Group meeting to discuss technical issues

[ReesR]

I must admit that I am frustrated with the lack of certain stations not being totally upfront with the community at large. I have called and asked to talk to station managers only to be ignored with the call never returned. I have discussed issues with many but no one appears to have any answers to when these technical limitations will be overcome. Some problems are said to be technical yet I feel after talking with some they are merely attempting to snow us.

I believe I can speak for most in this group that we have spent alot of money only to find stations promoting their leadership in high definition while at the same time deceiving us in not providing full disclosure. They hang a carrot out there while we watch with our older receivers in analog only to find out the limitations AFTER we buy into it. That is simply not fair play.

For example, I would never have spent this amount of money if I had known ahead of time 58 and 6 were running low power, 4 was running part time and 10 was multi-casting. I found this out AFTER I purchased my high def receiver.

I purchased my tv thinking I was going to use it as a high definition not a multi-casting receiver. It will be well over $4000 by the time I am done. This is large for an individual as I hope you would agree. I was led to believe that I would be able to receive CBS, HD Net, PBS, ABC, NBC, WB, UPN and other special programming on a regular time period. I have yet to see HD Net on 58. I was led to believe I would receive high definition and not multi-casting. I have seen a total of only 2 hours of high definition programming from our Public Broadcasting station since getting my receiver even though they have had two years to settle into this technology.

While the networks have indicated a further increase in high def programming, the current situation does not avail itself to receiving these resources if we are not in close proximity of those stations running less than their legal power levels.

Temporary authority given to them to run low power has been taken advantage of. Siting the cost of electricity was really hard to swollow considering the incremental cost increase that represented. Using cost and not a dual revenue stream shows that they are not looking at this as an opportunity but merely as something they have to do. How un-enlightning.

Would it be out of line of me to suggest that we band together and have a meeting to discuss this whole issue and see what we could possibly do as a group?

Individually, we are getting more frustrated with more programming not being able to be received and it might be more productive to attempt some type of group collective thinking at some agreeable location so we can clearly come up with something positive that would help the current situation.

Options I am currently thinking of is to have a sort of summit meeting with the local station managers and/or decision makers with the purse strings. Contacting the FCC. Providing a web site for Milwaukee community users and finding a way to inform people of it.

I am perfectly willing to play fair if the stations are.

I seek your comments.

Regards,



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Rees Roberts
Racine, WI
reesr@wi.net

HDTV Receiver: Sony KD-34XBR2
Bi-directional Yagi Antenna at 30 feet

[Greg Oman]

Rees,

You are not alone in your frustrations, believe me. I jumped on the HDTV scene in January of 2002, just for the Olympics. While that was great, I soon found not much else except Crossing Jordan, and the Tonight Show. Which lead me to invest in a lot of rooftop antenna stuff. There are several others here that took this leap a year before I did-- sets probably cost more, and there was even less content, it's one of those things being an early adopter.

If you've taken the time to look around this forum and others, I think specifically in the Milwaukee market that 58 has been the station making the most improvements in general. Unfortunately I saw a thread about the dirctional limitations of the 58 signal, and I'd suspect that you being in Racine are in a bad spot to get the signal at it's current strength. On the flip side though, I see a reasonable looking antenna, have you tried aiming at the Chicago area? I have to believe that you'll have a good shot at solid signals as a few others in Muskego, etc. have gotten Chicago relatively well. Those of us on the west side of town have good luck with Madison, primarily ABC. Makes up for the poor excuse of an ABC affiliate we have here with all the antenna bickering they're finally past it looks like.

Certainly some of the recent actions by the FCC won't hurt, although it's going to take a while for them to take effect. Although I don't know all the details, I really don't understand what looks like a loop hole to me with regards to broadcast power. WITI is broadcasting at something like cell phone power (not really, but I've glanced at other threads that rip on the feeble effort). To me, if a station serves the market with an analog signal, they should serve the digital equivalent to that same market. Meaning, I have NO problems tuning WITI on 6, yet have never been able to get them digitally. Note, not that I'd really watch much on FOX anyway with their 480p plan.

