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I looked into this recently when I moved houses and was without cable for a few weeks. I thought about purchasing an ATSC 3 box to try it out instead of just us

I looked into this recently when I moved houses and was without cable for a few weeks. I thought about purchasing an ATSC 3 box to try it out instead of just using an antenna with my TVs internal ATSC 1 decoder. I will never adopt ATSC 3 because they have built targeted advertising and viewer tracking into the spec. See for example https://rampedup.us/atsc-3-0-marketing-opportunity/ https://rampedup.us/atsc-3-0-marketing-opportunity/. It’s really too bad but to me this is the final nail in the coffin for ota programming in my opinion.

Melatonic 4y ago
Well that is extremely disappointing. Sinclair as a media company is also shady as fuck so I am not surprised they are the ones going in on this. Maybe this will create a black market for ATSC 3 boxes that have been hacked to remove / block all tracking features - sounds like a fun project for someone here :-D
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  ATSC 3 supports an application model based on a single page application that gets notified of events coming down the radio channel by websockets https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/A344-2019-Interactive-Content.pdf https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-... there is a radio back channel https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/A323-2022-03-Dedicated-Return-Channel.pdf https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-... but the TV is expected to have a real internet connection as well as the radio link. Such a system is capable of anything a web application is, including tracking. It would be interesting to see if targeting meant that I occasionally get to see an ad for something I could buy with my own money as opposed to the injection of the month (used to be pill of the month but now it seems to be all biologicals) or something seniors can get for free with medicare.
  - Melatonic 4y ago
    So just do not hook the tuner up to the internet then? Interesting. Unless of course they do something shady like throw a 4G chip inside the box
cjensen 4y ago
If your TV set can't talk to the internet, you can't be tracked. All you lose is the silly 'interactive' features that no one uses.
cogman10 4y ago
Yup, ATSC 3 is really unfortunately problematic in the amount of garbage that's been put into it. The fact it requires an internet connection is atrocious. Hell, the fact that ATSC supports PAID OTA transmissions is likewise garbage. It'll just encourage a race to the bottom with OTA bandwidth that will (likely) end up killing it off all together. Who is going to pay for 4 channels from a broadcaster vs streaming? Yet there will be enough incentive that you can almost bet the market for free OTA broadcasts will go away.

Melatonic 4y ago

Well that is extremely disappointing. Sinclair as a media company is also shady as fuck so I am not surprised they are the ones going in on this. Maybe this will create a black market for ATSC 3 boxes that have been hacked to remove / block all tracking features - sounds like a fun project for someone here :-D

PaulHoule 4y ago
ATSC 3 supports an application model based on a single page application that gets notified of events coming down the radio channel by websockets https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/A344-2019-Interactive-Content.pdf https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-... there is a radio back channel https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/A323-2022-03-Dedicated-Return-Channel.pdf https://muygs2x2vhb2pjk6g160f1s8-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-... but the TV is expected to have a real internet connection as well as the radio link. Such a system is capable of anything a web application is, including tracking. It would be interesting to see if targeting meant that I occasionally get to see an ad for something I could buy with my own money as opposed to the injection of the month (used to be pill of the month but now it seems to be all biologicals) or something seniors can get for free with medicare.
- Melatonic 4y ago
  So just do not hook the tuner up to the internet then? Interesting. Unless of course they do something shady like throw a 4G chip inside the box

cjensen 4y ago

If your TV set can't talk to the internet, you can't be tracked. All you lose is the silly 'interactive' features that no one uses.

cogman10 4y ago

Yup, ATSC 3 is really unfortunately problematic in the amount of garbage that's been put into it. The fact it requires an internet connection is atrocious. Hell, the fact that ATSC supports PAID OTA transmissions is likewise garbage. It'll just encourage a race to the bottom with OTA bandwidth that will (likely) end up killing it off all together. Who is going to pay for 4 channels from a broadcaster vs streaming? Yet there will be enough incentive that you can almost bet the market for free OTA broadcasts will go away.