FCC

The “gateway” – half cable modem, half set-top box – is slowly advancing into American living rooms, as part of the gigantic transition to video distribution based on Internet Protocol.

That’s jargon for “through the cable modem, to screens that connect that way,” instead of through the old fashioned juncture between the set-top box and the television.

Which raises this question: Will cable operators be required to keep buying boxes with a CableCard slot, and spending $50 per CableCard, as set-tops morph into gateways?

Answer: Yep. It’s a law that’s still on the books, and it goes like this: If you make a two-way, high definition box, you need a CableCard.

And then there’s the “even thoughs:” Even though every TV maker in the land stopped making TV sets with CableCard slots. Even though the FCC itself is anything but hot on CableCards.

Even though there are deployable alternatives – like the unheralded but significant work Comcast did to make its digital terminal adaptors (DTAs) capable of firing up in either major security mode (Cisco or Motorola), without CableCards.

On the “What the…” meter, this registers somewhere between ridiculous and nefarious: You’re ordered by law you to do something you already do (secure content) — but differently, and in a way that you costs a lot more.

You do it. None of your competitors have to do it. Just you.

Later, the industry segment that initiated the law in the first place (consumer electronics companies) stops supporting it. The enforcing agency (FCC) repeatedly backs away from it.

What will happen? Keep an eye on Charter, led by the guy (Tom Rutledge, CEO) who led Cablevision when it got its CableCard waiver, back in 2009. Its November 2012 request for an FCC waiver could be granted or denied any day now, and could set the tone for what happens with CableCards inside gateways.

Also watch for proponents of “AllVid” (Best Buy, Google, Sony, TiVo, and others) to re-emerge, proposing ways to do things that are already happening, in-market — as though they aren’t already happening.

That’s a short look at the very long, complicated and expensive history of cable and CableCards. More to come.

This column originally appeared in the Platforms section of Multichannel News.

Maybe this is happening to you, too. A conversation begins. It’s about over-the-top video, or usage-based broadband, or any of the tangents that go with the new world of video on TVs and screens not necessarily connected to a set-top box.

Then you hear it: “Title 6 video.” Here’s an example, from several batches of notes. “Look. To be a multichannel video provider (MVPD), you have to comply with the Title 6 rules.” Here’s another: “Anyone with a video server at the edge of the network wants to think they’re an MVPD. But they’re not Title 6.”

And because “Title 6” is a term that’s been around for so long (nigh on 30 years), the natural reaction is to nod solemnly: Ah yes. Title 6.

Which raises the question: What is Title 6 video?

Short version: It’s an outgrowth of the FCC’s Communications Act, and is the chapter that includes the Cable Act, etched in 1984. Title 1 is general info; Title 2 regulates common carriers; Title 3 applies to broadcasters, and so on up to Title 6, cable.

It mandates all the things one needs to do, in order to be a cable operator. Or, in regulatory lingo, an MVPD.

Here’s a sampling of what’s in the Title 6 rules: Franchising. Closed captioning. Must carry. Ownership. Emergency alerts. Blackouts. PEG channels. Program Access. Navigation devices.

There’s more, but it turns out that Title 6 is more dated than practical, these days, given the volume and pace of technological change over the last 28 years. Why: Those rules were made at a time when signal paths were in silos, and few of them. Phone service came from the phone company over twisted pair. Cable TV came from cable operators, over their plant.

These days, everything’s an app, with plenty of pathways into the home.

Should any guy with a video server at the edge of the network be considered an MVPD, without complying with Title 6 commitments? The kneejerk answer is no. But maybe a better question is this: Rather than try to shoehorn old rules into a new scene, why not ask what’s to be expected from video providers?

There are those who would say that the over-the-top video community views such regulations as a toolkit, from which to help themselves to the assets of others. Take the good or doable parts – think program access and compulsory copyright. Leave the rest, like retransmission consent and the complexity of the Title 6 obligations.

That’s a very short look at a very complicated cog in the tech regulatory machinery. More to come.

