TECHNOLOGY - April 12, 1995

FCC Chief Backs Broadcasters on Digital TV: Chairman Reed Hundt, the nation’s top television regulator, told broadcasters at their convention in Las Vegas that he wants to help them make the historic transition to digital technology. He suggested that broadcasters, not the government, decide what services may be carried on new channels that stations are to receive in the next few years. In 1992, the Federal Communications Commission decided to give TV stations another channel to deliver what was then believed to be the next generation of television: high-definition, a digital system that would provide movie-quality pictures and CD-quality sound. But the TV industry no longer sees a big business in high-definition television, and broadcasters are lobbying both the FCC and Congress to win the right to do whatever they want with a new channel. “We applaud the chairman’s view,” said Eddie Fritts, president of the National Assn. of Broadcasters.