymakers and citizens the benefits of NextGen TV-based warnings with real-world implementations and educating newsrooms about how they can leverage advanced alerting to better serve the public.

Arland opens up about these and other important issues in this Q&A. An edited transcript follows.

TVT: What are your top priorities for the AWARN Alliance as its incoming executive director?

Dave Arland: I think there are probably three things we need to do. The first is to recognize that, as with any transition, something of this magnitude takes time. For those of us involved in ATSC 3.0, it feels like it’s been a long time. But I’m old enough to remember the first digital TV transition that took many times longer than this, and we didn't have the capability to do new things. So, I think the first step is to position advanced emergency alerting and information as something that can ride the second wave of ATSC 3.0—if you view the first wave as just getting on air.

We’re almost at 80%. Right now, 76% of households in America can see at least one ATSC 3.0 signal. There are lots of numbers in this transition, but that’s an important one. So, the first step is just to understand that we’re up next, from a batter-up perspective. You can’t do any of this without being on the air.

So, at least stations are on the air, and they’re starting to add new functionality like high dynamic range and Dolby Atmos. The AWARN capability, generically, is tied to the fact that ATSC 3.0 broadcasts are such that they are also connected to the internet, so you’ve got over the top and over the air. One of the advantages of being connected is that you can know where your receiver is, so you can deliver alerts and information to an individual set or receiver based on where it is.

The second step is to find a way to better demonstrate what we're talking about here. It’s been a lot of concepts up to this point, and I know that there are some broadcasters who are pretty close to being able to deploy some of this technology. Being able to demonstrate this is a key ingredient for the future—almost like Hansel and Gretel and the breadcrumbs. I think broadcasters have to be shown this is a new capability.

Once we are able to demonstrate advanced emergency alerting and information, the third thing is to show broadcasters that this can be another way to enhance their public-service mission. One of the things we’re given as broadcasters is spectrum with the trade-off being that we have to serve the public. Providing an enhanced way to do that generically, under the umbrella term of AWARN, is certainly one key benefit that can be added. So, ATSC 3.0 has better picture quality, better audio and also enhanced capabilities, particularly for stations with news departments to reach people with additional, relevant information.

All of us know emergencies are going to continue to happen. Whether it’s the fires in Hawaii, the floods in North Carolina, the hurricanes that strike the coasts—where I live the tornados we’re always on the lookout for—those things are going to continue to happen. Alerting can be better from a television perspective, and that’s what we hope to demonstrate, especially because there are more people buying sets that have the ability to receive ATSC 3.0 signals.

TVT: While you mentioned the importance of the internet connectivity of NextGen TVs with respect to delivering geo-targeted emergency alerts and information, there is also an important over-the-air component to 3.0. Before the OTA aspects of 3.0 can be fully leveraged, the 1.0 logjam needs to be cleared somehow. Do you expect resolution to this issue anytime soon?

DA: I’m hopeful that a change in leadership at the FCC will mean a focus on the future for over-the-air broadcasting. It’s the sort of thing that requires some important decisions from the FCC in concert, obviously, with broadcasters.

We have done what we pledged to do, which was to collaborate and to make it work as best we can. But that only goes so far. You can't get to 100% in terms of household reach with the current setup—not while also transmitting 1.0. So, there’s got to be a way forward.

I think that’s part of the mission the Future of Television Task Force was working on. I know that report hasn’t come out yet. Hopefully it will come out soon, and then there will be a way forward with the new commission so that broadcasters see some certainty [regarding a 1.0 sunset].

All of these things are interconnected. There is an order of business in the sense that you have to be transmitting to make this work. You have to have receivers that people are actually using and buying and tuning, and you have to have antennas that are connected to those receivers in order for it to be optimal.

Even with all of those things, it is a medium that requires electricity. If the power is out everywhere, the real benefit is warning people in advance that something is coming. The more specific the warnings going out, the more people are likely to pay attention. I look at advanced emergency alerts and information as a way for stations to put modern technology to use in a manner that enhances what they’re already doing.

TVT: President-elect Donald Trump regularly stated when concluding his rallies that one of his goals is “to make America safe again.” Will you, as the new leader of the AWARN Alliance, reach out to the incoming administration to bring it up to speed on advanced emergency alerting and how it fits into that stated goal?

DA: Yes, I will, and I think that story needs to be told, but it has to be something where I can pull an arrow out of the quiver. We have to be able to show policymakers something beyond the concept. The concept is a good concept, and it’s what the standard is built upon. But it’s got to be more than conceptual.

People have to understand how this is going to help their local communities, or, if I’m a broadcaster, how it’s going to help me retain viewers.

TVT: You bring up demonstrations. A few years back, News-Press & Gazette demonstrated at NAB how 3.0 advanced alerting could be used. In that case, it was a demo related to the mudslides in Santa Barbara, California. Is that the type of thing you have in mind?

