Last month, the NAB announced the recipients of one of our industry’s highest honors, the Engineering Achievement Awards in Radio and Television. For radio, the honor goes to Bert Goldman, owner and president of Goldman Engineering Management, in recognition of more than 50 years of leadership and innovation in broadcast engineering.

The television honor goes to Harvey Arnold, senior vice president of engineering for Sinclair Broadcast Group, who is being recognized for his leadership and longstanding contributions to advancing broadcast technology. Harvey is an SMPTE Fellow and member of the SMPTE Board of Editors. A former chairman of the NAB TV Technology Committee, he remains active in ATSC, SMPTE, SBE and AFCCE. He is also a recipient of the Broadcasting+Cable Technology Leadership Award.

Both men will receive their awards at the We Are Broadcasters Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, April 21 at the 2026 NAB Show in Las Vegas. 

Harvey’s career spans nearly 50 years in broadcast engineering. A native of New York City, Harvey says he caught the “bug” as a child in the early 1960’s when his father took him on a tour of the NBC facilities at Rockefeller Center.

“In those days, people could actually tour the technical facility; you could walk past the tape machines and the cameras,” he said. “And as a little guy, I was just enamoured with this stuff.”

Harvey attended the University of Wisconsin in the 1970s, where his enthusiasm for broadcast was further piqued by working at WGBW, the campus radio station.

“We actually built a 5-kilowatt transmitter which we resurrected from another radio station,” he said. “I was hooked on it from that point on.”

After working for several commercial TV stations, Harvey joined North Carolina Public Television in 1980, where, during his 17-year career, he managed and expanded engineering and transmission operations for one of the nation’s largest statewide public television networks. He also participated in activities of the FCC Advisory Committee for Advanced Television Service (ACATS), helping test the ATSC DTV standard in the field and guide the rollout of DTV in the U.S.

In 1998, Harvey was recruited by Nat Ostroff, who led Sinclair Broadcast Group’s Advanced Technology team, and tapped into his experience at PBS to help the company transition from analog to ATSC 1.0.

Harvey said Sinclair’s reputation as a “technology-first” company was among the biggest reasons he joined the company, adding that Sinclair President David Smith would often present him with challenging projects.

“He would call me into his office for technical questions, and when I told him, ‘This is difficult and we’re not going to be able to do it because it defies the laws of physics,’ he would always smile and say, ‘Harv, you can work through that, you can figure it out,’” he said.

As our industry transitions to ATSC 3.0, Harvey has been at the forefront of Sinclair’s initiatives, including the development of the Broadcast Positioning System (BPS), helping test the technology in the Washington D.C. area.

Harvey emphasized the importance of the transition, particularly in terms of its place in the nation’s public safety ecosystem.

“Broadcasters need to embrace NextGenTV, and we need to be relevant... [BPS and emergency notification] are key examples of things that can directly benefit the public,” he said.

Harvey’s dedication to advancing and expanding broadcast technology over nearly half a century is a testament to his enthusiasm for our industry and TV Tech congratulates him on this well-deserved honor!

HUNT VALLEY, Md.—Sinclair Broadcast Group today announced its 2025 Diversity Scholarship program awarding up to $5,000 to a college sophomore and junior pursuing a career in broadcast/digital journalism or marketing.

The scholarship, open only to those attending a four-year college or university, is intended to help students from diverse backgrounds reflecting the broadcaster’s audiences nationwide, the company said.

Eligibility requirements and a scholarship application is available on the company’s website.

Sinclair Broadcast Group is reportedly considering selling more than 30% of its broadcast stations according to CNBC. 

The broadcast group, which owns 185 stations in 86 markets has already identified about 60 stations it could sell, according to CNBC’s source, who added that the station group has hired Moelis to broker the transactions. The stations are affiliates of Fox, NBC, ABC, CBS and the CW and if sold together their average revenue for 2023 and 2024 is an estimated $1.56 billion, according to the source. The stations are located in Minneapolis; Portland, Ore.; Pittsburgh; Austin, Texas and Fresno, Calif., among others. Bloomberg has previously reported that the company is also considering a sale of the Tennis Channel.

Sinclair has not responded to inquiries from TV Tech. 

Sinclair, which reportedly began shopping the stations in February, has lost more than 70% of its market value in the last five years, CNBC said, with its market capitalization at about $975 million with an enterprise value of about $4.7 billion.

Sinclair reported its latest earnings last week and while advertising revenue rose by 4% in Q1 2024,  core advertising excluding political was down by 3% YoY. The station group said it has pre-booked $77 million in political advertising for the second half of the year through Election Day. This is more than three times the $21 million it had booked in the last presidential election cycle as of May 1, 2020 and much more than the $28 million as of May 1, 2022.

Last year Sinclair split itself into two entities, one focused solely on the broadcast stations and the other focused on new tech ventures. In January, its Diamond Sports Group inked a deal with Amazon to keep its troubled Bally Sports regional sports network operating after Diamond filed for bankruptcy in 2023. 

The company is also actively lobbying the FCC to update its local broadcast ownership rules, claiming that current rules hurt local journalism and hinder its ability to maximize the value of its stations. 

SEOUL, Korea—Sinclair Broadcast Group said today that it is partnering with Korean-based content security provider Digicap to install a new system to automate ATSC 3.0 security certificate management. Sinclair will install the system, called Centralized Certificate Lifecycle Management System (CCMS), in collaboration with digital certificate management company Eonti.

Content security has been among the most contentious issues during the rollout of ATSC 3.0, with many viewers complaining about broadcasters encrypting 3.0 signals. Aware of these concerns, broadcasters are moving forward to resolve these issues to help spur interest in NextGen TV. The implementation of CCMS could help fill in the gaps by providing a more streamlined broadcast security environment. 

Because ATSC 3.0 services may integrate Internet functionality with broadcast programming, broadcasters use such digital certificates to help reduce the potential security risk from unknown or unauthorized broadcast signals. Managing these digital certificates can be a complex and time-consuming task, especially for large station groups. A station must register a digital certificate the day ATSC 3.0 transmission begins and renew it every year or two thereafter. Further, because ATSC 3.0 stations launch at different times, certificate renewal dates are spread throughout the year, making it more difficult to ensure certificates are valid.

CCMS uses pre-populated information to automate and simplify the management and operational tasks of ATSC 3.0 digital certificates, significantly streamlining the process. CCMS works in collaboration with Eonti to automate the lifecycle management of security certificates. In the lead up to a certificate renewal, CCMS alerts notify involved parties. CCMS can pre-populate necessary forms, manage form submission, monitor responses, and notify all parties when compliance steps are met—or users can choose to have CCMS simply provide notification when certificates need to be renewed. By streamlining certificate management, CCMS frees station personnel to concentrate on more pressing tasks.

“Sinclair is proud to participate in this pioneering initiative to effortlessly manage our NextGen Broadcast transmission security protocols,” said Paul Spinelli, AVP Engineering for Sinclair. “We take our broadcast signal security very seriously. With new business models developing for NextGen Broadcast, we needed to secure our signal to ensure our viewers can trust the integrity of our broadcast. 

“As the broadcaster with the largest number of NextGen Broadcast sites, we knew manually performing this work was inefficient and not sustainable,” Spinelli added. “CCMS enables us to do this more efficiently and with reduced effort across our operations, ultimately accelerating the transition to NextGen Broadcasting.”

“We love to help broadcast stations solve their problems as they move to more software-based and cloud-based solutions,” said Joonyoung Park, SVP for DigiCAP. “We made it easier for broadcasters by building CCMS on top of our software development and operation platform to provide rapid software development and validation with secure operations. We are committed to supporting our broadcast station customers and partners moving forward with next generation broadcast platforms.”

"We are at a transformative juncture in broadcasting, where the integration of ATSC 3.0's advanced security and content protection capabilities with our digital certificate lifecycle management expertise is set to redefine industry standards,” said Oscar Marcia, CEO of Eonti. “Our collaboration with DigiCAP and Sinclair Broadcast Group in deploying the CCMS not only underscores our commitment to leveraging technology to enhance broadcast security while also streamlining operational efficiencies for broadcasters. 

"This initiative leverages the expertise and technology of DigiCAP and Eonti to help broadcasters manage digital certificates, ensure content integrity and trust for consumers,” Marcia continued. “Eonti is proud to contribute our deep-rooted knowledge in PKI and cybersecurity to enable seamless, secure, and scalable broadcasting solutions to the industry.”

WASHINGTON—Several broadcast station groups have formed an advocacy to invest and promote the advancement of RUN3TV, a software suite for ATSC 3.0 that takes advantage of the format’s IP architecture to offer a wide range of advanced options, including DVR-type features as well as emergency alerts and ad personalization. 

The companies—Gray Television, Sinclair Broadcast Group, Hearst Television, Tegna and The E.W. Scripps Company—are members of Pearl TV, a consortium of broadcasters, manufacturers and NGOs that was formed at the dawn of the ATSC 3.0 transition when it launched six years ago and have been among the most proactive station groups in deploying and promoting ATSC 3.0. Specific financial terms of the investment were not disclosed. 

ATSC 3.0 has been launched by more than 91 stations in 40 markets, bringing the advanced broadcast standard to within reach of more than 75% of U.S. households. Pearl says it expects that number to grow to more than 200 stations in 53 markets by the end of 2024.

The broadcast group investors will lead the funding to accelerate the commercial launch of the ATSC 3.0 Framework Authority (A3FA), the driving force behind the RUN3TV platform. Pearl TV says it expects additional broadcast groups to become involved in the future. Progress Partners is the exclusive financial adviser for Pearl TV and A3FA initiative.

Pearl TV says the move unites broadcasters to offer new services and unlock the full potential of the convergence of broadcast and broadband that ATSC 3.0 enables.  The effort provides a common method for viewers to take advantage of NextGen TV broadcasting by standardizing broadcast application capabilities across manufacturers to provide interactive services and the convergence of over-the-air with over-the-top (broadcast + broadband) connectivity. 

For viewers, RUN3TV introduces an innovative suite of features designed to elevate the NEXTGEN TV experience, enabling functionalities like “Start Over” and advanced emergency alerts for broadcaster’s applications. This platform not only enriches the viewing experience with enhanced access to local news, weather, and on-demand content including VOD and streaming services but also provides viewers with immediate access to essential information and their favorite entertainment. With RUN3TV, viewers benefit from a more interactive, engaging, and modern viewing experience.

For broadcasters, RUN3TV makes it easy to integrate essential and advanced features across various platforms, while also allowing for the customization of unique services and content. This platform enhances broadcasters' ability to gather detailed viewership data, offering insights that help tailor content directly to viewer preferences, according to Pearl TV. With RUN3TV, broadcasters can not only provide seamless access to applications like “Start Over” and advanced emergency alerts but also significantly improve content discovery and viewer engagement.

"Our investment in RUN3TV and ATSC 3.0 is a strategic endeavor for local broadcasters like Gray, bringing additional, measurable value to local stations by providing more choices for our viewers.  RUN3TV improves over the air viewership measurement, but it also gives our viewers more options at the touch of a button to engage deeper with their local stations,” said Pat LaPlatney, CEO of Gray Television.

"By integrating our applications into the RUN3TV platform, we're committed to uniting the industry toward enriching the viewer experience, including offering more interactive services and essential public services like emergency alerts," stated Chris Ripley, CEO of Sinclair Broadcast Group.

Also critical to this effort is the collaboration with media measurement companies, including Nielsen and Comscore, Pearl said. Nielsen and Pearl TV have worked closely since 2018 and Nielsen watermarking success was confirmed during early ATSC 3.0 transmission trials. More recently, Pearl TV and Nielsen have further engaged as the NextGen TV rollout has now reached 75% of U.S. TV households.

“Nielsen is pleased to evolve our longstanding relationship with Pearl TV as we jointly explore the use of OTA ‘big data’ in our local TV measurement. OTA households have been a critical element of our local TV service for decades, and this latest development around RUN3TV is an exciting step in potentially being able to harness the power of OTA broadcasting data sources, which will only enhance our local TV measurement,” said Paul LeFort, Managing Director of Nielsen’s Local TV business.

Pearl TV engaged Comscore in 2018 to draw from Comscore’s long-term expertise with ‘big data’ as an industry leader validating, aggregating and providing solutions from return path data from virtually every Multichannel Video Programming Distributor (MVPD) in the ecosystem, the group said.  Comscore partnered with Pearl TV on the ATSC 3.0 trials and now brings more than two decades of expertise to the new RUN3TV platform.

"Our partnership aims to enhance audience measurement precision with big data capabilities for over-the-air, contributing to the industry's growth and innovation. Comscore eagerly anticipates the rollout of RUN3TV by broadcasters as it will allow enhanced return path data capabilities increasing the customer satisfaction and value of measurement," commented Brian Pugh, Chief Information Officer, Comscore.

Amid much commentary about the negative impact high-valued sports streaming initiatives could have on local TV stations and MVPDs there’s another much more optimistic view emerging from the ranks of several publicly traded station groups.In sharp contrast to those who feel threatened by sports rights owners’ surging embrace of streaming, these station owners contend they are making significant headway with opportunistic adjustments to the new reality.

Even in the case of “Spulu,”—the unofficial name of the mega sports streaming joint venture between ESPN, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery scheduled to launch later this year—there’s a big split between those who are shrugging it off and the entities ringing alarm bells. According to a report in the Wall St. Journal, the service—which promises to offer feeds from ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNEWS, ABC, FOX, FS1, FS2, BTN, TNT, TBS and truTV—could cost up to $50 per month.

A skeptic might see recent “what-me-worry?” sports-related stances taken by big station groups like Nexstar, Gray, Tegna, Sinclair and E.W. Scripps as posturing meant to allay Wall Street concerns. After all, there’s plenty of fuel for apprehension in the raw statistics surrounding the surge in sports streaming.

Unlevel Playing Field
In the U.S., 80% of sports fans, including 76% who watch NFL games and 89% of the soccer fan base, sometimes or regularly view the action online, according to Nielsen Fan Insights. As for sports rights revenues flowing to sports producers from streamers, research by Ampere Analysis found the global total jumped 64% to hit $8.5 billion in 2023, representing 21% of all sports rights revenues compared to 13% the year before.

Nonetheless, there’s a widening gap between station groups and Tier 1 multichannel video  programming distributors (MVPDs) who can turn developments to their advantage and other station owners and smaller pay-TV systems who feel they’re trapped on an unlevel playing field. It makes for a cacophony of messages hitting regulators and investors at a moment when everyone is looking for a more coherent, predictable business environment to work and invest in.

“If you could figure out whether there’s one unified voice from either the broadcast side or the cable side, I’d love to read your article,” says Grant Spellmeyer, president of ACA Connects, the lobbying organization representing smaller cable companies. “It is fractured all over the place.”

Brian Lawlor, president of Scripps Sports, offers several reasons for his company’s upbeat perspective on the role sports will continue to play in drawing audiences not only to its stations but, in some respects, to most other local broadcasters as well. “Even though some stuff has moved to streaming, most premier sports remain on linear television,” Lawlor says.

Streaming may bring some additional revenue to rights owners, but discussions with teams and leagues reveal “they’re all concerned about reach and their ability to put games in front of fans,” Lawlor adds. “At the end of the day, local broadcast continues to reach 100% of households.”

Indeed, as Lawlor and other station group executives note, free over-the-air exposure has become even more important to sports producers in light of the reversal in regional sports network (RSN) fortunes, including most prominently those of Diamond Sports Group, which is pursuing a Chapter 11 restructuring deal that would give Amazon Prime streaming rights to its sports partners’ games. “A decade ago, a lot of us had partnerships with RSNs reaching 80 percent of their markets, and now it’s down to just 35 or 40 percent,” Lawlor says.

Scripps, like other station groups, is capitalizing on sports teams’ desires to maintain broad local coverage, in this case with new deals involving the NHL’s Las Vegas Golden Knights and Phoenix Coyotes. Other recent high-profile local station sports partnerships include Tegna’s with the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs, Dallas Mavericks and Milwaukee Bucks, and Gray Television’s with that league’s Phoenix Suns, Atlanta Hawks, and New Orleans Pelicans.

Market Overreaction?
Along with citing such deals to quell Wall Street anxieties, some station group executives have been addressing what Nexstar President/CEO Mike Biard recently referred to as “a significant misinterpretation in market overreaction” to the proposed JV streaming service.

During the company’s Q4 2023 report to investors in late February, Biard said, “We have confirmation that it will function in the same manner as other vMVPDs that distribute over Fox and ABC affiliated stations,” meaning he expects the new service to join other online providers of MVPD-like lineups in payment of what amounts to retransmission consent fees.

Interestingly, the question of legally mandating retransmission payments from “virtual” MVPDs (i.e., YouTube TV, Hulu Live+, Sling TV), remains outstanding in an unresolved FCC notice of proposed rulemaking first issued in 2014, which the NAB has been pressing the commission to address since late last year. vMVPDs’ willingness to pay voluntarily while joining forces with the big four broadcast networks to oppose FCC action serves as another demonstration of market clout wielded by some station groups.

During their own Q4 conferences, Sinclair President/CEO Christopher Ripley and Scripps President/CEO Adam Symson agreed with Biard that the sports JV doesn’t look so bad, assuming it survives to generate payments to stations affiliated with broadcast networks carrying sports targeted by the JV. But as Ripley sees it, that’s a “big if.”

Citing missing Olympics and incomplete NFL and March Madness coverage, he said, “If this is all about attracting the sports fanatic, it’s hard to say it’s a slam dunk.” Instead, the JV “will be yet another virtual MVPD in an already crowded and somewhat established marketplace…competing with and likely cannibalizing other streaming products from the very same companies that make up the partnership.”

Such sanguinity is a far cry from the responses emanating from other sources. Along with crying foul over what they see as the JV’s antitrust implications, they assert high-profile exclusive pro sports deals like those cut by Amazon, Apple, and Comcast’s Peacock service are the tip of an unchecked spear coming right at them.

Initial Opposition
Opinions vary as to which business model constitutes the larger threat.

Unlike the big exclusive streaming deals, “Spulu’s” plans face court and Justice Department scrutiny. Coming to light in mid-February were the antitrust suit filed in New York by sports streamer FuboTV and an as-yet-unconfirmed investigation Bloomberg reported was getting underway at the DOJ.