Another point of frustration to me has been that I don't believe that the FCC is mandating HD broadcasting, generally accepted as 720 lines progressively delivered. They are mandating digital transmission of the signal. (Anyone straighten me out if I'm off here). And don't even start me on the digital cable thing, I think that's a farce mostly.

Even though I can't solve the problems, welcome to the group. I will tell you that both Jim Hall and Sean O'Flaherty frequent this forum and BOTH have been excellent participants even though they work for competing stations. There also is a engineer from the NBC affiliate in Madison that has poked in once in a while, so what we need to do is clone these guys and get them hired at other Miwaukee stations (if it were only that easy, I know I'm overstating that).

I can only hope those stations that were dragging their feet here have to cough up some big bucks to hang onto their broadcast spectrums.

Greg O.

[ReesR]

Thanks for your sympathic words. However, do you have any comment on us meeting together to leverage our numbers? Individually, I believe we will just stay frustrated. Together, we might be able to effect some positive change.

What say you?

[Tom Snyder]

There is strength in numbers...

Unfortunately, the kinds of numbers that mean jack-squat to station GM's are the ones that tally into the hundreds of thousands.

I suspect that, with the (tremendously visionary) exception of Jim Hall there isn't a single other GM in the market that even knows about us, and even if they did, they'd laugh at our hubris.

[ReesR]

Isn't that giving up before we even talk about it?

[Tom Snyder]

I'm not sure that you'd call this:

- the mulititude of individual attempts for the several years now by some of us old-timers to get the ball rolling,

- the founding of this group (what is it now... almost a year ago we had our organizational meeting?) to begin to gather strength in numbers, but meeting with resounding indifference from most of the stations pretty much contuously from day 1 (Sean and Jim being the exceptions)

- The offer to the more visionary stations to lead by example by using this group for signal testing, picture quality focus groups, etc., etc., etc.

- organized complaints to the F.C.C. and the media

"giving up before we even talk about it."

We all feel the pain expressed by the constant stream of new guys coming aboard who feel the same frustration with the lack of progress that many of us have been feeling now for a long time (some of us since we saw our first HDTV broadcasts at an NAB convention over 10 years ago).

I don't want this to sound like we're giving up. We're always open to new ideas. And while we appreciate your participation, your suggestions are not as much "new" as they are the actual history of our organization.

Todd and Kevin... am I off-base?

[Gregg Lengling]

You are not off base, the small numbers of our group will do nothing to move the local broadcasters (except those that have decided to become pioneers).

The only way to get attention is via the constant e-mails and phone calls that after a while will become burdensome to station management. A well thought out individual attack is more effective than a group attack. As a group we become a disgruntled minority. As individuals we become more of a force as quantity gets attention. I've tried different tacks will little response. I've attacked American TV with e-mails asking how they can sponsor ads and give-away promotions of HDTV via WISN when they haven't even got a signal on the air.

Individually we have a greater presence. E-mails, phone calls, letters, and even editorial response to the local papers will help. Unfortunately a big ally would be Tim Cuprisin, but even the Journal won't fund him to have a HDTV and apparently (this really gets my goat) he won't use his own funds to be able to get a set and see for himself.

With newspaper coverage and complaints to the FCC being our only public avenue(you know damn well direct correspondance to the stations will never become public) is the only way to go.

An additional thought is places like Flanners and other high-end Video retailers would have a vested interest in the furtherance of HDTV, their help and publicity would garner more interest and get notice. I posted an article the other day showing that the kilobuck barrier has been broken with 2 tube sets (I think Zenith if my memory serves me right) are now available. As product continues to arrive the attention of the public and the station managers and advertisers will be peaked.

We can only hope.


------------------
Gregg R. Lengling
RCA P61310 61" 16x9
glengling@ameritech.net

[ReesR]

My first reaction was to crawl into a hole and never come out. I was hurt by this comment by Tom: "the pain expressed by the constant stream of new guys"

How was I to know what has been done? There is no FAQ, no place to read about the history of what you guys have been doing over the years.

IF we had met, I would have suggested that we use our "limited" numbers to leverage the bigger numbers. To seek out from the retail establishments the names and addresses of those who have purchased HDTV systems so we could advise THEM what to do. One individual could never do that. It would take time and effort by a core team of people who really would like to see positive change occur.

