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Will America's Favorite Technology Go Dark?
Ant wrote to mention that MSNBC is reporting on the upcoming proposed digital television switchover planned for the end of 2006. From the article: "That's the date Congress targeted, a decade ago, for the end of analog television broadcasting and a full cutover to a digital format. If enforced, that means that overnight, somewhere around 70 million television sets now connected to rabbit ears or roof-top antennas will suddenly and forever go blank, unless their owners purchase a special converter box. Back when the legislation was written, New Year's Eve 2006 probably looked as safely distant as the dark side of the moon. But now that date is right around the corner and Congress and the FCC are struggling mightily to figure out what to do."
Perhaps they should delay the switchover if they're not ready.
Back in 1996, when the digital television transition was first proposed, media analyst Gary Arlen observed wryly that "it will be easier for Congress to take away Social Security than television sets."
They can take my TV set out of my cold.... oh wait, let me see what ad-free dvd movie to watch first...
Expect congress to push the date back or be swamped with rednecks bitching about their TV.
Like the brave Ithacans who faced down the deadly cyclops, these legislators are facing down the awful realities of trying to legislate technological progress. And like the Ithacans, they are getting their heads dashed against the rocks and eaten.
Well, the government had either lift the regulation or start subsidizing these sets somehow. Oh wait, that comes out of our taxpayer money... For the people by the people my ass if this goes through without some kind of recompense. The market simply isn't ready for it...
But on the bright side, what a way to get your average Joe to take a look at the government and the way it operates than to turn off his idiot tube. Not that this regulation was all bad -- it was to spur on development. Would that they'd do away wth IP patents in the same way.
We'll see. In this case, the revolution may really NOT be televised.
...in the UK, this is already happening, region by region - even though the official switchover isn't until 2008 or so. The first switchover was to a small area of Wales (with a smallish population), who decided by public vote (around 95% in favour) to switch off the analogue transmissions completely. I think my area (south west england/south wales) is scheduled next, although not for a year or so. Obviously, it's a lot easier to provide digital signals to the whole of the UK than it is to the entire of the US.
Of course, it's also to the UK (and I guess the US's) government's benefit, since by switching off early they can sell of the frequencies earlier, and get cash sooner.
These TVs aren't exactly obsolete -- they can still function as monitors for game systems, video tapes, DVDs, etc., etc. The question is how expensive these converter boxes will be. I might be willing to shell out the money for one of those, attach it to the oldest functioning TV set I can find, and have a nice retro piece.
Here in sweeden is simlar situation, but we will proceed with the conversion. Some part of the country is now switching, and I will get switched in late 2006.
Off course "officially" I have no TV...
------- In the end there are no begining
Its TV turnoff week people!
I don't want to read
Personally, I would find it hilarious to see the aftermath of all this.
Just imagine: millions of rednecks and fat bastards on welfare with too many kids marching from over the hillside a la civil-war front-line style, raising rabit ears over their heads, pulling their circa 1970 TV sets in their little red Radio Flyer wagons, screaming some indiscernible southern hick yella-belly gibberish that amounts to "give us tv or give us death", the ground trembling as they aproach, the stench overwhelming even though they are downwind, their tattered and soiled clothes barely covering the numerous warts and rashes, legislators running in horror, asking "why allah, why oh why?!?!"
Yeh, that would be funny.
Hubble telescope, anyone?
The reason that no one really gives a damn about switching over is that most people have cable or satellite, while those of us (including myself, still on rabbit ears) just don't think American television is damn good enough to pay for. The Brits bitch about their TV licences, but at least they get kick-ass television and television news that is second to none. I would gladly pay it. But am I going to buy a converter box to watch American TV? No - I barely even watch the rabbit ears now - my TV is basically a device for watching VHS tapes on. It's a slightly bigger screen to invite friends over to look at (instead of the computer monitor) and to be frank, I don't know if it's worthwhile to lug to my new apartment when my lease is up. And if you want me to subsidize this farce? The only way you will get me to support subsidizing television is if either the companies that put television on the air start putting on some shows worth watching or we move to an "all stations are publically financed and owned by the government" BBC-like model. I plan to solve the problem by living in another country by the time that New Years Even 2006 rolls around, but this has been a clusterf*ck at the FCC. The waste of HDTV bandwidth and the utter mismanagement of this FCC, spending more time looking for nipples than caring about technology. The corporations squatted the spectrum, didn't do anything with it... why hasn't the FCC responded with the only possible course of action and removed their licences!
