Japan's TV Broadcasts To Be All-Digital By 2011

Azuma writes "Officially, Japan will end Analog broadcasting by year 2011. Terrestrial digital television broadcasting services started on Monday, December 1st in Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka, with Japan Broadcasting Corp (NHK) and private TV stations broadcasting special commemorative programs. The services will initially be available to around 12 million households. Here is an article from Chinaview. The Daily Yomiuri reports that small local TV stations are at a disadvantage due to high costs of the new technology."

Comments

Of course!

[Kris_J]

Since migration to digital TV is going so well in the rest of the world...

I'll get a digital TV tuner when one is bundled in a video game console that I want. That's why I have a DVD player.

digital Soupy Sales

[davejenkins]

Digital, fine. I'm still convinced that Soupy Sales is running the networks here.

This still won't improve Japanese television much. All the shows come down to 4 types:

1. Simplistic travelogues to remote regions of Japan, where some little Tokyo cutiepie samples the local ramen, miso soup, and makes smirking comments about the funny accents when talking to some old man (NHK)
   
2. Two or three guys hanging around in some little bar, making snide comments about the girls they bring on the show, while idolizing their rice rockets (FujiTV)
   
3. Trivia game shows (with trivia so obscure that the shows _must_ be rigged) with the panel of stars (think matchgame 75 crossed with Jackpot)
   
4. Samurai weekly adventures on the level of "Gunsmoke" or "Rockford Files"
   

/glad I haven't invested in that plasma TV yet

Re:digital Soupy Sales

[dbleoslow]

You forgot, --Cooking shows --Cooking shows with celebraties --Cooking shows with celebraties going to resturaunts and trying food. --More cooking shows I swear I don't know how Japanese people are so damn skinny. All they talk about is food. Maybe that's the answer! Just talk about food long enough and you'll eventually trick yourself into thinking you've eaten!

Re:digital Soupy Sales

[macshit]

I agree that J TV often sucks, but hey, so does U.S. TV (UK TV, OTOH, is far better than both).

But still there's a fair amount that's entertaining, if not very highbrow, e.g.:

• Wacky public service shows, like a half-hour long celebrity extragavanza on how to properly freeze food or put your recycyling out on the curb (really).
  
• Anything involving that comedy duo of the tall blonde cheerful looking guy with a mohawk, and the short stubby bitter looking guy with the really thick glasses (what the hell are their names?). They seem to have hosted a million wacky shows, and all of those I've seen have been very funny (like the one where they [and their cohorts] had 1 minute 30 seconds to perform these bizarre skits involving Complicated and Very Strenuous Actions, with no prior rehearsals)
  
• Spooky Mysterious `This Really Happened' [Could it be ... Satan?!?] shows. I think these are really well-done, much spookier than the equivalent shows I've seen in the U.S.
  
• Cross-dressing comedy
  
• Shows involving pain

Re:digital Soupy Sales

[BJH]

The comedy duo you're thinking of is Kyai-n.
I gave up watching them when they did a late-night show where Udo Suzuki (the tall one) got fucked in the ass by a drag queen.

(Moderators: Yes, that really happened. No, this is not a troll.)

A little quick?

[Trbmxfz]

Viewers will replace about 100 million old TV sets

Hmm... Just 8 years for the population to replace all of their TVs sounds a little quick. Or does absolutely everyone in Japan replace their equipment way often?

Wouldn't lots of people be pissed off if such a change was announced in the USA? Your opinions are welcome.

Re:A little quick?

[strelitsa]

From my experience here so far, yes, people do replace their stuff - especially electronics - quite often.

As a formerly penurious American living in Japan, you haven't lived until you've gone on a "gomie" pile run with a truck and a few friends, right after Golden Week. Perfectly-good furniture, carpets, and household furnishings, all on the trash pile because the Japanese family wanted to buy THIS year's model instead.

Talk about your wretched excess. (I STILL have a coffee table from a gomie pile in my home, 15 years later).

Will it be compatible with the US digital standard

[Samir Gupta]

One of the great things about Japan is that it's on the NTSC video system, same as the US, so you can easily use Japanese video gadgets in the USA (other than region codes of course). Even though the frequencies for over the air broadcasts are different, if you use a separate tuner box, it's not an issue.

This definitely makes life much easier for electronics (DVD, VCR, game console) makers as well, as they can market a product in two of the the world's three largest electronics markets with minimal internal modification. But will the same compatibility hold once we enter the digital era?

