6 ms·

Same feeling here. ATSC 3.0 with DRM and persistent Internet requirements tells me this is going to be the downfall of OTA television. I can see ATSC 4.0 being

by 1970-01-01 2y ago

Same feeling here. ATSC 3.0 with DRM and persistent Internet requirements tells me this is going to be the downfall of OTA television. I can see ATSC 4.0 being a discounted ISP subscription paired with some OTA location checks via BPS.

Alive-in-2025 2y ago
So atsc 3 won't work unless you have some continuous "i'm user xyz watching this channel at time x.y.z" going back to the broadcaster? Why would anyone use atsc 3? It's not free over the air, you can't spoof it?
- TeMPOraL 2y ago
  It's not like anyone's gonna ask them. Networks will just label this as ${network name}'s HYPER NEXT GEN 10G TV EXPERIENCE (HNG TV), market the shit out of it, and offer free ESPN on it, tack on some Paramount HBO Supermax Plus for $0.99/year and throw in a half-decent Smart TV as a sign-on bonus, and adoption will skyrocket. TV networks in the US are a living proof that, with enough marketing spend and a pinch of confusion in the offer structure, you can sell people on anything. Half the time you can just offer sportsball access and people will switch. It's how previous versions of broadcaster overreach happened, and why Smart TVs succeed despite their shortcomings.
  - bayindirh 2y ago
    I came to the same conclusion when I saw a whole armada of new TVs from every manufacturer in the eve of any World Cup. Plus TVs tailored for football has a special mode called "sports" which make football arguably look/feel better. That kind of pumping makes me sad and sick.
  - pridkett 2y ago
    Or, the manufacturers will lose patience with slow adoption, the mess that is widevine DRM (what? Your TV isn’t based on Android? No, you can’t have DRM!), and customers really not caring because basically none of the broadcasts make the visual picture substantially better right now, so there is no incentive to move. That’s what happened to LG [0]. They dropped ATSC 3.0 tuners. I’m sure this cost them precisely 0 sales as the industry incompetence destroys the broadcast industry. [0]: https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/30/23897460/lg-drops-atsc-3-0-support-fcc-broadcast-tv https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/30/23897460/lg-drops-atsc-3-...
  - lotsofpulp 2y ago
    > TV networks in the US are a living proof that, with enough marketing spend and a pinch of confusion in the offer structure, you can sell people on anything. Half the time you can just offer sportsball access and people will switch. The cratering market values say otherwise. Few people under 40 even care about “TV”, and live sports distribution contracts (and the associated gambling) are the only thing holding it up.
    - aydyn 2y ago
      False, the majority of under 40 are still watching "TV" but just through intertube streaming. netflix, apple TV, amazon, and so on, all except apple have ads too.
      - lotsofpulp 2y ago
        The post I responded to mentioned TV networks, not TV. In a thread discussing over the air TV, I took that to mean linear programming sold by CBS (soon to be Skydance), NBC (Comcast), ABC (Disney), and Fox (also Disney, I think), and the CW (Nexstar). The crux of the matter being that even if OTA channels didn’t track people’s location, it wouldn’t matter since OTA itself going the way of the dodo.
        WorldMaker 2y ago
        Fox TV stations are now Fox Corp, aka "New Fox", the more direct successor to News Corp. Disney bought most (but not all) of News Corp's TV studio and film studio but knew it couldn't get past the FCC if it bought the TV stations (especially the sports stations).
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - lxgr 2y ago
        That's not really "TV", though (at least unless you'd also consider people buying a film or show on VHS or DVD "television").
  - geerlingguy 2y ago
    It's being marketed as "NEXTGEN TV" so not far off.
  - ThinkingGuy 2y ago
    Remember during the switch to digital TV, when marketers convinced half the population that they needed to buy a new "digital antenna" to keep viewing the same channels?
throwing_away 2y ago
There is 1 provider for ATSC3 DRM (which is already rolling out in major markets): Google Widevine. There is 1 operating system for ATSC3 DRM: Android. There are several SoCs that can be used for "Level 1 Widevine". When a SoC is compromised and the key is leaked from the TEE, all models of that device with the key are now untrusted for Level 1. I think people should just be aware of the state of play.
- geerlingguy 2y ago
  At NAB someone asked one of the ATSC folks what would happen if the key is compromised and someone didn't connect a receiver to the Internet. The answer was "the receivers have many built in public keys. They should last the lifetime of the device." Concerning because they could have a situation like with some 4K blu ray discs, your hardware becomes obsolete because DRM requires that cat and mouse game...
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - WorldMaker 2y ago
    Also with some manufacturers believing the lifetime of a device should be less than 5 years and ideally less than 3 years, and are treating software/firmware support in those lifetimes, there's a lot of perverse incentives hidden behind anyone suggesting "for the lifetime of the device". As bad as some of the old cable monopolies were, they were at least sometimes held to Ma Bell's "the lifetime of a device is supposed to be 60 years" standards (which Ma Bell didn't always follow either, but that's another matter). I realize the ATSC exists primarily to sell new standards, but maybe we need ways to get back to longer planning horizons than 3-5 years.
- lxgr 2y ago
  Wow, and all that to encrypt hours of ads with a few minutes of the 20th rerun of some show in between...
  - 2y ago
philistine 2y ago
This is so user-hostile that I don't believe there will be any adoption. It will have to be shoved down the throat of those who use broadcast, which are overwhelmingly older and more remote. ATSC first generation will probably outlive this DRM-driven abomination.

