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Congress
Approves the Commercial Advertisement
Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act
On December
2, 2010 Congress approved the Commercial Advertisement Loudness
Mitigation (CALM) Act which gives the FCC the authority to create
rules intended to mitigate variations in volume level (loudness)
between programming and commercials. Specifically, the CALM Act
requires that within one year after the date of enactment (i.e.
when the president signs the Act) the FCC must adopt rules incorporating
by reference and making mandatory ATSC A/85 (and any of its successor
standards).
A/85 is titled
Recommended Practice: Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining
Audio Loudness for Digital Television, and was approved by
the ATSC in November 2009. This Recommended Practice provides
guidance to broadcasters and creators of audio for ATSC high-definition
(HD) or standard-definition (SD) television content and recommends
production, distribution and transmission practices needed to
provide the audio soundtracks to the digital television audience.
It focuses on audio measurement, production and postproduction
monitoring techniques, and methods to effectively control loudness
for content delivery or exchange while maintaining a large dynamic
range. It recommends methods to effectively control program-to-interstitial
loudness including the use the Dialog Normalization (dialnorm)
metadata parameter to transparently set different content to a
uniform loudness (See TV
TechCheck from November 9, 2009.). The CALM Act limits the
FCC to focusing on those parts of the recommended practice that
concerns the transmission of commercial advertisements by a television
broadcast station, cable operator or other multichannel video
programming distributor.
The Act also
requires that the rules adopted by the FCC take effect one year
after those rules are adopted. So stations will have two years
from the time the president signs the Act (or approximately December
2012) to come into compliance with the new rules. In addition,
for stations that demonstrate that obtaining the equipment needed
to comply with the new regulations would result in financial hardship,
the FCC may grant a waiver of the effective date by one year and
then may renew that waiver for an additional year.
Finally,
the Act states that any broadcast television operator, cable operator
or other multichannel video programming distributor that installs,
utilizes and maintains in a commercially reasonable manner the
equipment and associated software in compliance with the regulations
issued by the FCC shall be deemed to be in compliance with such
regulations.
A copy of
the bill can be found on THOMAS, The Library
of Congress’ legislative information Web page http://thomas.loc.gov/.
Under the heading “Search Bill Summary & Status”
enter the bill number “S.2847.ENR.” Select text of the
legislation and the most recent text is available under Item #4.
A/85 is available on the ATSC Web page here: http://www.atsc.org/cms/index.php/standards/recommended-practices/185-a85-techniques-for-establishing-and-maintaining-audio-loudness-for-digital-television.
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