TV reception in rural America before cable

[ftballfan]

I think Greenville/Greenwood was just channels 6 and 15? I've never been to Mississippi, so I'm not 100% sure.

Pre-digital, yes. A Fox station was added to WABG as a sub-channel (or whatever term you call it). There was a reality show a few years ago called Breaking Greenville, which was about how both stations' news were competing against each other. There are a couple of notable personalities that went through Greenville: Hoda Kotb of the Today Third Hour worked at WXVT (15) and Jody Baskerville, once of the now-defunct news magazine Hard Copy.

The Fox subchannel came about with the demise of Foxnet. In fact, the shutdown of Foxnet was delayed two weeks in order for WABG to get their Fox subchannel up and running!

[mrsman]

I think Greenville/Greenwood was just channels 6 and 15? I've never been to Mississippi, so I'm not 100% sure.

Pre-digital, yes. A Fox station was added to WABG as a sub-channel (or whatever term you call it). There was a reality show a few years ago called Breaking Greenville, which was about how both stations' news were competing against each other. There are a couple of notable personalities that went through Greenville: Hoda Kotb of the Today Third Hour worked at WXVT (15) and Jody Baskerville, once of the now-defunct news magazine Hard Copy.

The Fox subchannel came about with the demise of Foxnet. In fact, the shutdown of Foxnet was delayed two weeks in order for WABG to get their Fox subchannel up and running!

That is a good use of the subchannel.

[SP Cook]

And antennas are becoming more important, as DirecTV, the largest provider, is getting into many disputes with local stations over "retransmission" (thanks to Congress, providers have to pay local stations to "retransmit" their signal, even though you can get it free with an antenna).  Currently in a dispute with Nextstar, which owns 150 stations in mid-sized markets, and starting Friday with CBS, which, like the other networks, owns its own affiliates in the big cities. 

DirecTV is working on a thing called "locast".  The retransmission law has an exception for non-profit TV clubs.  Back in the day people in really rural areas where even the worst cable companies would not go would form "TV clubs" which would put up an antenna and wire up the homes, with everyone donating for upkeep.  Locast is set up as a "club" and, if you live in one of the cities it is in (NY, Boston, Philly, DC, Baltimore, Chicago, Houston, DFW, Denver, LA, SF, and, oddly, Rapid City and Sioux Fall, SD) you "donate" $5/month and get a password to watch your local stations on the internet.    They want to eventually roll it out nationwide, which would destroy the monopoly power of local TV stations.

[Sctvhound]

Meredith dropped their stations from Dish Network as well. Including CBS in several major markets (Atlanta, Phoenix, St. Louis and others) and NBC in Nashville.

[vdeane]

They want to eventually roll it out nationwide, which would destroy the monopoly power of local TV stations.

How?  It would still be the same stations, just through an internet connection rather than an antenna.

[KeithE4Phx]

And antennas are becoming more important, as DirecTV, the largest provider, is getting into many disputes with local stations over "retransmission" (thanks to Congress, providers have to pay local stations to "retransmit" their signal, even though you can get it free with an antenna).  Currently in a dispute with Nextstar, which owns 150 stations in mid-sized markets, and starting Friday with CBS, which, like the other networks, owns its own affiliates in the big cities.

DirecTV has its moments, like now, but they only have about 1/10 of the retransmission-fee issues that Dish Network has.  Dish has several per year, every year, while DirecTV usually has one per year at most.

Those retransmission fees are what's keeping broadcast television on the air.  The advertiser-based business model failed years ago.  If those fees went away, we'd be back to most markets having 2 to 5 stations on the air (NYC, LA, and Chicago being among the few exceptions).  It'd be deja vu 1970 all over again.

[SP Cook]

Big Media wants you to think that, but anybody who owns a TV station owns a license to print money and if they do not think they can make it on ad revenue alone (which is what the situation was for the first 40 years of TV) is welcome to sign his FCC permits over to me.

[bandit957]

If those fees went away, we'd be back to most markets having 2 to 5 stations on the air (NYC, LA, and Chicago being among the few exceptions).  It'd be deja vu 1970 all over again.