I certainly would not want to make this kind of campaign public because, in the end, it would only serve to delay the number of systems sold. But, by forcing me to show my ideas here instead of at a meeting I guess they are out in the public arena now.

I would think that retailers would see it as a positive move that "someone" is doing something about it. I just thought it would have been a natural for us to do that. But without the opportunity for "new" ideas to get out, we will be destined to continue to get "the pain expressed by the constant stream of new guys".

Tom, I am not trying to be negative. Merely, trying to address the frustration we all feel and try to use that energy to see if anything new could be accomplished.

I am sorry that the pain of this new guy hit such a painful area Tom. I had spent quite a bit of time writing at the beginning of this thread trying to be as objective and positive as I could without whining. I was merely looking to "do something" which would help. I am honestly sorry to hear that others are more frustrated than I.



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Rees Roberts
Racine, WI
reesr@wi.net

HDTV Receiver: Sony KD-34XBR2
Bi-directional Yagi Antenna at 30 feet

[Matt Heebner]

Hey ReesR...we are all interested in the end result. I personally find your enthusiasm refreshing, as though a little "new life" has been injected in this group. We all started off feeling the same way, but after a little time you kinda realize that no matter how hard you try, things still move at a snails pace. Frustration sets in, and no matter how much you want things to happen....they don't. But things have changed over the last year...and for the good! But I think we are on the brink of an explosion in HD. More programming, more stations, more HD!
We as a group have to be kinda careful...these stations who are not broadcasting now, and who we bitch about the most, soon will be doing HD and it would be nice to get their support to be a legitimate informational and supportive website to new people. I really dont want WISN (for example) who might want to get the word out that they finally are in HD, to look back on the "early" days of this website and say to themselves, "We are not going to use this place for a local contact, all they did was complain for a year about how bad we were."
I am all for informing the public about the status of stations, and critizing them for their wrong actions, but they have their own agenda, and timeline, and all the emailing in the world (especially from only 200 people) isnt going to get them going any faster. Maybe if we had 2000 people things might be different, but I guess that's the curse of the "early adopter".
I think the best action plan is to criticize when neccessary without coming off as complaining, praising when warrented. Very often here I have seen much complaining about things not going right, and very little praise when something does go right. You capture more bees with honey...
And we still need to let retailers and the public know we are here. There is strength in numbers, and I think over the next year we are going to see quite an increase in members.
Matt

[This message has been edited by Matt Heebner (edited 09-02-2002).]

[ReesR]

Ok, here are a few more specific suggestions:

Contact Wisconsin Electric to ask them to sponsor HDTV. Slogan: "See what electricity can do for your TV!"

Contact Flanner to do the same. Slogan: "We see you clearly now" to the song of the same name.

Contact American to do the same.
Slogan: "Whats more American than HDTV?"

Contact Colder.
Slogan "Dont be left out in the cold. Get HDTV now".

ETC ETC ETC

If we were to contact these people in the right way, I would think we could find someone who would be enlightened enough to participate.

Anyone else have any ideas?

Miller beer slogan for HDTV?

You get enough of these and people would get the idea that HDTV would be mainstream all of a sudden. Combine this with the increased programming this fall and BAM you have the combination you need to convince local stations to pay for the electricity they need.

A win-win combination.

Someone has to start the idea. Why not us?

------------------
Rees Roberts
Racine, WI
reesr@wi.net

HDTV Receiver: Sony KD-34XBR2
Bi-directional Yagi Antenna at 30 feet

[Kevin Arnold]

I think you're on to something with the positive approach. In all honesty, there are simply just no enough of us to make a difference to any one station with one exception - we can be a test audience for both programming and technical adjustment for the broadcaster. This might be a non threatning way to offer our assistance to the various stations just setting up. I would happily and willingly help out 12 or any other station when they set up their digital signal. We could offer that to them and others to make their jobs easier. We can give them receptions reports, spot signal problems, and help them fine tune their transmitters without sending engineers out in trucks to find out. In return maybe we get a dialog going. How about we make this official, inviting the new guys on the block to take advantage of some free feedback. And it might actually be interesting. The beefs will never stop here in the forum but that is what internet forums are all about. You really need a thick skin to be here, otherwise as a participant or a broadcaster you will be constantly irritated by these postings. Any thoughts?