Keep in mind, the original legislation did state that 85% of the TV viewership must be on digital TV before they will simply turn it off: "Under federal law, analog service will continue until most homes (85%) in an area are able to watch the DTV programming." (from http://www.dtv.gov/consumercorner.html#needanewtv)
MSNBC is just making news of a moot point. Granted, they mentioned this in the text, too: "That's where the Congressional loophole comes in. Congress can ignore the end-of-2006 cut-off if fewer than 85 percent of households have digital television sets."
I really hate the media.
Maybe not for you, but you're forgetting that many household have more than 2 televisions (we have 6). At $70 each, that's $420.
Even if prices were to drop to, say, $50 each, that's still $300.
I say wait until these devices are less expensive to manufacture first, like when they're closer to $20.
Here in (currently) rainy England, one can buy for not very much money a set top box that provides free access to the most popular channels, with more available on subscription or through regular satellite or cable providers. The price of the boxes has fallen to below £50 and the convenience they bring - such as electronic program guides and reminders, plus the significant improvement in picture and audio quality, makes them worthwhile. Therefore, most people buy them and buy them for their relatives too who may not be able to afford or understand what they have to do. (I'm buying one for my Mum.) This is probably going to happen in the USA, and just as people worried some would be left behind in the digital revolution - yet were not, same with the great digital switchover. Market forces and kindness will save the day.
O'WONDERWe're working on it.
Every network affiliate around here has an HD broadcast also. I think it's been a requirement for a while now.
I don't understand why most "HDTV's" are actually HD monitors with no tuners though. That pisses me off.
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. - James Madison
Haha, that's a good one. :)
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
Oh, but "they" are as ready as they can be.
The driving force behind the legislation to abolish analog TV is the big media companies, who want to "plug the analog hole". That's why this is happening simultaneously in most of the industrialized world, despite the fact that no consumers have asked for it anywhere.
Their motive isn't to give you better quality pictures or (God forbid!) more choice. They want to force everybody to switch to digital because only digital technologies support strong DRM restrictions.
They can't retroactively change the court cases from the 70's that declared it legal to record TV shows on video for your own use. But by introducing new technology that makes it impossible to do so, they can make the legal point moot.
And by switching from analog to digial, they move away from the legal area where a reasonable balance has been struck between the interests of consumers and copyright holders, and into DMCA territory, where you're more or less classified as a terrorist if you even try to tamper with the copy protection.
I apologize for being so dystopian.
Christian Engström, Former Member of the European Parliament 2009-2014 for The Pirate Party, Sweden
The quality of the PICTURE isn't so much the issue with TV, it's the quality of the PROGRAMMING.
Give me something worth watching first, then worry about improving the definition.
"Survivor", "Joey", and "American Idol" in 1080i are still crap, they're just crap in high resolution.
Sure, we voted the lawmakers in didn't we?
It's the will of the people or something like that.
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. - James Madison
I've never heard a non geek complain about picture quality on an average broadcast TV. Unless it's a signal strength problem or a failing TV, consumers don't care. NTSC is good enough.
Look at the number of people who download TV shows. The quality really isn't as good as a broadcast but people love it anyway.
The electronics companies needed a way to revolutionize the industry. The consumer isn't driving this revolution.
Just like IBM's Microchannel and Intel's Rambus fiasco, this "improvement" will probably be rejected by the consumer. Online (streaming and/or downloadable) TV may take a big chunk out of the broadcast TV market.
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. - James Madison
What a great story to start off National TV-Turnoff Week.
We don't see the world as it is, we see it as we are.
-- Anais Nin
It sounds like a good idea to just do this suddenly. I think a lot of Americans might decide to go outside and get some exercise if suddenly they couldn't watch TV or couldn't afford upgrades. Then again, maybe they'll start a riot, and use their defunct TVs to smash store windows once the mayhem ensues.
That means if the TV sets go dark on new year's eve 2006 the US is expecting a baby boom in autumn 2006.
More digital television means actually less television for the mass market, which in turn means less control of the population, and ultimately more democracy. It might force people to buy a newspaper to learn the news, instead of watching useless mind-altering garbage TV shows for 5 or more hours per day.