DA: That’s part of it. The approach should be two-pronged. That was demonstrating the concept, but it’s also necessary to demonstrate the actual implementation. I think we’re close to being able to implement advanced emergency alerting and information. At least that’s my hope based on the people who’ve been working on this for some time. That’s where the rubber meets the road.

It will also have to involve people in TV-station newsrooms, the people who are actually going to hit the button and let the public know of an emergency—whether that’s the meteorologist, the weather team, an assignment editor or whomever. They need to warm up to this idea, and we need to let them know it exists and what’s possible.

TVT: How healthy is AWARN Alliance membership? I think the alliance lost some broadcaster group members a little more than a year ago.

DA: That’s one of our challenges, to try to bolster the membership and get people involved—some of whom never left, some of whom left for whatever reason.

Maybe they just weren’t seeing the progress they hoped for. Maybe they had other priorities. I don’t know.

But, you know, I'm actually very bullish on it, because I think it is logical now that we have so many stations transmitting NextGen TV. Most of those are connected in some way to a newsroom that would be monitoring and making people aware of emergencies.

TVT: Why did you take on the AWARN Alliance leadership role?

DA: I was asked if I would consider it. I'm sort of a human Venn diagram in the sense that I represent—and I’m going to continue to represent—the Indiana Broadcasters Association. I work for Pearl TV, and I work for ATSC itself.

So, I already have a pretty good working relationship with many of the people who have been plugged into AWARN, as well as the people who set the standards and the broadcasters who implement them—all the way down to the local level.

I’m also co-chair of the EAS committee of the National Alliance of State Broadcasters Associations. I’ve been in front of the FCC, talking about making sure our state EAS plans are understood, and working through their process. I also work with the National Weather Service locally.

There’s a lot of potential benefit from having somebody who speaks the lingo, is involved with the transition and came out of an electronics background. That’s why I was interested and the AWARN steering committee agreed—hence the offer and the acceptance.

WASHINGTON—John Lawson, longtime broadcast alerting advocate and founder of the AWARN Alliance, said he is stepping down as its executive director to work full-time in his position as co-founder of America’s Emergency Network LLC, which uses satellite and the ATSC 3.0 core network to interconnect alerting authorities to NextGen TV stations. Dave Arland, founder and president of PR firm Arland Communications, has been tapped as the new executive director, taking over when Lawson steps down at the end of the year.

AWARN (Advanced Warning and Response Network)—a coalition of broadcasters, device manufacturers and emergency management agencies tasked with developing advanced emergency alerting technology for ATSC 3.0 (aka NextGen TV)—was founded in 2015 with Lawson as its first executive director. Lawson is also president of his own consulting firm Convergence Services, a strategic consulting firm focused on spectrum, resilience and next-generation broadcasting business model.

Although Lawson has been a strong advocate for emergency alerting, he has recently expressed frustration and skepticism about the broadcast industry’s transition to ATSC 3.0, calling out broadcasters for not doing enough to advance the technology.

“By and large, the broadcasters have not lived up to the promises that many of them made to the FCC in 2017 to stand up advanced alerting if the commission approved a voluntary transition to ATSC 3.0,” he told TV Tech last year.

His frustration grew after meetings with the FCC and local broadcasters, Lawson told TV Tech recently. Last spring, in an op-ed published on TVNewsCheck, he advocated for a government program that would provide discounts for 3.0 converter boxes, similar to the converter box coupon program in the transition from analog to ATSC 1.0 several decades ago.

Then he met with the FCC.

“Senior staff at the FCC told me that the broadcast industry had made it clear from the beginning, in their opinion, that the 3.0 transition was unlike the transition from analog to digital, and that it would be a purely market-driven approach,” he said. “And then I went out on the road so to speak to the Michigan Broadcast Engineering Conference I really got a dose of reality,” adding that no one raised their hand when he asked attendees if the 3.0 transition was “on the right track.”

“I’m proud of the work of the AWARN Alliance to foster the use of ATSC 3.0 for advanced emergency messaging, which creates a powerful use case for NextGen TV,” Lawson said, thanking the AWARN Alliance’s core group of commercial and public broadcasters and technology companies that “grasp the life-saving power of NextGen TV alerting.”

Arland brings decades of industry experience and expertise in lobbying, communications and strategy to his new role at the AWARN Alliance. He continues to lead his consulting firm, Arland Communications, and serves as executive director of the Indiana Broadcasters Association.

“The AWARN Alliance itself is John Lawson’s legacy, and all of us owe him an enormous debt of gratitude,” AWARN Alliance Chairman John I. Taylor said. “Similarly, we are very fortunate to have the well-respected and talented Dave Arland to lead us into the future.”

WASHINGTON, D.C.—AWARN has announced that local TV broadcasters and emergency managers  from the Washington, D.C. metro region will be convening December 7-8 for the AWARN  Washington, D.C. Roundtable. 

The goal of the event, which is the third in a series, is to lay the groundwork for the voluntary use of  NextGen TV Advanced Emergency Information (AEI) and “reboot” the historic  partnership between broadcasting and public safety, AWARN said. 

