Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, a panel of broadcast stakeholders reported that they are proceeding to implement the U.S.’ voluntary NextGen TV broadcast transmission system, while identifying what could be potential opportunities for local broadcasters to use the new services to support their communities during the crisis. The remote panel discussion was held Thursday as part of NAB Show Express, a virtual event featuring some of the panels and content that had been planned for the 2020 NAB Show.

Ongoing impacts from COVID-19 could mean broadcasters won’t hit their goal of launching ATSC 3.0 in 40 markets this year, according to Pearl TV’s Anne Schelle. The broadcasting group’s managing director commented as part of a remote panel at a virtual IABM conference and discussed the pandemic’s effects on ATSC 3.0 rollout plans. Coming out of CES in January 2020, she said, the industry was in a good position to launch ATSC 3.0 in 40 markets this year, including multiple new TV models with built-in support for the new over-the-air broadcasting standard. But the pandemic has essentially delayed plans by about a quarter compared to where it should be at this point.

A decade-long migration from hardware to software, underway in the media and entertainment industry, has been slowed by companies’ inability to coax engineering teams to collaborate with the growing ranks of IT managers being recruited into the industry. A roadmap, drawn up at a February Cybersecurity for Broadcasters Retreat in Orlando, offers a way forward.

Parents as crew members, producers as bandwidth police, 90 new iPhones, confetti cannons in the mail and techniques borrowed from TikTok: Behind the scenes on the original singing-competition show.

CEO David Ross: “We value the IBC exhibition and it’s an important part of our annual calendar, but our approach to the COVID-19 virus has consistently prioritized health and welfare. Our decision today is based on that same principle, and I would call on the organizers of IBC to follow suit, remove any uncertainty, and cancel the event for 2020.”

Closure of the nation’s schools due to the COVID-19 pandemic has focused attention on the gap in access to broadband internet service between those with means and those without, those in cities and suburbs and those in rural America. Jim DeChant, of News-Press & Gazette Broadcasting, says there is an alternative to the internet that can fill this digital divide. By taking advantage of specific tools available in the ATSC 3.0 standard, broadcasters can deliver lessons over the air to students that can be stored on a NextGen TV home gateway and accessed via Wi-Fi from a home computer, media tablet or cell phone using a web browser, he says.

Panasonic has announced it will not be attending IBC in September. Arguably the biggest vendor so far to announce it won’t be attending the show, Panasonic said it intends to launch its own Technology Experience Zone to support its partners and customers through online initiatives.

New jobs posted to TVNewsCheck’s MediaJobCenter include openings in digital sales at Connecticut Public Television in Hartford, and in engineering at WRNN’s studio in Cherry Hill, N.J.

The coronavirus pandemic forced television news operations to produce almost entirely from producers’ and anchors’ homes. During a TVNewsCheck Working Lunch Webinar, set for May 28 at 1 p.m. ET, leading television engineering and operations executives will talk about what they’ve learned while facilitating this massive shift in workflow and the long-term changes likely to flow from it. Above, l-r: Speakers Richard Friedel, Fox Television Stations; Clint Moore, Gray Television; and Robert Lydick, Tegna Media.

NAB Show Express opens Tuesday and runs through Thursday with virtual panel sessions, keynotes and exhibition. Sony concludes its Technology Tuesday series, while the IEEE continues its Wednesday Webinars and Quantum hosts full day virtual gatherings Wednesday, Thursday and Friday Ross Video Live and Gates Air also have several virtual events this week. TVNewsCheck’s full listing of live and on-demand Virtual Events is here.

Synamedia is helping pay TV operators, telcos, and media companies change how they deliver, protect and monetize their content. In this interview, the company’s broadcast solutions manager, Mark Myslinski, highlights how NextGen TV (ATSC 3.0) will be a game changer for the consumption of live sports, in particular with stand-out video quality, immersive audio, and uncontested broadband broadcast.

Many weeks into its remote production, news magazine Inside Edition straddles the need to maintain a certain level of polish and the stripped-down necessities of the moment. Host Deborah Norville, for one, would like to see some of the show’s more minimalist new features stick around.

The TiVo Stream 4K is the well-known DVR company’s first piece of hardware that doesn’t have anything to do with recording TV broadcasts. Instead this little box, designed to plug into HDMI and hang from the back of your television, is all about streaming video — and could be a serious competitor to some favorite such devices like the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K and the Roku Streaming Stick Plus.

Richard Friedel, Fox Television Stations’ engineering chief, says the pandemic will likely accelerate the industry’s transition to IP and the cloud, slow down the NextGen TV rollout this year and permanently shift many station operations remotely. “We are going to have different workflows,” he says. “Some will probably continue forever.”