ACA Connects’ Spellmeyer echoes widely held sentiments expressed by skeptics. Looking at what little is known about the partners’ plans as a “continuing deterioration of the linear programming model,” Spellmeyer says the JV is especially notable as a harbinger of what could be in store.

“This is a bigger deal than the movement of one baseball playoff game to Peacock or even moving Thursday Night NFL games to Amazon,” Spellmeyer says. The JV is doing this “to further exploit their market power and put it together collectively and leverage it.”

But a source voicing the concerns of a large station group owner says the amounts big streamers are willing to pay for sports rights represent an even bigger anticompetitive threat to broadcasters, MVPDs and even Silicon Valley vMVPDs.

“They are all in the same sinking boat with the great white Amazon shark circling,” the person said. “These big tech streamers are willing to spend stupid amounts of money to take rights away from the broadcast networks and broadcast stations—when it comes to sports—are at the mercy of the networks.”

In addition to the courts, observers are also keeping an eye on Congress, which has cast a skeptical eye on sports streaming, and in particular, garnering swift criticism from politicians when NBC broadcast an NFL playoff game exclusively on Peacock in January.

“I think our job here is to protect the American consumer to ensure that they’re able to easily access the content that they pay for,” said Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), during a Congressional hearing on the subject in February. Referring to professional sports and media (with no pun intended), she said “I just think it’s a racket. It’s a racket.” 

SIDEBAR:

NextGen TV Could Bring Sports Coverage ‘On Par’ With Streamers
Beyond the debate over the immediate impact of sports streaming there’s another story to be told that’s opening a new chapter on broadcast stations’ plays in sports programming. With ATSC 3.0 (aka NextGen TV), leaping to 75% market coverage over the past year on a trajectory to near blanket coverage by year’s end, NextGen TV will give stations an opportunity to greatly enhance sports viewing experiences as well as to bring more local sports coverage to their audiences.

As explained by Anne Schelle, managing director of the Pearl TV consortium of eight large station groups operating 820 TV stations nationwide, Pearl TV affiliated stations and others rolling out NextGen TV services are putting a lot of stock in the appeal of what they can do with sports programming. Indeed, she notes, sports broadcasting is a big focus of the ATSC 3.0 exhibit at this month’s NAB Show.

One big aspect to what can be done with NextGen TV has to do with enabling 4K UHD with HDR when games are broadcast in 4K along with HDR enhancements to HD when technology supporting upscaling to HDR from SDR is in play. With 20 million households in reach of HDR-enabled signals at the start of the year, the goal is to hit 50 million this spring, 80 million by the Summer Olympics, “and then it becomes pretty ubiquitous by year’s end,” Schelle says.

Another sports-related advancement involves setting up a “virtual TV station” to stream the contents of a sports-rich station not equipped for ATSC 3.0 broadcasts. Schelle notes this allows these stations to deliver sports programming to connected TVs and personal devices with the full benefits of NextGen TV sports viewing experiences.

ATSC 3.0 support for HTML5 overlays that can be synched for display on OTA channels delivered to connected TVs adds still another dimension to sports viewing experience. Schelle says Pearl TV has partnered with Run3TV to use its platform as an abstraction layer that allows Pearl members’ HTML5 NextGen TV apps to run on all the operating systems used by their OEM partners.

“NextGen TV brings broadcasters on par with innovations we see on streaming services,” Schelle adds. She notes the ATSC 3.0 display at this month’s NAB Show includes demonstrations of joint efforts of Run3TV and Play Anywhere, a rights clearinghouse that facilitates interactive apps for advertising, betting, e-commerce and much else by ensuring all rights holders tied to a given app get the share due them from revenues generated by the app.

Critically, the HTML5 feed can also be used to bring complete coverage of sports events to CTV screens. “It allows broadcasters to do pop-up channels covering lots of things they couldn’t do on air in the past,” Schelle says. Pop-up tie-ins with stations’ EPGs can expose options to viewing local college and high school sports, enabling an unprecedented level of localized TV engagement. “There’s so much power in local sports coverage,” she notes.

Mentioning efforts along these lines by Pearl TV members’ Gray Television and Scripps, Schelle adds, “They’re recognizing it. Their ratings are super high with local audiences that have an affinity for these teams. This is helping them to pull in ‘Z-generation’ viewers.”

With ATSC 3.0 (aka “NextGen TV) now reaching approximately 75% of U.S. households, emphasis at the 2024 NAB Show will be on refinements and new applications for the advanced broadcast format—the most visible being HDR (high dynamic range).

“We’re expecting broadcasters to begin ‘taking the new car for a drive,’ with the expansion of high dynamic range programming to show viewers one of the key advantages of the new service—exceptional video that is matched with the Dolby audio system,” said ATSC President Madeleine Noland.

“We’re calling this ‘the year of HDR’ because a lot of stations have received, or will receive, permission to scale services into High Dynamic Range,” added Dave Folsom, Pearl TV group’s engineering lead. “At least two encoder manufacturers can now do this scaling, and that will make the service better. In most locations it will be provided as a 1080p service.”

Mark Aitken, senior vice president of advanced technology at Sinclair Broadcast Group, also weighed on the addition of high dynamic range.

“HDR is very significant, and one of the promises of the ATSC 3.0 standard is better television for America’s living rooms,” said Aitken. “It was the focus of the ATSC at this year’s CES. CBS’s delivery of the February Super Bowl LVIII in HDR should spur others to add this enhancement to their ATSC 3.0 transmissions and I expect to see announcements from other networks,” said Aitken, noting that HDR is nothing new at Sinclair. “We’ve been broadcasting HDR 24/7 at all of our stations with ATSC 3.0. Some 40 Sinclair stations are on the air with Advanced HDR by Technicolor.”

Seeing is Believing
West Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center will host most of the 3.0 exhibitors and perhaps the best first stop for attendees interested in 3.0 is the ATSC booth (W3056).

“We plan to showcase both the NextGen TV sets and also upgrade accessory receivers at the NAB Show to make sure broadcasters are aware of the variety of set-top devices coming for consumers,” said Noland. “Already, consumers have their choice of NextGen TV-certified and security-verified receiving devices from ADTH and Zinwell.”

“There are a lot of standalone devices now available to enable NextGen TV reception with legacy receivers,” added Pearl’s Folsom. “All modern TV sets have HDMI input capability, so when a conversion device is added the user can painlessly switch between ATSC 1.0 and 3.0. This should go a long way to greasing the skids to full adoption.”

Aitken says Sinclair will also have an exhibits-area presence at the show with ATSC, and both an “on-floor suite” not far from  the ATSC booth, and a Wynn suite, both demonstrating ATSC 3.0 datacasting. He also promised some surprise announcements at the show on recent major datacasting developments.

Additional Space for 3.0
Aitken says he hopes there is news from the NAB Show on a date for sunsetting 1.0, giving broadcasters more bandwidth to roll out the full inventory of audio, video and data enhancements that are part of 3.0.

“I believe there’s good progress being made in the Future of Television Initiative [dealing with ATSC 1.0 switch-off and other 3.0 transition issues] within the industry, with the NAB playing a key role and the FCC and other regulatory bodies coming to an understanding of the nature of what has to happen in order to jettison the first stage of this rocket, ignite the second stage, and be securely in orbit,” Aitken added.

Anne Schelle, Pearl TV’s managing director, spotlighted another big NextGen TV development — “Run3 TV—that will be featured at the NAB Show.

“Run 3 is a powerful middleware solution that acts as an abstraction layer, simplifying the complex process of developing and deploying NextGen TV applications across varying operating systems and devices,” said Schelle, adding that it will allow broadcasters to reach wider audiences with more efficiency and less technical overhead.

“At the 2024 NAB show, developers such as Velope, Playanywhere, Gameloop, and Roxi will showcase the innovative applications and capabilities enabled by Run3TV, highlighting the platform’s role in driving the future of interactive TV,” Schelle added.

New NextGen TV Hardware
Along with the new and updated 3.0 applications, manufacturers have been busy developing new products to show on the exhibit floor.

Heading the lineup of new transmitters for ATSC 3.0 is the new E-Compact EC600HP-BB3 series from Hitachi-Comark, optimized for LPTV/MPTV replacements and ATSC 3.0 SFN deployments, according to Joe Turbolski, Hitachi-Comark’s vice president of sales and marketing. 

GatesAir will launch its Maxiva VLXTE-OP, “which essentially rounds out the top end of the Maxiva family for ATSC 3.0 transmission,” said Steve Rossiter, GatesAir TV systems applications engineer.

Although details weren’t fully available at press time, Rohde & Schwarz is also promising a new transmitter launch. “Rhode & Schwarz has developed a new and next-generation ATSC 3.0-native transmitter that embraces the liquid-cooled design and legacy while enabling operators to maximize their efficiency at minimized operational cost,” said Manfred Reitmeier, R&S’s vice president of broadcast and amplifier systems.“

Dielectric President Keith Pelletier says the company will show their latest antenna offerings, including the Powerlite TFU-WB-LP series. “Dielectric has spent the last several years building out its portfolio of ATSC 3.0 solutions,” he said. “We are 95% there in terms of filling out the entire product line, which will essentially allow us to serve any ATSC 3.0 requirements. Dielectric expects to fill in some final gaps with new models at NAB 2024.”

Attendees will also want to check out Harmonic’s XOS media processor and cloud-based VOS 360 Media SaaS offerings. “These feature a unique cloud-native common software foundation and next-gen media processing technology,” said Jing Zhou, Harmonic’s director of broadcast solutions. “They enable broadcasters to deliver ATSC 1.0 and 3.0 services simultaneously and efficiently, with feature enhancements including AI-powered video compression and quality optimization, simplified SDR/HDR conversions, and more.”

Also, look for Sencore’s new AG 2700 for monitoring of both ATSC 1.0 and 3.0 OTA signals. It provides ASI and IP outputs signals, and includes SNMP functionality.

These new product offerings only represent a small sampling of NextGen TV technologies that will be on display at the 2024 NAB Show. 

NextGen TV Educational Opportunities
In addition to tire-kicking and networking opportunities at exhibitor’s booths, you’ll also want to take advantage of the large number of presentations being offered on ATSC 3.0 television. These are part of the BEIT (Broadcast Engineering and IT) sessions featured Saturday through Tuesday at the 2024 NAB Show.

Presentations will cover advanced emergency alerting, ATSC 3.0 television translators, use of ATSC 3.0 transmissions for positioning systems, converging ATSC 3.0 and 5G technologies, offloading of video streaming content via NextGen TV and more.

Of particular interest to broadcasters is the IEEE Broadcast Technology Society’s Saturday afternoon presentation, “ATSC 3.0 Business Case and Monetization,” focusing on creating additional revenue streams for stations. According to the session organizers, such topics as the delivery of audio (radio) services via ATSC 3.0, targeted advertising, use of geo-localized datacasting, and delivery of ATSC 3.0 enhancements through the use of virtual (Internet-delivered) channels will all be included.

Paul Shulins, IEEE BTS president and president of the Shulins Solutions consulting firm, terms this session a “must-attend” event. 

“Broadcasters today have many different options to generate revenue besides the traditional advertising dollars,” said Shulins. “Thanks to ATSC 3.0 this session will showcase several new creative concepts for monetizing your data capacity.”

Another session explores a relatively new ATSC 3.0 technology, “core networks,” which will provide delivery of television services and data across multiple TV transmission facilities in multiple markets.

“The ATSC 3.0 Broadcast Core Networks: Serving diverse use-cases across a heterogeneous broadcast and supplier ecosystem,” Tuesday afternoon panel discussion will be moderated by Spectra Rep COO y the chief operating officer at Spectra Rep, John McCoskey.

“Broadcast core networks connect broadcasters, end-user service providers, and virtualized network infrastructure providers and enable data-centric businesses using ATSC 3.0,” McCoskey. “Don’t miss this session if you are interested in learning about the role, value, and importance of broadcast core networks as a critical part of the ATSC 3.0 broadcast ecosystem.”

For a complete listing of BEIT ATSC 3.0-related sessions and times, visit https://nabshow.com/2024/learn/conferences/broadcast-engineering

Sinclair said this week it has inked a financing deal with its bankrupt Diamond Sports Group that would allow the RSN to continue operations. 

The “Restructuring Support Agreement” will see Sinclair pay $495 million to Diamond—which declared bankruptcy in 2023 with more than $9 billion in debt spread across its 19 Bally Sports regional sports networks. The payment will settle a $1.5 billion lawsuit filed by Diamond against Sinclair last summer in which the company was seeking to retrieve up to $1.5 billion in management fees it paid to Sinclair following Sinclair’s acquisition of Fox’s 19 RSNs (under the “Bally Sports Group” brand) from Disney.

Sinclair said that $496 million payment could result in a net cost to Sinclair of $250 million to $325 million. 

The new agreement includes a $115 million minority investment from Amazon whose Prime Video streaming service will become the new home to Diamond’s “Bally Sports Plus” D2C apps. The cash infusion will allow Diamond to pay $350 million to its creditors, emerge from bankruptcy and continue to operate the RSNs independently.

David Preschlack, CEO of Diamond stated: "We are thrilled to have reached a comprehensive restructuring agreement that provides a detailed framework for a reorganization plan and substantial new financing that will enable Diamond to operate and thrive beyond 2024. 

"We are grateful for the support from Amazon and a group of our largest creditors who clearly believe in the value-creating potential of this business," Preschlack continued. "Diamond's near-term focus will be on implementing the RSA and emerging from bankruptcy as a going concern for the benefit of our investors, our employees, our team, league and distribution partners, and the millions of fans who will continue to enjoy our broadcasts."

The agreement—which is subject to court approval—is a sign of the new reality in which regional sports networks, which have suffered declining ratings due to the increase in subscribers cutting the pay TV cord over the years now will operate in a hybrid fashion with Amazon, according to one observer.

“Diamond was paying over $2 billion indeed to the leagues. The RSNs can’t generate enough revenue for the teams only being on cable,” one source familiar with the talks told TV Tech sister brand NextTV. “They definitely can’t go exclusively DTC. Diamond will be able to make money on cable, make money on DTC with streaming and put a number of games on broadcast, some on Sinclair stations.”. 

LAS VEGAS—ROXi is teaming up with Sinclair Broadcast Group to offer ROXi’s interactive music apps to Sinclair's ATSC 3.0 (aka NextGen TV) channels, bringing the U.K. based service to the U.S. for the first time. 

Backed by U.K. entertainment icons Simon Cowell and Kylie Minogue, ROXi—which started in the U.K.—is expected to offer broadcast viewers access to an estimated more than 100 million music videos as well as curated music video channels, karaoke and music games, all available free with ads or a monthly subscription. The new channels—ROXi Music Channel, the ROXi Music Karaoke Channel and the ROXi Music Games Channel—will be made available over Sinclair’s 3.0 stations in early 2024.

“The new channels will change what broadcast TV means for millions of Americans,” ROXi said in a press release. “For the first time, linear TV channels will have all the interactive features of a downloadable TV app without consumers having to download or launch an app on the TV.”

The new broadcast TV music channels are powered via ROXi’s new FastStream technology which allows interactive TV channel experiences to be broadcast over the airwaves with the NextGen TV (ATSC 3.0) standard.

“Our partnership with Sinclair will revolutionize what Broadcast TV means for millions of households across the U.S.—viewers will get instant access to TV music channels that feature the interactivity and capabilities of a music app, without having to download or launch an app,” said ROXi CEO, Rob Lewis. “Our viewers will be able to pause, play and skip on Broadcast TV for the first time. It is a true revolution in linear TV, and we’re bringing it to homes across America with Sinclair in 2024.”

“Through our strategic partnership with ROXi, we’re building a better and more interactive broadcast television experience. We’re confident this partnership will help accelerate the adoption of NextGen TV by delivering entertainment features that consumers will increasingly come to demand on their televisions,” said Skip Flenniken VP, GM of Technology Business Development at Sinclair.

ROXi is hosting sneak previews of its NextGen TV interactive music channels at CES2024 in Las Vegas all this week at the ATSC (Advanced Television Systems Committee) booth at CES Tech East - Las Vegas Convention Centre Central Hall, booth 19744.

According to ATSC president Madeleine Noland, NextGen TV market launches in Chicago, San Diego, and Tucson, will bring NextGen TV market penetration to 75% of U.S. households by next month. According to a spokesperson, approximately 45 of the station group's 185 TV stations nationwide are now broadcasting 3.0.

ROXi is also launching its new downloadable free ROXi TV Music App on a wide range of Smart TV platforms including Samsung, LG, Roku, Vizio, Sony BRAVIA, Amazon Fire TV, Comcast, Google TV and Android TV. The free ROXi TV App offers additional interactive features including the ability to search and play music from ROXi’s catalogue of 100 million music videos. ROXi TV app users can also upgrade to ROXi Premium for an unlimited ad-free music experience.

As the roar of the metaverse hype machine fades to a ho hum, there’s growing evidence that what can be called a “metaversal” approach to production is starting to take hold in the broadcast industry.

Paralleling the headline-grabbing and often flawed efforts to deliver immersive virtual reality (VR) experiences with sports programming, broadcasters have quietly been learning how to leverage volumetric VR and augmented reality (AR) production tools in their workflows. This has allowed them to add compelling graphics dynamism and personalized viewing experiences to internet-streamed 2D renderings of news, sports, and other live broadcasts that are reaching viewers worldwide. 

At the same time, by bringing these solutions into the production mainstream, broadcasters are getting the hands-on experiences in volumetric productions that are essential to producing a new generation of 3D immersive viewing experiences. These efforts are gaining currency with ongoing improvements in extended reality (XR) hardware and software. 

In the Real World
Notably, while many high-profile sports and other VR programming initiatives were done in by poor viewing experiences, some providers, including the NBA—in a recently renewed multiyear deal with Meta; and NBC with its live VR streams during the 2022 Winter Olympics—have stayed the course. With these new productions they’re demonstrating that it’s possible to eliminate pixelation on VR headset screens, stomach-churning delays in responses to shifts in viewers’ fields of vision, and other impediments to user adoption.

Equally important to the improvements in consumer experiences are major advances in headgear, including smaller form factors, tetherless VR head-mounted devices (HMDs) that free users from wired links to computers, and eye movement-tracking sensors that lead to more accurate renderings of what users are looking at. 

