Jessell | It’s CBS’s Turn To Stand Up For 3.0

The proponents of ATSC 3.0 put on a little show at our TV2020 conference in New York last Wednesday. Several station group heads stood up to pledge their support for rolling out the new broadcast standard that, they claimed, would give their ancient TV medium a rejuvenating jolt.

I and some others were disappointed that the champions of 3.0 did not come with some kind of plan for the rollout or at least concrete next steps. Earlier this year, several of them got together to experiment with a single, low-power 3.0 station in Phoenix. It’s a baby step. If they’re serious about 3.0, they need to begin taking some major strides soon.

But still, the New York rally was significant, primarily because the headliners were Jack Abernethy and Valeri Staab, heads of the Fox and NBC station groups, respectively. Their presence and brief comments underscored that two of the Big Four see the potential of 3.0 and are willing to work with the affiliates in making it happen.

I say “underscored” because Fox and NBC have been quietly backing the 3.0 cause for years. They have been active with the Advanced Television Systems Committee in writing the new standard and they have contributed spectrum and other resources to the Phoenix project.

What was significant last Wednesday was that top executives of the two companies stood shoulder to shoulder with their peers at Tegna, Nexstar and Univision in publicly declaring their allegiance to 3.0. That will resonate not only with other broadcasters who are sitting on the fence, but also with consumer electronics manufacturers.

It CE companies are going to make 3.0 receivers and close the loop on the 3.0 ecosystem, they have to be absolutely convinced that there will be 3.0 signals in the ether when the sets roll off the assembly lines.

Now it’s CBS’s turn.

CBS has been the great 3.0 naysayer. For reasons it has never fully articulated, it has contributed little to the technology’s development and has bad-mouthed it in New York and Washington.

CBS’s problem, I think, is not that 3.0 is not good enough, but that it it’s too good. Coupled with market-blanketing single-frequency networks and sparkling 4K programming, some fear 3.0 will encourage more people to cut the cord to their MVPDs, choking off retransmission consent revenue.

That concern is easy to understand, but it dismisses another of 3.0’s prime attributes. Once a critical mass of 3.0 receivers is in place, broadcasters can start offering data-driven targeted advertising. You can charge car dealers much more for a spot, if they know that they will be reaching consumers whose car leases are expiring or who have recently done some online shopping for a new one.

Whatever CBS’s problem is, there is some hope now that it might come around and join the 3.0 party.

Prior to the 3.0 session, I interviewed on stage Sean McManus, chairman of CBS Sports. We mostly talked about his NFL TV rights, which expire in 2022. He expressed great confidence that CBS would be able to reup for a large package of Sunday games.

Calling the NFL “the most valuable programming on television,” he said CBS “will defend its territory and defend the AFC package.”

He also said that the NFL and CBS would also probably want to enhance the broadcasts by stepping up to 4K UltraHD, adding that the stations would have to figure out how to broadcast it. He recalled how CBS and Sony were instrumental in developing HD.

Well, I am not sure if McManus was aware of this, but the only way the CBS O&Os and affiliates are going to broadcast UltraHD is by upgrading to 3.0. Unlike the current 1.0 standard, it has the built-in compression needed to handle the fat 4K signals.

So, there you go. If CBS believes it needs to broadcast the NFL in UltraHD, then CBS is, whether it knows it or not, a proponent of 3.0.

And there is something else.

You may have missed the news: CBS CEO Les Moonves was ushered out last month after the weight of sexual harassment charges became so heavy the board of directors could no longer ignore it.

Moonves was the chief architect of the retrans-first strategy at CBS. He made a lot of promises to investors about how the retrans dollars and reverse comp dollars derived from retrans would pile up. Something as nebulous as 3.0 was not going to get in the way.

Well, now that he is gone, perhaps CBS will give the technology and its potential a fresh look. CBS chief tech Bob Seidel has been among the 3.0 skeptics, but I was never sure whether that skepticism rose from his own analysis or from his duty to Moonves.

If the reassessment comes, it may be a while. Things are still unsettled at CBS. Joe Ianniello is running the company as interim CEO, but it is far from certain he will get the job permanently. CBS has said it is considering other candidates. And, of course, principal owner Shari Redstone may yet find a way to screw up the company beyond recognition.

But sooner or later, the reassessment will come and the conclusion must be “OK, count us in with NBC and Fox on 3.0.” It’s the bet you make if you still want to be in broadcasting 10 years from today.

P.S: What about ABC? So far, it too has not been much more than an interested bystander in the development of 3.0. But, in my mind, there is a difference between it and CBS. Owner Disney made ESPN its big sports outlet and, frankly, I’m not sure it wants to be in broadcasting 10 years from today.

Harry A. Jessell is editor of TVNewsCheck. He can be contacted at 973-701-1067 or here.