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Program and System Information Protocol

video and audio industry protocol

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionApr 10, 2025
Entity authorityQ1062494 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) is the MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group, a video and audio industry group) and privately defined program-specific information originally defined by General Instrument for the DigiCipher 2 system and later extended for the ATSC digital television system for carrying metadata about each channel in the broadcast MPEG transport stream of a television station and for publishing information about television programs so that viewers can select what to watch by title and description. Its FM radio equivalent is Radio Data System (RDS).

Function

PSIP defines virtual channels and content ratings, as well as electronic program guides with titles and (optionally) descriptions to be decoded and displayed by the ATSC tuner.

PSIP can also send:

the exact time referenced to UTC and GPS time;

the short name, which some stations use to publish their callsign. A maximum of seven characters can be used in a short name.

PSIP is defined in ATSC standard A/65, the most recent revision of which is A/65:2013, published in 2013. A/69 is a recommended practice for implementing PSIP in a television station.

PSIP also supersedes the A/55 and A/56 protocol methods of delivering program guide information (which the ATSC has deleted). TV Guide On Screen is a different, proprietary system provided by datacasting on a single station, while PSIP is required, at least in the United States, to be sent by every digital television station.

PSIP information may be passed through the airchain using proprietary protocols or through use of the Programming Metadata Communication Protocol metadata scheme.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Program and System Information Protocol” as video and audio industry protocol. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Program, System and Information.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2013—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Program, System and Information providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Program and System Information Protocol”, the useful work is to connect “video and audio industry protocol” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 10, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q1062494. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2013.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Program and System Information Protocol”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Program and System Information Protocol primary sources, Program and System Information Protocol archive and Program research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Program and System Information Protocol”?
  2. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
  3. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Program and System Information Protocol” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.