“We’re gratified with the range of broadcasting and emergency management  organizations that have come together for these discussions. Our focus is regional, but the implications are national. The power of these meetings comes from bringing together TV broadcasters, who’s signals have tremendous reach, with local alerting  authorities, who ‘push the button’ for delivering local alerts,” according to AWARN  Executive Director John Lawson. “The educational sessions and off-the-record discussions create an opportunity to  explore ways to work together. The pay-off is the capacity to deliver geo-targeted, rich  media emergency information across multiple platforms.”

The AWARN Washington, DC Roundtable will cover an afternoon and part of a second  day. It will be hosted at the new offices of the National Association of Broadcasters. 

The  following organizations are co-hosts for the Roundtable: 

• The AWARN Alliance 
• ONE Media 3.0 
• National Association of Broadcasters 
• Maryland, DC, and Delaware Broadcasters Association 
• Fairfax County Department of Emergency Management and Security
• Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (coordinating alerting for 18  jurisdictions in the National Capital Region) 
• Radio Television Digital News Association 
• WHUT-TV at Howard University 
• Virginia Association of Broadcasters 

 In addition, a number of groups and companies are sponsoring the event. These include: 

• Advanced Television Systems Committee 
• LG Electronics/Zenith R&D Lab 
• National Association of Broadcasters 
• Sinclair Broadcast Group 
• The Weather Company, An IBM Business

To register, or for more information, contact John Lawson, executive director, AWARN Alliance at Jlawson@AWARN.org or (202) 302-1654.

 WASHINGTON, D.C.—While much attention is focused on ATSC 3.0’s advanced emergency alerting capabilities like geo-targeting warnings and TV wakeup, retired Lt. Gen. Reynold Hoover May 25 during the first day of the virtual 2021 AWARN Summit illustrated precisely why the technology’s ability to disseminate information post-event may ultimately prove to be its most valuable quality in an emergency.

“Ladies and gentlemen, for the last 15 minutes we’ve actually been working a missile launch from North Korea,” Hoover said during the opening of his keynote speech. “We detected a launch of a Hwasong-15, which is an ICBM. It has a max range, we estimate, of about 13,000 kilometers, which takes in the entire United States.”

“NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] has assessed this launch as a threat to the United States. NorthCom [U.S. Northern Command] has launched our ground-based interceptors. We’re reporting flight as nominal. We estimate now impact in 14 minutes,” said Hoover, who among a long list of career accomplishments served as chief of staff at FEMA and integrated the agency into Homeland Security following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks as well as being a driving force behind the adoption of IPAWS (the Integrated Public Alert & Warning System).

Surprising Ron Prater, executive director of Big City Emergency Managers who moderated the session before the keynote, the lieutenant general said, “Ron, let me ask you, the mic’s going hot in 30 seconds. We have NORAD telling us 14 minutes to impact. What are you going to tell the public, and what do you want them to do?”

Clearly caught off guard, Prater said he is not an alert originator. “I would personally just panic, and then I would probably call Becky [Rebecca Baudendistel, director of public warning for the New York City Office of Emergency Management and a prior panelist) in New York City and ask her what to do.”

Hoover responded: “OK, Becca. Thirteen minutes to impact…. What are you going to tell people, and what do you want him to do?”

Taking a few seconds to digest the situation, Baudendistel replied: “I think, you know, the first thing is we need to do is address the problem as quickly as possible and put in a trusted source in that message to make sure they [the public] know[s] this is not just Becca saying this. This is coming from… the officials on this call.”

Hoover persisted in his description of the missile flight status. “Sure, sure. OK. So, NORAD now says impact is going to be on the West Coast, and impact is estimated at about 15 minutes.”

Shifting gears, Hoover recounted the Jan. 13, 2017, emergency warning issued in Hawaii that a missile strike was imminent. Public alerts explicitly stated the warning was not a drill and to seek shelter, he said.

“What do you think they [the public] did?” asked Hoover. In the 38 minutes it took the state to rescind the alert and issue a message telling people the emergency warning was false, many people panicked.

“There was chaos. People panicked in the streets. People said their last goodbyes. People, you know, went to get their kids. They were hiding in the bathrooms. They didn’t know what to do. They were searching for more answers.”

Going back to Baudendistel, Hoover resumed the description of the hypothetical missile attack. “Now NORAD advises that missile impact is imminent and most likely [will strike] Seattle, Wash…. Becca, is that going to change anything… [regarding] what you are going to tell people? Impact is imminent.”

Baudendistel replied: “I don’t think so. I’m not sure what else they can do at that point.”

Building on her observation, Hoover explained that in cases like the one in the roleplaying exercise, it is important to tell people what you want them to do, know who is going to communicate that message and how that message will be conveyed.

“And is that message going to cause more panic and harm than good?” he asked. “Certainly, we saw in Hawaii…panic, and we saw chaos. People didn’t know what to do.”

