Tektronix announced that it is helping Wave Broadband, a cable operator serving more than 400,000 subscribers across the West Coast, to comply with the Commercial Advertising Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act. Wave Broadband has so far deployed Tektronix’s award-winning Sentry Assure in three of its cable networks, where they continuously monitor the loudness of all the ads in all of the channels being delivered to subscribers.

“We take customer satisfaction and the customer experience very seriously, which is why we turned to Tektronix to help us comply with the CALM Act and ensure that customers do not experience commercials that are overly loud and bothersome,” said Tim Klinefelter, Wave Broadband’s EVP of Broadband Services. “Sentry Assure not only enables us to identify these ads so their volume can be lowered, but it also has all the database and reporting capabilities we need to fully comply with the CALM Act’s requirements.”

The CALM Act, which is enforced by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), requires cable operators and other video service providers (VSP) to ensure that ads be no louder than the programs they accompany. The FCC began enforcing the act on December 13, 2012, requiring large VSPs to come into compliance within one year, but granting smaller VSPs up to two years to fully comply. Rather than monitor VSPs themselves, the FCC relies on the public to report loud commercials to them via its website, fax or mail. To comply with the act, VSPs must be able to monitor the volume of ads, document when loud ads occur and show that they have resolved whatever caused the ads to be too loud.

“With the CALM Act now being enforced, ear-splitting ads have gone from being nuisance to a potentially serious business issue because all it takes is one disgruntled subscriber alerting the FCC to every loud ad to create a lot of trouble. Smart operators like Wave Broadband are not sitting on the sidelines, but actively deploying solutions to come into compliance,” said Eben Jenkins, general manager of the Video Product Line at Tektronix. “Long before the CALM Act was signed into law we were working with some of the nation’s largest cable operators in preparation, enabling us to develop the industry’s most comprehensive line of solutions for complying with the act, including our Sentry Assure.”

Tektronix
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