Looking forward, while Apple’s Vision Pro mixed reality (MR) HMD set for launch in early 2024 with a starting price tag of $3,499 is targeted to the enterprise and the high-end consumer markets, its incorporation of a dazzling array of advances combining AR and VR technologies exemplifies where mass market user experience is headed as prices for such devices fall over the next few years.

The new volumetric production-driven perspective on the broadcast industry’s migration into the metaverse runs counter to the current sense of disarray in the metaverse camp, which may mean new terminology is needed to avoid detracting from the transformative developments now underway. 

Notably, Apple CEO Tim Cook never used the word “metaverse” when he introduced the Vision Pro in June. Indeed, with Meta’s Reality Labs laying people off in droves after racking up a $13.7-billion loss in 2022 and headlines trumpeting the demise of metaverse projects like Microsoft’s AltspaceVR, Walmart’s Universe of Play, and Disney’s Next Generation Storytelling & Consumer Experiences, there’s far less of the metaverse-infused banter that saturated the internet two years ago.

Building a Foundation
But no matter how the next phase of engagement with internet-based technology is labeled, there’s no denying that the broadcast industry, along with many other industries is moving inexorably toward building a foundation to operating in a new era blending real-world experiences with immersive virtualization. The pace of XR adoption across all sectors is reflected in many recent research reports.

For example, MarketsandMarkets predicts the XR market—encompassing devices, software, and applications—will grow from $40.1 billion in 2023 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.7% to reach $111.5 billion by 2028. 

Researcher Brainy Insights, citing demand for 3D/360-degree content in sports and other entertainment as well as advertising, forecasts even faster growth in the global volumetric video segment of the market with projected expansion at a 29.3% CAGR from $2.1 billion in 2021 to $21.2 billion by 2030.

The broadcast industry’s embrace of volumetric technology in traditional 2D program production is a welcome development for a company like Arcturus Studios, which since its founding seven years ago has amassed a full suite of solutions, including acquisition of the Microsoft creative platform, that are designed to provide end-to-end support for building and streaming immersive 3D user experiences. 

Now there’s an opportunity to apply that technology to address a major pain point impacting broadcasters everywhere, notes Mark Gerberman, vice president of sales at Arcturus. With the amassing of ever more data that can be used to enrich viewing experiences, broadcasters need to make it easier for consumers to absorb and understand all that information. 

“A lot of our focus now is in the virtual production space,” Gerberman says. “Humans by nature see things in 3D, so being able to use volumetric technology to more concisely convey the data producers are pulling off the field is top of mind.” 

The results of such efforts are on view just about everywhere. Across the globe consumers have grown accustomed to seeing 3D data displays generating stats in sync with the narratives of on-air personalities broadcasting from studios that are often embellished with virtual furnishings and backdrops.  

The impact of the volumetric production agenda is noticeable in post production processing, according to Allan McLennan, president of 2G Digital Post, a leading Burbank, Calif.-based post house serving motion picture and TV producers worldwide. “Where we see it is in the sheer size of the files, which are a lot larger than a traditional video capture or film,” McLennan says.

Once news, sports and other live content is produced on location for immediate output, the completed files are sent to post production where they’re processed for on-demand access. “Those files need to be compressed, packaged, secured, and pushed out with a very heavy eye on quality control,” McLennan notes. 

2G Digital is known for its QC expertise, which is essential to meeting producers’ specifications for packaging and local distribution, McLennan adds. “There’s always something that has to be looked at for delivery to the different platforms in the marketplace,” he said. 

While the bigger files benefitting from volumetric enhancements might add a second or two to the post production processes, today’s state-of-the-art hardware can handle the loads. “What it really comes down to is updating new types of software,” McLennan says. “We’re on top of that on an ongoing basis.”

Deloitte Initiatives
With the growing focus on volumetric production in 2D programming, the industry is peeling back layers of the XR onion, normalizing the use of tools that will take them much farther over time, Gerberman notes. Indeed, as he and others in the field can attest, the migration is well underway with a rapidly expanding spate of initiatives at national and local levels of broadcast operations worldwide. 

For example, Allan Cook, managing director at Deloitte Consulting, is deeply involved in such initiatives as head of Deloitte’s Unlimited Reality practice, which has been expanding across multiple industries since its genesis several years ago on the heels of metaverse-oriented projects involving the U.S. Department of Defense. There’s a lot of volumetric production activity underway in the broadcast industry, Cook says.

Cases in point include multi-year Unlimited Reality engagements with the U.S. Golf Association (USGA) and Sinclair Broadcast Group, which, unlike the unit’s other broadcast industry clients, have been willing to publicize what they’re doing with the firm. These applications are based on volumetric 3D production techniques that leverage AI, 3D computing, Web 3.0 technology, and advanced streaming to produce experiences meant for 2D viewing on conventional device screens as well as more immersive 3D viewing experiences if clients want to engage with people through AR and VR eyewear.

One of the features offered with the latest version of the USGA App used in this year’s U.S. Open and U.S. Women’s Open championships allowed viewers to follow play tournament-wide on interactive streams to their PCs, tablets and smartphones. “With our app you could watch any player at any time on any hole from any direction,” Cook says.

“You could watch a player in 3D hit the ball and see exactly where it landed on the fairway,” he adds. On the green, “you could zoom down to the ball going into the hole in near real time.” In addition to shot tracking, the app allowed viewers to tap into scorecard highlights of all televised shots and to receive customized alerts about players they were following.

Such capabilities demonstrate the drawing power of this technology. With tens of thousands of users worldwide, the app registered as a top-five app in the Apple store during the men’s open, Cook says. The results are resonating with the USGA, which this year for the first time has extended use of the app with varying feature sets across all 15 of its championship tournaments. 

360-degree Socialized Viewing Environment
The other publicized example of what Deloitte is doing occurred with the Sinclair-owned Tennis Channel’s coverage of this year’s BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, CA. The app— offered on an invitation-only basis to viewers worldwide—delivered a multi-faceted 2D user experience based on 3D volumetric production technology supported in part by Epic Games’ Unreal Engine, a leading provider of 3D creation tools for multiplayer video games. 

This was the first project undertaken in fulfillment of Sinclair’s goal to build a 360-degree socialized viewing environment with its live sports and possibly other broadcasts. “We created a number of experiences you wouldn’t be able to get in your home or even at the event,” Cook explains. 

The app made it possible for users’ avatars to play tennis on a digital replica of the Paribas tournament’s center court. “We also allowed you to do a number of 360 tours behind the scenes, so people could see parts of the environment you wouldn’t be able to see as a regular member of the public,” Cook says. Shopping for paraphernalia in virtual merch tents was part of the experience as well, which “proved to be quite popular,” he adds.

While Cook declines to discuss what’s next on Sinclair’s metaverse agenda, he makes clear there’s much more in store. “They’re very interested in looking at expanding beyond the Indian Wells event with other viewing engagements,” he says.

As for Deloitte’s ability to support more immersive, volumetric user experiences, those elements remain in the proof-of-concept stage with multiple clients kicking the tires on the possibilities. For example, Cook says, this “very leading-edge work” includes “two engagements right now on the next generation of AI headsets from a small company in Silicon Valley.” 

For now Deloitte is providing “a great tool to supplement the television experience,” he adds. “I don’t think we’re at a stage quite yet where we’re going to replace TVs.” 

But the great thing about what’s happening now with volumetric productions is that, as Cook puts it, “if you build it out in 3D, it’s relatively easy to pull it onto any device that could display the 3D experience, whether that’s the headsets, which still relatively few people own, or through your mobile phone or tablet device.” This was demonstrated with the USGA app at the U.S. Open, where on-site users could mix what they were watching on the course with immersive viewing of any other point in the tournament through one of the supported AR or mixed reality (MR) headsets. 

Gerberman describes a similar stage of progress toward what he calls the “Holy Grail” of volumetric experiences that are on tap with six-degree-of-freedom (6 DoF) VR engagements with live sports. Whereas 3 DoF offered in VR sports viewing supported by NBC, the NBA, and others allows viewers to follow the action as if they were there from any of several fixed positions on the playing field, 6 DoF allows users to scope what’s happening in all directions as they virtually move around the arena.

The need to use volumetric technology to better engage with younger audiences is “one of the things we’re hearing from every sports league,” Gerberman says. “Kids are used to 3D experiences and navigating around 3D worlds,” he notes. “It’s just how kids interact with content. Volumetric technology is ripe for enabling those types of experiences with live sports.”

HUNT VALLEY, Md—Months after selling off its controlling interest in its Stadium sports network, Sinclair Broadcast Group is launching a new diginet to replace it. Starting Oct. 30, a new free OTA network, The Nest, that offers so-called “comfort food programming” comprised of home-improvement, true-crime, factual reality series, and celebrity driven family shows will start airing on the former Stadium channels.   

The mix of programming in daytime includes classic episodes of Flipping Boston, Flipping San Diego, Sell This House, American Justice and Cold Case Files.  While in primetime, The Nest will feature fun, celebrity-family dramas such as Growing up Gotti, Ozzy & Jack’s World Detour, Steven Segal: Lawman, Ice Road Truckers, Dog the Bounty Hunter and Wahlburgers.   

The Nest joins Sinclair’s lineup of national broadcast networks, Comet, CHARGE!, and TBD, which the broadcast group says have grown more than 23% in viewership over the past year.   

At launch the network will be available in more than 50% of all US OTA television households including the major markets of New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Dallas - Ft. Worth, Boston, San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose and Seattle-Tacoma with more affiliate additions in the coming months.  

NEW YORK—Sinclair Broadcast Group has inked a deal with Amagi to migrate on-premise playout of its local broadcast stations to the cloud. Sinclair says the deployment is designed to the broadcast group optimize its media operations, enhance business agility, and significantly reduce the risk of maintaining its legacy on-premise systems.

"For Sinclair and its stations, we needed a platform that would align with our vision for transformation in our media operations," said Mike Kralec, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Sinclair. "We've successfully partnered with Amagi in the past and their proven track record of deploying playout systems in the cloud, along with our combined success in deploying proof-of-concept and test environments, demonstrated their ability to be that transformational platform for us. We're beyond happy to work with them as we get this new playout environment underway."

The announcement comes less than a week after the nation's second largest broadcast group revealed a similar deal with AWS as its preferred cloud provider. In that arrangement, Sinclair plans to leverage AWS Media Services, such as AWS Elemental MediaConnect, to develop centralized, dynamic and scalable media operations for 200+ channels, including converged media storage and optimized media workflows with relevant metadata.  

Amagi utilizes AWS cloud infrastructure to deliver its media technology solutions, such as channel playout, content delivery, and monetization. 

Broadcasters have traditionally run their automation and playout systems on-premise at the local broadcast station which, at scale, can lead to uniquely differentiated workflows, duplication in media operations, management of multiple different playout systems, and high costs in fixed architectures that don't quickly or easily adapt to business requirements. 

To unify their environment while maintaining rigorous and resilient architecture requirements, Sinclair will use Amagi's flagship products: Amagi CLOUDPORT channel playout platform; Amagi LIVE News and Sports Orchestration platform; Amagi's smart hitless switcher; and the Amagi MONITORING solution for their playout, playlist, and ingest monitoring. Evolved to suit the fast-paced needs and hectic workflows of traditional broadcast, Amagi's full technology stack will improve Sinclair's resiliency and enable the company to upgrade service capabilities at a much faster rate than what is possible on-premise, according to Sinclair.

Del Parks, President of Technology at Sinclair, said, "As Sinclair continues our cloud media transformation, we are looking forward to partnering with Amagi and incorporating their vast capabilities into our technical operations, including our deployment of ATSC 3.0, NextGen Broadcast."

Amagi and Sinclair will together launch—for the first time—over-the-air (OTA) local broadcast station affiliate playout origination in the cloud, which is set to go live for the first channel in June 2023 with continuous rollout through 2025. This event will mark the first large-scale, cloud-based playout solution by a major broadcaster in the U.S. for local terrestrial broadcast networks, Sinclair said. To meet the ever-changing needs of these networks, Amagi will continue to scale and evolve its Amagi CLOUDPORT solution over time working closely with Sinclair.

"The broadcast industry is rapidly changing, and with these changes, broadcasters will need improved agility, cloud resiliency, cost savings, and unified workflows," said Srinivasan KA, Co-founder at Amagi. "Our work with Sinclair signifies a shift in the options and opportunity that the cloud can finally bring to broadcasters of all origination needs. By understanding the principles of performing traditional ground operations in the cloud, Amagi is poised to become the industry leader in affiliate-level cloud broadcasting."

TORONTO—Rebecca Hanson has been appointed Director General of the North American Broadcasters Association, succeeding Michael McEwen who is retiring this summer. 

Ms. Hanson begins as Director-General designate on April 15th, where she will work alongside McEwen before taking full responsibility July 1. 

“As over-the-air broadcasters move to the multi-platform streaming IP world, they remain committed to serving their listeners and viewers in the communities where they live, work and play,” said Borika Vucinic, president of the NABA Board of Directors. “Rebecca understands this unique role in a multimedia world and will work with our members as broadcasting adapts to a rapidly changing environment on the national, regional, and international fronts.”

An experienced broadcast and media executive, Ms. Hanson has managed numerous policy issues before the FCC and Congress relating to broadcast regulation. While SVP of Policy and Strategy at Sinclair Broadcast Group, she advocated for new video technology, fair compensation for cable carriage, and spectrum protection. She also served as General Counsel for HC2 Broadcasting group overseeing the regulation of 250 full- and low-power television stations.

At the FCC, Ms. Hanson served in a variety of roles, beginning with the first U.S. National Broadband Plan in 2009, the related broadcast spectrum auction planning in 2011, and other broadcast policy issues including the transition to ATSC 3.0. She currently serves on the Maryland Public Broadcasting Commission and is on the board of the U.S. NAB Leadership Foundation.

Ms. Hanson will continue to address these issues in her new leadership role at NABA with a solidly forward-looking strategy that includes resisting all forms of encroachment on broadcast spectrum, a continued commitment to broadcasting core values as a public good, and demonstrating other values that broadcasting offers in evolving communications, NABA said.

“Broadcasters throughout North America are rightfully proud of their service to local communities, and NABA will continue to support that mission among the challenges and opportunities presented by new streaming technologies,” Ms. Hanson says. “But when it comes to regional matters (like spectrum and technology coordination, or equipment markets) and international issues (like spectrum usage at the ITU or copyright protection at WIPO) NABA is best situated to represent broadcasters’ common interests in Canada, Mexico and the U.S. I am honored to be chosen to lead these efforts and look forward to working with all stakeholders in the months and years ahead.”

BALTIMORE—Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced a distribution agreement with YouTube TV to add carriage of Sinclair Tennis Channel and T2, plus diginets CHARGE! and TBD to YouTube TV’s service offerings. The agreement also extends YouTube TV’s existing carriage of Sinclair’s CBS and MyNetworkTV affiliated television broadcast stations. 

Tennis Channel, and T2, Tennis Channel’s first free ad-supported TV (FAST) channel, are scheduled to debut June 1, to coincide with Roland-Garros (the French Open). Sinclair’s multicast networks CHARGE!, and TBD are also scheduled to launch on YouTube TV June 1st. Additionally, the agreement renews carriage of Comet, bringing all three of Sinclair’s diginets to YouTube TV’s lineup.

“We are pleased to reach an agreement that brings Tennis Channel, T2 and all three of our  Emerging Networks to YouTube TV, a valued partner of ours,” said Will Bell, SVP, Head of Distribution & Network Relations for Sinclair. “As the media landscape continues to evolve, our goal remains the same – to bring our unrivaled content to people wherever they want to experience it. With Roland-Garros kicking-off May 28, the timing is perfect for YouTube TV customers.”

Financial terms of the agreement were not released.

Sure, HDR (aka high dynamic range) is better than SDR (standard dynamic range, a term we didn’t even need until we had HDR), but why?

SDR is regular television—it can produce a maximum luminance level of around 100 nits limited to Rec.709. HDR gives a maximum luminance of 1,000 to 10,000 nits (and a minimum of 400 nits), with brighter brights, more detailed darks and more saturated colors with Rec, 2020 (Fig 1). The more realistic color is due more to WCG (wide color gamut) than to HDR itself. 

Three Formats
There are three main display formats for HDR: HDR10, HDR10+ and Dolby Vision. As you would expect, each handles HDR differently.

HDR10 is open standard, typically mastered between 400 to 4,000 nits. It’s a PQ (perceptual quantizer) transfer function with static metadata, delivering the same brightness and tone mapping for the entire program. 

HDR10+ is royalty-free for the content creator. TV/display manufacturers pay an annual license fee. Dolby Vision, similar to HDR10+, is proprietary from Dolby Laboratories. Both are mastered from 1,000 to 4,000 nits using dynamic metadata that adjusts the brightness and tone mapping per scene. 

For HDR10+ and Dolby Vision, most content is mastered at around 1,000 nits. While seemingly the same, Dolby Vision is considered better than HDR10+ in areas such as peak brightness minimum, tone mapping, TV support and content availability, according to a number of sources.  

Stretching the Truth
Marketing & PR are one-half truth, one-half half-truths and one half omitting the truth—it all depends on what’s being sold. But sometimes, the people doing the selling don’t really understand what they’re selling.

In a recent “Consumer Reports”’ story, “How to Watch Super Bowl LVII in 4K HDR,” buried deep in the story, there’s an image appearing to be from DirecTV to promote 4K HDR, comparing two images of a colorful parrot to show the better quality of “4K
HDR 2160p.” (Fig. 2)

But that image is being compared to “Full HD 1080p”—not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison with only one image being HDR. The message is clear: This is how great the Super Bowl will look, compared to your old fashioned 1080p SDR TV, if you can get it in 4K. But if the 1080p image had HDR, the difference wouldn’t be so… different.

Do We Really Need 4K if HDR is So Good?
SMPTE Life Fellow Mark Schubin has compared formats, frame rates and HDR to show what provided the best data option.

“HDR offers the most bang for the bit,” Schubin said. Preliminary HDR data that he presented at the annual HPA Tech Retreat in 2016 from EPFL (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne/Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne) from 2014 showed a “tremendous improvement and very, very little additional bits required, anything from zero to maybe something around 20%.” 

