The National Association of
Broadcasters Streams Through Las Vegas
From April 11 through the 17th, The NAB Show covered every inch of the
Las Vegas Convention Center, incorporating large areas of the Hilton
Hotel as well. The massive event highlighted upcoming trends in
broadcast content with a head-spinning array of seminars, luncheons and
technical booths featuring camera equipment, lighting fixtures,
satellite capabilities, and high-definition, digital formats for film
and television.
2008 National Association of Broadcasters Convention
Photo credit: Stephen Thorburn
Sound intimidating? Your humble correspondent walked the many miles of
cables, cords, electronic gadgetry, switchers, testers, monitors,
cameras, light fixtures and software programs to bring you this trend
report from the (immense) field.
The big news was the coming digitalization of television broadcasts,
with all the accompanying talk of converter boxes, $40 coupons to aid in
the conversion, and the new industry standards such a dramatic shift
brings. February 17, 2009 will see the demise of analog television and
the end of a broadcasting era. The NAB show highlighted the change for
attendees with an enthusiastic look to the future of broadcast content,
including marketing strategies and product and audience development.
This subject was the single most important and pervasively covered
during the conference.
At the keynote “State of the Industry Address,” NAB President and CEO,
David K. Rehr reviewed the past and positioned broadcasters for the
future. Rehr touched on regulatory challenges, opportunities in the
“digital age” and the fast-changing and evolving global market.
NAB President and CEO, David K. Rehr
Photo credit: Jacqueline Monahan
Notable CBS veteran Charles Osgood was honored with a NAB Distinguished
Service Award. The award recognizes a recipient’s significant and
lasting contributions to the broadcasting industry. Osgood currently
anchors CBS Sunday Morning and writes and anchors The Osgood File for
CBS Radio.
Charles Osgood
Photo credit: Jacqueline Monahan
Academy Award Winner Tim Robbins highlighted the program with a keynote
address. The critically acclaimed actor was slated to take part in a
moderated Q&A with the audience, but was persuaded to deliver a humorous
prepared speech about the media, its expectations and sometimes subtle
hypocrisy. He cajoled the audience of broadcast professionals not to
fall for the easy, exploitation-filled circus of celebrity foibles to
grab ratings while much more relevant and urgent issues are ignored. His
challenge to the crowd was to be as excellent as they could within the
field, making a difference in the human condition in general, instead of
dwelling on some starlet’s undergarments in particular. The actor took
the time to chat with attendees and sign autographs immediately after
his speech.
Academy Award Winner, Tim Robbins
Photo credit: Jacqueline Monahan
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Perusing the booths and information sessions at the conference
brought to my attention the following trends:
Going Mobile
After years of the “bigger is better” philosophy in relation to monitor
screens, it seems that the future broadcast devices are getting smaller
and smaller. Handheld devices are becoming as ubiquitous as cell phones
and the challenge is portability combined with resolution clarity.
The emerging mobile video marketplace currently has 4.1 million active
users across the U.S. In order for this marketplace - still in infancy
stage - to reach its full potential, content creators and mobile
operators need to collaborate to create customized and interactive
content that can instantly spark users' interest and their growing
expectations for compelling content.
Questions now being explored by the industry are: what’s next for
interactivity? How interactive will mobile TV become? How will mobile TV
play a stronger role in the music, film and TV industries?
You can’t help but stayed tuned for this one.
The Red Camera
It’s a REDvolution – the democratization of filmmaking. This digital
camera, especially the one known as Scarlet, is revolutionizing film
productions.
It’s a lightweight, extremely portable piece of equipment that delivers
professional results and models start at $17,500, making it within the
reach of a whole new segment of the creative population.
Director Steven Soderbergh sums it up best when he says, “I feel I
should call up Film on the phone and say, I’ve met someone,” and
“Shooting with RED is like hearing The Beatles for the first time.”
HD Radio
David K. Rehr, President and CEO of NAB, spoke at the NAB Radio Luncheon
on the continued value of radio and emphasized how radio continues to be
for everyone and will always be an integral part of American culture
even as the convergence of technologies progresses. It’s free, it’s
wireless, it’s convenient and it’s not going anywhere, according to Rehr.
It is, in fact, going HD or digital. The difference is that digital
radio can happily co-exist, even switch over to an analog signal when
necessary, so both formats can and will be maintained.
As of 2007, more than 1200 AM and FM stations are broadcasting with HD
Radio technology, with more than 550 FM stations offering more than one
digital channel per FM frequency. Amm stations have been slower to
upgrade. Consumers need a new receiver for HD broadcasts but the content
itself is free.
HD radio will make it possible for an audio version of Pay-Per-View
(Pay-Per-Play?) to be available to consumers. The younger the
demographic, it seems, the more willing they would be to pay for this
service. This emerging market is being researched.
TV/Broadband Merge –Metadata
Metadata is "data about data", of any sort in any media. An item of
metadata may describe an individual datum or a collection of data
including multiple content items.
The closest concrete object that can illustrate a form of metadata is
the now antiquated library catalog, which holds information about the
books in its collection. This used to be a gigantic collection of
drawers and cards. Modern metadata is now a gigantic collection of
wires, signals and codes that convey information about information.
Here’s another example. On a portable music player ( iPod, etc,) the
album names, song titles and album art embedded in the music files are
used to generate the artist and song listings, and are considered the
metadata.
Internet television stations are the result of this marriage and
audiences are being developed, products marketing and content produced.
Look for more variety and availability in the future. You just might be
carrying this TV on your wrist.
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Other impressive NAB sights were comprised of news vans and helicopters
planted on the plush convention hall carpets. Everything about
information is electronic and instantaneous here, news gathering being
the most urgent. One gets a sense of how giant and how global the
industry is.
Photo credit: Jacqueline Monahan
One of the best displays (aside from the news choppers and Emmys) came
from Bron Kobold USA, with their DWP 400 lighting fixtures, one of which
was displayed under simulated rain. The light was unaffected, but
steamed dramatically in the downpour, demonstrating its resiliency.
Photo credit: Jacqueline Monahan
News about the hometown: Larry Lujack, the original 'Super Jock' who
always "tells it like it is," was inducted in the NAB Broadcasting Hall
of Fame in celebration of his memorable four decades of excellence in
radio. Lujack’s heydays were in Chicago during the 60’s and 70’s, a
favorite stop on the radio dial for your humble correspondent.
The enormous NAB show was not even big enough to contain all of the
information I encountered. It spilled into the streets, onto the busses
and surrounding hotels, each piece its own story and innovative process.
It let me see just how the world was wired and my connection to it.
Guess I got NAB-ed by it all.
For further information:
http://www.nabshow.com
http://www.nab.org
