Longtime readers of this blog will tell you that I’m not very optimistic about ATSC 3.0, or NextGen TV as it is also known. While I think we all like the idea of adding 4K and advanced services to over-the-air TV, it just seems to be too hard to do. (You can read several years of rants about this subject here.) The latest proof of this comes from TV maker LG. The company has recently announced that they are removing ATSC 3.0 support from their televisions, at least for now. It’s a bit of a spiteful move, but it shows the headwinds that ATSC 3.0 still faces.
A (very) quick primer about ATSC 3.0
This isn’t intended to be a deep dive into what ATSC 3.0 is, or isn’t; you can read my many articles on the subject. But, it’s important to know some of the highlights (lowlights?) of this latest technology. That way you can understand why what LG did is so devastating.
Today’s television standard, called ATSC 1.0, was developed in the 1990s with a pure and true purpose. The goal wasn’t just to offer better picture quality, but to offer more choice and more opportunity. Using digital technology allows broadcasters to multiplex. In other words, they could offer more than one video stream on the same broadcast channel. So, they could offer educational programs, special-interest programs, and even foreign-language programs that would be too expensive to broadcast otherwise.
Two decades later, ATSC 3.0 was proposed as a way to incorporate advanced features like 4K, on-demand, and interactive programs. It wasn’t done to make TV better for regular folks, although that’s how it was pitched. ATSC 3.0 is all about making big companies richer, something they don’t exactly deny. It’s about serving you ads that are tailored to you, the same way that YouTube and ad-supported streaming services do. If it ends up being better quality or more diverse, that’s just a nice coincidence.
Why ATSC 3.0 has taken so long, and why we’re not there yet
Broadcast channels are regulated by the US government with the aim of making sure they serve the public’s interest. There are tons of laws that govern broadcasting, and they’re always being interpreted in different ways. In order to help move ATSC 3.0 along, the FCC said in 2017 that broadcasters could have test ATSC 3.0 channels as long as the content on those channels was 100% the same as the regular channels. So in other words, no 4K, no addressable advertising, none of the stuff that the big companies really wanted.
By 2020, though, a lot of cities were primed to get ATSC 3.0 test broadcasts. And then, well, you don’t need me to tell you what happened in 2020. This set things back about two years, and by then the FCC’s order allowing testing was about to expire. Finally, everything is in place to allow more testing to happen. The goal is to maybe, possibly, allow 4K television and advanced features maybe in 2027.
Cut to today, and why ATSC 3.0 is shooting itself in both feet
ATSC 3.0 was already in pretty deep trouble before this week. Broadcasters are so afraid that someone will pirate their content that they’ve built advanced encryption into the ATSC 3.0 standard. But, that encryption wasn’t exactly ready in 2017. It’s only been in the last few months that we’ve seen these signals getting encrypted. That means that all the ATSC 3.0 televisions and converter boxes made before now are all obsolete. A few companies have promised to upgrade their hardware for free, but if you bought an ATSC 3.0-equipped television in 2021, it won’t get those broadcasts. Ever.
And now, it looks like things are getting worse. LG Electronics, one of the world’s largest TV makers, has said they will no longer feature ATSC 3.0 decoding in any TV moving forward. Why? Because they lost a patent lawsuit that would cost them about $7 per TV moving forward. I’m not quite sure why they didn’t think people would just pay $7 more, but whatever. This purely spiteful move makes it very hard to root for ATSC 3.0 adoption anytime soon. Chances are, they’ll change their minds, but it just sets ATSC 3.0 that much further back.
The outlook for ATSC 3.0 in 2024
Every year, I write some variant of an article that asks, “will this finally be the year that ATSC 3.0 breaks out?” And then, nothing big happens and the industry still congratulates itself on some minuscule achievement. The real question still remains whether or not we will ever truly see ATSC 3.0 as the actual broadcast standard for the USA. In order for that to happen, Congress would have to agree on a plan to phase out ATSC 1.0 and allow ATSC 3.0 to offer unique services that ATSC 1.0 can’t.
Without getting too political, it seems like depending on Congress to do anything that will save you is a bad business model. One side may believe that this sort of change is necessary to preserve broadcasting’s business model. The other side may believe that the new tech doesn’t do enough to serve the public. I, your humble writer, am not going to weigh in on this argument. I’ll just bring up what happened in the past.
In the mid-2000s, the US government authorized a ton of money to allow people to buy converter boxes to let them use their old televisions. Even with that, the transition took about three years to complete. Flashing forward, if something like that were to actually get through Congress when it needed to, after the 2027 testing period ended, we would be looking at an end to the transition sometime about 2030. And folks, that’s a best-case scenario.
That’s why I’m less-than-bullish about the outlook for ATSC 3.0 in 2024. It’s hard to be optimistic when you look at the facts.
Ending on some good news
Here’s the good news. ATSC 3.0 is a broadcast technology. That’s all it is. The broadcast signal itself isn’t really any different from ATSC 1.0. That means that you can buy an antenna today from Solid Signal and know that it will work today and tomorrow. If ATSC 3.0 ever happens, your antenna will keep working. Period.
If you don’t know which antenna you need, call us! We have experts on hand who can help you choose the right antenna for your situation. We’re here during East Coast business hours at 888-233-7563. If it’s after hours, fill out the form below.
