I have re-read the bill again, just to be sure my first instincts are correct. If you're in a market where your satellite carrier is offering analog LIL, it does NOT matter whether you can receive digital OTA or not. There will be NO "digital white area" rule in LIL markets.
If you subscribe to analog LIL for a particular network, you
will be able to get a digital distant local for that network,
whether you can get digital OTA or not (much less HD), as long as (a) digital LIL isn't available from your carrier (and you
will switch to digital LIL when it's available), and (b) except for Alaska & Hawaii, the distant station doesn't air its network programming before your local station (i.e., Mountain time zone is limited to Mountain/Pacific markets, Pacific time zone to Pacific markets only). Those who can't get analog LIL in their part of the market (for example, because you're outside the spotbeam) are safe; in fact, several modifications in the House bill were intended specifically for them. For Alaska & Hawaii, only (a) will apply, but D* and E* are required elsewhere in the bill to launch digital LIL in those states within 30 months.
Believe it or not, the NAB is almost as happy with this as D* and E*:
- Anyone that can get analog LIL *must* take it in order to get digital distant locals, so local stations still have access to satellite households. (And let's face it: Local news, weather and sports is still a big draw for most people; that's why analog LIL has been far more successful than anyone could have imagined in 1999.) This tie also makes distant locals more complementary to local stations than competitive.
- Since you generally won't be able to get a show via distant locals before it airs locally, by the NAB's thinking, HD is the *only* reason you'd watch the distant local.
- By avoiding a "digital white area" rule in LIL markets, it removes well over 90% of the potential for consumer complaints (which make the NAB look bad, as they did in the analog era) if the final FCC rule looks too much like the analog "grade-B" rule. (The NAB's biggest complaint all along was that a "digital white area" would recreate the same debacle, in their view, as when satellite first got distant locals.)
- And finally, it assures that digital distant locals WILL go away once digital LIL is available, so the NAB won't lose you forever.
The only way a Nexstar-like station (Nexstar owns my market's NBC affiliate) could wipe out HD distant locals in their market is if they get the satellite carrier to carry their non-HD digital signal in their digital LIL package. Since I don't see any "digital must-carry" language in this bill, I'm sure D* and E* would fight them. In that case, I suspect the analog signal would meet all must-carry requirements, even if they carry true HD signals from the other networks (as would likely happen in Little Rock, where the ABC and CBS affiliates are already in true HD, and I believe Fox as well).
Besides, by the time digital LIL makes it to Nexstar markets (Little Rock is one of their biggest, if not THE biggest), Nexstar will already be under major pressure from the networks, viewers, and possibly even the FCC to upgrade. Their excuse for not broadcasting in true HD is flimsy now, but will be even flimsier then, when so many of their viewers will have switched to HD.
