You're Gonna Love the Digital Transition

Today we all become digital. Thanks to Congress, which passed a law mandating this transition a few years ago, all analog life in these United States will cease and everything will be transformed from waves and particles into bits and bytes. Anybody who doesn't have a converter to make him or herself into a digital entity will simply disappear off the face of the earth.

We've had plenty of warning time on this. In fact, the transition was supposed to take place over the winter, but it was clear that millions of Luddites, the clueless elderly and the occasional disassociated feeb had failed to heed the clarion call of progress and were in danger of fritzing out when the moment arrived. Mr. Obama quite rightly put off the moment until today, when fewer people are necessary to keep things running, this being the summer.

The move to digital was considered necessary by the massive Internet and telecommunications powerhouses like Gooogle (GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT), Verizon (VZ) and even Yahoo (YHOO), which wants to take all the bandwidth associated with formerly analog commerce and exploit it in some way they have yet to explain. Their lobbies were bigger than anybody else's, and better furnished, too. So the eventual outcome of the debate was never in doubt.

For most Americans, the transition will go smoothly. Those who have heeded Klaatu will have either already purchased a personal digital converter to be implanted in the soft tissue behind their ears or made some arrangement with their local cable company to rent one. Those who have not? It's been nice knowing you.

Comments

[rr52]

I live in Monroe County Michigan. I'm between Toledo, OH and Detroit. I've been complaining about the transition ever since I got my convertors. I used to get 16 channels between Ohio, Detroit, and Canada. I get nothing on my 13" Sharp Aquos with Terk amplified HD antenna. I get WJBK Fox Detroit only on another TV with a convertor box and RCA amplified antenna. And I get nothing with a convertor and powered UHF/VHF antenna on yet another TV. I'm out over $415 including Sharp Aquos TV and I have to buy an outdoor antenna. My aunt lives 10-15 miles west of me and gets nothing either. WXYZ Detroit flat out told me I would have to get an outdoor antenna. Lovely. Who's paying for that?

Digital signals are too weak after 26 mile range. People living outside of metro areas have no signal. I know about analog and digital. I have a big dish from years ago. My analog on my big dish used to suffer blackouts. A digital 4DTV receiver fixed that but it's a huge dish picking up that signal. Letting people think their UHF/VHF antenna or an amplified indoor antenna would work for this conversion was a bold lie. This is a move to force us to pay for everything even what used to be free airwaves and especially at a time when people cannot afford it. What a fiasco.

[Dampflok]

How long before it bubbles to the top that the cable companies are taking advantage of this by cutting back some of the prior service, and then charging more to get it back in the form of converter boxes for each TV.

Please note; this is not a self-righteous gripe, just a simple question. And how does a charge of self-righteousness relate to complaints about a degradation of service - or complete loss of same, for that matter? And how does a charge of self-righteousness relate to a person who decides to kiss off TV? Bully for them, I say.

[twocrows]

gee, after reading all this, I feel SO left out!

I can't complain about the signal -- mine is great.
I can't complain about how awful TV is -- I still love the history and discovery channels and even the occasional forays into some of the dramas.
I can't complain about how inconvenient it all is -- my cable company did all the work.

I actually enjoy being able to record stuff if I'm busy doing something else [like reading or visiting friends, f'rinstance] when a show I want to watch comes on.

I guess I'll have to limp along just enjoying my documentaries and be left out of all the self-righteous
b*tching.

[mbaty]

Yes, and now instead of being able to follow along with a slightly fuzzy picture and/or sound, it just skips like a dvd player, meaning words are dropped and pictures become impressionistic gobbledygook. Oh, and good luck tuning to all the stations at once. Remotes become obsolete because you still have to get up and adjust the antenna every time you change the channel. I'm hoping it improves. But hey, when it's working the picture sure is clear.

[carolrhill814]

I just feel badly about the people that can't afford the changes and will no longer have TV in any way shape or form and we can't even imagine how many people are going fall through the cracks.