Continuing with the scenario, Hoover reported the missile struck Seattle, knocking out all communications and power in the area, collapsing bridges and highways, shutting down rail and auto traffic and causing general devastation.

“It seems to me that that is where ATSC 3.0 and that is where what we think of NextGen TV, and that is where what we think of IPAWS 2.0… comes into play,” said Hoover.

“Because it’s post disaster in an event like that that is going to save more lives than the chaos we created [in Hawaii].”

Acknowledging the emergency management community wants to warn in advance of an event what and when it can, Hoover said in “a catastrophic, no-notice event,” it’s important to tell people exactly what to do, where to go and what steps they can take to save lives in its aftermath.

Hoover illustrated what he meant drawing on the work of Genie Chance, a journalist and radio broadcaster, during the 1964 Alaskan Earthquake.

Chance, who was running an errand with her son during the quake, drove to the public safety headquarters and using the VHF radio she had in her car began submitting reports to KENI radio.

“What does she say?” asked Hoover. “She says things like, ‘John Lawson, your family is at the Ross’s house, and they want you to know they’re safe, and they would like you to come there as soon as you can.’

“Things like, ‘The city manager is asking all department heads to report to him at the public safety building immediately.’

“Things like, ‘All engineers and pipefitters please report to the maintenance building in downtown Anchorage immediately.’”

IPAWS, ATSC 3.0 and other technologies need to be survivable “in any situation” to relay these sorts of critical messages following a catastrophe, he said.

“We are going to save more lives when we think about how we can apply ATSC 3.0 post event than in some cases we might have saved pre-event with a warning that might cause chaos.”

“I would urge you, as you think about all of the great capabilities of NextGen TV and the broadcast capabilities that we have, we need to think how it’s going to survive post-blast or how it’s going to survive post-earthquake,… and we need to think about how that system is going to work in the future post-incident because that’s where I think… we’re going to end up saving lives,” he said.

WASHINGTON—Broadcasters and players from the largest alerting authorities in the country will converge online next week for the virtual Advanced Warning and Response (AWARN) Summit 2021, May 25 and May 27 from 1-4 p.m. ET.

The summit, themed “Developing a Voluntary Roadmap for Next Generation Emergency Messaging,” will offer panel discussions, interviews, breakout discussions and networking. The goal is to develop guiding principles that could lead to voluntary model agreements between emergency managers and TV broadcasters related to advanced warning, the AWARN Alliance said.

“Recent innovations in media and networking technology, together with a new focus on resilience in the face of natural and manmade disasters, have created a perhaps historic opportunity for voluntary, public-private solutions,” said John Lawson, executive director of the AWARN Alliance. “Discussions will include the use of NextGen TV (ATSC 3.0) in an all-digital, public-private ‘network of networks’ to improve our response to many types of emergencies. The goal of the summit is to lay the groundwork for regional roundtable discussions later this year to develop model local agreements.”

Members of the AWARN Alliance and AWARN Advisory Council as well as guests from the government and private sector will participate. Speakers include executives from media, consumer electronics, web services and the alerting software industry. Senior officials from government and non-government alerting organizations will also speak.

New survey data regarding where people turn for emergency information will be presented.

More information is available online. 

WASHINGTON—The AWARN Alliance has elected its 2021 Steering Committee, the organization’s governing body that provides guidance to the AWARN Alliance and its executive director.

For the first time, the membership elected a chair and vice chair for the AWARN Steering Committee, which will help streamline governing activities at the Alliance. John Taylor, senior vice president, public affairs, LG Electronics North America, was elected chair. Jim DeChant, vice president of technology, News-Press & Gazette Broadcasting Co., was elected vice chair.

“Advanced emergency alerting and messaging has been clear use case for ATSC 3.0 from the very beginning. AWARN has positioned the broadcasting and consumer electronics industries to use this powerful new technology for voluntary, cross-industry solutions for addressing some of our country’s most pressing public safety communications needs,” said newly-elected chair Taylor. “Our governance structure has evolved to meet the challenges and opportunities we face, and I’m honored to be serving on the Steering Committee with my esteemed colleagues.”

ATSC President Madeleine Nolan, who serves as an ex officio steering committee member, applauded the AWARN Alliance for “major strides made to date, forging strong connections with the broader emergency management community and educating key stakeholders about the capabilities of advanced emergency messaging powered by ATSC 3.0.” She added, “I am excited about AWARN’s goals as articulated in its ‘Vision and Mission’ statements and look forward to continued close collaboration with the entire AWARN team as we work toward common goals.”

2021 AWARN STEERING COMMITTEE

· Chair: John Taylor, Senior Vice President, Public Affairs, LG Electronics North America

· Vice Chair: Jim DeChant, Vice President of Technology, News-Press & Gazette Broadcasting Co.