I have dozens of devices that can generate a video signal. My old TV is not going to go blank, even if I never watch a DTV signal ever.
Tuesday morning, DirectTV is going to be putting up a new bird, the Spaceway 1.
"After a checkout period, Spaceway 1 will go into service this summer to begin DIRECTV's new program offering for both national and local high-definition channels to its customers across the United States. It will later be joined by three other satellites to fully implement the system by 2007."
"By 2007, the number of high-definition channels will be expanded to over 1,500, and DIRECTV says its next-generation services will be able to reach every U.S. household."
"Spaceway 1 carries a two-meter transmit antenna with full steering ability that can form multiple spot beams to customize programming in different regions of the country. This communications payload has a total bandwidth capacity of about 10 gigabytes per second."
I find this preferable to our government's enforced upgrades, although I can see the arguments for more efficient bandwidth usage.
More info
No more distraction for the masses through television? Which results in the masses becoming interested in politics. This is definitely not in the politician's interest, I therefore don't think they will be shutting down the television service for all those people
This is NOT a conversion from analogue TV to HDTV. It is a conversion from analogue TV to digital TV and there is a BIG difference. Does sending a digital signal allow the broadcasting station to send a HDTV broadcast? Yes. Do they HAVE to transmit a HDTV broadcast? NO. The fact is a lot of consumers, how many I do not know, already have the capability to receive a digital transmission. This is done through a variety of methods such as subscribing to a cable or satellite service. Folks with either of those services will likely not notice a change.
Now the folks with an old analogue only TV set that are receiving their signal from rabbit ears are going to notice a change once the analogue signals are shut off. Some may subscribe to satellite or cable I suppose but there will likely be a fair amount that do not wish to and will complain LOUDLY. It will only get louder if the ATSC tuner boxes necessary to get their sets working with the new signal are too expensive. The other option of course will be to buy a set with an ATSC tuner built in but a lot of folks won't like doing that either.
Right now I would say it's quite probable that the switchover will be delayed.
Wasn't the reason to switch over to digital was to conserve radio frequencies? If you take a look at the current United States Frequency Allocations - The Radio Spectrum, you'll notice that there's several really big chunks taken up by tv broadcasting. and with the fact that cable companies are required to provide basic cable tv service for a minimal price (~$8/month), which isn't much imo, they can free up those blocks of frequencies for something more useful/important.
HD Trailers
To quote from BoingBoing:
Among other things, it explains WHY a date was set for a crossover to HDTV. Sure TV works just fine now, so why switch you ask? Actually, it's NOT about trying to sell the public new TVs. It sounds simple, but that's a very narrow view that doesn't see the whole picture and all the politics behind what's going on. The linked article sheds quite a bit of light on that.Maybe they are afraid that if this happens, a lot of Americans will miss out on the TV propaganda. What would happen then?
eat shiat and bark at the moon
You aren't the only ones to get shafted. Over here the switchover dates are different for each region. The shutoff dates are already fixed since they involve termination of long-term contracts. However, the go live dates of Digital TV are not so fixed.
The region I live in was promised DVB-T for the 18th of April. However the powers that be decided that 1 million people where not worth the hassle of installing digital infrastructure (By the way, Germany is about 15 times as densly popuated as the US). And when did they tell us? Beginnning of April.
So all those people who bought DVB-T Receivers are now royally screwed. Still Analogue TV was shut off with very little noise, like one article in the local paper on Saturday the 16th, complete with a big ad from the cable service.
Satelite dishes are now sold out. We were lucky to get one for my mother-in-law who was freaking out so we had to install it as quickly as possible and she still owes us the money for the dish. Funnily enough it was about 25% more expensive than the identical one we bought for ourselves two years ago.
I think you will get screwed the same way. DVB-T will only be available in very high density population centres. The rest can go buy a dish and find a wall to fix it on. Don't suppose otherwise even if you are bombarded with ads about how good DVB-T will be and that you should buy the box while it's cheap.
-- Put crudely, the world is an extremely large problem instance. (Russel/Norvig Artificial Intelligence)
I am attached to my TV. And my TiVo. And cable (or satellite, or IPTV, or whatever they come up with next). It provides me with information and entertainment. TV has been a part of my life since I can remember. I used to wonder what people did before Nickelodeon and MTV.