That's about what I have anyway. On a good day, I think I can get only 5 stations now.

[hbelkins]

If those fees went away, we'd be back to most markets having 2 to 5 stations on the air (NYC, LA, and Chicago being among the few exceptions).  It'd be deja vu 1970 all over again.

That's about what I have anyway. On a good day, I think I can get only 5 stations now.

My brother lives in Owen County and with a small rooftop antenna, he gets tons of stations from the Cincinnati market. Another antenna, mounted on his deck, gets a crapload of them from Louisville.

[bandit957]

I can't even get Channel 54 or 64 anymore.

[ftballfan]

Where I am, it is almost impossible to get anything over the air without an outdoor antenna

[KEVIN_224]

@SCTVHOUND: Merideth also owns WFSB-TV (CBS) channel 3 of Hartford. I don't know how much of an impact it's had here, as the last provider I had access to was Frontier.

[SP Cook]

How?  It would still be the same stations, just through an internet connection rather than an antenna.

OK here goes.

For the first 40 years or so of TV, local TV was free.  If you lived close enough to town, you just put up an antenna and watched what came in.  If you could not get TV with an antenna, well, that is where the first cable TV, then called CATV, came from.  A businessman put up a better antenna than any one person could afford and sold subscriptions to it.  The local TV stations got nothing, they survived, and in fact thrived.  The Supreme Court, in a case called Fortnightly, affirmed that cable companies could receive and retransmit local TV signals without paying the TV stations.

Then, in the 1990s, Big Media got Congress to change the law.  Now cable companies, and satellite and other types of providers like Play Station and so on, must pay the local TV stations whatever they demand to carry the signals.  And, with knickpicky exceptions, every single place in the USA has ONE AND ONLY ONE local station that "owns" your home for each network (CBS, NBC, etc).  For example I like in a market where Nexstar owns the CBS.  The only way for DirecTV, or any other provider, to provide CBS to me, is to pay whatever Nexstar wants.  Which is why Nexstar stations are currently off DirecTV.   The amount of money paid by you and me customer has gone up ten fold, to nearly $10 BILLION with a B, in just the last 10 years. 

But there are two exceptions to this.

- You still can put up a plain old antenna and pull in whatever you can.  Obviously this only works if you live close enough to the city the TV station is in, but it is something.  But switching between a cable or dish box and the antenna is cumbersome.  The providers are working on this.  In DirecTV's case it is called an "LCC box" which is an add on to the DirecTV box that makes local, antenna received, channels appear in the guide and such just like all the DirecTV channels.  Without payment to the local stations.

- Which leaves rural people, the main point of this discussion.  Well, Congress left a loophole in for non-profits.  So the cable and dish industry are fostering the foundation of locast, an NON-PROFIT website.  When fully rolled out, an antenna in each market will receive all of the local stations and retransmit them to everyone in the market for a donation of $5/month.  The local stations will get no payment and will have to go back to living simply on the windfall profits they make from selling advertising, since they could no longer take TV signals away from people to demand more money.   A rare instance where the consumer is going to win.

[hbelkins]

In my DirecTV market, only the Lexington stations are provided, and not all of them at that. We get the main NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox and CW affiliates. The three old-line Lexington stations (WLEX, Channel 18, NBC; WKYT, Channel 27, CBS; and WTVQ, Channel 36, ABC) have several subchannels. These are not carried by DirecTV.

We do not get the Hazard CBS affiliate, WYMT, on DirecTV. Dish Network also does not carry it. And they will not unless forced to by the federal government. This is the station that covers many local stories that the Lexington and Huntington stations that penetrate into this area do not.

The Frankfort cable system carries both Lexington and Louisville broadcast stations. Some eastern Kentucky cable systems carry both Lexington and Huntington stations.

My Owen County brother, who lives right smack dab in the middle of Kentucky's Golden Triangle, has Dish Network. Their local stations are from Cincinnati, not Lexington or Louisville.

There's really no rhyme or reason to what the satellite providers deem to be local channel for any given community.

Instead of the stations paying cable and satellite providers to carry them, it should be the other way around. The providers should pay them a fee for the right to retransmit their signals.

