Local broadcasters are increasingly degrading their high-definition picture quality due to multicasting — transmitting digital subchannels alongside the primary HD stream within a station's 19.4 Mbps digital TV pipe.

Gray Television, owner of KKTV in Colorado Springs, Colo., has asked the FCC to substitute its ch. 10 allotment with ch. 49 in order to improve the station's coverage.

The faltering economy is causing many stations to consider outsourcing master control and other technical back-office jobs. Among those that may provide such services are third-party firms as well as LIN, Media General, Raycom and other station groups that have already began centralcasting or hubbing.

Harry Jessell's column on the troubles of digital VHF missed the mark. It can work as well as UHF transmission if it is allowed enough transmission power, receiver performance improves and indoor and outdoor antennas are designed to receive both spectrum bands properly.

Weak over-the-air TV reception wasn't the only snafu for ABC O&O WPVI Philadelphia in June's digital TV transition. WPVI, which has the region's top-rated Action News, also lost its popular radio dial position — 87.7 FM.

NBC News has deployed a new ENG-to-studio link system that has the potential to reduce or supplement the network's dependence on conventional microwave and satellite vans for coverage of breaking news stories, and at the same time allow reporters to get closer to the action.

A half-dozen public interest groups argue the waiver has opened the floodgates to similar requests that together threaten to "lock consumers into low-cost, low-function set-tops."

Add KTVB Boise, Idaho, to the list of VHF stations that have gotten permission from the FCC for six-month power boosts after losing some viewers in the digital switch due to the different propagation characteristics of the DTV signal. That brings the total to four, according to an FCC spokesperson.