The three-network powers of yore are about to get a much-needed shot in the arm (or perhaps the butt, if their core cheapo analog viewers decide to upgrade to cable instead of buying a digital converter).
I don't really even know who watches over-the-air broadcast television, other than people who can't/won't/don't pay for cable BUT still love TV enough to own a set.
Essentially what I'm implying is that people who currently don't pay for cable or satellite (a) cannot pay for it, or (b) don't want the advanced features or channels.
Therefore, almost every single benefit of digital broadcasts are almost entirely irrelevant. Receiving an HD picture on a 13 inch analog television won't look any better (and will cost those consumers $50-$100 to buy the converter). Moreover, those who don't want the advanced features or multitude of channels aren't going to suddenly buy a big-screen HDTV to watch broadcast channels in high definition, just because their black-and-white in the kitchen doesn't receive Maury Povich anymore.
While I think it is wise and important to reapportion our available spectrum as new technology becomes available and matures, I doubt the legislative mandate to push analog TV into obsolescence is important or a worthwhile use of our legislative, financial, and technological resources.
(As a side note, isn't broadcast television dying, or just turning into one of the pack, anyway? We are no longer bound to the three-network oligarchy, and I fail to see why we should keep supporting that establishment legislatively).
At least in Australia.......
...
The standard was screwed up (I can't recall the details, go for a google, but I'm pretty sure we're low on bandwidth)
Anyhow EVERY instance I've seen of digital (free to air) in Australia is _EXTREMELY_ over-compressed,..
Sure the resolution is "spiffy" but when you're seeing colour "block" screwups (sorry, don't know the term) or very "off white" whites due to compression it just annoys the heck out of you.
Now sure we should all start getting HDTV's (1920x1080i or 1280x720p) and even HD-DVD's but the actual HD-TV I've seen has honestly been really really bad
Okay people, calm down. We are only talking about Over-The-Air broadcasts here. Which I think some of you have forgotten. From the article, 85% of Americans get their TV from Cable or Satellite. That means only 15% are going to be shit out of luck. To be honest, things should just switch off on Jan 1, 2006 and cut all analog broadcasts. It would be nice to see the government quasi-encouraging technology for a change instead of stifling it.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
Here in Italy, the switch is sheduled for 31 december 2006.
What's "fun" is that nobody was even considering it until some four years ago. The move was decided in a rush, and the government granted *150 euros* to anyone who buys a decoder. That is, 100% of the price for many brands (incidentally, if you're 16 you can get just slightly more to buy a PC). Why all this generosity?
Well, it happens that, as you may know, italian prime minister Berlusconi also own 3 of the 7 major channels (3 of the remaining ones being state owned). To contrast this monopolist position a law was passed years ago limiting to two the channels a single corp can control. Berlusconi managed to ingore it until 2003, when he ruled that if DT had been adopted by the majority of italians by 2006. The rest is history. What blows me is that it seems most people just don't get that *they* are paying for the decoder they are getting "for free" from the store.
That's why I for one don't welcome our new DVB-T overlords...
Well, which is it? Is the population actively anti-intellectual or is it really the legal parasites and their masters? To claim that the population is anti-intellectual I think gives them too much credit. As long as there's some chick with big cans on the tube or a reality show to watch I think the population cares not.
I'd go with the legal parasites.
As much as I am for moving technology forward, this topic really pisses me off. We still cannot get cable / broadband at my house, and now they want to shut off analog broadcasting? Uhm hello? Shouldn't you have a infrastructure that supports digital communication in place before pulling the plug?
Kiteboarding Gear Mention slashdot and get 10% off!
In the Americas, the ATSC standard for terrestrial broadcasting that will be replacing NTSC. Instead of the channel allocation that DVB is using, ATSC retains the existing scheme and every local station gets another channel to broadcast on. The digital channels also have as much bandwidth as their analog counterparts, which allows for either high definition programming or simulcasting as many as six standard definition programs on one channel.
For example: WGBH is channel 2 in Boston but they run an ATSC digital simulcast on channel 19. With an ATSC tuner, you can tune in to the channel just by selecting 2 and the tuner reroutes it. When WGBH simulcasts, you can view programs on channels 2.1, 2.2, etc.