Alive-in-2025 2y ago

So atsc 3 won't work unless you have some continuous "i'm user xyz watching this channel at time x.y.z" going back to the broadcaster? Why would anyone use atsc 3? It's not free over the air, you can't spoof it?

TeMPOraL 2y ago
It's not like anyone's gonna ask them. Networks will just label this as ${network name}'s HYPER NEXT GEN 10G TV EXPERIENCE (HNG TV), market the shit out of it, and offer free ESPN on it, tack on some Paramount HBO Supermax Plus for $0.99/year and throw in a half-decent Smart TV as a sign-on bonus, and adoption will skyrocket. TV networks in the US are a living proof that, with enough marketing spend and a pinch of confusion in the offer structure, you can sell people on anything. Half the time you can just offer sportsball access and people will switch. It's how previous versions of broadcaster overreach happened, and why Smart TVs succeed despite their shortcomings.
- bayindirh 2y ago
  I came to the same conclusion when I saw a whole armada of new TVs from every manufacturer in the eve of any World Cup. Plus TVs tailored for football has a special mode called "sports" which make football arguably look/feel better. That kind of pumping makes me sad and sick.
- pridkett 2y ago
  Or, the manufacturers will lose patience with slow adoption, the mess that is widevine DRM (what? Your TV isn’t based on Android? No, you can’t have DRM!), and customers really not caring because basically none of the broadcasts make the visual picture substantially better right now, so there is no incentive to move. That’s what happened to LG [0]. They dropped ATSC 3.0 tuners. I’m sure this cost them precisely 0 sales as the industry incompetence destroys the broadcast industry. [0]: https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/30/23897460/lg-drops-atsc-3-0-support-fcc-broadcast-tv https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/30/23897460/lg-drops-atsc-3-...
- lotsofpulp 2y ago
  > TV networks in the US are a living proof that, with enough marketing spend and a pinch of confusion in the offer structure, you can sell people on anything. Half the time you can just offer sportsball access and people will switch. The cratering market values say otherwise. Few people under 40 even care about “TV”, and live sports distribution contracts (and the associated gambling) are the only thing holding it up.
  - aydyn 2y ago
    False, the majority of under 40 are still watching "TV" but just through intertube streaming. netflix, apple TV, amazon, and so on, all except apple have ads too.
    - lotsofpulp 2y ago
      The post I responded to mentioned TV networks, not TV. In a thread discussing over the air TV, I took that to mean linear programming sold by CBS (soon to be Skydance), NBC (Comcast), ABC (Disney), and Fox (also Disney, I think), and the CW (Nexstar). The crux of the matter being that even if OTA channels didn’t track people’s location, it wouldn’t matter since OTA itself going the way of the dodo.
      - WorldMaker 2y ago
        Fox TV stations are now Fox Corp, aka "New Fox", the more direct successor to News Corp. Disney bought most (but not all) of News Corp's TV studio and film studio but knew it couldn't get past the FCC if it bought the TV stations (especially the sports stations).
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    - lxgr 2y ago
      That's not really "TV", though (at least unless you'd also consider people buying a film or show on VHS or DVD "television").
- geerlingguy 2y ago
  It's being marketed as "NEXTGEN TV" so not far off.
- ThinkingGuy 2y ago
  Remember during the switch to digital TV, when marketers convinced half the population that they needed to buy a new "digital antenna" to keep viewing the same channels?

throwing_away 2y ago

There is 1 provider for ATSC3 DRM (which is already rolling out in major markets): Google Widevine. There is 1 operating system for ATSC3 DRM: Android. There are several SoCs that can be used for "Level 1 Widevine". When a SoC is compromised and the key is leaked from the TEE, all models of that device with the key are now untrusted for Level 1. I think people should just be aware of the state of play.

geerlingguy 2y ago
At NAB someone asked one of the ATSC folks what would happen if the key is compromised and someone didn't connect a receiver to the Internet. The answer was "the receivers have many built in public keys. They should last the lifetime of the device." Concerning because they could have a situation like with some 4K blu ray discs, your hardware becomes obsolete because DRM requires that cat and mouse game...
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- WorldMaker 2y ago
  Also with some manufacturers believing the lifetime of a device should be less than 5 years and ideally less than 3 years, and are treating software/firmware support in those lifetimes, there's a lot of perverse incentives hidden behind anyone suggesting "for the lifetime of the device". As bad as some of the old cable monopolies were, they were at least sometimes held to Ma Bell's "the lifetime of a device is supposed to be 60 years" standards (which Ma Bell didn't always follow either, but that's another matter). I realize the ATSC exists primarily to sell new standards, but maybe we need ways to get back to longer planning horizons than 3-5 years.
lxgr 2y ago
Wow, and all that to encrypt hours of ads with a few minutes of the 20th rerun of some show in between...
- 2y ago

philistine 2y ago

This is so user-hostile that I don't believe there will be any adoption. It will have to be shoved down the throat of those who use broadcast, which are overwhelmingly older and more remote. ATSC first generation will probably outlive this DRM-driven abomination.