Local channels from satellite?

[yankov]

Prelimenary results of the pool

I see that over 60 people voted in this pool so far and main surprise for me from these preliminary results is the fact that over half of VOOM subscribers apparently not happy with their OTA reception.
Hope someone from VOOM reads this forum.

 

[seandudley]

Some of those people voting that they would pay if it was available (or take it free is available) could just like the idea of not having to have an antenna on their roof, but they receive their signals fine OTA.

 

[mike528]

Some of those people voting that they would pay if it was available (or take it free is available) could just like the idea of not having to have an antenna on their roof, but they receive their signals fine OTA.

Yes, thats exactly right -- the way the poll was worded, I said I'd take it if free (why not?) because it would eliminate an antenna and make tuning in a little simpler (wouldn't have to rotate my OTA antenna). But I get most of my OTA signals just fine. I would like to see sat companies allowed to offer national feeds in HD, but the FCC is not going to allow that. I am not interested in getting locals from satellite (or cable) if they are just in SD, and I would not want to see Voom waste bandwidth tryinig to offer locals for 25 or 50 or 100 cities, like Dish and DirecTV do. If Voom tried to offer lots of cities in HD, that would be a lot of bandwidth indeed.
I think a big part of the problem with OTA reception is that a lot of local stations are broadcasting very weak digital signals. If they devoted the same attention to their digital transmissiion that they devote to their analog, I think we would have good reception of a lot more channels.
I'm happy with the current solution -- locals OTA, and satellite bandwidth devoted to as many HD channels as possible.

 

[ricks]

"You can tell your HOA to shove it. (Assuming you are in the US). See http://www.fcc.gov/mb/facts/otard.html . The HOA has no say on what over the air antenna you choose to use."

Not exactly correct, unless you live in Alaska, the antenna or dish size is limited to one meter. This can and does present some problems with antennas. That's why I went with a Square Shooter.

"I'm familiar with that legislation, but it only applies to the areas that are exclusively used by resident, such us patio or balcony. Roof is property of HO assotiation and this FCC regulitions unfortunately does not apply here."

Absolutely correct. However, you might be surprised at what does qualify as "exclusive use". For instance, I live in a townhouse but my a/c unit is technically on common property behind some bushes on the side of the unit. Not on my patio which is the only truly exclusive property I have. Yet, I mounted my dish next to the a/c unit. Clearly, even though it is common property, no one but I would ever have the right to use that space (approx 5' deep and 10' wide) behind a hedge except me.

 

[rudolpht]

Correct. FCC is biggest deterrent to net feeds, which is why LIL killed other sat service in the PQ department. Let's not kill Voom.

 

[yankov]

By the way - VOOM and Installs Inc. approved me for SquareShooter and they will install it next Friday at their expense.
I will let you know if it improves OTA reception.
I was almost ready to pay for Squareshooter and it's install out of my own packet...

 

[seandudley]

"You can tell your HOA to shove it. (Assuming you are in the US). See http://www.fcc.gov/mb/facts/otard.html . The HOA has no say on what over the air antenna you choose to use."

Not exactly correct, unless you live in Alaska, the antenna or dish size is limited to one meter. This can and does present some problems with antennas. That's why I went with a Square Shooter.

Unless I am missing something, the antenna for off the air reception of TV stations has no such limitation on size. It has a maximum height restriction, but not a maximum size restriction. The paragraph about satellite dishes mentions a size, the one about antennas does not. Here are the paragraphs.

The one about the satellite dish:

(1) A "dish" antenna that is one meter (39.37") or less in diameter (or any size dish if located in Alaska) and is designed to receive direct broadcast satellite service, including direct-to-home satellite service, or to receive or transmit fixed wireless signals via satellite.

And, the one about the off-air antenna:

(3) An antenna that is designed to receive local television broadcast signals. Masts higher than 12 feet above the roofline may be subject to local permitting requirements.

Sean Dudley

 

[ricks]

Sean:

It's possible you are correct regarding the one meter limitation not applying to antennas. As with a lot of regs, it wasn't entirely clear to me. There is more than one section of the regs that might apply. I read them several times and my less than 100% positive conclusion was that it also applied to antennas. Given the nature of antennas, that didn't make complete sense to me. But, then, who said the Feds always have to make sense? Probably the only way to know for sure is to find some case law that addresses this specific issue. I doubt this is a matter of first impression.