[allniter89]

In the 1970s we lived in rural areas south of Dover, DE. We used a 30' antennae with a rotator. We could pick up all Philly stations (3, 6,10, 17, 29, & 48) & a couple from Balto (2 & 13). All these channels came in crystal clear no matter the weather. When they finally ran cable to us the picture was good in clear weather but if it even looked like it was going to rain or snow the pic was in & out.
Here in FL we use Dish for tv & internet. When we have heavy rain we loose tv but internet is ok. We get an excellent variety of channels, even stations from LA, Denver, Boston, Chicago & 2 from NYC. If & when they run cable waay out here I think I'd probably stay with Dish.

[Life in Paradise]

Instead of the stations paying cable and satellite providers to carry them, it should be the other way around. The providers should pay them a fee for the right to retransmit their signals.

As I understand it currently, cable and satellite companies actually do have to pay the local providers for retransmission of their signals.  In turn the cable companies (and satellite) charge us a fee for what they pay broadcast companies.  It kind of burns me up to have to pay for something that is free to me over the air, and I'm close enough to town to use a small antenna next to my TV and switch over to pick up a few channels that aren't packaged onto cable.  One of the negotiating tactics local TV stations sometimes use is to get the cable company to also pull up some of the digital subchannels.  Satellite doesn't have that capability in most cases, but a bunch of the subchannel providers actually have an internet streaming presence.

[allniter89]

We've lost one of our local stations for a week now while the station & Dish try to settle on a fair price. This is usually resolved in a couple weeks. Some stations we lose forever then Dish adds another channel to fill the void.

[rawmustard]

DirecTV is working on a thing called "locast".  The retransmission law has an exception for non-profit TV clubs.  Back in the day people in really rural areas where even the worst cable companies would not go would form "TV clubs" which would put up an antenna and wire up the homes, with everyone donating for upkeep.  Locast is set up as a "club" and, if you live in one of the cities it is in (NY, Boston, Philly, DC, Baltimore, Chicago, Houston, DFW, Denver, LA, SF, and, oddly, Rapid City and Sioux Fall, SD) you "donate" $5/month and get a password to watch your local stations on the internet.    They want to eventually roll it out nationwide, which would destroy the monopoly power of local TV stations.

In what should be surprising to no one who follows the TV industry, the makers of Locast are being sued by the broadcast networks, probably because the claim of being a non-profit TV club was spurious.

[ErmineNotyours]

[   A rare instance where the consumer is going to win.

What I've heard will happen is the networks will pull NFL football off the air and will move it to a premium NFL streaming and cable channel, just like baseball.  Then the networks/studios will lobby to get the exemption closed.  The consumer never wins.

[KeithE4Phx]

- Which leaves rural people, the main point of this discussion.  Well, Congress left a loophole in for non-profits.  So the cable and dish industry are fostering the foundation of locast, an NON-PROFIT website.  When fully rolled out, an antenna in each market will receive all of the local stations and retransmit them to everyone in the market for a donation of $5/month.

I believe that law was designed for non-profit OTA translator groups, not streaming services like Locast.

The local stations will get no payment and will have to go back to living simply on the windfall profits they make from selling advertising, since they could no longer take TV signals away from people to demand more money.   A rare instance where the consumer is going to win.

The advertising-only business model has been unworkable for many many years.  The subscriber fees paid to local broadcasters (who, in turn, pay the networks... unlike decades past where the networks paid their affiliates for time) are what keep them on the air.  Broadcasters today make almost no money from OTA; effectively just a small percentage of their total ad revenue, since 75-85% of their viewership is via cable, satellite, and online, not via their transmitters.  If they had to survive with just advertising, all those bloated news departments, and 6-12 hours of news and feature programming per day would go away.  So would maybe half of the stations currently on the air.  The networks would have to start paying their affiliates again.

For example, CBS has lost about 1/4 of their viewership in those markets where their O&O stations and other affiliates (such as Meredith stations) are blacked out on Dish Network.  That means that they don't get a dime from Dish until they make a new deal.  That includes 18 of the Top 25 media markets.  Meredith owns CBS affiliates in another five.  That has to hurt the bottom line big-time.  That's close to 1/16 of the country's population (assuming that's Dish's market share; it has to be close) that doesn't receive CBS unless people make arrangements elsewhere.  And they are.  Dish is bleeding subscriber cancellations.

