January is upon us and the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is right around the corner. Hosted in Las Vegas, the international trade show has always been a place to see new product releases from the largest and most popular technology companies in the world.
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Category: News
Mobile DTV’ers will be happy to hear that a new alliance was formed earlier this month. Although the coalition only represents 30 broadcast companies, the alliance forms a total of 346 full-power television broadcast stations which will help bring mobile digital television to over 90% of the U.S. population.
The Mobile500 Alliance is an open, inclusive alliance organization, and in fact, just days before the press release, two dozen broadcasters had signed on to the Mobile500 Alliance….so one would assume that we’ll see more broadcasters hop on board before Mobile DTV’s nationwide rollout.
You can learn more about the Mobile 500 Alliance at their website: www.mobile500alliance.com
Would the FCC Broadband Plan prevent over-the-air broadcaster’s from deploying Mobile DTV (MDTV)? Not so, says FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski.
“Under the incentive auction plan, broadcasters will be able to provide mobile DTV, both licensees that choose to retain all 6 Megahertz, and those that choose to share,”
Genachowski addressed many concerns by broadcasters last month at the 2010 National Association of Broadcasters Show; including the “voluntary” spectrum auction in which broadcasters could participate in by “choice”.
The auction is part of a five-year plan for spectrum reclamation and allocation to wireless companies, so that they may continue to offer wireless services for mobile users with products such as smart phones, netbooks, and laptops. The FCC believes that this action (along with others involved with the Broadband Plan), would help resolve the looming crisis for wireless companies.
As Mobile DTV testing begins in select markets, users of those devices have already begun uploading videos to YouTube.
Here we see a mobile dtv tester with a MDTV dongle plugged into a netbook while driving around in Orlando, Florida. Note the consistently clear reception while driving around in a rain storm.
continue reading…
Last Updated: 3-1-10
March 1st, 2010
FCC thinks broadcast spectrum has, “a massive amount of unlocked value” for wireless spectrum
Source: BroadcastEngineering.com
FCC chairman, Julius Genachowski, Julius Genachowski, recently commented on why some of the TV broadcast spectrum should be considered for use by the wireless spectrum.
“a massive amount of unlocked value”
“About 300MHz of spectrum have been set aside for broadcast TV,”
“In markets with less than 1 million people, only 36MHz are typically used for broadcasting. In cities with more than 1 million people, on average about 100MHz are used. Even in our very largest cities, at most only about 150MHz out of 300MHz are used.”
The FCC recently proposed a voluntary plan for broadcasters to give up some of their spectrum with the benefit of receiving compensation, but the National Association of Broadcasters have claimed that the recent rollout of mobile digital television, MDTV, will utilize some of the unused spectrum.
Last Updated: 2-23-10
On Feb 14, Eric Taub from The New York times penned a smashing piece on Mobile DTV titled, “Local TV for Devices on the Move”.
Notable quotes,
….30 stations in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle and Washington have installed the necessary equipment, at a cost of $75,000 to $150,000.
In reference to costs for each station to add Mobile DTV broadcast technology to their existing TV towers.
Seems like a small invesment for broadcasters with a big payoff potential, and this comes at a time when local stations are losing out on content distribution rights to Internet TV (ie: Hulu).
Yes according to a recent blog post by Jamie Berke’s deafness blog at about.com but not without caveat. She cites a recently published document, “OMVC Mobile TV Use Cases” by the Open Mobile Video Coalition, and questions whether or not Closed Captioning will be utilized by manufactures of MDTV sets and broadcasters.
Our question at MDTV Review is: Will Government Legislators regulate this new broadcast technology for deaf viewers or will it be left up for business to decide?
What’s new in the world of Mobile DTV? Lots. For starers, FLO TV (mobile TV pay service), scored mega buzz with their Super Bowl commercials last Sunday. One starring CBS sportscaster Jim Nants who gives an injury report on a man shopping with his wife,
and the other featuring historical events caught on live TV with a small cameo from Will.I.Am,
Both commercials were hot topics on for days on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and the blogoshpere.
FCC to pay broadcasters for networks?
Newsweek mentioned yesterday that the FCC is considering paying broadcasters to take some of the valuable TV broadcast spectrum to satisfy the growing needs of cell phone providers. continue reading…
Here are some YouTube videos of “MDTV” being demonstrated at the 2010 Consumer Electronic Show.
Up first is NetworkWorld.TV’s Mobile DTV preview at CES.
Description: NetworkWorld does a fantastic job showing various MDTV products from vendors including LG and Samsung. Alo includes interviews with David Arland w/ Open Mobile Video Coalition, and John Godfrey w/ Samsung Electronics America.