[Gregg Lengling]

Now this is a constructive non-threatening idea. I know that Jim Hall has used our feedback and was very appreciative of it. I'm sure that any other station manager or engineer would welcome that sort of help. Now I think it is an important item that the active members/board (so called for lack of a better term) put together a objective statement paper to forward to the pertinent station managers and engineers. I'm sure that at least 1 or more would welcome the helpful insight and feedback. Of course there will always be 1 or more that will totally ignore offers of this type because they are more interested in their analogue revenues than actually delivering a product that the consumer wants. Especially with the high price they paid for their spectrum (yeah right....they got it free and 6MHz of spectrum would cost a Mobile Phone enterprise bidding on it over 1 billion dollars for a nationwide license). Actually I have seen small chunks at 800 and 900 go for pretty high prices...I sold 200KHz at 800 for over 7 figures for the Milwaukee Market only (70 mile radius operational service area). So you go figure out what 6MHz of Television frquencies are worth.


------------------
Gregg R. Lengling
RCA P61310 61" 16x9
glengling@ameritech.net

[Tom Snyder]

Rees:

I don't want my my comments to be received negatively, either. By talking about the pain we're feeling...we're not asking for sympathy, we're more just saying "welcome to the club." http://www.milwaukeehdtv.org/ubb/smile.gif

And, as I said, new ideas are welcome...cuz what some of us have been doing hasn't been having much impact. http://www.milwaukeehdtv.org/ubb/wink.gif

[ReesR]

Thanks for sharing that Tom. Much appreciated. So, am I to conclude then that a meeting of the minds would be received with enthusiasum?

I guess I am seeking some level of go ahead with this. I don't believe in just doing something and just asking forgiveness later. This is because I would love to see a whole bunch of people involved.

I'm looking for a win-win senario. For us, for the new buyer, for the retailer, for the tv stations.

Because of what I do now (full time caregiver for my 89 year old Alzheimers mother) I have time I could spend on this currently. I would feel like I was doing something positive if I could expend energy this way so everyone could benefit.

[ReesR]

Update:

I received a surprise email from Jim Hall this morning. He offered to have a phone conversation to see what he could do to rectify the problem I was having receiving WDJT-DT.

What occurred was, to me, a wonderful interchange of realities. I think it is fair to conclude that my expectations were/are much higher than his "realities".

We discussed a tremendous range of issues regarding the whole DTV environment. Jim, thank you for taking the inititive.

He has offered and I have accepted to have his station's involvment to see what is causing my reception problem. I must admit that my expectations have been taken down a notch. We talked about much more. That much more needs to be done.

While I still see many opportunities that could be investigated, I am currently thinking that I need to digest what Jim shared with me.

I will keep you informed. But for now I think we should put on hold any ideas for involving this group.

Regards,


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Rees Roberts
Racine, WI
reesr@wi.net

HDTV Receiver: Sony KD-34XBR2
Bi-directional Yagi Antenna at 30 feet

[techboywi]

Heres an idea on what to do with this whole DTV "mess". Keep in mind, TV is a business, they are in it to make money. Running a transmitter takes a lot o' juice (then thrown in another transmitter for DTV, and the cost doubles), and good ol WE Energies isnt just giving it away.

To make money, TV stations sell ads. Advertisers look at neilsien ratings, etc to see if their ads are effective. The current DTV stations, at least last I heard, were having trouble selling ads on the DTV channels, because they couldnt prove anyone would be watching, why pay for an ad no one would see?

How can you help? If you see an ad for American on one of the DTV broadcasters, go to American and BUY somehting. Tell them you saw their ad on DTV.

This conversion is a very expensive proposition, and in this time of econimic downturn, stations are finding it harder and harder to get the capitol to invest in what some broadcast engineers are already calling "The electronic Edsel"

[ReesR]

(the following comments are NOT directed to any specific television station but is my opinion about the state of HDTV, industry wide, based mostly on what I am observing locally)

No disrespect but this is exactly what I find so hard to swollow. It reminds me of a story about two shoe salesmen who try to sell natives in Africa shoes a hundred years ago. The first says "How do you expect me to sell shoes? They don't wear any." The other said, "What a gold mine, no one wears shoes, I will make millions".