· AWARN Executive Director: John Lawson, President of Convergence Services, Inc., which manages the Alliance

· Public Television Representative: Tim Bischoff, Chief Technology Officer, Kentucky Educational Television

· Small Broadcaster Representative: Pete Sockett, Director of Engineering and Operations, Capitol Broadcasting Co. – WRAL/WRAZ/WILM

· Joe Di Scipio, Senior Vice President, FCC Legal & Business Affairs and Assistant General Counsel, Fox Corp.

· So Vang, Vice President of Emmerging Technology, ONE Media 3.0

· Anne Shelle, Managing Director, Pearl TV

· Yoshi Tsurimaki, Producer of Business Development, T-NET Japan

Ex-Officio Advisors:

· Madeleine Noland, President, ATSC

· Luke Fay, Senior Manager of Technical Standards, Sony

· Kelly Willams, Vice President, Engineering and Technology Policy, National Association of Broadcasters

WASHINGTON—NextGen TV, the evolution of broadcast TV powered by the ATSC 3.0 standard, will have wide-ranging impacts on how TV is delivered and viewed by consumers, but according to John Lawson, executive director of the AWARN Alliance, perhaps no broadcast element has a bigger upside with NextGen TV than weather.

The AWARN Alliance discussed what things will look like with ATSC 3.0 in this week’s webinar “NextGen TV and the Future of TV Weather.”

THE BASICS OF ADVANCED EMERGENCY ALERTING

The ATSC 3.0 standard is built with a multitude of layers that offer different types of services, but as ATSC President Madeleine Noland outlined in the webinar, the most relevant to weather broadcast is its Advanced Emergency Alerting layer. 

One of the key AEA features includes what Noland called the receiver “wake-up,” a bootstrap component of the layer that enables monitoring for alerts even when a receiver is in stand-by mode. If a relevant alert is sent out, the monitor will wake-up and broadcast the alert.

There is also the AEA table, which determines the key information that is needed to properly disseminate alerts. This includes data like where the alert is for, allowing for geo-targeting; the timing of the alert, severity, and more. Noland called the AEA table “the heart and soul of the system.”

Other elements that the AEA layer provides is the delivery of rich media, including interactive content for recipients.

PUTTING IT TO USE

It’s not enough to just have the tool, the right people need to know how to properly use it. The groundwork for this certainly seems to be in place based off of the panelists’ presentations during AWARN’s webinar.

Veronica Johnson, morning lead meteorologist with WJLA in D.C. and a fellow of the American Meteorological Society, discussed how broadcasters can improve upon their role as a trusted source of weather and other emergency information with NextGen TV.

Many people get their alerts from either broadcast TV or radio stations, which come in the form of on-air announcements or text crawls and texts/push alerts to mobile devices. However, these alerts are typically delivered to a very broad audience, where everyone might not be impacted—a source of frustration for many Johnson has found, especially when it interrupts “Jeopardy.” 

The ability to focus alerts via AEA’s geo-targeting capabilities is expected to remedy that. Johnson takes it a step further and says that dedicated, area-specific weather channels could be developed to provide 24/7 information.

Johnson also highlighted how alerts via AEA can be delivered to more devices beyond just the TV or smartphone. Gaming devices are a potential source for receiving alerts, as are cars, which could receive information on road closures or other incidents impacting someone’s commute.

Johnson says she sees “zero negatives” and all positives with the launch of NextGen TV, and believes that it will become the second most important tool for weather broadcasters, behind radar.

A ‘BACKBONE OF WEATHER INNOVATION’

The weather industry itself is also utilizing NextGen TV technology. FACETs (Forecasting a Continuum of Environmental Threats) has been working with broadcasters since 2016 to determine how its technology can be incorporated to better serve broadcasters and their viewers. “The more we learn as researchers, the more we are excited about what we  can provide broadcasters,” said Kodi Berry, Ph.D, FACETs program lead at NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory.

The Weather Company has found that NextGen TV tech gives a boost to a number of its features, including its Weather InSight program, which uses AI to provide hyper-local and hyper-focused information. Rodney Thompson, senior strategist, Digital B2B/B2C weather products for The Weather Company, said that NextGen TV creates a better experience for delivering weather information.

“ATSC 3.0 can be the backbone of weather and weather innovation,” said Mark Taylor, a technologist with MyRadar and a strategic advisor to the AWARN Alliance. However, when asked if the weather industry is expected to wait for broadcasters to utilize the NextGen TV tech he put it bluntly. “No, but hopefully we can do it together.”

ATSC 3.0 deployments are already underway across the country, ready to serve viewers that have ATSC 3.0-compatible TV models—Sony, Samsung and LG are currently offering NextGen TV capable models. Noland reports that ATSC 3.0 is expected to reach 50% of the U.S. TV households in the first quarter of 2021, then 75% by the fall of 2021.

WASHINGTON—AWARN Alliance plans to stress that NextGen TV, based on the new ATSC 3.0 standard, can be just as big of an evolution for the weather industry as it is expected to be for broadcasters during an upcoming webinar—or “weathernar” as they are choosing to describe it.