This column originally appeared in the Platforms section of Multichannel News.

by Leslie Ellis // June 25 2012

As a general rule, I avoid the tech-regulatory scene, because it is gets so bogged down with gibberish that typically boils down to the words “no you cannot.” Yet, a passel of deadlines are looming, which seemed a good time for a summertime regulatory round-up. In deadline order:

Emergency Alert System and “CAP.” Regulators: FEMA, FCC, National Weather Service, U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Deadline: June 30, 2012. What it is: Here in Colorado, we’re already getting the afternoon tornado warnings, which turn the TV into a bleeping, black-screen, with white text advising us to take immediate shelter, and accompanying audio, saying the same thing. EAS and the common alerting protocol (CAP) extends that type of work nationally, so that the President (of the U.S.) could theoretically interrupt TV programming to tell us something really important. At an MSO level, the work of it is software changes to the gear that currently handles local EAS.

Video Descriptive Services. Regulator: FCC. Deadline: July 1, 2012. What It is: This has lots to do with a little button on your TV remote labeled “SAP,” for “Secondary Audio Program.” Right now, and depending on where you are, pushing that button invokes a monaural mix-down of the sound track, with all of the speaking done in Spanish.

With VDS, however, pressing SAP would also mix the audio channel down to monaural, but instead of Spanish, you’d hear the original feed, plus a description of what’s going on visually. Not so much “suddenly, the phone rang,” because the viewer could hear it ringing. More “she put the phone to her ear anxiously.” The work of this is more on program networks than MSOs, but if you’re bigger than 50,000 subscribers, you’re on the hook to pass through 50 hours of VDS-augmented programming every quarter.

Closed Captioning for IP Video. Regulator: FCC. Deadline: September 30, 2012 for program networks; January 14, 2013 for device manufacturers (which in and of itself is an inscrutable bifurcation.) What it is: Rules that require program networks to put closed captions on full-length video content that’s made available in Internet Protocol (think HBO Go, Xfinity, etc.)

This one is riddled with complexities that will make you want to poke your own eyes out. The Report and Order details “VPOs” (Video Programming Owners), “VPPs,” (Video Programming Providers, and 112 deliriously entertaining (not!) pages of accompanying regulatory-speak. Stretch and hydrate before you dive in.

Commercial Audio Loudness Mitigation Act (CALM). Regulator: FCC.  Deadline: Dec. 13, 2012. What It is: Ways to not get blasted out of your chair when commercials play at way higher volumes than program material.  By year-end, MSOs need to begin periodic testing of networks that don’t “self certify” that they’re CALM compliant. Big halleluiah on this one.

Interactive TV was the buzz going into the 1999 Western Show. In part 4 of this panel, featuring Time Warner Cable’s Michael Adams, AT&T Broadband’s David Rudnick, and CableLabs’ Don Dulchinos, we review what the consumer landscape will look like for TVs with built-in set-tops, after the July 2000 removable security deadline imposed on cable (but not satellite!) by the FCC.

Video courtesy The Cable Channel.

Interactive TV was the buz, going into the 1999 Western Show. In part 3 of this panel, featuring Time Warner Cable’s Michael Adams, AT&T Broadband’s David Rudnick, and CableLabs’ Don Dulchinos, we review what’s happening with OpenCable, separable security and PODs.

Video courtesy The Cable Channel.

Interactive TV was the buzz going into the 1999 Western Show. In part 2 of this panel, featuring Time Warner Cable’s Michael Adams, AT&T Broadband’s David Rudnick, and CableLabs’ Don Dulchinos, we discuss the state of deployments (we were on the cusp of the DCT-5000 at the time, LOL), apps (email, chat, a wallet), and the complexity of the Internet.

Video courtesy The Cable Channel.

Interactive TV was the buzz going into the 1999 Western Show. In part 1 of this panel, featuring Time Warner Cable’s Michael Adams, AT&T Broadband’s David Rudnick, and CableLabs’ Don Dulchinos, we discuss why ITV is back (again!), as well as infrastructure requirements, economic viability and oh yeah, that World Wide Web thing.

Video courtesy The Cable Channel.