Currently, I see the majority of the combined industry saying no one wears shoes so how do I make money with this? I see this and say this is a license to make money. Double the revenue, double the opportunity. (at least until analog is turned off) Admittedly, there are startup costs. But that is true with any business. It is a matter of attitude.

If you do not have programming which discusses HDTV you can't expect people to understand what the benefits are. If you don't sell the concept no one will buy into it. Currently, it is about as low key as you can get and still keep it alive.

Next time you watch tv just count the number of times you see promos which say "watch our news" compared to how many you see about HDTV. And you wonder why it isn't catching on.

The current slate of broadcast owners would never have made it, back when television first started. They took risks. Compare todays HDTV with the transition to color, for example. I can still remember it. They didn't hide the fact they were transmitting in color like they hide the fact they are transmitting in HDTV. The majority of info we see now is just an acknowledgement that this or that program is being transmitted in HDTV. No info, few promos, no selling the idea. I still remember the promos for color I saw. See the difference? They are all hiding behind a lack of ratings. Of course there will be low or no ratings at first. That is why you would have lower rates for advertising at first too on digital television.

Anyway, those are my deeply seated reasons why my expectations are higher for HDTV. The concept of "if you build it, they will come" only applies if you believe in the concept yourself first. The industry obviously does not and wants a transition that is handed to them on a silver platter. It just doesn't work that way.

Leadership has to come from someplace. I suggest that we do our part in promoting the fact that this is good stuff and expect nothing less than 100% from our local stations to promote it like their own newscasts. If they do, I believe the consumer will react positively from being informed and buy into it in droves. Millions will buy HDTV shoes.

End of editorial.



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Rees Roberts
Racine, WI
reesr@wi.net

HDTV Receiver: Sony KD-34XBR2
Bi-directional Yagi Antenna at 30 feet

[wxndave]

Rees,

You have some interesting ideas, I'm just not sure they are all sound. Broadcasters face many problems with DTV that they didn't have before. With color they didn't have to worry about their current viewers not being able to watch. A black and white tv still works today. It won't in 5 years with out a converter. The same goes for stereo. These improvments didn't force anyone to go out and spend major amounts of money. Now the FCC says that you will need to by a new TV or converter in five years. Do you know how many people could care less if TV is digital?

Yes the broadcaster need to teach the public about DTV. But the main problem comes from Stores like Best Buy who can't tell you one thing about DTV or HDTV. Lets face it many people shope at these stores because they are cheap. The companies who make the equipment are also to blame. Do you realize that every converter out there works different. Look at how some had problems last week with Nova because they had RCA tuners that didn't pick up the audio. They can't even get a channel guide to work on any of these boxes correctly.

Now imagine you are a owner of a station,who now needs to spend millon plus dollars to buy a transmitter, feedline, antenna,tower installation, encoders, muxes and converters. Then spend an extra $6000.00 a month for electric to run a high power transmitter 24/7. Keep in mind that you still haven't convereted you current studio configuration. Your master control is still a non digital plant. Which means you can't put comercails in the DTV feed. Then Neilsen tells you they have no way to monitor how many people watch DTV.

So now go and tell your advertisers that you want them to spend money on DTV programming. Oh by the way, I can't tell you how many people will be watching since there are no ratings available. Maybe I'm wrong, how many people in this forum have a Nielsen diary for dtv? By the way how many DTV sets are in Southeastern Wisconsin? Does anyone know?

I agree that we need to do our part to help DTV take off. We need to put pressure on stores to teach their sales people more about DTV. Plus give people examples of it in the stores. Engineers in Madison went to these stores and asked them to air the programming on weekends instead of the inhouse feeds. Maybe we need to volunteer to spend time in these stores on weekends to promote DTV and HDTV. That maybe the only way it will ever happen.

