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While programmers and cable outfits get hot under the corporate collar, earth station owners and suppliers profess little concern. They point out that the majority of earth station owners live well outside cable range and generally do not try to redistribute or sell the signal. Benson Begun, a vice president of the Warner Amex satellite operation, concedes that "we don't see the backyard individual receiver as a significant economic threat. But the pirate who puts up an antenna on an apartment complex or a hotel is viewed as much more significant, and such people we are actively pursuing."
Satellite users could—and might—scramble the signals bouncing off the communications satellites and then unscramble them for cable subscribers. But FCC Staff Engineer Wilbert Nixon says such a process would represent "an expensive investment." Just now, there are probably not enough earth stations to justify a major legal or technological fuss, and confusion will probably continue to reign in the absence of a definitive court test.
There are strong indications, however, that the audience and the market for earth stations will continue to grow. Until 1979, the FCC required a construction permit for any earth station. Now a video freak with a fair amount of technical finesse can assemble one from a Heathkit for $6,995, and students from Hall High School in Spring Valley, Ill., put together a fine version with a $1,700 kitty and some Army surplus parts. At least 70 companies can now supply earth stations or various components for them. In Hailey, Idaho, a small outfit called Commtek Inc. publishes a monthly SAT Guide that furnishes up to 140 pages of listings to its 12,000 subscribers all over North America and the Caribbean.
The FCC is considering a modification of its spacing regulations so that there would be room for at least 20 new satellites in the next five years or so. The heavens could be full of satellites floating around like apples in a Halloween bobbing tub, and the SAT Guide may eventually get as thick as the Manhattan Yellow Pages. More significant, the Communications Satellite Corp. (COMSAT) has submitted the first application to the FCC for permission to establish a direct broadcast system. By the mid-1980s, this system could conceivably be sending down three channels of pay programming into smaller (2½ ft. in diameter), cheaper ($200-$500) earth stations. Meanwhile, an RCA subsidiary, and several other firms, including CBS, have plans of their own to develop direct broadcast systems. All in all, prospects seem bright for many more people to join the folks in Brooklyn, Hall High School and Easton, Pa., on the satellite beam.
—By Jay Cocks. Reported by David S. Jackson/Washington and Gary Ruderman/Chicago, with other U.S. bureaus