I think the problem is that high definition programming is being pushed but nobody is buying tuners. HDTV sets often don't include a built-in digital tuner, and most people who want DTV are getting QAM-standard converter boxes from their cable and satellite providers.
Since I'm studying in Munich right now, I look around at electronics stores and see plenty of DVB-PAL converters. People know that they will need them. Unfortunately, I think Americans without Cable TV are generally uninformed about the new equipment they will need. There are ATSC tuners that will work with NTSC TV sets but nobody is buying them and I haven't seen any retailing for less than $150.
I don't have a television, haven't had one for about 9 years, don't miss it, except for Red Green.
I watch TV when I stay in a hotel, stay with family, etc. I never have the desire to get one of my own.
We think that advertisements don't affect us because we don't immediately rush out and buy a Big Mac (Whopper, Coke/Pepsi/Shasta, Bud/Miller/Michelob, Ford/GM/Toyota, whatever) instantly every time we see a commercial. Try doing without TV for a year and see what happens to your purchasing habits. For me, I noticed the biggest difference in less desire to see movies.
I don't think that TV is inherently evil (though it does tend to totally dominate any room it's in, even when off). I do check out DVD's from my local library and watch them on the computer.
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories
Great quote:
That sounds about right...!
Within the next 90 days, start selling a $19.95 device at WalMart that includes a digital antenna and RF converter box. Then start running an informercial which loudly screams "Don't get left behind, if your TV is not digital by 2007, you won't be able to watch American Idol! It's like getting a whole new TV for just $19.95 plus $12.95 shipping and handling! ACT NOW! We take credit cards..." Run this for a couple of months, followed by a bunch of fast-talking 30-second spots that run every 7 minutes on all major channels.
I guarantee you that every Joe Schmoe and their grandma will have one within 18 months, including the 4 ladies on the bus who spent 25 minutes the other day trying to convince their friend to go "AOL for Broadband" on a new SBC DSL connection...
(They also tried to figure out what DSL stood for. They settled on "Digital Satellite Link." I was behind them supressing laughter. I would have politely given them as much tech info as they wanted, but they seemed like the type of people who don't like smart-asses 20-somethings making them feel stupid by actually providing unsolicited factual information.)
This is a classic example of that truism. Most people don't need, don't want, and can't afford new televisions throughout their house, and I would guess are more or less happy with their current analog pictures. The government shouldn't be forcing this down everyones throats. And the idea that the government would pay to subsidize converters for low income households is ludicrous, when there are people within even the US that do not have enough money to eat.
Oh the travesty! Imagine the horrors: families talking with one another, people reading books, or [gasp] exercising. How will America's youth compete in the global economy of tommorrow if they don't get the recommended daily allowance of One Day to Live, When Desperate Housewives Attack, or Oxy-Clean infomercials?
This one gang kept wanting me to join cause I'm pretty good with a bo staff.
As someone who's made the unfortunate switch over to digital satellite TV, I can say I hate it.
In an analog transmission, if the signal gets weak, I get a bit of snow in the overall picture. In a digital transmission a weak signal results in ugly "garbage" data (squares, pixels, weird colors, black spots and sound clicks and drops).
In an analog transmission, the full clear picture is a full clear picture. In a digital transmission, I can see MPEG artifacts everywhere (most noticeable next to sharp edges, like credits and subtitles, and in subtle gradients). It's in NO way a better picture than analog!
Useful site about ATSC, its pros and cons:i ndex.sh tml
http://www.tvtechnology.com/features/atsc/
Excellent timing on the article, since today is the start of TV-TURNOFF WEEK 2005
Servus,
actually in germany there now seems to be an interresting development. Since terrestrial TV-transmission is relatively expensive, compared to satellite transmissions, commercial stations are stopping to transmit terrestrially in some less populated areas at all. When the analog transmitters get turned off, they will only have a choice of about 5-6 public TV channels over the air.
But here nobody really cares. Free to Air satellite is just normal here (unless you live in an apartment building) and you can get more channels that way anyhow. And even on satellite a large share of the users already moved to digital, despite of the fact that the digital signal is worse most of the time.
In the US, digital television would have a lot more potential. Everyone can see the difference, at least in newer productions. With digital TV you can get real colour television, perhaps with HDTV even in a better resolution. (Note that PAL already has 576 lines instead of the 480 lines of NTSC).