If the FCC would let them, I believe most would just turn off those expensive, high-maintenance transmitters, lease the tower space to other services, and use cable, satellite (which will be dying in another decade), and streaming as their "transmitters."  Fortunately, the FCC and Congress won't let them.  The reason is that too many rural areas are not wired for high-speed internet or cable, or may have fiber connections, but not at a data rate that will allow multiple video streams.  It took over 60 years after the invention of dial telephone service in around 1910, and its almost immediate use in urban areas (beginning in 1915), before it was universal in the Continental US.  Nationwide high speed internet could take close to that long, and it's only been available to the general public for about 20 years now.  Despite the comparative few viewers that use OTA, broadcast TV will be around for some time to come, even though they are money-losers for the broadcasters.

In fact, I think Canada is making a big mistake in turning off their OTA transmitters in rural areas.  What happens when their satellites start dying?  This is what AT&T/DirecTV is predicting will happen with their birds after another 10 years or so.  They're making it clear that satellite delivery of television is eventually coming to an end.  This is why they're getting in on the streaming market now.

[SP Cook]

The advertising-only business model has been unworkable for many many years.

Really?   I repeat my offer to take any FCC monopoly permit any broadcaster who believes it cannot make it on ad revenue alone off their hands.  Simply sign it over.

The networks would have to start paying their affiliates again.

How tragic for Big Media.  Disney (ABC) made $12.6 Billion last year.  Comcast (NBC) made $11.7 Billion.  Fox made $8.2 Billion.  National Amusements (CBS) which is virtually privately owned by one person, made $8.2 Billion.

How tragic for Big Media.

If the FCC would let them, I believe most would just turn off those expensive, high-maintenance transmitters, lease the tower space to other services, and use cable, satellite (which will be dying in another decade), and streaming as their "transmitters."  Fortunately, the FCC and Congress won't let them.

Oh, Congress will let them.  All they have to do is go off the air, and become a "cable" channel, like ESPN, CNN, or Discovery.  All of whom exist in the free market, without government granted monopoly.

The reason is that too many rural areas are not wired for high-speed internet or cable, or may have fiber connections, but not at a data rate that will allow multiple video streams. 

Rural America will never have high speed internet service.

They're making it clear that satellite delivery of television is eventually coming to an end.  This is why they're getting in on the streaming market now.

Because rural America will never have high speed internet, and for this reason sat. delivered  TV will exist for many decades to come.  Further anyone who thinks that internet TV will not simply be stolen and VPNed out of region doesn't understand how the internet works. 

And, as obviously an employee of Big Media, you better hope so, because internet TV = no retrans for you.  Having to live only on ad rev alone.

How sad for Big Media.

[Sctvhound]

- Which leaves rural people, the main point of this discussion.  Well, Congress left a loophole in for non-profits.  So the cable and dish industry are fostering the foundation of locast, an NON-PROFIT website.  When fully rolled out, an antenna in each market will receive all of the local stations and retransmit them to everyone in the market for a donation of $5/month.

I believe that law was designed for non-profit OTA translator groups, not streaming services like Locast.

The local stations will get no payment and will have to go back to living simply on the windfall profits they make from selling advertising, since they could no longer take TV signals away from people to demand more money.   A rare instance where the consumer is going to win.

The advertising-only business model has been unworkable for many many years.  The subscriber fees paid to local broadcasters (who, in turn, pay the networks... unlike decades past where the networks paid their affiliates for time) are what keep them on the air.  Broadcasters today make almost no money from OTA; effectively just a small percentage of their total ad revenue, since 75-85% of their viewership is via cable, satellite, and online, not via their transmitters.  If they had to survive with just advertising, all those bloated news departments, and 6-12 hours of news and feature programming per day would go away.  So would maybe half of the stations currently on the air.  The networks would have to start paying their affiliates again.