That improvement was in peak brightness. Schubin compared it to EBU quality comparisons from 2013 between HD (720p, 1080i and 1080p) and 4K showing “very little improvement” in quality, as well as high frame rates up to 240Hz, which showed “a significant improvement [in quality], but you also have to double the bitrate for every doubling of the framerate.”

The greater brightness and contrast range of HDR is key. “What makes it more realistic is the human visual system because we perceive more contrast as spatial resolution,” said Matthew Goldman, senior director, Media Engineering & Architecture for Sinclair Broadcast Group. “It looks more real.”

Returning to Fox’s Super Bowl 4K upconversion, I asked Schubin: “What is
your opinion of the viewer’s quality difference between 1080p60 HDR and 2160p60 HDR on a 4K TV that would upconvert the 1080p
to 2160p?”

“Without knowing the specific equipment involved, I really can’t say which is better, but I’d say the difference is probably negligible,” Schubin said. “It’s not clear that Fox’s technology would necessarily be better than what’s in a TV. Yes, it costs more, but the TV stuff is integrated and amortized over tens of millions of sets. But the production in HLG could be significant. 

“When HDR has been perceived as problematic—such as the very dark ‘Game of Thrones’—the production has not been HLG,” he added. “In the dark areas, HLG is essentially the same as SDR; it’s in the bright areas that it offers much more range, so it’s probably good to use for the live
Super Bowl.”

Schubin didn’t watch this year’s Super Bowl in HDR, but added: “Having watched football in HLG HDR, I think it offers a substantial advantage, visible even on a small screen from across the room. Having watched football in HD, upconverted to 4K, and true 4K, on side-by-side monitors, I’d say differences are perceptible, but just barely—definitely not the big kick added by HDR.”

More Comparisons
1080p HDR, upconverted 4K HDR or native 4K HDR: which is better?

What do you mean by “better?”

Tim Walker, senior product manager (HDR image analyzers, frame syncs, routers, scaling and scan converters), at AJA Video Systems, puts it this way: “There’s broadcasters that are being bullish doing and promoting HDR,” he said. “Others question the extra expense in producing HDR. But for a top-end broadcaster, you’re investing in your archive for generations to come from the moments captured today.” 

That means producing the best possible imagery today: 4K HDR. 

“Doing [less expensive] upconversion at distribution gets you that 4K banner,” Walker added. Upconverters do an exceptional job—that’s one reason people do 1080p HDR and not worry about 4K in the truck.”

Walker, Goldman and Schubin are firmly in the “better pixels, not more pixels” camp.

“Having HDR makes for a better viewing experience from home,” said Walker. “Plus, you can absolutely see a benefit of down-mapping or tone-mapping to SDR. Viewers benefit from the entire signal processing chain using HDR. In live sports, you won’t get the highlights off the helmets, but you will get more detail in the image in the darks and brights. SDR will benefit from a native HDR production.”

Then There's Sinclair
Sinclair is doing HDR 24/7 with ATSC 3.0 over the air broadcasts in more than 30 markets nationwide (and growing).

“We absolutely see it as a business advantage at the end of the day, improving the viewing experience of our viewers,” said Goldman. ”Other than sports, it just looks more realistic—the screen pops. You don’t know you’re missing it until you’ve got it. All I have to do is show it to you. Consumers may not know what HDR is, but they know they like it, so there’s definitely a commercial advantage.”

What makes Sinclair unique is the HDR they’re using is not HDR10. “We’re using part of the ATSC 3.0 standard, A/341, and use Advanced HDR by Technicolor [SL-HDR1], as a transmission format,” said Goldman. “It’s not a new HDR format. What SL-HDR1 lets us do is send SDR video as a base layer plus an enhancement layer for HDR as part of the metadata stream. 

“The reason we do this is that it doesn’t matter how you get to the TV, it’ll display a useable picture,” Goldman added. “It’ll do great SDR—and with the SL-HDR1 metadata reconstruction—HDR with the SDR video without having to rely on the TV. We guarantee that the original artistic intent is maintained for both SDR and HDR.”

Every HDR TV uses HDMI with EDID (Extended Display Identification Data)—that’s part of the handshake between the TV and the signal device. But what are the capabilities of the display? Is it HDR? What formats? What’s the minimum light level, peak white level, colorimetry? The HDR is then adapted for that display. If it’s SDR only, that’s all it gets. Sinclair uses SL-HDR1 because, according to Goldman, it’s the only transport format that’s TV set-independent and delivers a useable picture. 

I asked both Goldman from Sinclair and Walker from AJA the same visual quality question: With all things being equal, on a scale from 1 to 10, if 1080p SDR is a 1 and 4K HDR is a 10, where would you place 1080p HDR and 4K SDR?

Both answered exactly the same: 1080p HDR sits at 8, while 4K SDR sits at 4 (Fig. 3). 

That’s the power of HDR, but it doesn’t negate shooting to archive in 4K HDR. The question is: How do you want your production perceived by viewers today… and in the years to come? 

Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced a reorganization in which a new holding company, Sinclair, Inc. will become the publicly-traded parent of Sinclair Broadcast and its subsidiaries.

The Baltimore-based company, which was founded in 1986 and at 193 TV stations, is the second largest TV station group in the country, has greatly expanded beyond its traditional broadcast base to now include real estate, venture capital, private equity, and direct investments. Among its subsidiaries is ONE Media LLC, a technology division focused on business opportunities from the ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard, as well as Compulse, a marketing technology and managed services company, and the Tennis Channel. As part of the reorganization, these other businesses and assets will be held by New Sinclair through a new subsidiary to be known as “Sinclair Ventures.”

“We believe the new structure will provide greater flexibility for creating value within the company. The new structure simplifies the corporate structure and improves the transparency of financial disclosures on the value drivers of the company,” commented Christopher S. Ripley, President and CEO of the company. “We believe these other assets, some of which are currently buried in the broadcast division, can receive greater visibility outside the ‘broadcast’ umbrella, while Sinclair Broadcast will become a broadcast-focused subsidiary for which stockholders can better value its true performance. In short, we believe a holding company structure can unlock unrecognized value and provide structural flexibility for the growth and monetization of our current and potential future media and non-media businesses.”

In the Reorganization, each outstanding share of Sinclair Broadcast’s Class A common stock and Class B common stock would be exchanged automatically on a one-for-one basis for a share of Class A common stock and Class B common stock, respectively, of New Sinclair. New Sinclair’s Class A common stock is expected to continue to trade on the Nasdaq Global Select stock market under the ticker symbol “SBGI” just as Sinclair Broadcast’s Class A common stock does today. 

Under applicable law, the Reorganization will be accomplished through a share exchange and is subject to the affirmative vote of two-thirds of all the votes entitled to be cast on the matter at a special meeting of Sinclair Broadcast’s stockholders expected to be held in the second quarter of 2023.

BALTIMORE & LOS ANGELES—Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced a multi-year, national agreement with USC Shoah Foundation-The Institute for Visual History and Education to assist with the recording of interviews with genocide survivors as part of the Institute’s Last Chance Testimony Collection Initiative.

The effort is a race-against-time effort to collect testimonies from the last living survivors and witnesses to the Holocaust and other genocides, the foundation said. Under the agreement, Sinclair will provide its production facilities to film testimonies via high-definition video and audio recordings taken with state-of-the-art equipment at its broadcast television stations around the U.S.

Sinclair’s WPEC CBS 12 in West Palm Beach, Florida was the first market to begin providing production space, equipment, and staff to assist the Institute in recording new testimonies. Beginning in April, the recording of testimonies will expand to WJLA in Washington DC and WBFF in Baltimore, with additional Sinclair news markets throughout the country planned, Sinclair said. 

“It is an honor to assist USC Shoah Foundation with the recording of survivor’s interviews, ensuring the memorialization and preservation of these important, powerful stories. Through the education provided by the foundation, we hope to move one step closer to eradicating intolerance and discrimination in all forms.” said Chris Ripley, president and CEO, Sinclair.

USC Shoah Foundation is working with local Jewish federations to identify Holocaust survivors.

USC Shoah Foundation first began collecting testimonies almost 30 years ago to give voice to Holocaust survivors and use their testimonies to educate present and future generations.

Over the next five years the Institute recorded and indexed more that 50,000 interviews in which Holocaust survivors chronicled their lives before, during and after the Holocaust. More than 52,000 Holocaust survivor and witness testimonies are now saved and shared through the Institute’s Visual History Archive, which is currently available to users at 185 access points in 15 countries and forms the basis of educational activities that reach some 10 million learners annually.

The Last Chance Testimony Collection Initiative was launched in 2019 to encourage Holocaust survivors-most of whom are now in their eighties and nineties-to give testimony while time and memory permit.

Beginning in 2009, the Visual History Archive began adding testimonies from other mass atrocities including the Armenian Genocide, the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda, and the War and Genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The total archive now contains more than 56,000 testimonies.

There is no cost to survivors or their families for recording these interviews, the foundation said. 

Dr. Robert J. Williams, Finci-Viterbi executive director of USC Shoah Foundation, said the Last Chance Testimony Collection Initiative is rooted in the belief that as long as there are still witnesses ready to speak, their voices must be heard.

“Every Holocaust survivor who shares his or her experience adds to our knowledge and provides an enduring legacy of memory,” Dr. Williams said. “With antisemitism once again on the rise around the world, it is our duty to collect and listen to the testimonies of those who experienced the worst consequences of unchecked bigotry against Jews.”

USC Shoah Foundation is also seeking descendants of survivors and Holocaust scholars to volunteer as interviewers to guide survivors through the testimony collection process.

To request to be interviewed, to volunteer as an interviewer, or for more information, go to sfi.usc.edu/last-chance. 

BALTIMORE—Sinclair Broadcast’s Diamond Sports Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Tuesday citing $9 billion in debt spread across its 19 Bally Sports regional sports networks. In its filing, it said the RSNs will continue to operate and that it has approximately $425 million in case to finance its operations and restructure. 

Sinclair said it plans to spin off Diamond to become a standalone company with ownership going to its creditors and secondary and unsecured creditors. 

The filing came as little surprise as warning signs of the RSN’s imminent bankruptcy had been known for months. Sinclair acquired the RSNs from Fox in 2019 for $10.6 billion and $8 billion in debt. But as more consumers cut the cord, cancelling their pay-TV subscriptions and pro sports leagues continue to increase their rights fees, the financial pressure has increased among all regional sports networks, with Warner Bros. Discovery—which operates three RSNs—informing sports leagues last month that it plans to exit the business, according to the Wall Street Journal. 

Diamond—which missed a $140 million interest payment last month—owns the rights to broadcast to 14 MLB teams as well as several NBA, NHL and WNBA teams. In a news conference in February, Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred commented on DSG’s tenuous position. 

"We've been really clear that if Diamond doesn't pay, under every single one of the broadcast agreements, that creates a termination right, and our clubs will proceed to terminate those contracts,” Manfred said. In the event that MLB stepped in, what we would do is we would produce the games, we would make use of our asset, the MLB Network, to do that. We would go directly to distributors — meaning Comcast, Charter, the big distributors — and make an agreement to have those games distributed on cable networks.

"We would also be seeking flexibility on the digital side, so that when you look at MLB.tv, you'd go in, you can buy your out-of-market package like you've always had, but you would have the option to buy up into in-market games, which I see as a huge improvement for fans."

According to CNBC, DSG has missed only one rights payment to a sports team, the Arizona Diamondback, to which it has yet to secure streaming rights.   

David Preschlack, CEO of Diamond, said DSG filing Chapter 11 will allow the company “to reset our capital structure and strengthen our balance sheet through the elimination of approximately $8 billion of debt. The financial flexibility attained through this restructuring will allow DSG to evolve our business while continuing to provide exceptional live sports productions for our fans.

“DSG will continue broadcasting games and connecting fans across the country with the sports and teams they love, Preschlack continued. “With the support of our creditors, we expect to execute a prompt and efficient reorganization and to emerge from the restructuring process as a stronger company.”

In the latest dispute between broadcasters and virtual multichannel video program distributors (aks ‘vMVPDs), Sinclair Broadcast Group has removed its ABC affiliates from the Hulu Plus Live TV service, in an apparent disagreement over carriage terms between Sinclair and The Walt Disney Group, owner of Hulu and the ABC TV network. 

Although the live feeds have been removed, Hulu Plus Live subscribers still have access to ABC on-demand content. Hulu Plus Live, which costs $70 per month had 4.5 million subscribers at the end of 2022. Sinclair owns 27 ABC affliates in markets as small as Kirksville, Mo. to the largest, Washington D.C.

Although neither has issued any formal statements, Hulu tweeted the news last night:

This current dustup is the latest illustration of how traditional retrans disputes have now bled over from cable and satellite into the streaming realm. Unlike traditional pay-TV services—in which the pay-TV operators negotiate directly with local stations—in the case of vMPVDs, which have become increasingly competitive with pay-TV operators for viewers, networks negotiate carriage agreements for their affiliates directly with the streaming services, which include Hulu, Sling, FuboTV and YouTube TV.

Last month, a number of the nation’s largest station groups, including Nexstar, Sinclair, Hearst Tegna, Gray and Cox, removed their CBS affiliates in a similar dispute with FuboTV. Although many of the stations have since been restored to the FuboTV lineup, Nexstar, the nation’s largest station group, remains a holdout as of this week. 

“We are in a dispute with CBS right now over the Fubo situation,” Tom Carter said, in a report from Variety on Tuesday. “But keep in mind that virtual MVPDs contribute less than 10% of our distribution revenue and our distribution revenue is about half of our total revenue and Fubo is the smallest vMVPD we deal with. So we’re talking about a relatively minor amount of money, quite honestly, to both us and CBS. So it’s kind of easy to pick Fubo as a fight to have.”

BALTIMORE—Sinclair Broadcast Group says primetime ratings for its three free over-the-air, multicast television networks Comet, CHARGE! and TBD have collectively grown a 30% increase in viewership so far this year. 

For the first 7 weeks of 2023, the networks experienced year-over-year growth across all key dayparts in the coveted P25-54 demographic. In Prime, the networks collectively garnered a 30% audience increase, while cable networks as a whole have declined by 23% on average for the same period, according to the broadcaster.

CHARGE!, which features a lineup of high-profile police procedural dramas including CSI: Miami and CSI: New York, saw a 54% increase, while TBD’s audience, who are attracted to the channel’s offerings of reality-based series including Fear Factor and World’s Dumbest garnered a 50% increase. Viewership for Comet, which broadcasts sci-fi and fantasy series franchises, including The X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, rose 5% during the period.

In daytime, CHARGE! kicked off 2023 with the launch of its new weekday line up, anchored by the long-running CBS prime-time hit Without a Trace, resulting in a 50% double-digit year-over-year increase while Comet saw an increase of 82% viewership year over year with the Jan. 16 premiere of Stargate SG-1—one of the longest running sci-fi series in TV history—during the early evening 5-8 P.M. M-F timeslot.

“In recent months, Comet, CHARGE! and TBD have added new programming acquisitions, grown ratings and successfully launched several new series,” said Adam Ware SVP, Growth Networks Group for Sinclair.  “In January we announced the addition of new and upgraded local broadcast affiliates and linear carriage, adding 2.4 million national TV households. 2023 is off to a great start, it’s clear that the OTA broadcast sector is on the rise with even more exciting things to come, stay tuned.”

Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced the company’s annual Diversity Scholarship program is now accepting applications for the 2023 school year. The company says the scholarship program “aims to invest in the future of the broadcast industry and help students from diverse backgrounds, who reflect Sinclair’s audiences nationwide, complete their education and pursue careers in broadcast journalism, digital storytelling, and marketing.”

Sinclair has provided more than $250,000 in tuition assistance since 2013.

Applicants must be a current college sophomore or junior at an accredited four-year undergraduate college or university in the United States. Students from all 50 states may apply here. 

Deadline for submission is April 30, 2023.

Sinclair says the Diversity Scholarship program is part of the company’s overall efforts to bring more diversity to the industry, including enhanced efforts to recruit skilled and talented employees from historically Black colleges and universities and Hispanic serving institutions.

“The continuation of Sinclair’s annual scholarship program is an affirmation of our commitment to increasing diversity in the broadcast industry and providing the next generation of journalists and marketers with the tools they need to succeed,” said Sinclair President and CEO Chris Ripley.

WASHINGTON—Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. has named Todd Bernstein vice president/general manager of WJLA-ABC7 and WJLA-24/7 in Washington, D.C.

In the press statement, Rob Weisbord, Sinclair’s chief operating officer and president of broadcast, said, “Todd has nearly 20 years of broadcast and sales management experience at WJLA, with deep roots in the Washington D.C. community. We are thrilled he is stepping into the GM role to lead the team, and we’re confident he will continue to successfully grow the station and revenue.”

Bernstein joined the station in 2005. He has held several leadership roles at WJLA, most recently serving as station manager. Prior positions include director of sales, sales manager, director of business development, national sales manager and local/political sales manager.

Bernstein began his media career at Harrington, Righter & Parsons as an account executive. There he was responsible for the oversight of advertising for Sinclair-owned stations.

Bernsteing said he was “both humbled and honored” to take on this leadership role. “I’m thrilled to lead these fantastic stations as we continue to create content and grow across all platforms.”

Bernstein holds a Juris Doctor from Syracuse University College of Law and a Master of Arts in Broadcast Journalism from Syracuse’s S.I. Newhouse School of Communications.

NEW YORK—FuboTV has inked a deal with Sinclair Broadcast Group that will bring Bally Sports’ 19 regional sports networks (RSNs) to Fubo in the coming weeks. 

The Bally Sports RSNs are owned and operated by Diamond Sports Group, a subsidiary of Sinclair. This agreement expands the existing partnership, which already includes the carriage of Sinclair’s owned local broadcast stations, Tennis Channel and Marquee Sports Network (television home of the Chicago Cubs), on Fubo TV.

The deal will allow cord cutters to access local sports on Sinclair’s RSNs without having to subscribe to traditional cable or satellite and will expand FuboTVs live sports footprint. 

