Billion Dollar Handout To Upgrade TVs

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday March 13, 2007 @10:55AM from the if-we-can-send-a-man-to-the-moon dept.

db32 writes "SFGate has the story of the cutoff date for those rabbit ear antennas that some of us grew up with (Feb. 19, 2009). Now while the story of analog vs. digital TV has been beaten to death, still I think there is something more here. 'The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration... said it is setting aside $990 million to pay for the boxes. Each home can request up to two $40 coupons for a digital-to-analog converter box, which consumer electronics makers such as RCA and LG plan to produce.' Beyond my disdain for most TV to begin with, I am blown away that with all of our current problems — homelessness and crime on the home front, war fighting and terrorism abroad — our government is seriously going to spend this much money on upgrading peoples' televisions."

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Investment by govt to allow reclaiming of spectrum by fact0r · 2007-03-13 12:28 · Score: 0, Redundant

By paying for everyone to get a digital set-top-box the government brings forward the time they can turn off analogue transmissions.

Presumably once analogue transmissions can be turned off the government stands to generate substantial income in re-auctioning the recovered radio spectrum.