Just my view of the world.
Dave

[mcq]

HD equipment in place for 2.5 years... SO I understand the general feeling of helplessness. I think that one of the reasons that I attended the first meeting was to meet people who felt as lonely in the digital divide as I did. Over those 2.5 years I realized that the best was yet to come for HDTV. I watch what I can, and enjoy what is available. It's not the TV stations fault that I am an early adopter... (That's my wife's fault http://www.milwaukeehdtv.org/ubb/smile.gif-- NOT

Be patient...it will happen. It is unfortunate that many of the local (and national) broadcast entities are obviously taking legal advantage of us, the tax-paying fools. Speaking of which, I hate paying taxes as much as I love watching HDTV. Should we be directing our energies at cutting taxes!? ........

Anyway, 4x3 will be around a long time, One good move I made, was to purchase a 4x3 HDTV. (Sony 61HS10) I have had countless football parties (Yeah, including the opening game of the XFL) at my modest home with 10-20 participants. It still surprises me that every one of my guests loves the crappy picture on the big screen... go figure.

I'll fire off a once in a while email in disgust; I'll boycott programs and stations that really make me angry; I'll attend any rally for MKEHDTV.ORG; I'll give a couple of bucks if asked; I'll stuff envelopes or post responses here..... But most of all I will be patient and wait. I calculate that about the time my HDTV viewing choices are saturated, I may let my wife convice me to get a big plasma set. (Remember when set meant set of tubes???)

[mike jacobi]

Money talks b walks. If the group could get together and create a buying group for equipment it would give leverage for retailers to push stations.If you would print your basic guide to terms and allow retailers to use them in their sales environment it would help crediting the grou p and leverage them joining. HDTV for Dummies If the group would help a retailer by giving a basic presentation on HDTV via Powerpoint you will create new members. Finally I am not an engineer just a buyer of new tech things. I am having difficulty in understanding .Like does it make sense to buy a $600 TV attenna wth rotor and amplifier TO GUARANTEE I WILL GET LOCAL STATIONS FROM SOMEWHERE OR JUST TRY MY BOWTIE FOR TEN BUCKS AND PRAY. You are very helpfull group and I appreciate your help but create leverage through education like the MR. Fixit show on radio or ASk Gus on 6.

[Greg Oman]

Good suggestions Mike. Part of what brought us together was one of us starting a thread on the AVS forum for Milwaukee programming. That lead to a yahoo group, a meeting in January, and finally this site.

The common thread was that we each (mostly techies, but not all of us) was figuring this out on our own-- what's available to watch, what equipment to get, etc. It's one thing for a guy in Boston to say, I'm 40 miles from the tower and have blah, blah, blah in equipment. Now knowing that signal coverage is very different in each market (for several reasons) it became clear that having a group of local people that have done this could be of value.

We spoke about what to do next, how to get visibility for our group, how to influence retailers to maybe mention us as a support resource, and a few members here actually work at local retailers-- so that's a step. Having the likes two guys like Jim and Sean (alphabetical order guys) has been extremely valuable-- and probably kept the complaints about their particular stations rather professional. It would probably be wise for each station to appoint a person that is a liason in some capacity, they probably lurk around here anyway. I'm sure they know who we are-- after all, Tim Cuprisin has mentioned us once or twice.

There probably are one or two other threads about what we can/should do, but the first thing we need to do is build membership-- not for the sake of the club, but to be able to say there are 1000 people ready to watch HD in this market. Problem is 1000 is a very small nember, but we have to keep going in that direction.

I've concluded that this whole thing is another chicken and egg debate. Broadcasters are reluctant to spend the money pushing a signal that not many people are prepared to view (and as an advertiser, do I want to pay more for commercial time?), people don't buy sets because there's not much to watch (and there a bit of 1970's antenna stuff that you need to know at the moment) and prices are "high" (unless you buy a rear projection set, then the uplift isn't that bad. This fall we'll be treated to even more HD across the board, this will help, it's just a slow process.

With the FCC pushing, with forums like this cropping up in other cities, with educated consumers, and savy station managers (getting stuff to do this out of the parent conglomerates) it's going the right direction.

Still, you have to wonder why Madison still seems to be further ahead of Milwaukee in this regard. I know the university has something to do with it, but it can't all be because of the university.

Greg O.