Digital TV: New wave set to wash over border
Canadian broadcasters risk being swamped
Tony Atherton
The Ottawa Citizen
If the progress toward Canadian digital TV were to be expressed digitally, it would be: Broadcast Industry, 1; Federal Government, 0.
That's the number of recommendations acted upon by the key players since the report of the digital TV task force seven months ago. It warned that conventional Canadian television could be swamped by the U.S. digital revolution if action was not taken quickly.
The U.S. is proceeding with plans for a fall launch on all network affiliates in 10 major markets of digital TV, with its promise of high-definition, wide-screen pictures and computer compatibility. The technology will spread to 20 more U.S. cities by 2000. The first generation of digital TV sets will be sold (for about $8,000 each) in the U.S. and Canada this fall.
Yet there has been no response from the Canadian government since its digital TV task force submitted sweeping recommendations and a schedule for switching to the versatile technology. This would see the first broadcast of digital TV in Canada by 1999 and a national launch by 2004.
However, this month the broadcast industry went ahead with one of the key task force recommendations, the formation of a pan-industry organization to provide research and signal testing, co-ordinate the digital launch, and advise the government on policy.
The new Canadian Digital Television Inc., supported by broadcasters, cable companies, program producers and satellite operators, has appointed former task-force chair Michael McEwen as its president.
The formation of CDTV puts the ball in the government's court, McEwen says. "I think they're seized with the issue now."
Time is of the essence, he says. While the American breakneck timetable for implementing digital still may go off track, the Canadian industry has to be prepared to meet the inevitable onslaught of border-hopping high-definition television signals. Canadian broadcasters must offer similar quality or lose viewers.
"If we didn't have some (response from the government) by the fall, I would start having concerns," McEwen says.
Not to fall too far behind "you've got to start creating that envelope now. And we've got to start co-ordinating all the players."
The industry is waiting to hear, for instance, how the government plans to allocate digital bandwidth.
One question is whether it will provide digital-signal space automatically to every conventional broadcaster, as the U.S. has done, or look to some other means of distribution. The government also must respond to the task force's recommendations for subsidies to assist the industry in making the switch.
One recommendation urged the government immediately to create a $50-million-a-year digital TV programming fund. This would be used to help producers and broadcasters create programming for wide-screen, high definition TV. The programming needn't be produced in HD video; programs made on 35mm film would be suitable for conversion to high-definition TV, McEwen points out.
Eighty per cent of the U.S. networks' prime time schedule is already produced on 35mm film, providing a ready library of HDTV-compatible programming, McEwan adds. In Canada, where lower-cost 16mm film is widely used for major drama productions and conventional video for everything else, producers need help to switch to programming that is HDTV-friendly.
Even within the Canadian industry there is resistance to the switch to digital, McEwan admits. Cable companies don't have enough capacity to carry all the existing conventional signals as it is. And they're worried about how they'll manage, if they must carry conventional and digital signals during whatever time the government allows for the transition to digital TV. And broadcasters worry about the cost of converting to digital transmission.
But, says McEwen, "with the Americans going ahead, there's a certain inevitability to this. So, then, the issue is not whether it's coming, but how can we effectively manage this?"
Even though viewers in Windsor will have access to U.S. digital TV by the year's end, "I don't think any of us are worried about the bleed-over in the first year or two," McEwen says. "If an early adopter wants to buy a digital television set so they can watch the Super Bowl in high definition, good on them.
"But we're not worried about those eyeballs until the year 2000, when the American penetration, according to its timetable, will start to increase, and the cost of (digital) sets will start to drop. Then it becomes a more attractive proposition. And I think that (Canada) should be strategically positioned."
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