FCC making rules to buy-out broadcasters

[Baylink]

Cause that can't be a bad idea, right?

I especially like:

Second, the FCC will re-arrange the remaining broadcasters so they're clustered together in the electromagnetic spectrum. That will free up contiguous blocks of spectrum that can be put to alternative uses.

Has anyone here seen their letter where the FCC promises to pay for their new antenna, retuning, and related work, not to mention the advertising that you've moved? And new channel graphics?

Seriously; is *anyone* in Washington paying attenti... wait; what? :-)

There is a Public Comment period, but the Ars piece doesn't link to it; I expect Uncle Charlie needs to be swamped with smart comments.

#unexpectedconsequences #katrina

[w9wi]

**In theory** stations are to be compensated out of the auction proceeds. Whether that actually happens, of course, we'll not know until it's all over...

I don't see any need to change channel graphics -- nobody's major virtual channel is going to change.

[Baylink]

I meant to come back to this. The virtual channel number/PSIP thing has (well, had) a dirty little secret.

WTSP-10 in Tampa has for 3 decades had it's transmitter in Tarpon Springs, nearly due north of Pinellas County; everyone else in the market is on 4 or 5 2000 footers in Ruskin, slightly south of East.

So dating back to the early days of cable, there were lots of people with 18 element *single channel* Yagis pointed north, on their stick with the log-periodic aimed at 100 degrees. Pinellas is the most populous county in the state; there are probably still tens of thousands of people watching OTA.

But for almost 3 years, they couldn't get channel 10.

Why, you ask? (Go ahead; I'll wait)

Because their digital transition channel was RF 24... which those yagi's weren't really well tuned for.

This was a major issue for WTSP; they almost lost an ABC affil in the 70s because of signal and tower location problems.

I don't know if this happened anywhere else, but I can tell you, I didn't wanna be *their* Chief for a while...