How much of an impact the deal will have on Sinclair’s struggling Diamond Sports Group RSNs remains to be seen. Since Sinclair acquired the Bally Sports RSNs from Disney and rebranded it as Diamond, the broadcaster has incurred more than $9 billion in debt as sports rights costs explode and subscribers continue to cut the cord. Sinclair reports that Diamond lost more than $1 billion in its most recent quarter and according to a report in the New York Post over the weekend, the division could face bankruptcy if MLB, NBA and NHL—which have expressed interest in acquiring Diamond—back out.  

With this new agreement, FuboTV will provide subscribers with access to their respective local Bally Sports RSN(s), including: Bally Sports Arizona, Bally Sports Detroit, Bally Sports Florida, Bally Sports Great Lakes, Bally Sports Indiana, Bally Sports Kansas City, Bally Sports Midwest, Bally Sports New Orleans, Bally Sports North, Bally Sports Ohio, Bally Sports Oklahoma, Bally Sports San Diego, Bally Sports SoCal, Bally Sports South, Bally Sports Southeast, Bally Sports Southwest, Bally Sports Sun, Bally Sports West and Bally Sports Wisconsin.

FuboTV, which currently has 1.2 million subscribers, will offer fans a new streaming option for Bally Sports RSNs as well as a leading choice for RSN coverage with a total of over 35 networks in its portfolio, and most available in its base channel package (Pro). Fubo’s sports offering includes more than 50,000 live sporting events annually, with many streaming in 4K, from RSNs, local broadcast networks and national sports networks ESPN, FS1, CBS Sports Network, the Pac-12 Networks and many more. In addition to sports, FuboTV also streams popular live entertainment and news programming and features more than 40,000 TV shows and movies on-demand each month.

“RSNs are integral to FuboTV’s sports-first content strategy and our mission to superserve local passionate sports fans,” said Henry Ahn, chief business officer, FuboTV. “We are very pleased to bring Fubo subscribers significant local sports coverage through our new partnership with Bally Sports, the nation’s leader in local sports rights. Sinclair has been a great partner and we’re pleased that we were able to work together well to get a deal done that is meaningful and beneficial for both sides. We’re looking forward to bringing the Bally Sports RSNs to Fubo subscribers in the coming weeks.”

“FuboTV has long been associated with connecting sports fans to their favorite teams and we are thrilled to be expanding our partnership to include the Bally Sports regional sports networks across their platform, providing Fubo’s subscribers with streaming access to their favorite hometown Bally Sports teams,” said Will Bell, SVP, head of distribution and network relations, Sinclair. “Fubo has been a great partner, and we are excited to continue to grow our relationship to serve our collective viewers.”

OTTAWA—Recent changes to Federal Aviation Administration rules governing flight authorizations for drones (aka unmanned aerial systems/UAS or unmanned aerial vehicles/UAVs) now allow for expanded missions with less red tape. These changes, along with other recent positive advances, illustrate the advances that have taken place over the past decade as the use of UASs for TV coverage has blossomed.

More Trust from Regulators 
The responsible, disciplined approach to UAS pilot training and operations pursued by U.S. broadcasters has paid off. Impressed by their willingness to embrace the spirit of the law as well as the letter, the FAA has revised their rules to give the industry more flexibility. 

The new rules, “Remote ID and Operations Over People,” which the FAA published in December 2020, required UAS operators to be in compliance by September 2023 and signal a pathway to expanded flight operations, according to Jeff Rose, UAS Chief Pilot with Sinclair Broadcast Group. 

“With these new rules we now also have the ability to obtain LAANC authorizations [Low Altitude Authorization Notification Authorization Capability] for flying at night in restricted airspace,” Rose said. “This automated service allows near instantaneous authorizations for night flying in restricted airspace, which is a big benefit for newsgathering.”

Scott Wilder, senior vice president of field and production operations at Fox News, describes the FAA’s improved LAANC authorization application process as “the best advance that I can speak to on the regulatory front. What used to take 60 days now takes 60 seconds. It is a true game changer. The FAA is doing a phenomenal job with it.”

That’s not all: “The FAA has been working to make it easier to fly and easier to obtain permissions to fly in locations not previously available,” Wilder added. “The FAA is also proving to be 24/7. When we have waiver requests on a Sunday evening, we hear back in an efficient manner.”

Another area where the FAA is providing more leeway to responsible UAS operators is the “Operations Over People” rule applying to pilots who fly under Part 107 of the FAA regulations, according to Dr. Shaun Passley, founder of ZenaTech, developer of the ZenaDrone 1000 totally autonomous (self-flying) UAS. “This rule allows UAV pilots to operate at night under specific conditions and provided that they complete certain training or pass knowledge tests,” he said.

Remote ID Makes the Difference
The FAA’s more expansive attitude towards UAS operations is built upon its requirement for these aircraft to be equipped with Standard Remote ID (SRID) transmitters.

“SRID enables the transmission of the drone serial number, brand, GPS, geometric altitude, geometric location, velocity, time of the day, emergency status, and more,” said Claudio Lisman, president, CEO and founder of ProximaVision, a consulting firm specializing in drone and nanosatellite technologies. “UAVs must have their SRIDs operational from the moment of takeoff to shut down, broadcasting message elements at 1Hz [once per second], no later than one second after the measurement of position. In fact, the vehicle will not be able to take off unless it has transmitted all of the required message elements.”

Requiring UASs to carry and use SRIDs at all times makes it possible to integrate them into air traffic control systems alongside manned aircraft. As such, “making SRIDs mandatory in manufactured drones will enable much better traffic management, security, and new applications, such as flying over areas that have been restricted up to now,” Lisman added. “It will also allow flying UAVs over people, which in the case of news and production, is almost always required.”

The SRID requirement simply expands options, according to Wilder. “The SRID rule allows us more opportunities to have a drone in the air; most recently during Hurricane Ian, hours before the heart of the storm impacted the west coast of Florida,” he said.

“Remote ID also lays the foundation of the safety and security groundwork needed for more complex drone operations,” said Dr. Passley. “The rule provides crucial information to our national security and law enforcement partners and other agencies charged with ensuring public safety.” 

A New, Better View for TV News
Anyone who has been watching TV news the past two years knows how integral drone footage has become for covering stories effectively. Small wonder: Overhead drone footage can provide a framing context to a story unavailable to ground-based cameras. As well, the motion associated with drone footage makes any news story look better: it’s just more exciting to watch. 

These capabilities have allowed Fox News to cover stories in entirely new ways. Take for example, the influx of undocument immigrants at the Texas/Mexico border, where Fox News has been flying drones like the DJI Matrice with thermal imaging for over a year. This kind of high-tech capability “allows us to fly at night and show what looks like high-quality surveillance images of the migrant crisis,” said Wilder. “Every day we capture the surge of migrants happening that you can’t see from the same location on the ground. Our drone coverage on the border has changed the way that story is being told.”

That being said, what really makes UASs so useful to TV news departments is their ability to deploy extremely quickly and start capturing memorable footage fast. “A drone will almost always be able to arrive on the scene faster than a car or mobile unit,” Lisman said. “That is why drones are ideal for coverage of fires, demonstrations, war zones, and sports events applications in TV news and broadcast.”

These advantages explain why UASs are proving to be as significant an enhancement to TV news production as video cameras were with their instant access to recorded footage (compared to film), and satellite trucks for getting coverage out of anywhere fast. 

The result: “Local TV newscasts are using drone video daily for expanded storytelling as well as breaking news coverage,” said Rose. “Our viewers love drone video and have come to expect it regularly whether it is a compelling news story or just beautiful weather shots.” This is why Sinclair now employs 133 pilots across its station, many of whom carry a UAS with them as part of their kit. “This leads to fresh drone content daily,” he said.

BVLOS: The Next Frontier
As far as TV news UASs have come, there is still one frontier to be conquered: “Beyond Visual Line of Sight” (BVLOS) flight allows the ability to send UASs beyond the view of their operators, navigating their path by using video feeds from their cameras plus any onboard self-flying (autonomous) capabilities.

“Currently, the FAA provides waivers to professional pilots and certain organizations so they can fly BVLOS,” said Lisman; “however, those waivers are hard to obtain. The main limitation is the communication and range between the drone and pilot control. In addition, the latency needs to be very low when flying long distances. This is important, as the pilot needs real-time awareness of the topography and the terrain below.”

Historically, broadcasters such as Fox News have been “very conservative” in the kinds of UAS flight profiles they choose, an approach that has won them trust from the FAA and public alike.

“Safety is our number one priority,” Wilder explained. “I recently denied a request after thinking long and hard about it because I knew what was being requested would look amazing. But I also knew that a lower altitude safer version would be almost as amazing. We aren’t looking to impress anyone, we are looking to offer visual advantages that didn’t previously exist in the safest possible manner.”

The challenges of safe BVLOS flight are being addressed by UAS manufacturers and operators today. And when they are sufficiently resolved by SRID, onboard aircraft avoidance detection systems, and autonomous drones, expect TV news organizations to cross the BVLOS frontier in record numbers.

“In the future, when drones are flying everywhere for package delivery, there will likely be drones used for news gathering flown both with a pilot in the field as we do now and also piloted remotely from beyond visual line of site,” Rose predicted. “These BVLOS drone operations could potentially be piloted remotely from the TV station or pre-deployed as a ‘drone in a box’ at strategic locations. 

Rose said Sinclair will even use ATSC 3.0 technology as it becomes incorporated into drone flights, for greater precision and more accuracy. “The use of ATSC is 100 times more precise than GPS alone, allowing for more accurate navigation [from 3 meters with GPS down to 3 centimeters using ATSC datacasting],” he said. 

“Every day it gets better and better,” Scott Wilder concluded. “I think within several years every photographer will be a Part 107 pilot and have their own drone. That will be a big change to expect that every story assigned has a Part 107 photographer shooting the story with the ability to have aerial imagery.” 

It’s certainly no secret that radio broadcasting has been moving away from its century-old analog over-the-air delivery platform. 

One large media company, the Sinclair Broadcast Group, is now field-testing a delivery modality that may prove to be the medium’s next step into 21st century broadcast ecosystems. 

The ATSC 3.0 or “NextGen TV” IP-based digital television transmission system is being rolled out rapidly across the country, with a projected availability in 82 percent of U.S. markets by year’s end; and the technology is being beta-tested at a Sinclair-owned ATSC 3.0 Class A television property in the Washington, D.C. market, WIAV(CD). 

But for (TV Tech sister brand) Radio World readers, the story of interest here is that, in addition to multiple streams of NextGen TV content, the station is providing a “multiplex” of audio services that includes Hubbard Broadcasting’s all-news operation in the nation’s capital, WTOP(FM). 

An Open Door?
Mark Aitken, Sinclair’s senior vice president of advanced technology and president of One Media 3.0, says the initiative is part of a larger effort exploring the full potential of the hybrid over-the-air/internet digital television transmission standard in terms of new business models and opportunities for broadcasters.

“We’ve been building out the Baltimore/Washington marketplace with some ATSC 3 showcase applications for automotive,” said Aitken. “ATSC 3 opens the door for providing additional content beyond television services.”

The package of a dozen or so audio services, including WTOP, is available free to owners of ATSC 3.0 television receivers. This is enabled through an app that’s easily executed on the sets themselves as a function of the NextGen TV interactive layer.

“With an ATSC 3 television set, the user launches the app that’s announced on the channel,” said Aitken. “The app lists the available services. We launched the audio services inside of STIRR XT (Sinclair’s brand for NextGen TV alternative services). 

“When you turn to the channel there’s a very recognizable icon that looks like a remote control that questions the viewer about launching the app. Using the remote control the user can navigate around various services; weather, news, traffic, headlines, etc. As well, there is STIRR XT, and inside of that are music services which include country, rock, classical and other services. The WTOP audio is just one piece of this [although] it’s at the top of the audio service list as we wanted to bring local radio into the environment.”

Aitken added that the “radio” app is not specific to one make of NextGen TV but is designed to install on any of the LG, Samsung and Sony sets that offer ATSC 3.0 capability.

The music channels accompanying WTOP are by a third-party Stingray, which provides customized audio services.

Alternative to Satellite?
Aitken noted that this NextGen TV audio delivery service is thought of as a possible alternative to that provided by satellite broadcaster SiriusXM, but with the addition of existing local radio services that’s already familiar with listeners.

“If we can include local radio in different markets as part of that whole experience, we believe that there’s a compelling consumer proposition to offer that as a paid service. You might get 100 channels that are uniformly the same and not much different than SiriusXM — for example ’70s, ’80s, ’90s channels, an Elvis channel, a classical channel, all of those — but part of that mix should be local radio.”

Aitken said the inclusion of local radio programming streams and other audio with television makes sense, especially with the plethora of consumer devices for consuming content that exist today.

“When content comes in on different platforms … this is a barrier to many consumers — having to switch from one platform to another,” he said. 

“Part of the equation is getting the user interface right. People don’t like having to push buttons other than ‘channel up/channel down’ and ‘volume up/volume down’ in between services. NextGen TV can be the common platform that brings different services together for a great consumer experience.”

Aitken envisions using the enhanced capacity for delivering data that’s part of the ATSC 3.0 standard for delivery of perhaps 50 to 100 or more audio services, without affecting the capability for simultaneously providing very high-quality television.

“[With ATSC 3.0] we’re doing HD video with 3 mbps typically, if one of the channels is operating with HDR (high dynamic range), we might use more bits. However, the bits used [for AC-4 audio] right now are inconsequential. You could do a voice-only service using xHE-AAC compression with only 6 or 7 kbps. You can do stereo music services starting at 12 kbps. So, you’re not talking about using up a whole lot of capacity. 

“What that means on the inverse side is that you can provide a very robust tier — a very robust PLP (physical layer pipe) inside ATSC 3 with a very robust modulation and coding formulation — and provide excellent indoor and mobile service without having to sacrifice a lot of spectrum.”

(The original ATSC 1.0 digital television compression scheme caps data rates at about 19 mbps within a 6 MHz television channel, while the much more efficient ATSC 3.0 coding methodology can provide upwards of 25 mbps within the same 6 MHz of broadcast spectrum at similar SNR.)

When asked about promotion of the ancillary audio service available on Sinclair’s D.C. TV station, Aitken said that there had been none. 

“There’s been no advance publicity; people discover it through the process of discovering ATSC 3. The response to [the audio service] has been positive, based on data analytics collected on those devices.”

Useful Feedback
Such data analytics leads to another big plus that’s associated with ATSC 3.0, whether the programming being consumed is video or audio. The hybrid OTA/internet connectivity of the NextGen TVs provides a return channel from consumers that can provide content producers or distributors with “instant” demographics on how their content is going over with consumers.

“In the ATSC world where the smart TV is connected to the internet, we can get real data about consumer actions,” said Aitken. “This is real data, not data extrapolated through Nielsen.”

Aitken said that at this point in the trial his company is not paying a lot of attention to such feedback for actionable activity, but it could be valuable as the concept of radio-via-ATSC 3.0 takes off. 

He mentioned that the potential interactivity between content originators and consumers afforded by NextGen TV is starting to get some creative juices flowing within the radio community.

“Some of the radio guys have ideas about things that they’d like to do, but can’t do in radio today, like promotions for concerts,” said Aitken. He said Sinclair has been approached by some radio groups for more information about “3.0 radio.”

Sinclair is not currently in the radio broadcasting business, but has owned properties in the Seattle market in the past, and previously experimented with airing radio audio there in connection with its ATSC 3.0 TV broadcasts. Asked if the company is considering re-entering radio, Aitken replied that there had been some discussion, but nothing has been decided yet. The on-going D.C. market “proof of concept” trial is being conducted just “to show that there are automotive and audio business opportunities.”

“As we’re not in the radio business [now], we’re probably looking at partnering where we sell the bits and someone else provides the audio service.”

He observed that while the audio services are now provided free, this would eventually change in today’s world of “bits for bucks,” especially when 3.0 capabilities are extended to automobiles.

“In the automotive environment, we think that such services should be for pay,” said Aitken. “We think that there are opportunities, or certainly value, in providing competition to SiriusXM, [which comes] with an interactivity that’s not available on any other platform.”

This article originally appeared on Radio World.

WASHINGTON—The FCC has issued $3,374,000 in fines to 21 broadcast television licensees finding that they “willfully and repeatedly” violated rules limiting commercials during children's programming.

The violations occurred between Nov. 10 and Dec, 16, 2018 when a commercial for “Hot Wheels Super Garage” was inadvertently aired 11 times during eight 30-minute-long episodes of “Team Hot Wheels.” This was in violation of the Children’s Television Act of 1990 which, among other things, states that a program associated with a product, in which commercials for that product are aired, would be treated as a program-length commercial.

The commission said the violations came to light when stations admitted to breaking the rules when filing their license renewal applications in 2020.  

“Multiple Broadcasters responded “No” to the question in their applications entitled Children’s Programming Commercial Limitations, indicating that during the previous license term, the respective stations failed to fully comply with the commercial limits on children’s television programming,” the commission said.

Sinclair Broadcast Group bear the brunt of the fines, incurring $2,652,000 for each of its 82 stations. SBG was the provider of the Hot Wheels programming along with the related “Super Ultimate Garage” commercials.  Several Nexstar stations and a range of smaller station groups were also fined. 

The FCC said Sinclair’s violations were particularly egregious, “considering the number, nature, and circumstances of the commercial limit overages, as well as Sinclair’s history of prior offenses and ability to pay.”

“In the last 17 years Sinclair has been fined or admonished 11 times for program-length commercial violations, establishing an extensive history of prior offenses,” the commission said. “The circumstances and extent of the apparent violations here are particularly troubling because an experienced television licensee apparently committed them. 

“Over the course of slightly more than a month, not a single employee noticed that at least one—and sometimes more—Hot Wheels commercials were airing during a Hot Wheels program,” the commission added. “This is a textbook violation of Commission rules that have been in place for more than 30 years. 

“Sinclair, as a broadcast television company with roots stretching back five decades, was or should have been long aware of its compliance responsibilities in this context,” the FCC added. “Moreover, in light of its compliance record, the company should already have had a robust system in place to vet these advertisements. We consider Sinclair’s geographically extensive reach to a potentially large national audience of viewers as problematic as well.”