For example, CBS has lost about 1/4 of their viewership in those markets where their O&O stations and other affiliates (such as Meredith stations) are blacked out on Dish Network.  That means that they don't get a dime from Dish until they make a new deal.  That includes 18 of the Top 25 media markets.  Meredith owns CBS affiliates in another five.  That has to hurt the bottom line big-time.  That's close to 1/16 of the country's population (assuming that's Dish's market share; it has to be close) that doesn't receive CBS unless people make arrangements elsewhere.  And they are.  Dish is bleeding subscriber cancellations.

If the FCC would let them, I believe most would just turn off those expensive, high-maintenance transmitters, lease the tower space to other services, and use cable, satellite (which will be dying in another decade), and streaming as their "transmitters."  Fortunately, the FCC and Congress won't let them.  The reason is that too many rural areas are not wired for high-speed internet or cable, or may have fiber connections, but not at a data rate that will allow multiple video streams.  It took over 60 years after the invention of dial telephone service in around 1910, and its almost immediate use in urban areas (beginning in 1915), before it was universal in the Continental US.  Nationwide high speed internet could take close to that long, and it's only been available to the general public for about 20 years now.  Despite the comparative few viewers that use OTA, broadcast TV will be around for some time to come, even though they are money-losers for the broadcasters.

In fact, I think Canada is making a big mistake in turning off their OTA transmitters in rural areas.  What happens when their satellites start dying?  This is what AT&T/DirecTV is predicting will happen with their birds after another 10 years or so.  They're making it clear that satellite delivery of television is eventually coming to an end.  This is why they're getting in on the streaming market now.

DirecTV is the ones with the blackout. An even larger share of the population than those with Dish Network. Dish Network is only Meredith's stations. They do own some large market stations (KC, St. Louis, Atlanta, Phoenix). Plus anyone with DirecTV Now is missing CBS.

And the Nexstar dispute is an even bigger problem. In my market (Charleston), we've been missing NBC and CW for a month now. About 15-20% of the market has been missing NBC for that length of time.

Los Angeles is the biggest DirecTV market by far. As of 2015, they had almost 1.3 million subscribers in that area, double the amount of the New York area. Probably less than that now, but they've been missing CBS for about 2 weeks now. That's a huge loss for that network.

Here is that page with the information. Some of it is probably a little out of date due to cord-cutting, but it still gives you a good idea how people get their TV.

http://researchexcellence.com/files/pdf/2015-07/id302_mvpd_dma_level_digital_subscriber_data_june_2015.pdf

[vdeane]

If the FCC would let them, I believe most would just turn off those expensive, high-maintenance transmitters, lease the tower space to other services, and use cable, satellite (which will be dying in another decade), and streaming as their "transmitters."  Fortunately, the FCC and Congress won't let them.  The reason is that too many rural areas are not wired for high-speed internet or cable, or may have fiber connections, but not at a data rate that will allow multiple video streams.  It took over 60 years after the invention of dial telephone service in around 1910, and its almost immediate use in urban areas (beginning in 1915), before it was universal in the Continental US.  Nationwide high speed internet could take close to that long, and it's only been available to the general public for about 20 years now.  Despite the comparative few viewers that use OTA, broadcast TV will be around for some time to come, even though they are money-losers for the broadcasters.

The irony is that the parts of the country where digital TV signals come is well are the same parts of the country that already have broadband.

And, as obviously an employee of Big Media, you better hope so, because internet TV = no retrans for you.  Having to live only on ad rev alone.

Nope.  While some local stations do stream their broadcasts online, by and large TV streaming is paid - sometimes both subscriptions AND ads at the same time!  See: CBS All Access, Hulu

[ce929wax]

^I subscribe to CBS All Access and pay an extra $4 a month not to have commercials.  I wish Hulu had the same option.

[kphoger]

The reason is that too many rural areas are not wired for high-speed internet or cable, or may have fiber connections, but not at a data rate that will allow multiple video streams. 

Rural America will never have high speed internet service.

What is internet service like in rural America?  I haven't dealt with it since before streaming video was a thing.  My family has done just fine streaming multiple video streams with just 15 MBps download, and I know other people who have reported no problems with as little as 5 MBps download or even less.