Broadcasters meet to battle wireless

Television broadcasters are confabbing in Las Vegas this week to plot how to fight the forces of evil in Washington — wireless companies. Broadcasters say they aren’t rushing to fork over airwaves to the federal government, despite congressional go-ahead this year to reimburse them with auction proceeds from wireless carriers eager to pay billions to connect smartphones and tablets.

“They want us out of this game,” former Sen. Gordon Smith, president and chief executive of the National Association of Broadcasters, said of the wireless industry in his opening remarks at the group’s annual convention. “We can’t let down our guard.” The wireless industry says the fight song being played by broadcasters is misguided: Consumers have already voted with their feet how they want content delivered. Broadcasters see their future as a mixture of broadcast and wireless, and they argue that their use of spectrum — their signals go from one-to-many recipients — is a better use of the limited federal airwaves than wireless carriers’ one-to-one recipient service.