FCC Chairman Jessica Rosenworcel commented:

“It is not always easy to be a mom right now. I know, because I am one. The screens around us are multiplying, and it is hard to keep tabs on what our kids are consuming. But in the Children’s Television Act, Congress sought to ensure that broadcasting would remain a special place for kids’ content. The law put clear limits on advertising on children’s programming. Those limits were ignored here, where broadcasters mixed toy commercials with content and violated our rules. This Notice of Apparent Liability is the result. I thank my colleagues for supporting this enforcement action because every parent wants to know their kids are safe and with so many ways to watch, honoring the principles in the Children’s Television Act is essential.” 

SAN FRANCISCO—With dozens of information platforms to choose from (and a proliferation of often-less-than-objective sources out there) how do modern TV news outlets plan to tackle the 2022 election this November?

For every station group and news broadcaster prepping for this year’s midterm elections, one fact stands immutable: Objectivity reigns supreme. Only second to that are the technology choices and newsgathering trademarks that a network will employ to better connect with viewers and strengthen that loyalty. 

What sets some election coverages apart from others depends on the network’s core priorities. 

From the Ground Up
For news network Newsy, the priority is about reporting and producing from the ground up. Rather than seeing itself as a bells and whistles organization, the head of the Scripps news group said her election coverage team is focused on contextual stories, solid reporting, deep dives into political profiles and live election news coverage.

“The hallmark of Newsy is that it’s a nonpartisan, news-driven channel focused on communicating with our audience through the visual medium, which means beautifully produced packages that appeal to viewers all over the country,” said Kate O’Brian, head of national network news group at E.W. Scripps Co., which produces the Newsy channel. 

Newsy is unique, she said, because it provides a linear stream available in every possible distribution method (except cable) and is free everywhere. “For the consumer, no matter what story we’re doing, we bring something that others are not able to bring free: 24/7, live content,” she said.

That will dovetail directly into the network’s 2022 election coverage. The journalists within the network’s 14 bureaus are reporters and producers who are local to those bureaus, O’Brian said. In addition to a national producer and political reporter, the network has reporters across the country in places other people don’t—Phoenix, Nashville, Seattle, Denver and more. 

“That creates a kind of coverage for us that is deeper and broader, which gives us and gives our audience an advantage,” O’Brian said. Newsy also has a partnership with 61 local Scripps television stations as well as an additional group of reporters providing additional political coverage.

When it comes to the visual look of the network’s November election coverage, Newsy will shortly roll out the “Inform Your Vote 22” moniker. The network also plans to differentiate itself by covering stories that may be passed over by other networks, O’Brian said. “It’s why we chose to put our bureaus in these random places—it’s not a random choice. [Those bureaus] represent the country.” 

Intersection of Data and Graphics
Heading into the November elections, Telemundo finds itself faced with a delightful challenge: how to best cover a significant number of election races involving Latina politicians.

“One of the things that NBCUniversal has done is to make diversity one of its strongholds,” said Jeffrey Liebman, director of news operations for Telemundo. “This [election] year it’s important to be covering Latina races.”

Telemundo will work with the other networks under the NBCUniversal banner —including the NBC News Group, MSNBC, CNBC and others—by pooling resources when it comes to election data graphics. The network uses several Vizrt Engine graphics platforms for graphics creation; datamining for onscreen graphics and charts is handled through the NBC technology department. “We want the entities to work together so that our election environment is streamlined,” Liebman said. 

As a news organization, Telemundo knows that much of its viewership is situated on the coasts, so the network is prepping for the ability to program news late into the night for West Coast viewers.

“What was very successful in the last election was the tremendous amount of data we were able to use to really tell stories and convey to viewers what the status of the election numbers were,” he said. Oftentimes, the minute-by-minute returns that were coming in were driven by augmented reality storytelling, he said. 

This year, the Telemundo team has expanded that AR graphics team which plans to take advantage of the cavernous, two-story, glass foyer that hosts the Telemundo news space in Miami, which also serves as a production hub for other NBC properties. “That area gives us a lot of creative freedom that has proven ideal for things like AR,” Liebman said. “If a news program requires a camera frameup of a wide expanse, that open space offers a breathtaking background for any number of creative possibilities,” he said. 

AR options may include an augmented reality version of Capitol Hill—appearing in the Miami building’s circular rotunda with its wide, winding staircase—in which the roof of the virtual Congressional dome flips open to reveal animated election numbers and statistics inside.

The network also plans to make prodigious use of LED flatscreens in its election staging.  “They are wonderful for storytelling and can be used easily as touchscreens,” Liebman said. “The significant use of AR graphics and LED technology ends up being much less expensive than constructing a huge stage,” he said.

But even if you can put a lot of magic on the screen, the bottom line will always be about the content. “It’s about numbers and how NBC parcels out those graphic numbers in both English and in Spanish,” he said. “And it works.”

Providing Context
For Sinclair Broadcast Group, its 2022 election coverage will showcase its commitment to providing context that goes beyond a typical 15-second news sound bite. Its “Beyond the Podium” segments that will air as election coverage kicks off will showcase meaningful content that separates Sinclair from its competitors, said Scott Livingston, senior vice president of news for the station group.

“As it has done with previous news coverage, Sinclair stations will take advantage of social media platforms to gather our viewers’ questions for candidates, allowing for a more direct conversation from the local communities that Sinclair serves,” Livingston said. “We will also stream as many candidate press conferences and forums in real time on our digital platforms,” Livingston said, in an effort to provide unmatched coverage on every platform in every market.

Sinclair’s Capitol Hill bureau will provide daily stories on key topics and issues impacting the country while local resources will be leveraged to provide comprehensive coverage in important swing states. “We will also provide live coverage from Capitol Hill with our national interactive mapping to track the results across the country and the impact on the balance of power in Congress,” Livingston said

Sinclair will also continue its “Connect to Congress” series, a multimedia initiative that kicked off in February that enables members of Congress in Sinclair’s news markets to speak directly to their constituents on a regular basis through their local TV news stations. The program relies on broadcast, digital and social media technologies to get viewers answers to local issues. 

Telemundo, Newsy and Sinclair share challenges facing nearly every news outlet come election night: breaking through the noise of so many virtual platforms. The way forward, each said, is to unearth fresh content for viewers and knowledgeably expand that news across platforms with the penultimate goal of helping the electorate make informed decisions. 

BALTIMORE, Md.—Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. expanded the company’s digital executive leadership team with two new positions. Richard Cooke was named vice president, Audio Programming, and will focus on growing the company’s news and sports business in podcasts and audio device platforms. Lou Ferrara was promoted to vice president, Consumer Data and Strategy, and will oversee consumer data platforms, enabling new personalized services for Sinclair’s digital audience.

In a company statement, Kevin Cotlove, EVP and chief digital officer, said, “Their work will be a key part of expanding consented first-party data across our digital ecosystem and delivering new types of storytelling to our users.”

Cooke joins Sinclair from podcast studio Cadence13, where he was VP of Programming and Development. At Cadence13 he oversaw the launch and growth of dozens of podcasts across a variety of content categories, winning multiple Streamy and Webby awards. Prior to that, Cooke launched the podcast division at FOX Sports, managing podcast production, sales and growth strategies. He has also worked as a producer at ESPN across radio, TV and digital.

Ferrara, who joined Sinclair in 2018, previously managed Sinclair’s email and newsletter business and operations. Before that he served as chief content officer at Bankrate.com, during the brand’s turnaround and subsequent sale to digital marketing company Red Ventures. He also spent 10 years at the Associated Press.

The Sinclair Broadcast Group station cluster in West Palm Beach, Fla. is a very active campus with four TV stations: WPEC, WTVX, WTCN and WWHB. We also produce newscasts for our sister station WGFL in Gainesville, and are home to the Network Operations Center for nationally distributed Sinclair networks, Comet, Charge! and TBD.

Early in 2022, Spanish language Azteca affiliate WWHB was selected to be the host station for the West Palm Beach market’s NextGen TV rollout. This meant WWHB would transition away from broadcasting in the traditional ATSC 1.0 format and move exclusively to ATSC 3.0. 

While an exciting project to undertake, this would involve many changes in how we deliver content to viewers. Fortunately, we developed a unique partnership among the station groups in our market led by our partners at One Media. 

In collaboration with E.W. Scripps, Gray and Hearst, Sinclair’s WWHB would serve as the host carrying everyone’s main programming. This meant CBS, ABC, FOX, NBC, and Azteca signals would transmit together as never before in the new format.

Transparent to Viewers
Through our partners at LTN Global, all the local stations would send their main program feed to the WPEC facility for OTA transmission. The partnership also included an agreement that traditional ATSC 1.0 programming previously broadcast on WWHB would be shared across those different stations as additional subchannels. Again, LTN Global provided the transport mechanism to deliver our outbound programming to the other stations in the market.

PSIP information remains the same so WWHB’s viewers never know the difference. We control the programming here in the WPEC campus, but the content is transmitted on four different stations in ATSC 1.0 format. Confused? It gets better…

We now needed to monitor our content delivered across multiple stations throughout the West Palm Beach area to maintain compliance and quality control.  Accomplishing that required major changes to our existing receive system.  

Shown below is the station’s tower-mounted receive antenna system. One UHF Paraflector antenna pointing North, a VHF Log Periodic looking South and a smaller UHF Log Periodic also pointed South.

At the studio tower base, all three antenna signals are combined and processed so that a uniform level can be distributed via underground fiber directly to the Master Control Hub for over-the-air monitoring and to our in-house cable system for distribution across the campus.  

This was accomplished using multiple tuned-cavity filters, passive attenuators, and some fancy RF plumbing. Once the signals were filtered and processed, they were fed into an RF signal combiner where they were re-mixed for amplification into the fiber transmitter. 

Not surprisingly, that complicated and unwieldy arrangement was inherently lossy and resembled a science experiment gone awry despite our best efforts at cable management.

'Swiss Army Knife'
As part of the ATSC 3.0 rollout, we were issued a new signal analyzer from One Media—the Hexylon, which is a veritable “Swiss Army Knife” developed by GSERTEL/TELEVES in Spain.  

For us here at WPEC, the Hexylon became a vital tool to analyze, verify and document multiple signals across a wide variety of transmission formats—everything from multicast UDP to STLTP, QAM, ATSC 1.0, as well as ATSC 3.0 and a lot more. Because this was a new piece of equipment, we got factory training from instructor Javier Ruano who showed us how to use its features. 

 That instruction session led to a series of discussions between Javier and the engineers at WPEC. In one conversation, Javier mentioned using AVANT X, a product which sounded tailor-made for our OTA reception challenge. 

I wanted a second opinion, so I called Jon Kipp at TONER CABLE who further explained the features of the AVANT X in depth.  We decided to put it to the test. Senior Engineer Bob Blauvelt and I put the AVANT X through its paces, and we were impressed!

AVANT X can input up to four separate OTA RF signals, along with a dedicated input for traditional QAM cable channels and another for FM radio.  It processes each of those inputs and allows the user to adjust the independent gains and filtering. The user can eliminate unwanted channels, reconfigure channel assignments and selectively adjust overall gain to produce a uniform response across the spectrum.

 The output section boasts a whopping +55dB of gain and is suitable as a launch amplifier. After we benched the unit for a week, we made plans to completely overhaul the receive system and replace all the passive components with the AVANT X. After a few days laying out blank rack panels and punching holes with the drill press, we had all the components mounted and ready to install.

There’s a lot of cellular data and other RF interference in our area, so we added TONER CABLE’s 606 LTE filters to each feed just to be on the safe side. Because we wanted to incorporate signals from the Miami stations, which are 90km to the south, we included a pair of Channel Master preamps to give us better signal-to noise to work with. 

Apart from the front-end gear, all we really needed was the AVANT X. We got rid of all the multiple cavity filters, passive attenuators, and lossy combiners. Installation took just a few hours and immediately eliminated all the reconfiguring, tweaking and downtime required by our previous “science experiment.”  We filtered out and re-introduced two signals out of Miami as a separate input on the AVANT X so we could better align them, and the results were remarkable.

For reference we measured the raw output of each antenna as shown below:

On the studio side, we distribute more than 90 television channels throughout the WPEC campus using our in-house cable system. We modulate our own QAM channels using the Sencore OMNI 16. The channel lineup also includes 50 cable channels from a Vecima Hospitality Encoder provided to us by Xfinity.  

Internal Distribution
With the NextGen TV format now available, we wanted to incorporate the ATSC 3.0 signal for internal distribution to offices and conference rooms equipped with NextGen receivers. Sadly, the frequency for ATSC 3.0 Channel 33 was already in use in the QAM system, so we put a second AVANT X in line. This allowed us to regroom a copy of the ATSC 3.0 signal and slip it between a gap in the QAM signals on Channel 12 as shown below. 

Grooming the ATSC 3.0 Channel 33 to In House Channel 12 resulted in a bit of adjacent channel spillover from active channels 32 and 34. By allowing a 6MHz band on either side of the inserted channel, we were able to avoid any cross-channel interference. The original Channel 33 signal remains unaltered for test and QC on a separate feed, while the new channel copy is inserted into the larger system for distribution throughout the campus. 

Overall, we were highly impressed with the performance and features of the AVANT X. The folks at TONER CABLE and TELEVES have been great to work with and I am grateful to Javier Ruano and Jon Kipp for their help and assistance through the project. The AVANT X has proven to be an affordable, simple and elegant solution for those who need to accurately monitor over the air television signals In a professional or even residential environment.

RAYMOND, Maine—Sinclair Broadcast Group this week promoted Keith Pelletier to president of its Dielectric subsidiary.

Pelletier, a 25-year veteran at Dielectric where he most recently was vice president and general manager of RF antenna and system manufacturing, is taking over for Andy Whiteside who plans to retire this summer, the company said.

“Keith has in-depth engineering and manufacturing experience coupled with strong leadership skills and excellent rapport with Dielectric’s customer base,” said Whiteside. 

“Keith recognized early on the unprecedented demands that the U.S. spectrum repack would place on the industry and drove his team to develop and implement the innovative engineering and manufacturing process changes that resulted in Dielectric providing over 85% of the TV antennas to the repack program – a key factor in ensuring the timely success of the repack effort.”

Pelletier earned a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maine, Orono. He is the author of many technical papers and has frequently presented at major engineering conferences.

“I am looking forward to leading the company into the future,” said Pelletier. “Dielectric will continue to embrace change and lead efforts to stay on the cutting edge of technology and manufacturing while solving broadcasters’ future RF needs.”

Sinclair acquired Dielectric in 2013.

More information is available on the company’s website.

LOS ANGELES—Tennis Channel and Samsung’s free streaming service, Samsung TV Plus have teamed up to launch T2, Tennis Channel’s first free ad-supported TV (FAST) offering in the United States and Samsung TV Plus’s first channel to offer year-round live sports competition. T2, which features matches and original programming not featured on Tennis Channel, T2 is now available to all Samsung TV Plus users with 2017-or-newer Samsung smart TVs and Galaxy mobile devices.

Tennis Channel, which is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, says it new, youth-oriented channel is distinct from its linear television network, online platforms and print magazine in its content, tone, look and feel. T2 will include matches from the men’s and women’s professional tennis tours—the Association of Tennis Professionals and Women’s Tennis Association—as well as select matches from the French Open and International Tennis Federation events. In addition to on-court competition, other programming includes original short-form features and documentaries exclusive to T2.

The launch is just the latest in a trend of bringing traditional, linear type TV programming to a generation raised on on-demand streaming. The market for FAST channels is expected to grow from $2.1 billion in 2021 to $4.1 billion in 2023, according to a recent study by Verizon Media, which also found that monthly active users will hit 216 million in 2023.

“The demand for top-level sports programming has grown even stronger as media platforms continue to evolve, and we couldn’t be happier to usher in T2, our new FAST standard, with Samsung TV Plus,” said Ken Solomon, president, Tennis Channel. “Thanks to the voluminous live-match content unique to tennis—daily, global events around the clock with often overlapping multi-court coverage—T2 lets millions of Americans watch live tennis from many of the world’s top events, all year long. There are more great matches than we can fit on Tennis Channel, making T2 and Samsung TV Plus’ innovative platform the perfect complement. It allows us to attract even more viewers to the game in an exciting new way, rising the tide for tennis fans, our existing distribution partners and the game’s stakeholders everywhere.”

Tennis Channel FAST channels are currently available on Samsung TV Plus in Austria, Germany, India, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom—though they are programmed and designed separately from the new American channel. T2 expands that reach to the large U.S. marketplace and comes during one of the most important months on the annual tennis calendar.

“We are excited to partner with Sinclair and welcome T2, the destination to watch live marquee tennis matches from around the world, exclusively on Samsung TV Plus,” said Takashi Nakano, senior director of content acquisitions and business development for Samsung TV Plus. “Adding live sports to our lineup gives our viewers even more choice and that’s what Samsung TV Plus is all about.”

Tennis Channel’s domestic FAST channel on Samsung TV Plus is the latest platform in the network’s continuing media expansion. In recent years, this has included a podcast network, print magazine, youth-oriented digital newsletter and streaming-subscription service in marketplaces outside the country. At the same time, the channel has become the exclusive television and digital home of both the men’s and women’s professional tours in the United States.

BALTIMORE—A ransomware cyberattack in October 2021 cost Sinclair Broadcast Group $63 million in lost revenue for the broadcast group and has cost the company $11 million to date, it said in its latest quarterly report. 

The attack, which plagued the company’s internal operations for several weeks forced Sinclair to have to produce its news on internal networks. The company says it has since implemented extra security measures. Sinclair said it paid no ransom, and was able to restore its network from backups, but the disruption impacted revenues and expenses.

Sinclair added that since there is no assurance that they will be fully reimbursed via  their insurance policies, it estimates that the cyber incident will have resulted in approximately $24 million of unrecoverable net loss; however, that estimate may increase as details of the recovery are still fluid.

The security hack was part of the reason that the company  reported a loss of $89 million for the quarter or $1.18 a share, compared to net income of $467 million, or $6.32 a year ago.

Revenue dropped 2% to $1.476 billion from $1.512 billion a year ago, which Sinclair attributed partly due to the cyber attack as well as the absence of political advertising. The company would have seen an increase in its revenue had it not been for cyber incident.  

Ad revenues decreased 31% to $383 million while core advertising revenue, sans political spending, increased 4% to $364 million. Distribution revenue increased $1.048 billion, up from $917 million a year ago

Sinclair also announced that it was raising its dividend by 25%.

Chris Ripley, Sinclair's President/CEO was optimistic about the next fiscal year.