“NextGen TV and the Future of TV Weather” will take place on Nov. 12 and focus on how ATSC 3.0 is a powerful tool for improving public safety, including the processes of emergency alerting and sharing information.

ATSC President Madeleine Noland will be on hand to kick-off the session with an introduction of the ATSC 3.0 standard. Panelists will then discuss how the new standard can help with the delivery of vital weather information. Panelists will be from the National Severe Storm Laboratory, which has built a next-generation severe weather forecast and warning framework; The Weather Company, set to share details on its smart automation powered by AI; and other weather enterprise entrepreneurs who are working with ATSC 3.0.

The webinar will begin at 2 p.m. ET on Nov. 12. Registration or more information is available online. 

SAN DIEGO—As part of the company’s efforts related to advanced emergency alerting (AEA), Verance has announced that it has officially joined the Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance. This voluntary, international coalition of technology firms and trade associations work to utilize NEXTGEN TV for AEA and post-alert news and information.

What Verance says it expects to contribute to AEA technology that already assists with providing videos, images, maps and real-time updates is its Aspect watermarking platform, which ensures that metadata and triggers associated with next-gen experiences like AEA can reach 100% of connected TVs across all distribution paths, including ATSC 1.0, 3.0, over-the-air, cable, satellite and OTT services.

“On behalf of our coalition, I am very happy to welcome Verance to the AWARN Alliance,” said John Lawson, AWARN executive director. “Aspect watermarking can play a vital role in fulfilling our mission to deliver AEA to the widest possible audience and enable more lives to be saved during emergency situations.”

Richard Glosser, Verance’s head of business development added: “The power of our combined technologies ensures that critical alerts and ongoing information will reach the right households at the right time, including in today’s ATSC 1.0 broadcast environment.”

ALEXANDRIA, Va.—Four technology companies have joined the Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance, including two major Japanese tech firms, AWARN announced today.

New members include T-NET Japan, an engineering company developing technology for use worldwide; Internet Initiative Japan, a global provider of network services, value-added outsourcing services, cloud computing, WAN services and systems integration services; Unisoft, which offers ATSC 3.0 delivery systems; and Gaian Solutions, which specializes in operating AI- and ML-based content monetization.

“Our new members bring years of experience in advanced television, as well as the integration of over-the-air television and the internet,” said John Lawson, executive director of the AWARN Alliance. “Our new Japanese members also bring firsthand knowledge of the Japanese emergency warning system, the most sophisticated in the world. The expertise that all of these companies bring in developing the full potential of Next Gen TV is a major asset in achieving our goals.”

The AWARN membership announcement comes on the heels of Fox Television Stations’ decision last month to join the alliance, becoming the first major broadcast network to enlist.

“We see great potential for ATSC 3.0 interoperability with the world’s other key technical standards, such as W3C, 3GPP and Hybridcast,” said Yoshi Tsurimaki, producer, business development at T-NET Japan.

The AWARN Alliance has expanded its mission from a focus exclusively on the use of 3.0’s Advanced Emergency Alerting to enable broadcasters and emergency managers to warn the public of imminent danger to a broader use of AEA to help TV broadcasters better serve the public with emergency-related information.

To that end, the alliance also will launch roundtable discussions with TV news thought leaders over the next few months aimed at developing a voluntary framework for packaging a TV station’s news assets and using 3.0 to engage viewers across multiple devices, it said.

NEW YORK & ALEXANDRIA, Va.—Fox Television Stations is the newest member of the Advanced Warning and Response Network, making it the first major television O&O station group as part of the coalition, per the official announcement.

AWARN is a coalition of commercial and public broadcasters, consumer electronics makers, tech companies and trade associations that are developing voluntary advanced emergency messaging capability that uses ATSC 3.0.

“Our stations are dedicated to serving their communities, and nothing is more important than giving people the information they need to stay safe in emergencies,” said Richard Friedel, executive vice president of engineering, operations and technology for Fox. “We support the Alliance’s broader mission to develop a framework for providing emergency information beyond the initial alert. ATSC 3.0 will enable Fox Television Stations to use its local news assets as never before, and we are happy to add our voice to that initiative.”

AWARN has also announced that it plans to launch a series of roundtable discussions with TV news leaders with the goal of developing a voluntary framework for packaging a TV station’s news assets and using ATSC 3.0 to engage with viewers across multiple devices.

ALEXANDRIA, Va.—The Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance is expanding its mission with the next-generation of emergency alerting to place greater emphasis on news as a source of potentially life-saving information.

“The alliance’s steering committee sees AWARN evolving to become more newsroom-centric,” says John Lawson, AWARN executive director.

While delivering official alerts, such as EAS and EAN notifications, will remain the primary focus of AWARN, the advanced capabilities of ATSC 3.0 enable TV newsrooms to deliver a wider range of emergency-related information, such as evacuation routes, the location of emergency shelters or even where fresh drinking water and plywood are available, he says.