Unfortunately the broadcast flag will ruin it all.
Until Wal-Mart can sell $100 Digital TV's, this just isn't going to happen. If not, the converter better be cheap. The money made on beer ads and McDonald's commercials dwarfs the severity of the situation.
"You know me, Marge! I like my TV loud, my beer cold, and my signal analog!"
I'm from a very small farming community. They don't have cable, they don't have high speed internet, the cows out number the people there.
To get channels besides local stations people have to get satellite. It's not that bad really, I like satellite more than I like cable. But didn't congress pass a law several years ago saying satellite providers couldn't carry local channels and they couldn't provide locals from other markets?
So congress (in effect) is saying that they can't have antenna's to watch local TV, and they can't use satellite to watch local TV, but they don't get cable to be able to watch.
?????
J
Abiit, excessit, evasit, erupit.
Actually, if you look at the history, most of the content companies lobbied against the digital switchover. They felt that things were just fine as they were. TV is the main competitor of the movies. Anything which improves television is going to cut into their movie market. Only once the switchover was approved and actually started to be implemented did they begin to argue for the broadcast flag. It only got added a year ago, after all commercial stations were already required to have digital broadcasts. The broadcast flag also doesn't plug the "analog hole" because it still allows a low resolution output of the signal. The same composite video out that your current TV provides to your VCR can be used on your new TV even when the broadcast flag is on. You just can't provide high definition video signals to non-5c compliant devices.
The broadcasters were also mostly against it because they, at very least, have to buy new transmission equipment, operate two broadcast antennas for a while, potentially provide more programming, and deal with a host of new technical issues.
Really, only two groups benefit from this: consumers who get better TV (and with digital tuners mandated to be in all TVs over 27 inches soon, the cost of tuners is going to come down sharply) and equipment makers who get to sell everyone a new TV and/or converter box.
Keith Irwin
... 5 ... 4 ... 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...
... hiss ...
It's got my vote!
DVB-T for digital terrestrial television broadcasting is a totally different modulation standard than DVB-S, the satellite broadcasting standard.
DVB-T is based on COFDM modulation, which a lot of people think is inherently better than 8-VSB, the modulation scheme for ATSC. But in truth, the newest receivers for ATSC that can handle multiple reflected signals (ghosts) do just about as good a job.
DVB-S is based on single carrier phase-shift modulation, generally QPSK. The new DVB-S2 offers a high quality 8PSK modulation mode as well for higher bandwidth.
No blood for digital TV!
The idea of "forcing" large numbers of people, including low income or rural populations, to purchase expensive converters or new TV's is offensive. It smacks of the same sort of simony involved with the pay-for-weather sites trying to force noaa.gov to stop providing free online weather feeds so that they can force taxpayers to pay for the feeds.
Granted there is nothing on analog broadcasts worth watching, but nations do need simple, broadcast media for government communications, emergency communications and other items which fall within the national interest.
As someone who has watched a Digital signal and an analog signal, I can say that Digital quality is WORSE than analog when viewed through a NTSC set. Things may be different under HDTV, but when viewed through "standard" TV sets, the digital signal is inferior.
Consider a scene that is mostly a single color, such as characters under moonlight (mostly blueish) or a submarine action movie where they are about in the murky depths (also mostly blueish scene).
In an analog signal, the light to dark blue is graduated evenly, while the digital signal shows banding and other digital artifacts, because there aren't enough "blue" colors in the digital compression scheme.
I've also watched many episodes of StarGate SG1 under digital where the Audio and Video were out of sync, and it wound up looking like a bad quicktime movie played on an underpowered computer and the characters lips flapped, but the voices were just a fraction of a second out of sync -- it still looked really weird.
Maybe it's just my shitty provider (comcast), but damn, digital is so bad, it makes me want to throw out my TV.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
TV isn't always about entertainment though. When 9-11 happened the first thing I did on hearing about it was flip the tube on to see the news reports. Yes, radio also broadcasts news but sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words.
For some, a TV can be a window into the rest of the world. Much as I think television is overwatched, it still does have some redeeming qualities.
"Do you honestly think that reading is inherently better than TV"
Yes yes. A thousand times yes.
Or have I been trolled?