[bayside]

Think when has congress ever done anything free for us as this is supposed to make our viewing pleasure more clear..They are up to something..

[GardenerNorCal]

What did we do with the money received from the auction of the analog airwaves? Anyone know?

And why expiration dates on the coupons for the converter boxes I know of least six that could not be used. Was that put back into the treasury for bailouts?

[CAPTAINSKIPPY]

My uncle was right - TV is trash, don't even bring it into your house. Yet I wonder, after cutting back to basic cable, should I just wait for the DVD collector set instead?

[werbenjagermanjensen]

A few years ago I bought a set that was advertised as being HDTV ready. I didn't find out until my local TV stations started broadcasting their first HDTV signals that it didn't actually have a tuner in it. So I bought one along with an indoors antenna (since my roof antenna was taken down many years ago when we had cable.) Guess what? Now that the HDTV conversion is complete, I can't pick up a thing. Even though I'm trying to tune in stations that are all within 25 miles of my home and there are no mountains or skyscrapers in the way, the fabulous new digital signals they're putting out are so much weaker than the analog ones (which I was getting fairly well before, even with no antenna whatsover) that my equipment cannot read them at all.

I decided a couple of years ago that the sludge that's currently on cable TV wasn't worth the $50 a month my local cable provider is charging for it, and from what I saw before the digital translation, what's on the broadcast networks is even worse. So it's no great loss. I'll give away my digital equipment, which was fairly cheap (I got it at Radio Shack) and maybe someone who lives next door to a TV station will be able to pick up something with it. It's okay, I can still watch videos.

[ImaSpeakonit]

I've been abandoning TV for years now. The coverage of the primaries and the general election are what put the final nails in it's coffin.

So for me, "It's goodbye tv, for good! I hope you rot like all those brains that you have for far too long!"

[paixa3]

Welcome to the non tele club. You will have time to read good books, read international journals and be MORE INFORMED than most of the couch potatoes in the USA.

I abandoned my television in 1985.

[philtll]

The amount of time it freed up to work on your self-righteousness has been a total joy, yes?

[DurantImboden]

Never mind digital vs. analog--what was wrong with black-and-white TV? Why did the FCC let the TV networks and manufacturers conspire to push more expensive color TV down our throats?

[tbrnotb]

So, you prefer black and white TV??????
Sorry, for the price of $500 you can get a great color TV. And your problem with this is.....?????

[RudyV]

Too bad, I guess, for those of us who bought converter boxes only to discover that digital signal strength is crap!

[GardenerNorCal]

It certainly is. And there is no way I can currently pick up the public tv station. Perhaps that's what they wanted. Less access.

[philtll]

It couldn't POSSIBLY be more complicated than this, right?! Couldn't be user error, or the fact that most stations won't go to their full power until they have some kinks worked out...naaaah.

[twocrows]

yup. moving forward is cr*p.
I remember my grandad being all moanie about automobiles. they were so much trouble. you had to crank em. and the roads were SO bad. and what was the matter with the old tried-and-true horse and wagon anyway???

[tmtrvl]

Great article! I chucked through the whole thing! Loved it!

[RustyNeverSleeps]

Don't have a digital receiver & I'd throw its crushed remains in the garbage if I did. Don't have cable, or dish, either.

"Millions left behind" reads Busi(work)ness Week. Tonight tv goes digital... and I breathe a sigh of relief, for whatever reason.. I'm gonna turn on my 1 in b/w and bask in the fuzz...

[kit1544]

I suspect that the lack of protest was because we were all given the same lie. We needed to convert to digital because the analog was needed by our police and emergency services. Just another lie out of the government! Do they ever tell the truth?

[Elaine Jenkins]

Yep, convienently left out the part the part about selling it to Verizon, Sprint, and all those other cell phone carriers so we can have TV on our telephones. Just what I need.