Television stations devote enormous resources to newsgathering that can be leveraged to better inform the public via the advanced features of 3.0 when emergencies arise, he says.

The decision to expand AWARN grew out of a series of workshops and focus groups with emergency managers as well as TV broadcasters from three different regions of the country, says Lawson.

However, both groups expressed some concern about overusing 3.0’s enhanced warning features, such as the TV wake-up function, geo-targeting and rich media, to disseminate emergency information. Doing so might fatigue the public and ultimately desensitize audiences to bona fide alerts, causing them to hesitate to take action or ignore warnings altogether.

“The emergency managers see the best use of ATSC 3.0 alerting being reserved for imminent threat alerting, something that is severe and urgent,” says Lawson. Those from the TV community concurred and said voluntary arrangements are needed with emergency managers about what does and does not qualify for an imminent threat alert.

The concept of an on-screen icon for 3.0 viewers to inform them of a possible threat—rather than a banner alert—was discussed. This approach could give viewers control over emergency information, allowing them to click to learn more or to dismiss and disregard.

“The point is to develop a system to deliver the rare alert as well as a service that is capable of delivering more content to consumers on a voluntary basis,” he says.

Interest in taking advantage of 3.0 to deliver this type of information has come from both news-producing and non-news-producing stations as well as commercial and public broadcasters.

“Some stations see this as a way to supplement their news reporting on their main channel by using a digital subchannel,” says Lawson. “Public stations without a regular newscast view it as a way to provide highly localized, critical information to their communities.”

The next step is to organize a series of conversations with TV news directors and other news executives at station groups and stations “to develop a framework to begin using 3.0 for a broader range of information that would be valuable for the communities they serve,” says Lawson.

Part of those discussions will center on the extent to which TV stations rely upon local public authorities for information versus their own reporting. Lawson draws the analogy to the National Weather Service and weather data and graphics vendors.

“There are third-party commercial companies that package weather information and graphics despite the National Weather Service and NOAA offering massive amounts of public data,” he says.

The AWARN steering committee has directed Lawson to establish an operational framework, such as recommended practices, for newsrooms to rely upon to communicate emergency information to their audiences via 3.0, he says.

“We are also hopeful that expanding our footprint to look at emergency information beyond alerting will help us grow our membership,” he adds.

The Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) remains one of the clearest and strongest use cases for Next Generation Television. It was a key factor in the Federal Communications Commission’s approval of voluntary transmission with ATSC 3.0 [nearly one year ago]. And it’s the platform for a renewed relationship between broadcasters and the public to improve disaster resilience.

The AWARN Alliance continues to grow and evolve. Members include commercial and public broadcasters who reach 90 percent of U.S. households, the National Association of Broadcasters, the Consumer Technology Association, LG Electronics, and tech companies in the U.S., South Korea, and Japan. But many other industry players remain on the sidelines.

The Alliance works closely with our partners who are building the technical architecture for advanced alerting, including ATSC’s AEA I-Team, NAB PILOT, Pearl TV, One Media and the CTA. In this division of labor, the Alliance is answering the “what,” while our technical partners are answering the “how.” Together, we are creating the world’s most advanced alerting system.

Toward that end, AWARN is developing a user experience (UX) style guide based on social science and usability research. So far, we have conducted focus groups with alerting authorities for 26 million people in Southern California and Arizona. For our next focus group at the New York City Emergency Operations Center, TV news professionals from the network stations and WNET, one of our public media members, are invited. We hope to test usability with end-users in 2019.

The AWARN Steering Committee has been formed to help guide the Alliance, which is managed by my firm, Convergence Services, Inc. The committee quickly has become the forum for holistically examining the major issues around the launch of advanced alerting. Convening cross-industry working groups to address these issues, along with UX development, has emerged as a focus of the Alliance for next year. Major questions include:

• Where does official alerting end and station news and weather begin?
• If the most urgent alerts should be automatically passed through stations, as some broadcasters have suggested, what sort of voluntary agreements are needed between stations and alerting authorities?
• Smart industries avoid regulation by providing voluntary services; how can voluntary AWARN preclude any future perceived need to regulate ATSC 3.0 alerting?
• As pressure builds on streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu to provide local emergency messages, can ATSC 3.0 home gateways and smart TV’s provide a hybrid alerting solution?
• What are appropriate guidelines among broadcasters, receiver makers, and emergency managers for “waking-up” devices from standby mode?

The AWARN Alliance is bringing together broadcast executives, news and digital directors, emergency managers, device makers, and tech vendors for resolving these issues. We appeal to all organizations seeking success in the Next Gen TV ecosystem to become part of the solution. After all, if we can use ATSC 3.0 to send a geo-targeted, multimedia alert to any enabled consumer device under the worst possible conditions, we can use it to send anything.

As one of our members has said, “If you’re not at the table, you’re on it.”

For more information, visit our website. 