Here's the difference between UK and US TV:
On UK TV, you have all the stuff that's worth watching packed into three or four channels. (BBC2, Channel 4, BBC1... er... that's about it.)
On US TV, you have almost exactly the same amount of TV that's worth watching, but it's spread across about a dozen channels, and you can only get those by subscribing to about a hundred channels.
The answer is ReplayTV or TiVo. You tell it what you want to watch, and it goes away and searches the hundreds of channels and finds the 3 channels' worth of stuff that's worth watching. It also lets you skip the obnoxious ads.
I tried watching US TV without a PVR, and it's just impossible. You have to dedicate an hour or two to reading the centimeters-thick TV guide each week, you have to track where FOX have moved your show to this week, you have to sit through the ads without going into a homicidal rage, and so on. The reward-to-effort ratio is way too low.
This is why Americans who get TiVo liken it to a religious experience, and say "You'll have my TiVo when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers". It turns US TV into something approaching UK TV.
Anyway, as far as the original topic goes... I don't see it as that big of a deal if they just go ahead with the switchover. Nobody who gets cable or satellite will even notice. How many people get their TV via bunny ears anyway?
Rural America doesn't get its TV via bunny ears. My in-laws live in rural America. They all have satellite dishes, because there's no way you'll pick up TV via a set-top antenna out on the prairies. No, the people who will be hit by this are predominantly poor people who live in cities and suburbs, and culture snobs who think they're too good for TV but occasionally sneak a fix (see examples in this discussion). 90% of the problem could probably be fixed by capping the price of basic cable.
Anyone have any actual statistics on how many people receive TV via bunny ears?
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
There are people in this country who can't afford to eat three decent meals a day. And congress, who's salaries we pay, is spending real, actual time worrying about how these people are going to watch TV.
Maybe I'm just being naive, but I don't see why congress needs to give a crap about analog TV being around. Let the market decide when it's time to switch over to digital.
First I would like to point out that number of 70 million people who get their television from rabbit ears or roof top ant. is a complete fabrication. that means that roughly 1 in every 7 people do not have cable or satelite? The actual number is probably closer to 700,000 than 70,000,000. The research would be pretty easy take all the service providers numbers add them together and then subtract them from 100,000,000 (population divided by 3 to set for families). Just take a drive through a rural area (pick West Virginia or North Dakota) and count the percentage of houses without a dish. You will find that number is less than 30 %. The main point I want to make is that they are approaching this from the wrong angle. They are putting the burden on the consumer. They need to put the burden on the manufacturers and service providers. They need to stick to the date of New Years 2006 for the requirement of the stations to have their HD broadcast up. If they don't take away their liscense. The 2 other steps they need to address are education and the supply chain. They need to set a date about a year from now, lets say June 1 2006 to be the last day for the manufacture or importation of televisions with an analog tuner unless the television also has a digital tuner. That will begin to bleed the supply of analog only sets out of the population. This will slowly deplete the number of people with an analog only set as the life span for televisions isn't that great any more. The second step is education. They need to require that all stations that have an FCC liscense broadcast 2 Public Service announcements explaining the date of the swtich and the reasons for it. One of these announcements would have to be during Prime Time Television. The final step would be setting a realistic date for the end of the analog broadcast. I believe the date of January 1 2011 would be perfect. This would be 5 years from the date of the last analog only broadccast, and would allow for ample time for the bleeding of all the analog only sets. This would address the real issue: People do not understand anything about this law. The average person doesn't understand what digital TV or High Definition TV is. Most people who have digital cable or satelite think they have High Definition service. This plan would make sure that everyone had a better understanding, and would put the burden on the large companies that control the television instead of the individuals. If anyone in the FCC or congress is reading this feel free to have my ideas. I believe ideas and thoughts are free despite what larget corporations would lead you to believe.
If your tv goes blank, spend time with your family instead..
Read a book..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It will be like that episode of the Simpsons where all the kids come out side, rub their eyes from the sun they haven't seen, and begin to do all the things kids should be doing.. running, playing, etc...
-- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
Ever since I killed mt cable connection, my time spent reading slashdot has greatly increased. Now instead of spending hours each day veging out to mindless brain rot, I spend hours each day participating in insightfull, interesting, and funny conversation.
Nice Marmot
"Give a man a fish and he will ask for tartar sauce and French fries!"