"Sometime in May, the U.S. military plans to get into the satellite newsgathering business.
Seeking to provide local stations with access to video footage they otherwise couldn’t get, the military has decided to equip existing public affairs units in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan with much of the same news gathering equipment reporters embedded with military units used to gather and transmit reports from the frontlines of the Iraq War.
The military’s $6.3 million foray into satellite newsgathering is called the Digital Video and Imagery Distribution System (DVIDS). According to Lt. Col. William Beckman with the Third Army in Atlanta, DVIDS will rely on five mobile news crews equipped with portable news gathering technology, including Sony PD 170 camcorders, a Nikon D2H still camera, laptop computer with Avid Express DV editing software and the compact Norsat NewsLink 3200 satellite terminal from Norsat International. Initially, one unit will be based in Afghanistan, another in Kuwait and three in Iraq. The Kuwait-based unit eventually will be moved to Iraq, said Beckman." (thanks Antone)