"We continue to be encouraged by the rebound in the advertising market in 2021 and expect a robust advertising market in 2022, driven by significant political ad placements, continued strong demand from the service and sports betting categories, and a slow recovery in the auto and other supply-constrained sectors." Ripley said.

"The year ahead is an important one for our Company from a content and programming perspective," he added. "Already in 2022, we renewed our local digital rights with the NBA & NHL, paving the way for our new “Direct to Consumer” product, debuted two new original programs on our regional sports networks, and secured live tennis rights for the Women’s Tennis Association tour in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. Coupled with the continued roll-out of NextGen broadcasting and the emergence of gamification elements across our platforms, we remain steadfast in our mission of connecting people with content everywhere."

BALTIMORE—Sinclair Broadcast Group has appointed Rob Weisbord to Chief Operating Officer of the corporation and President of Broadcast. As COO, Weisbord will lead operations for the company and its owned/operated television stations, 21 regional sports network brands, national networks including Tennis Channel and Stadium, multicast networks and all digital and streaming platforms.

Weisbord, who has served as the company’s President of Broadcast and Chief Advertising Revenue Officer since 2020, will continue to report to Chris Ripley, President and Chief Executive Officer.

 “As Sinclair continues to expand into a multi-platform content and solutions business, Rob is uniquely qualified to serve as COO. He has been instrumental in the growth and diversification of our business operations, with an impressive record of innovative thinking, bold leadership, and strategic and operational accomplishments. We are thrilled to promote Rob into this position,” said Ripley. 

Since joining Sinclair in 1997, Weisbord has served in various executive management positions for Sinclair including Chief Operating Officer of Sinclair Digital Group, Vice President of New Media, Director of Digital Interactive Marketing, Regional Group Manager, and General Manager for the company’s Las Vegas duopoly of KVMY-TV and KVCW-TV. 

“Over the last 40 years, Sinclair has established itself as a leading provider of local news and sports content and I’m excited to have the opportunity to continue its evolution and advancement while building on its existing successes,” Weisbord said.

Weisbord holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Management and a Master’s Degree in Business Administration from the University of Tampa.

BALTIMORE—As TV stations struggle to find new talent, Sinclair Broadcast Group is stepping up its efforts to attract and train new journalists by holding a News Reporter Academy, an interactive workshop for college students interested in pursuing a career in news reporting.

The workshop will be held on March 30 from noon to 3 p.m. ET / 9-12 p.m. PT.

Now in its second year, the News Reporter Academy is hosted by Sinclair’s corporate news operation and is designed to give students an opportunity to learn about working in a newsroom and interact with Sinclair’s news teams.

In the three-hour interactive session, students will learn the basics of news reporting and investigative storytelling, managing a social media presence, how to look and sound their best on-camera and how to package a resume and reel, Sinclair said. 

The News Reporter Academy builds on the success Sinclair has had with its Producer Academy. That separate effort, which targets students interested in pursuing a career in digital or broadcast news producing, is now in its fifth year. 

The News Reporter Academy is free and open to undergraduate and graduate college students.

Students must register in advance by March 25.  Registration is limited to 150 students and .edu email address is required. Registration is available here. 

BALTIMORE, Md.—Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced that it is unlikely that a carriage agreement with Dish Network will be reached before the current deal expires on August 16, 2021 for Sinclair’s broadcast stations and Tennis Channel. 

As a result, all Sinclair broadcast TV stations and Tennis Channel would no longer be carried by Dish Network, the company said. In total, 108 broadcast TV stations are expected to be dropped, including 97 ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC affiliates.

The move would impact 3.5 million Dish subs in 38% of the country. 

“We have tried unsuccessfully to reach fair and customary terms with Dish Network for the renegotiation of our retransmission consent,” stated David Gibber, Sinclair’s senior vice president and general counsel. “Given the status of these negotiations, we feel it is important to alert Dish Network subscribers to the real risk that some of their favorite stations will no longer be available through Dish Network including their access to live, local news, popular syndicated programming, sports programming including college and NFL football, and the network programming of our ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and CW affiliates in those markets.”

Sinclair did not discuss the sticking points in the negotiations but a key issue is likely to be Sinclair’s regional sports networks, which were dropped by Dish in 2019. 

Dish's response can be found here.

This article was updated after Sinclair revised downward the number of stations impacted by the dispute from 112 to 108. 

BUFFALO, N.Y.—Sinclair Broadcast Group has launched local news operations at its Fox 29 WUTV Buffalo, NY station with a nightly newscast at 10 p.m. and has gone live with a Buffalo Plus digital news site for Bills and Sabres fans. 

Fox 29 news, which began airing on July 1, provides reporting from across New York with content from a statewide network of sister stations. Viewers will also see reporting from Sinclair’s team of journalists in Washington DC.

Fox 29 has also launched an “Buffalo Plus,” a digital news site for Buffalo Bills and Sabres fans. “Buffalo Plus” will take audiences beyond headlines with photo galleries, commentary, team news, exclusive programming, podcasts and information about the Buffalo Bills and Sabres, the station reported. 

The Fox 29 on-air team will be led by veteran New York journalist Michael Benny, chief meteorologist Scott Hetsko, and sports director Mike Catalana. 

Leading Fox 29’s team as news director is award-winning journalist Kelly Holland, who has 15 years of experience in the Buffalo market, previously serving as news director for Spectrum News Buffalo.

“With news breaking in the Buffalo region by the minute, our newscasts will provide the latest local news and sports coverage so our audiences don’t miss a beat,” said Nick Magnini, Fox 29’s vice president and general manager. “It’s essential our viewers are equipped with the most up-to-date information, and our dedicated news team will do just that, sharing the most important stories each day.”

ATLANTA—Sinclair Broadcast Group has expanded its sports production and delivery capabilities with the launch of a new 25,000-square-foot, SMPTE ST 2110 media operations center here dedicated to its regional sports networks (RSNs).

The operations center, which leverages cloud-hosted disaster recovery channels, also serves as a large-scale ST 2110 production facility for its Tennis Channel. Sinclair’s Tennis Channel features a cloud-based environment for pop-up live special events as well.

The new op center is built around Imagine Communications infrastructure and playout solutions.

“This transition cannot be a simple lift and shift of legacy systems; it is the opportunity to take a fresh look at the way a broadcaster operates,” says Don Roberts, VP of sports engineering and production systems at Sinclair. Meeting both business and technical requirements were driving factors in Sinclair’s transition to IP connectivity and software-defined architecture.

“We have to start from good user engagement, to understand what will change at each step,” says Roberts. “The transition to IP and the cloud is transformative. We can’t just flip a switch. We have to redefine how the business works. This is change management as much as technology.”

Sinclair has a history of advocating for the SMPTE ST 2110 family of standards and a long relationship collaborating with Imagine to develop IP playout and production systems, the broadcaster said.

Following its 2019 purchase of the regional sports networks from Fox/Disney, Sinclair developed a new playout strategy and committed to building an IP-based facility from the ground up to serve as a future-proof hub for the RSNs.

Sinclair partnered with Encompass to build the operations center, which leverages the Imagine Versio integrated playout platform, Selenio network processors and Magellan SDNO control system at its core.

Sinclair’s first step was to develop an on-premises solution for the RSNs. “We also developed options to put some functionality ― like the archive and disaster recovery playout ― into the cloud,” says Roberts. “This enables us to use the Atlanta facility as a stepping-stone, continually refining the workflows and business cases that will help us transition to a hybrid approach that balances capability and cost.”

Sinclair also was developing a platform for its Tennis Channel at the same time. With a master control center in Santa Monica, Calif., the Tennis Channel uses the Versio platform, on-premise for primary origination with Imagine’s ADC automation and as software instances hosted on the AWS cloud for pop-up special events under the control of the cloud-optimized Versio automation system.

“Tennis is live and unpredictable, so we need our playout capabilities to be agile and responsive,” says Roberts. “Software solutions like Versio give us that agility ― the ability to make a decision and have it on air virtually instantly. And because it can be hosted in the cloud, we simply spin it up at the beginning of each tournament and close the software when it ends.”

Imagine’s Selenio Network Processor (SNP) are central to the architecture at the Santa Monica center. Each 1RU SNP device hosts four independent, software-defined processing channels.  

The SNPs at the Tennis Channel facility act as IP gateways and support format conversion, which allows the facility to be primarily 1080p, but accommodate 4K and HDR UHD when needed, which was used for the French Open tennis tournament from Roland Garros in Paris. The facility also uses the new SNP-MV multiviewer personality, allowing for tactical multiview displays to be established quickly wherever they are needed in the workflow.

Sinclair launched the new Tennis Channel ST 2110 infrastructure in December 2020 and went live to and from the cloud during coverage of the 2021 Miami Open in March, one of the first high-profile live sporting events played out from the cloud.

“Our plans moving forward are all about making production and delivery more efficient, to create a single ecosystem. Each of our RSNs has its own production facilities, and as they need a technology refresh, we will bring them into the ST 2110 world. We see Imagine as a key partner in that process: we work closely with them, we have honest exchanges about the way forward, and we are all learning as we go along. It’s a winning team,” says Roberts.

ARLINGTON, Va.,—In an important demonstration of some of the new services that NextGen TV can offer, BitPath, CAST.ERA and ONE Media have delivered “Enhanced GPS” broadcasts that could provide a major new tool for autonomous vehicle navigation and other applications. 

The demo broadcast of “Enhanced GPS” (eGPS) data using ATSC 3.0 showed it could deliver positional accuracy within a few centimeters. 

That kind of accuracy could be very important in a number of applications like autonomous vehicle navigation. 

Additionally, a drone incorporating eGPS and a 5G radio was used to show the potential of “Beyond Visual Line of Sight” observation and live imagery. This demo delivered a near real-time broadcast of gathered live images that could very useful for news, first responders and other applications. 

The demoes are important because traditional space-based global positioning systems are vulnerable to low power and environmentally induced inaccuracies. Using the high-power data transmission capacity of terrestrial broadcast stations, improved eGPS positioning can be broadcast to an unlimited number of vehicles inside of the range of a licensed broadcast television station. 

The companies involved also noted that enhanced GPS is one example of how ATSC 3.0 could usher in a new era of datacasting services from broadcasters. 

Testing of eGPS and aerial observation capabilities was orchestrated by CAST.ERA, the joint venture between Sinclair and SK Telecom from South Korea, in conjunction with Doosan and South Korean broadcaster, MBC. Using advanced drone technology combined with the NextGen broadcast-enabled eGPS, the demonstration permitted supervised autonomous drone takeoff, flights and landing at extraordinarily precise locations. 

Commenting on this important proof of concept, John Hane, president of BitPath, which is building a national broadcast data network, noted that “today’s demonstration shows one of many high value, low bandwidth applications for broadcast data. Location services are more important to the economy every day. Applications extend from all transportation sectors to energy distribution, smart cities, public safety, and cyber security. BitPath looks forward to working with our partners and other broadcasters to add new dimensions to broadcasters’ public interest services.”

Kevin Gage, CAST.ERA’s chief operating officer, added that “data services, cloud management of ATSC 3.0 services and ultra-low latency media encoding are just a few of the new technologies we plan to release this year. The eGPS project highlights each of these technologies over a hybrid ATSC 3.0-5G delivery network.”

One Media 3.0 is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc.

 HUNT VALLEY, Md.—Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. has announced that Barry Faber, president of distribution and network relations, will be retiring on June 25, 2021. 

During his 25 years at the Company, Faber helped Sinclair grow into one of the largest and most diversified broadcasters in the country. In his years as general counsel, Mr. Faber guided the Company through many acquisitions, including more than 150 broadcast stations and Tennis Channel, the company reported. 

He was also well known for leading Sinclair’s and the broadcast industry’s ground-breaking and ultimately successful efforts to be paid by pay-TV providers for their content. Farber had served as president of distribution and network relations since April of 2019. 

“Barry has been a key factor in propelling Sinclair to the forefront of the broadcasting industry and shaping its direction,” said David Smith, Sinclair’s executive chairman in a statement. “With Barry’s oversight, our company took the lead and transformative step to be compensated for the cost of the high-quality programming that others were re-selling. Barry has been an integral part of our executive team for decades, positioning us as a leading broadcaster and diversified media company.”

“I am grateful for the opportunity to have worked with such a forward-looking and entrepreneurial company that always strives to better itself and the industry in which it operates,” explained Faber in a statement. “David Smith and Chris Ripley, and all the others I have worked with over the years, have always been very supportive of my endeavors, for which I am very appreciative, and I extend my best wishes to them as they embark on the next chapter of Sinclair’s incredible journey.”

Farber will work as a consultant for Sinclair after his retirement. Sinclair will announce his replacement later this year.

HUNT VALLEY, Md.—Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced its plans for a direct-to-consumer streaming version for its Bally Sports regional sports networks, which it intends to launch in the first half of 2022.

In an earnings call on May 5, Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley said that they had already cleared the path with distributors for the DTC service and that Sinclair has DTC rights for most of the teams covered by the RSNs, with discussions underway to enhance those rights.

No details were shared as far as price for the service or an official launch date.

Sinclair acquired 19 Fox Sports RSNs from Disney in 2019, which they rebranded as Bally Sports earlier this year.

Sinclair currently does not have distribution of its RSN channels on Dish Network, Hulu + Live TV or YouTube TV, which is likely spurring their decision to go DTC.

For more information, read TV Tech’s sister publication Next TV’s full coverage. 

NEW YORK—Sinclair Broadcast Group has entered into a multi-year enterprise partnership with Operative Media to change how local and national media are transacted across digital and linear platforms, transitioning its inventory to a common impression-based currency, Sinclair announced.

The partnership enables Sinclair to consolidate all its sellable assets across platforms and markets into a single ad sales system, thereby creating a unified brand experience for customers and sellers, it said.

Sinclair will use Operative Media AOS, the company’s next generation ad sales management technology platform.

The impression-based model directly addresses the viewership fragmentation that’s made it difficult and time consuming for marketers to identify audiences at scale as well as buy and execute against them, Sinclair said.

“We already provide a unique opportunity for marketers to engage consumers of all kinds, and Operative’s technology will further consolidate and simplify our sales process,” said Rob Weisbord, president of Broadcast and chief advertising revenue officer of Sinclair.

“It will bring this concept to our markets in a way that is easily managed by our various sellers and the portfolios of inventory they represent. It will provide them flexibility to dynamically manage audience and spend allocations across Sinclair’s broad asset catalog,” he said.

The AOS platform automates workflows involving planning, order management, inventory management and stewardship and billing, which Sinclair expects to drive efficiency internally across its portfolio and externally with customers. The platform supports Sinclair’s Compulse 360 and ZypTV products and will provide the foundation for the broadcaster to integrate with other partners and technology companies, it said.

The partnership provides automated integrations with key buying systems that will shorten the time it takes to develop plans and deliver reports and invoices to customers. It will reduce discrepancies between buyers and sellers by passing all data electronically between the buy and sell systems. Yield tools will help deliver improved outcomes for both Sinclair and its customers by optimizing inventory use, delivery and make goods, it said.

“This is an opportunity to align our proven track record in the broadcast industry with Operative’s technological expertise to create a simple solution that we believe will change the way advertisers connect with consumers across all devices,” said Brian Bark, CIO of Sinclair. 

“This new platform will empower advertisers with the ability to optimize campaigns across Sinclair’s distinguished portfolio of content, while altering the way the industry does business—paving the way for other media companies in the process.”

More information is available on the Operative Media and Sinclair websites. 

JEJU ISLAND, South Korea & ARLINGTON, Va.—CAST.ERA, a joint venture of SK Telecom and Sinclair Broadcast Group, says it will introduce a technology package by year’s end that converges 5G and ATSC 3.0 to broadcast Ultra-HD (UHD) video with little to no latency to NextGen TVs and mobile devices and support personalized ad delivery for each viewer during commercial breaks via OTT.

“We plan to introduce the cloud-based, AI-driven next-generation TV broadcasting solutions into the U.S. market this year,” said CAST.ERA COO Kevin Gage. “These solutions will help accelerate U.S. broadcasters’ deployment of next-generation TV broadcasting services into the market.”

The new technologies also will enable OTA datacasting and live TV broadcast via OTT to home viewers and those on the go with minimal lag in transmission time. The announcement comes following successful trials of CAST.ERA’s technology on Jeju Island, South Korea, the company said.

The converged 5G-ATSC 3.0 technologies include:

• AI Upscaler, which creates high-quality broadcast video in real-time, upscaling broadcast resolution, increasing frame rate and expanding color gamut via artificial intelligence.
• Virtualized Broadcasting Platform, which uses cloud and mobile edge computing to operate and remotely control broadcasters’ local transmission systems from a centralized location and enable more efficient and economical operations.
• Zero-Latency OTT, which cuts OTT streaming delay to TVs and mobile devices from nine seconds to zero. The technology also dynamically inserts personalized ads for each OTT viewer during commercial breaks.
• Datacasting, which makes it possible to distribute large amounts of data via TV broadcast signals.  

“Bringing together the technologies and expertise that these two companies possess will help unlock the huge potential that ATSC 3.0 has for delivering IP content efficiently over large geographic areas covered by our TV signal,” said Sinclair CTO Del Parks. “These technologies are a game changer. Our new abilities to provide improved viewer experience and access to new business models, like data delivery as a service (Ddaas), is one of the most exciting things to happen to our business since HDTV.”  

The new technologies were trialed at Jeju Technopark in a 5G-ATSC 3.0 testbed. The trials began with a transmission from Las Vegas to Jeju Island. 

They were conducted in collaboration with South Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT, Korea Communications Commission (KCC), Korea Radio Promotion Association (RAPA), Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), Jeju Special Self-Governing Province, Korean broadcasters, and select partner companies, the company said.

During the trials, CAST.ERA worked with Doosan and MBC to demonstrate a location service that carries GPS correction data (MBC RTK) via a 3.0 broadcast signal to a Doosan hydrogen fuel cell drone. The correction data reduces GPS positioning errors from 3 to 6 feet to 4 inches, the company said.

CAST.ERA will provide broadcast solutions to the United States and Korea, working with Sinclair and other U.S. broadcasters and Korea’s Kai Media, ATBiS, DigiCAP and Hasigancom. SK Telecom is Korea’s largest mobile telecommunications provider and a pioneer in 5G smartphone service.

