HOLLYWOOD The broadcast in Sinclair Broadcast Group is morphing into something more than TV. It has to, according to Mark Aitken, SBG's vice president of Advanced Technology. Aitken delivered a keynote at this year's SMPTE conference in the heart of Hollywood.
We don't see ourselves simply as televisioners, he said of SBG. We see ourselves as having a platform to provide services, and one of those services is television.
Aitken noted how the technical side of broadcasting is occupied with 4K, high-dynamic range, frame rates and so forth, while regulatory issues and business objectives are treated as entirely separate matters. Yet those very issues are determining the industry's future, and they are legion, he said. Ownership limits, public inspection file rules, Aereo, the CALM Act, closed captioning, EAS, indecency, the incentive auction, tower and antenna issues, white spaces, the UHF discount the list goes on.
Engineers believe the technology is driving the business, he said. We as engineers are not taking a broad look at the surroundings in which we live, and taking the initiative to do the kinds of things to determine where broadcasting is going. 4K, HDR, immersive sound we have all these beautiful potential entrapments of a consumer. But without understanding the business objective, there's little to be gained.
Aitken said broadcasters are in a state of war.
War has been declared. Google has declared war on the TV ad industry. If your competitors believe they're engaged in war with us; if we don't acknowledge that, we're going to lose. They are decidedly after what we've got viewers, advertisers, content they after making lots of money.
You see a massive migration of content to the Internet; to the wireless industry. If you're a content producer, you're doing the right thing, looking for a distribution platform that generates the most revenue.
I ask why is it not a status quo that content isn't coming to broadcasting? We exist as islands. We don't function as an industry. The broadcast industry really has to unite, at least in a virtual sense. So what can we do to become a viable competitor in the marketplace?
Ad dollars are leaving local broadcasting, he said, not at a rate where broadcasting will die in 10 years, but will be in bad shape.
This is a reversible trend, he said, but one that requires an immediate response. The wireless guys are ramping up LTE-broadcast. (See Verizon's Wireless Network Ready' for LTE Multicast )
Phone companies' appetite for TV is not entirely new. They've been after the business for years. Aitken recalled how, in 2007, he went to a poker game fundraiser held by the late Alaska senator, Ted Stevens.
There were our or five tables. I was one of the last people to walk in. I got to my table, introduced myself. This young kid looked at me and said, it's great to have another broadcaster here.' I said, who do you work for?' He said, Verizon.'
LTE-broadcast evolved without the type of standards constraints that hold back broadcasting, he said.
Today, the standard does not have the flexibility to do multiple things, which is why we find ourselves developing ATSC 3.0. Broadcasters have been slow to the table to identify what their wants and needs are. The goal of many is the same as it was in 1994 when ATSC was being deployed. Those managers doing nothing but selling spots, who view revenues in a very small silo, don't look at those opportunities because they don't exist for them.
One new opportunity looming large is the incentive auction. Sinclair and the National Association of Broadcasters are challenging the Federal Communications Commission's Incentive Auction Report and Order on the grounds that it violates congressional intent.
We believe broadcasting is being marched, quite literally, to the cliff, he said.
The spectrum auction legislation contains the concept of flex-use, which is left #ff0000. For Sinclair, it opened the door to experiment with a new transmission standard. Sinclair subsidiary One Media is launching the group's next-generation transmission platform in Austin, Texas, next month.
As broadcasters, there's a growing voice saying we need the same opportunity as wireless providers, instead of being locked into doing just one thing, he said. The challenge is thinking about what broadcasting could be.
Sinclair's answer and it has been for years is mobile. Particularly the mobile-connected tablet. Aitken called it the consumptive device of the future.
In 1999, 2000, we worked with Nokia. We based the DVB-T standard on high-arc modulation. We had three tablets. They like several bricks bolted together. They were capable of receiving mobile television. This industry did not believe there was an opportunity in mobile 15 years ago.
Tablet computers are now expected to generate more mobile data traffic in 2017 than the entire global mobile market in 2012.
When the Advanced Television Systems Committee did finally issue a mobile standard, it fell flat. Aitken more or less declared it dead.
The failure of ATSC mobile was a failure on the part of not all broadcasters embracing it as an opportunity, he said. It was a massive failure because an industry did not put its will behind it. And because there was not a uniform roll-out, and no tough discussions with rights holders, consumers never had the opportunity to see it, and device makers never had the incentive to build devices.
There is still an opportunity in mobile data offload, he said.
There is real money in the broadcast distribution in data. There is a reason for LTE-broadcast. The Internet of Things' is all about the mass distribution of data to specific devices, measured today in billions
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
HOLLYWOOD The broadcast in Sinclair Broadcast Group is morphing into something more than TV. It has to, according to Mark Aitken, SBG's vice president of Advanced Technology. Aitken delivered a keynote at this year's SMPTE conference in the heart of Hollywood. 
