The wireless tools used for Programme Making and Special Events (PMSE) – wireless microphones, in-ear monitors, video cameras and effect control – are essential to the contemporary production of events and content creation. However, the spectrum that is vital for successful PMSE equipment deployment is diminishing and is under constant threat from existing and potential new wireless services.
In a statement, the Association of Professional Wireless Production Technologies (APWPT) reports that it ‘spends significant amounts of time and energy attending regulatory meetings where the spectrum requirements for PMSE operations are often queried and challenged by regulatory authorities. In response, the APWPT has to repeatedly justify the PMSE sector’s spectrum needs. This can be difficult without hard evidence’.
A new spectrum usage app will allow the APWPT to gather this evidence.
With a new app developed by the APWPT, PMSE equipment operators and frequency planners can quickly and easily provide information about events, frequencies required and the PMSE equipment used, via a smartphone or tablet. Information that is provided from the front-line will assist the APWPT to better represent the PMSE sector’s interests with real-world data from events and productions. Data received via the App will be anonymised but will, over time, help to develop an invaluable database, reflecting the reality of daily, weekly, monthly and yearly, PMSE equipment usage.
The App is available now from most mobile app shops – search for APWPT.
‘The more PMSE users and frequency planners that download and report back using this App, the better,’ says APWPT Co-President, Alan March. ‘All data gratefully received. The APWPT is an international organisation and we are looking forward to receiving information from countries from across the world. Data that is received from PMSE people in countries that do not run licensing systems for PMSE activities will be particularly welcome. It will enable the APWPT to demonstrate to the relevant administration the real-world density of PMSE use in their country where, previously, they probably had no concept of just how widely PMSE systems are deployed.’
The Association of Professional Wireless Production Technologies promotes, on an international level, the efficient and demand-driven provision and use of production frequencies for professional event productions as well as working to safeguard such production frequencies for PMSE users in the long run.
More: www.apwpt.org