John M. Lawson is executive director of the AWARN Alliance and president of Convergence Services, Inc.

For comprehensive coverage on ATSC 3.0, visit TV Technology's ATSC3 silo.

LAS VEGAS — The Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance today announced it will feature ATSC 3.0 advanced alerting with hybrid OTA-broadband solutions at the 2018 NAB Show, April 7–12.

The alliance will also highlight steps to take advanced alerting worldwide. On Monday, April 9, the AWARN Alliance, NAB and RAPA, the Korea Radio Promotion Association, will sign a memorandum of understanding during a ceremony at the show to promote future joint development of advanced alerting based on ATSC 3.0.

“From the beginning, U.S. and South Korean companies have supported AWARN, starting with LG,” AWARN Executive Director John Lawson said. Aircode and DigiCap have since joined the alliance. “Along with NAB, we’re honored to be engaging with our colleagues at RAPA for continued co-development of Next Gen TV, including a joint global initiative for ATSC 3.0 advanced alerting,” Lawson said.

[Read: ATSC 3.0: A New Value-Added Approach for Emergency Information]

Lawson also hailed the decision of The Weather Company, an IBM Business, to join the alliance and bring its expertise in severe weather alerting and geo-targeting.

“Increasingly, the alliance is providing the nexus between the Next Gen TV development community and the nation’s emergency managers,” said Lawson. “Our goal is not only to create the architecture for delivering geo-targeted advanced alerts, but also design rich media and accessible messages that lead to life-saving action by the public.”

The alliance will also demonstrate interactive hybrid AMBER Alerts and HazMat alerts at the NAB Show, taking advantage of the IP nature of the 3.0 standard. AWARN alerts are being designed for delivery over-the-air, and if ATSC 3.0-enabled smart TVs or mobile devices are connected to the internet, new capabilities like social media integration and interactive maps are now possible, the AWARN Alliance said.

For more information visit the AWARN Alliance website or stop by the AWARN Alliance booth at the NAB Show: N1739FP.

For a comprehensive list of TV Technology’s ATSC 3.0 coverage, see our ATSC3 silo.

LEAWOOD, KAN.—When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in August 2005, WWL – at the time a Belo station — managed to stay on the air due in large part to the efforts of Rick Barber, its director of technology and broadcast media when the storm struck.

But despite building a transmitter building on 14-foot concrete columns to get above sea level, installing a 1MW generator with a 1,500 gallon feed tank and installing an additional 10,000 gallon tank as a reserve, to stay on air Barber and a well-armed cadre of private security personnel hired by Belo had to transport fuel – a scarce and valuable commodity in the wake of the hurricane — to top off the generator’s tanks.

[Read: All 50 States, D.C., Opt In To FirstNet]

While Katrina is ancient history, Belo is no more and Barber has left the station, the problem of picking up the pieces after a major calamity, like a hurricane, earthquake or terrorist attack, to maintain vital, potentially lifesaving communications with the public remains.

However, with the signing of the 2018 Omnibus Spending Bill on March 23, things may be getting better for broadcasters who must grapple to stay on air in the aftermath of an emergency.

Tucked into the 2,232-page spending bill was the SANDy Act, which aims to protect the nation’s communications networks by giving radio and TV broadcasters, cable and satellite providers and wireline and mobile telephone service companies priority access to otherwise restricted areas in an emergency to make repairs and maintain service.

“Television and radio broadcasters have been trying to get priority access written into federal law since at least Hurricane Katrina, when stations were lifelines but diesel fuel deliveries to keep their generators running were blocked,” said John Lawson, executive director of the AWARN Alliance.

“The bill covers a range of communications infrastructure, but priority access for broadcast facilities may have the greatest positive impact for recovery,” said Lawson, who also serves on FEMA’s National Advisory Council Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Subcommittee.

Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, authored the SANDy Act and led bipartisan negotiations aimed at its passage. New Jersey was among the states that suffered communications disruptions caused by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012.

In the Senate, the bill was backed by Senators Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), John Thune (R-S.D.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

NAB issued a statement lauding the bill’s passage. “NAB is grateful that this bipartisan bill acknowledging the lifeline role of local broadcasting in times of emergency is now the law of the land,” said NAB EVP Communications Dennis Wharton in the statement.

WASHINGTON—Trilithic Inc., a supplier of homeland security government-mandated emergency alert systems, has joined the Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance, according to an alliance press release.

The company, which recently became a part of VIAVI Solutions, joins other alliance members including commercial and public broadcasters reaching 90 percent of U.S. households, NAB, CTA. LG Electronics and a growing number of South Korean tech companies.

Next year, the AWARN Alliance will work to develop a standards-based advanced warning beta end-to-end solution, said John Lawson, executive director of the alliance.

“Trilithic has deep experience with alerting technology using the Common Alerting Protocol across diverse platforms,” he said. “We look forward to working with them as we develop our upgrade to America’s alerting capabilities.”

More information is available on the AWARN Alliance website.