[EAS] Activity at the FCC

[k7cr]

There is a huge job to be done here demonstrating the advantages of CAP at 
the station level.   Right now a very small percentage of broadcasters see 
ANY advantage to this change, in fact, I would wager that most feel it's 
just another unfunded federal wild hair.

In our recent SBE EAS session where we got into the nitty gritty of our new 
system here I took some time to explain how TV Stations could begin getting 
their crawl info from the same text that's used for the voice message and 
stop using the Header Codes for that purpose.  I reminded the assembled that 
this was a very sore point a few years ago here in this area.  Slowly I saw 
the lights go on.   Prior to this point, they really did not see any benefit 
to the station, other than the expense.

Amber is another mission for EAS that can be enhanced via the use of CAP 
(transmission of a child's picture comes to mind)

Like a lot of things in this area....Education is the key.

On the input end, our county level emergency folks are thrilled that they 
don't have to voice messages any more.   Those buttons on the front of an 
endec were a constant source of frustration....Even after templates had been 
created for them to work with.  They all now know how to operate various 
computer programs and with CAP they can now launch public warning messages 
using those same tools.

One demonstration of how it works etc seems to do the job.

The question is now how to get broadcasters fired up about making the 
change.

With that being said - There is always going to be the hold out who is 
saying, under his breath, over my dead body....

Clay


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Richard Rudman" <rar01 at me.com>
To: "The EAS Forum - accurate and up-to-date information on the EAS and 
itsimplementation" <eas at radiolists.net>
Sent: Saturday, January 22, 2011 9:31 PM
Subject: Re: [EAS] Activity at the FCC


> One of the ideas I have been kicking around is that there should be 
> incentives to get EAS 100% into the CAP mode as soon as possible.
>
> What kinds of incentives could be offered to licensees to get there?
>
> I can think of a few, but I would really like to hear from others on the 
> list first.
>
> Richard
>
>
>
>
>
> On Jan 22, 2011, at 9:20 PM, k7cr wrote:
>
>> One needs to keep in mind a couple of factors here.    We are going to
>> assume that the creators of messages are going to use CAP (at least that 
>> is
>> the direction we are going here in Washington State)...  At some point 
>> the
>> CAP message is going to be 'reduced' to SAME and that message may undergo
>> additional distribution.    Again, using Washington State as an
>> example...When our State EOC issues a message they send it via two 
>> paths -
>> 1) CAP (via IP) and 2) SAME via our existing State Relay Network.    On 
>> the
>> receiving end you have some choices, based on the type of equipment you 
>> have
>> and how you have connected yourself to which distribution system. 
>> Counties
>> are now up and running with them now all originating EAS messages using 
>> CAP
>> as well  and everyone understands that their messages are likely to be, 
>> at
>> some point, down-converted to SAME.   Some broadcasters will likely be OK
>> with staying with SAME, while others will want to upgrade sooner rather 
>> than
>> later.
>>
>> This will all likely change when (and perhaps if) the FCC requires 
>> everyone
>> to have a CAP capable box.   At some point we will likely see SAME go 
>> away
>> in favor of the more feature rich capabilities of CAP
>>
>> I hope this makes sense.  Questions are certainly welcome.
>>
>> Clay Freinwald
>>
>> ----
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