Surprised that they are so far behind Europe ...

[hattig]

Sure, our digital broadcasts aren't HDTV quality over here, but we've had Digital TV via Satellite for over 5 years now, and over cable and terrestrial for not that much shorter a time. Digital TV receivers are virtually free now (a non-subscription box can be had for around 50 pounds, so that shows how cheap the hardware is).

So why the costs for receivers are so high in Japan I don't know ... I suspect price gauging of the poor old consumer, even if the receivers are more modern and HDTV, etc.

HDTV capable TV sets are still extremely expensive though, but they aren't a necessity for receiving digital TV.

2011?

[Talez]

Australia is like technology backwater and we're killing off analog TV by the end of 2008.

I doubt the US will ever see conversion

[0x0d0a]

I'm starting to suspect that the United States will never see conversion.

We have fast enough and cheap enough hardware now that it's feasible (nicer) home connections to stream down much-better-than-TV video over an Internet connection. There are a number of improvements to make in upstream distribution structure, but ultimately, despite the fact that IP currently provides essentially nothing by way of real-time guarantees, my guess is that we'll slowly start seeing more and more Internet-based systems. It just doesn't make sense to have a single purpose dedicated system just for TV.

I suspect that those cheap consumer broadband routers will start having a "smart bandwidth allocation" feature that the ISP will also grok which guarantees real-time delivery (well, over the last and slowest leg of the trip). It wouldn't be a very difficult system to devise -- system on local network allocates bandwidth from router, router talks to upstream system.

A healthy amount of precaching would be important -- this could be an issue in sports, where having a sub-one-minute precache is essential to many hardcore fans. It'd work wonderfully for almost anything else, though.

Digital TV NOT= picture quality

[Fidigit]

We need to debunk this idea the widely held view that digital TV will provide better quality picture.

While it is true that it _can_ provide better quality, it can also provide _lower_ quality. It is all down to how much compression the broadcaster puts on the video.

This is more than amply illustrated by the UK digital satellite broadcasts by Sky, where compression artifacts are highly noticeable. An example being the green pitches during soccer matches. The high compression looks at the pitch and says, that all looks quite similar, and renders it as a big green blocky splodge.

Spectrum is a valuable commodity, do you really think commercial broadcasters are going to "waste" it on picture quality, when they could squeeze in another three TV channels - ignoring all of the extra advertising revenue that could bring?

Meanwhile, in Osaka...

[windside]

As far as English news sources in Japan go, I've always found the Daily Yoimuri highly dubious and I really don't see how a Chinese newspaper is relevant. Here's the story from the Japan Times, which I read this morning over my granola, thinking "Jeez, I should send this to Slashdot."

This story is pretty close to my heart since I'm working on a project in Japan right now that aspires to distribute digital TV content via the internet instead of conventional channels. My understanding is that every major electronics manufacturer in Japan is working on the same sort of thing, so reading that the Japanese government "has vowed to phase out analog broadcasting by 2011" doesn't necessarily mean that this country is headed the same way as the US. As usual, Japan will most likely do its own thing.

HDTV broadcasts, not HDTV cable

[stiller]

It is in fact silly to think that in 8 years, every television will have to be replaced by a HDTV because of a sudden revolution.
Why, already a large number of people have broadband internet connections in their home. (At least here in Europe you can easily get 8Mbit for a very reasonable price)
So chances are, in 1 or 2 years, some bright mind will start providing for all early adopting tech geeks by streaming HDTV standard compliant video from his website. This would only require an upgrade of whatever media player they'll be using.
Soon after people will develop cheap (linux based, ofcourse!) standalone players that only require a monitor and an xDSL connection. A surge in HDTV set sales will be the result.
Why should HDTV emerge from the same, centrally directed, mass-oriented cable companies? When did they develop something new? It will happen, but not in the form you're thinking of.

Re:Surprised that they are so far behind Europe ..

[Anonymous Coward]

Um... they have digital satellite and cable in japan too(who the hell do you think makes or at leasts sells those devices)

Also have you seen the price for ANYTHING in japan. The prices in japan in general are high.

I have a friend from Japan, and she would go shooping in New york city and spend lots of $$$$ and she would say she was amazed at how cheap everything was.

All I want to know is what are they going to do with all the old signals? Will amature radio/tv geeks be allowed to use them?