Two Los Angeles broadcast stations will offer themselves up as subjects in an experiment to see if they can seamlessly share a broadcast channel in hopes of eventually freeing up spectrum for the wireless industry.
The two stations, public broadcaster KLCS and Spanish language station KJLA, will participate in the experiment thought up by the wireless communications industry trade association CTIA.
The object of the experiment is to jam two stations together on the same spectrum and hope viewers can’t see the difference at home. If it works it will mean more spectrum can be sold off to wireless carriers who say they need the added spectrum.
According to Wireless Week, “If the FCC approves the pilot, KLCS will host KJLA throughout the first quarter of 2014. At the conclusion of the test, CTIA and the TV stations will submit a report to the FCC on the viability of channel sharing.”
“We hope that the pilot program will provide broadcasters around the country with ‘real world’ data to evaluate the opportunity to channel share in the upcoming spectrum auction,” Alan Popkin, KLCS director of engineering, said in a statement.