ATLANTA—Two years after its $9.6 billion purchase of 21 Fox RSNs and Fox College Sports from Disney by Sinclair, the network has unveiled its new 25,000-square-foot Media Operations Center in Atlanta, as it also rebrands its new sports arm as “Bally Sports.” 

Sinclair built the facility with Encompass Digital Media after Disney/ESPN decided to keep the former Fox RSN sports hub at The Woodlands in Houston. The time crunch to design, build and equip the new facility didn’t make getting to completion any easier. 

“What Fox had built over a 15-year period, we had to recreate in two years, from scratch,” said Del Parks, executive vice president and chief technical officer for Sinclair. 

“We settled on Encompass for the facility because of its experience as a program service provider [and] we hired Deloitte and Think Strategic Consulting to help program and manage the project,” said Don Roberts, Sinclair’s vice president, sports engineering and production systems. “Now, we’re in the process of commissioning the SMPTE 2110 facility with its key vendors, Imagine, Encompass and Diversified.” 

Parks said Sinclair made its new facility as future-proof as possible; as the sports industry advances to higher resolution UHD and HDR, the need for an all-IP facility is critical. 

With an existing major uplink facility and backup disaster recovery uplink in Connecticut, the site will feature the latest infrastructure, including two 2.5 MW generators, two 750 KW uninterruptable power supplies and power feeds from two separate grids to provide the redundancy such a facility requires. The technical core consists of 84 racks with the latest IP equipment installed by Diversified. 

Since the Bally Sports RSNs cover teams from not only MLB, but also the NBA and the NHL, game times can overlap and the facility needs to cover multiple events. So it “has a large capacity for control rooms and has UHD 4K capabilities. That gives us plenty of room to expand,” Parks said. “Additionally, we have AT&T fiber connecting all of the RSNs and the sports venues to Encompass.” 

At the core playout is Imagine Communications’ Versio Modular Playout and ADC Automation. 

Sinclair’s remote trucks are mostly provided by the Mobile TV Group, of Denver. “They operate from the venues and send back the signal via fiber to Atlanta, where the commercials and the pregame and postgame shows are inserted,” said Parks, “then uplinked to the satellite for distribution to our multichannel video programming distributor customers. 

“It’s also important to note,” Parks added, “that due to the FCC-mandated satellite repack of the C-band spectrum, Sinclair also has to deploy more than 3,500 new satellite receivers (integrated receiver/decoders) from Synamedia, then transition its satellite operations from an MPEG2-based distribution from The Woodlands to Encompass and the new, more efficient encoding process High-Efficiency Video Codec.” 

In addition to the Bally Sports RSNs, the new Media Operations Center will host Marquee Sports Network (the Chicago Cubs’ RSN) and the Yankees YES Network. As Parks noted, building out the operation at Encompass to accommodate so many content providers in such a short timeframe has been a huge challenge. 

“We’ve had at least 50 people working directly on this project,” said Parks, noting that the equipment in the 40 control rooms, supervisor pods and offices is installed and ready. “I’ve worked for Sinclair for 50 years and this is the largest project that we’ve ever done.”

BALTIMORE—Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced layoffs to 5% of its workforce due to the “profound impact” that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the broadcasting group.

Sinclair owns or operates 190 television stations and 23 regional sports networks across 88 markets. It’s entire staff is about 9,200 employees, meaning that 460 employees will be impacted by these layoffs.

In an official statement provided to TV Tech, Sinclair said that no part of its business has been shielded from the pandemic, and as a result, “we are currently undergoing enterprise-wide reductions across our workforce, including corporate headquarters, to ensure we are well-positioned for future success.”

Sinclair is the latest broadcast/media company to make reductions or changes to its workforce because of the pandemic. In November 2020, ESPN announced that it would eliminate 500 positions as part of a more streaming focused strategy, accelerated in part because of the pandemic. Also, back in April 2020, Meredith announced a series of salary cuts.

In Sinclair’s fourth quarter 2020 earnings report, it disclosed that it generated higher profits despite a 7% drop in revenue. The company also announced an acquisition of ZypMedia.

Here is the full statement from Sinclair:

"The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be felt across all sectors of the economy, something that can have a profound impact on a company as diversified as ours. From local businesses and advertisers to distributors and partners, no component of our business’s ecosystem has been fully shielded from the impact of the global pandemic. In response to this, we are currently undergoing enterprise-wide reductions across our workforce, including corporate headquarters, to ensure we are well-positioned for future success. These reductions represent approximately five percent of our workforce."

HUNT VALLEY, Md.—It may be a little early for SiriusXM and radio broadcasters to get worried, but they might want to take a close look at what Sinclair Broadcast Group will be doing two weeks from now in Seattle.

That’s the targeted launch date for the ATSC 3.0 over-the-air delivery of four Sinclair radio stations in the market as part of its STIRR XT digital audio service. OTA simulcasts of KVI, KOMO, KOMO-FM and KPLZ-FM will complement 15 digital audio channels already being delivered over the top as part of STIRR XT.

But there’s far more to the impending over-the-air launch than merely radio simulcasts. From a strategic point of view, the rollout—while initially modest—demonstrates Sinclair’s commitment to delivery of far more than better looking and sounding TV via ATSC 3.0, says Mark Aitken, senior vice president, Advanced Technology, for Sinclair and president of ONE Media 3.0. 

“One of the reasons we are doing this is because the automotive guys always ask: ‘Is there an alternative to digital radio [and] to SiriusXM that can be delivered via the ATSC 3.0 standard?’” he says. 

While acknowledging it’s “early in the game,” Sinclair is hoping the Seattle 3.0 radio simulcasts—the first of many to launch in the broadcaster’s ATSC 3.0 markets—will pique the interest of automakers as they plan for the future, he says.

Automakers need a minimum of three years to add anything to what’s on the drawing board. The launch of STIRR XT OTA today just might be enough to nudge them into including 3.0 receivers in future models, he says.

“We think there is a real compelling reason to consider the inclusion of ATSC 3 receivers in cars,” says Aitken. “Once you’ve done that, all of the other opportunities for what can be carried in that digital spectrum open up.”

Frequently cited use cases for ATSC 3.0 in vehicles include delivery of in-car entertainment, map and navigation data and fleet-wide software updates for computer-controlled automotive tech.

NEXTGEN TV HYBRID SERVICE

Like ATSC 3.0 itself, the combined STIRR XT is a hybrid service—part OTA and part OTT. When the 3.0 radio simulcasts launch, only NextGen TV sets and gateway owners in Seattle will be able to receive them. However, in October 2020 Sinclair revealed early production samples of its Mark One smartphone with built-in 3.0 receiver. These phones and other expected 3.0 consumer devices will make mobile reception of OTA 3.0 digital audio a reality one day, says Aitken.

“We truly will be delivering radio broadcast content—just delivered over a different spectrum,” says Aitken. “It’s not FM; it’s television spectrum.”

Consumers access STIRR XT via the STIRR Radio broadcast app available universally on televisions labeled as NextGen TV sets. When consumers launch the app, they can navigate to STIRR Radio to begin enjoying OTT- and OTA-delivered digital audio channels, he says.

Currently, Sinclair is in discussions with other broadcasters about simulcasting their radio stations over the air via ATSC 3.0 with STIRR XT in markets where the station group has no radio stations, says Aitken, adding that the service at launch will be purely ad-supported. 

XHE-AAC CODEC AND ATSC 3.0

STIRR XT audio channels delivered over the top are being encoded using the Dolby AC-4 audio codec, which is specified to be used in North America as part of the ATSC 3.0 standard.

However, Sinclair has other plans for STIRR XT channels delivered over the air. Rather than AC-4, the station group will encode OTA audio channels using the xHE-AAC (Extended High-Efficiency Advanced Audio Coding) codec. 

“We are working on integrating a broadcast app-delivered highly efficient radio audio codec, which is not technically supported in the ATSC 3.0 standard,” says Aitken. “But because this is all IP—and this is the magic of IP—that broadcast app will deliver a player for an audio codec that does not exist in the ATSC 3.0 standard.”

Motivating Sinclair’s choice of xHE-AAC for OTA-delivered STIRR XT is bandwidth efficiency, says Aitken. With xHE-AAC, Aitken predicts significant bandwidth savings. For example, a stereo audio channel encoded with AC-4 requires 96kb/s, while the same channel needs just 24kb/s when encoded using xHE-AAC, he says. 

The extra efficient codec also puts Sinclair’s STIRR XT OTA delivery in line with what’s going on around the world in digital radio, he says.

“xHE-AAC is the audio codec that is part of the digital radio standard called Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM),” says Aitken. “It is deployed globally, and it is in fact the most efficient commercially available codec.”

Adopting the Digital Radio Mondiale framework in the STIRR Radio broadcast app ensures that all of the tools for radio functionality are already available, he adds.

The Seattle rollout of STIRR XT follows Sinclair’s initial deployment in Oklahoma City. Sinclair plans to make STIRR XT available in all of its ATSC 3.0 markets.

“The whole point here is that we are using STIRR as a backbone piece of our OTT-OTA convergence strategy,” says Aitken. “We are bringing to bear all of the tools and all of the assets that we can to step forward with a competitive foot with the services we can offer.”

BALTIMORE & PROVIDENCE, R.I.—Sinclair Broadcast Group and Bally Sports have debuted the Bally Sports logo and regional monikers for Sinclair’s owned and operated regional sports networks. The Bally Sports logos will replace the current Fox Sports regional logos when the official rebrand takes place.

“We are extremely proud to unveil the Bally Sports logo as it signifies a new, transformative chapter in the regional sports business and is representative of our cohesive partnership with Bally’s,” said Steve Rosenberg, president of Local Sports, Sinclair Broadcast Group. “The upcoming rebrand across our RSN footprint is incredibly exciting, not only for our entire portfolio, but for loyal sports fans across the country.”

As part of the rebrand, Sinclair’s Prime Ticket will become Bally Sports SoCal and Sports Time Ohio will become Bally Sports Great Lakes, monikers that Sinclair and Bally say align with the region’s true geographical roots. 

In addition, Fox Sports Carolinas and Fox Sports Tennessee will sunset as part of an effort to streamline offerings. The live games available through these RSNs, which include Nashville Predators and Carolina Hurricanes games, will head to Bally Sports South (previously Fox Sports South) and Bally Sports Southeast (previously Fox Sports Southeast).

Nineteen total RSNs will be rebranded. In addition to the above mentioned, the new RSN monikers include Bally Sports Arizona, Bally Sports Detroit, Bally Sports Florida, Bally Sports Kansas City, Bally Sports Indiana, Bally Sports Midwest, Bally Sports New Orleans, Bally Sports North, Bally Sports Ohio, Bally Sports Oklahoma, Bally Sports San Diego, Bally Sports Southwest, Bally Sports Sun, Bally Sports West and Bally Sports Wisconsin.

The new logo was created by Interbrand and features Bally’s traditional red script above a red “Sports” typography.

No official date for the rebranding has been announced, with Sinclair saying that it will take place “in the coming months.”

For more information, visit www.sbgi.net.

Out west in Phoenix, Pearl TV along with its other market partners in December 2020 launched a two-node ATSC 3.0 SFN trial on The E.W. Scripps Company-owned KASW.

Back east, Louis Libin, Sinclair Broadcast Group vice president for Spectrum Engineering and Policy, was preparing in late 2020 for a Q1 launch of a new six-node 3.0 SFN test on channel 30 in the Baltimore-Washington, D.C., area that will also include a Sinclair big stick.

The Phoenix SFN test initially looked at the viability of different ATSC 3.0 use cases that rely on single frequency networks. Longer term, testing is designed to help guide broadcasters to optimize future SFN deployments.

Sinclair’s test will look at the basic functionality of an SFN in a limited area using 40W transmitters (200W to 400W ERP), a newly designed, radome-enclosed Dielectric antenna with slant polarization and other technology in a self-contained package that the broadcaster can quickly and easily deploy about four or five miles from each other to blanket markets in the future. Think cell phone network with better than 5G performance (broadcast bits rather than unicast), and you get the picture.

What violates Kipling’s “never the twain shall meet” dictum when it comes to these east and west SFN tests is a common desire on the part of those conducting them to share findings with other broadcasters, whether competitors or not, to make it easier for every broadcaster to succeed with 3.0.

Dave Folsom, retired CTO of Raycom Media and a Pearl TV engineer, says findings will be shared with the industry, including baseline performance compared to that of using different modcods and operational data. “That will be freely distributed and freely shared with everyone, and people can make their own conclusions based on the data,” he said.

Libin’s plans mirror those of Folsom. Saying Sinclair “desperately” wants to share its SFN findings domestically and around the world, Libin identifies a desire to help the industry grow as motivating this magnanimity.

That’s where the TV broadcast industry is as it enters 2021. Whether east or west, north or south, there’s a strong spirit of cooperation and collaboration on the technical side that ultimately will position the front office to make business decisions that lead to success and move their organizations forward.

NEW YORK & BALTIMORE—ViacomCBS and Sinclair Broadcast Group have come to terms on a new multi-year agreement for 13 CBS network affiliates owned by Sinclair. These stations reach more than 6 million TV households, per the announcement.

The stations covered by this new agreement include:

• WRGB, Albany, N.Y.  
• KBAK, Bakersfield, Calif. 
• KFDM, Beaumont, Texas 
• KBOI, Boise, Idaho 
• WKRC, Cincinnati 
• KDBC, El Paso, Texas 
• KVAL, Eugene, Ore. 
• WWMT, Grand Rapid, Mich 
• WHP, Harrisburg, Pa. 
• KTVL, Medford, Ore. 
• KPTH, Sioux City, Iowa 
• WPEC, West Palm Beach, Fla. 
• KIMA, Yakima, Wash. 

In addition to remaining available through traditional TV, all of these stations will be locally available to subscribers of the CBS All Access digital subscription streaming service.

In total, Sinclair owns CBS affiliate stations in 23 markets, which represents 8% of the U.S. and about 10 million households, per ViacomCBS.

“We are pleased to have reached an agreement with Sinclair that covers several early renewals,” said Ray Hopkins, president, U.S. Networks Distribution, ViacomCBS. “We look forward to providing our best-in-class news, sports and entertainment programming to millions of households in Sinclair markets through our valued and long-standing partnership.”

“We are happy to have reached agreement to continue to offer our viewers CBS content, including primetime and sports programming, which complements our stations’ valuable local news and syndicated content,” said Barry Faber, president, Distribution & Network Relations for Sinclair. “The renewal is testament to the symbolic relationship between a network and its affiliates.

NEW YORK & BALTIMORE—Fox Broadcasting Company and Sinclair Broadcast Group have announced a new multi-year agreement that will renew Fox network affiliations for Sinclair-owned stations.

According to the official announcement, the deal covers Sinclair stations in 25 markets, which reach approximately 11% of U.S. TV households.

“We are pleased that we have reached agreements with Fox to continue our long-standing relationship,” said Barry Faber, president, Distribution & Network Relations for Sinclair. “These renewals reflect the mutually beneficial network-affiliate model, which integrates the network’s primetime and sports programming with our stations’ local news and syndicated content.”

Among the programming that this will keep on the Sinclair stations is Fox-produced NFL games.

“This new agreement extends our valued relationship with Sinclair and ensures that millions of consumers will continue to enjoy Fox’s leading sports and entertainment content from the #1 broadcast network of the television season,” said Mike Biard, president, Operations and Distribution for Fox.

HUNT VALLEY, Md.—Early in 2020, Sinclair made the business and operational decision to migrate three of our national networks—Comet, Charge! and TBD—to automation and playout in the public cloud. This entirely new infrastructure and services platform allowed us to take a green field approach and let us consider how we really wanted to operate.

As a broadcaster, we sought to add value by streamlining the media supplychain and operations workflows, automating processes to remove manual touch points and reducing the effort required to build and maintain racks of equipment. We looked to remove the hardware wherever practical and move the signaling processes from manual operations to embedded in the creation of the linear stream itself.

We had some experience in public cloud playout in the past, with Imagine Communications as our primary technology partner. It made sense to build on this experience, as we were already familiar and comfortable with the Versio platform. This time we decided to originate these channels from Versio playout instances controlled by Versio automation and running within AWS.

FAST AND SIMPLE

The first thing to say about cloud playout and automation is that it is swift to implement. Our timeline was to design in April, start implementation in May and finish in the third quarter. That left us with development testing in June and production deployment in July and August, in time for shadowing in September when we also went on air. All this took place in a year when external forces limited everybody’s mobility and every design, implementation and training session was remote.

This is a big point in favor of the cloud. With automated infrastructure deployments, you can build large infrastructures in days, not weeks, and without any requirement for hands-on servers, switches and storage.

The second point is that this migration allowed us to streamline our playout operations with extensive automation. The software and infrastructure now leverage the metadata that accompanies our media to ensure it’s in the correct distribution path with the correct segment timings, and that any information that does need manual review is handled by exception.

Public cloud serverless computing means our traffic team no longer works from a spreadsheet—the BXF segment timings are reformatted, embedded in a message and distributed.

EVOLVING WITH THE TIMES

Similar to letting our metadata drive multiple outputs, our linear stream itself now serves multiple distribution paths. Our streams used to be created individually, with broadcast sent to LTN Global for distribution and separately sent to digital encoders for OTT. Now the same stream serves broadcast and digital using embedded signaling.

What are the results? First and most obvious, we are much more efficient. We have increased our capability for ad delivery and distribution, which is critical to any media company.

Second, we are no longer constrained by hardware, making our operations more flexible. We’re not stuck making assumptions that we’ll need to live with or face as obstacles in the future. We’ll build the system we need now and as business requirements change, we can change with them.

Essentially, our architecture does not age, it evolves. As AWS, Imagine or one of the other partner providers innovate, we can quickly take advantage of any new capabilities.

It becomes a living system on which we can improve and innovate at any time we choose. That gives us remarkable flexibility as a broadcaster: The freedom to efficiently match infrastructure and operations to business models.

Mike Kralec is vice president of Technical Operations and deputy CTO at Sinclair Broadcast Group, responsible for media technology and operations. He can be contacted at mkralec@sbgtv.com.

For more information, contact Imagine Communications at 866-446-2446 or visit www.imaginecommunications.com.