The Song Remains The Same

Cable World, Sept 30, 2002

Byline: ALICIA MUNDY

The upshot of the seemingly endless hearing on the future of DTV in the House Commerce Committee last week, hosted by the irascible Billy Tauzin (R-La.), was evident from the beginning. It took only minutes of the four-hour ordeal for the members and witnesses to illustrate the depth of their differences and thus the unlikelihood of a resolution this Congressional session or even the next. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who began pushing for digital TV in 1987, noted the inevitability of several more hearings on the subject. "We may have our differences, but I guess we'll still have this," he sighed. Snapped Tauzin, "Well, there better be no ten-year reunion."

Actually, if several of the parties have their way, that could happen. Tauzin began the hearing with a laundry list of all the existing impediments to DTV, including those involving cable companies. "I have a real concern about consumers being forced to go out and spend money for a converter box - and will end up getting nothing new for the additional cost. This cannot be allowed to happen," he said. "Consumers reasonably expect that their consumer electronics equipment, including TV sets, will work with their cable system."

Markey complained that the Federal Communications Commission's DTV plan "has thus far not properly implemented the unbundling provisions in the 1996 Telecommunications Act for set-top boxes, cable modems, and other equipment," leaving the problem for Congress.

Witnesses took issue with just about everything. "The largest remaining obstacle to the DTV transition is the inability of consumers in this country to purchase DTVs and set-top boxes that connect simply and directly to a home digital cable jack, anywhere in the country," said Richard Lewis, Chief Technology Officer of Zenith Electronics. Michael Willner, CEO of Insight Communications and a representative of the cable industry, said, "There are no compatibility problems between digital TVs and cable systems. Today, cable operators are providing customers high-definition programming using digital set-top boxes with no technical or compatibility problems." He glided past the issue of whether cable companies would allow consumers to buy set-top boxes that work with different cable systems, a standing issue with Tauzin and Markey. (An excerpt of his testimony begins on page 17.)

Willner's argument against dual must-carry and free multicasting for broadcasters resonated with several House members. But his discussion of possible "down-resing" of hi-def TV left a few staffers, both Republican and Democrat, cold. One who asked for anonymity said, "The cable industry has been using copyright as a shield here, but the real issue is whether they will guarantee HDTV signal pass-through." A broadcast lobbyist agreed, saying the "sanctity" of HDTV signals is "about the only issue related to DTV on which all the politicians will come together. There's no room for wobble here."

Several members, including Jane Harman (D-Cal.), raised homeland security as one reason to push the transition. It would return the analog spectrum to the government for use for emergency channels. That would not, however, result in billions of dollars flowing into the Treasury through its resale, as envisioned by Congress.

But the NAB's board president, Dispatch Broadcast Group CEO Michael Fiorile, said that by making broadcast stations return analog spectrum at the end of 2006, the government would "disenfranchise millions of viewers and would do irreparable damage to free, over-the-air broadcasting." To some politicians, the specter of angry TV-less voters marching on the polls is more frightening than the threat of terrorism. In the end, to the disappointment of Tauzin, Markey and others, there was little consensus among committee members as to what areas to push the parties on and even on the urgency of moving forward with spectrum return. And there was no movement by any of the parties toward compromise. That led one committee aide to note that the FCC's voluntary DTV plan may be the only avenue for change.

THE NEXT QUESTION:

*Will Tauzin toss the DTV issue back to the FCC with hopes that progress can be made there?

*Will this debate be rendered moot if consumers embrace HDTV service that is now being rolled out by cable?