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Idiots.

What about the businesses that paid $20,000,000,000 for the airwaves that were supposed to be available after the switch?  What is this - the fourth time this has been delayed?

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Do it in warm weather so folks can get on their roof etc. to work on their antennas.

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They'll need a bailout. And their execs will have a salary cap.

It's a waste. I guarantee that on the 13th, all over the nation old farts will be screaming, "WTF, I can't get American Idol!"

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I'm confused. My parents live in the Stone Age and just got a box. No need to go on roof. What am I missing?

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I would bet you old farts don't watch "American Idol".   Maybe TV Land re-runs of Andy Griffith.

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I'm confused. My parents live in the Stone Age and just got a box. No need to go on roof. What am I missing?

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Just peachy. They've been running those ads on all the local stations for 6 months, there's coupons for converter boxes, and some retards STILL haven't figured out what to do?

And the powers in charge cave in?

This is a perfect example of why this country is fucked up and nothing can get done. The lowest common denominator of our society is holding up progress for everyone else...

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Local station just announced they will be shutting down analog on Feb. 17 anyway.
I have stated before, I think it is a stupid idea to do the switch in winter.
Do it in warm weather so folks can get on their roof etc. to work on their antennas.

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I would bet you old farts don't watch "American Idol".   Maybe TV Land re-runs of Andy Griffith.

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Maybe it will just never happen...the way its going that could prove true!

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WSAZ? I saw that too.

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WSAZ? I saw that too.

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Local station just announced they will be shutting down analog on Feb. 17 anyway.
I have stated before, I think it is a stupid idea to do the switch in winter.
Do it in warm weather so folks can get on their roof etc. to work on their antennas.

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WSAZ? I saw that too.

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Not just that I am in the television industry. Depending on the size of the analog transmitter it costs the stations between $8k and $20k per month in electricity just to power it.

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Just a general question. How much less power does it take to transmit the digital signal?

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There's no need to change antenna unless it's a non-rotor type and needs to be pointed in another direction....

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At this time, they're running the digital signals at a reduced power while the analog signal is still being broadcast.  When they turn off the analog broadcasting, they can blast out the digital at the same power as they previously broadcast in analog.  From what I understand, that will give each station significantly longer range.

Kharn

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Just a general question. How much less power does it take to transmit the digital signal?

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That is not the issue, the issue is they are making them spend an extra $50k to $100k that was not budgeted in an already crappy economy. The have planned for 3 years to cut the analog transmitters off. A lot of these transmitters are 20+ years old and WAY less efficient than the digital ones.  Keep in mind they have been running the digital one in tandem for while now anyway.

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I dont think you know what you are talking about.

Obama’s secret telecom advisor pushing his company’s interest

By Timothy P. Carney
Examiner Columnist | 1/16/09 11:04 AM

A telecommunications company has confirmed for this columnist that its vice president for policy—who is also an Obama donor and a former lobbyist—is advising Barack Obama’s transition team on telecom policy.

Obama’s transition team, which has failed to disclose this executive’s involvement, happens to have proposed a significant change in telecom policy that will profit that very company, called Clearwire.

By pushing to delay the long-scheduled transition of television broadcasting from analog signals to digital signals, president-elect Obama is directly aiding Sprint and its partner Clearwire while hurting Verizon.

Clearwire’s executive vice president for “Strategy, Policy and External Affairs” is R. Gerard Salemme. Writer Julian Sanchez reported Wednesday on the website Ars Technica that Salemme is serving on the Obama transition team as a telecom advisor. Clearwire told this columnist that Salemme is on leave to help craft Obama’s telecom policy.

Clearwire provides infrastructure for Sprint’s wireless data network. In layman’s terms, Sprint pays Clearwire to connect your Blackberry to the Internet.

The fates of Sprint and Clearwire, as well as their competitors, particularly Verizon, are tied up with the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC’s) actions on digital television because wireless broadband (high-speed Internet over cell-phone signals, in effect) is tied up with the FCC’s actions on digital television.

Here’s the policy issue in brief: For decades, TV programming has been broadcast over the air in analog format. These days—in addition to cable, which, obviously, goes over cables and not over the air—television broadcasters can send programming over the air in digital format.

By using digital broadcasting, more programming can be crammed into a narrower range of frequencies. Seeing this as an opportunity, the FCC—which has complete control over who can use what frequencies in the U.S.—started pushing during the Clinton administration to end all analog TV broadcasting and move it all to digital broadcasting.

After years of wrangling and negotiating, Congress and the FCC set February 17, 2009—between the Superbowl and the NCAA tournament—as the date for all TV broadcasting to switch to digital.

This will free up a huge swath of frequencies, which the FCC has auctioned off to other telecommunications firms. One buyer was Verizon, who will use this spectrum for its wireless broadband networks (again, providing Internet for Blackberries and similar devices).

Specifically, they will use this spectrum to launch their fourth-generation wireless broadband network (or “4G” as it’s known, in contrast to the “3G” you hear about with today’s iPhones and Blackberries). So, Verizon’s 4G network awaits the transition to digital TV.

But Sprint and Clearwire, on spectrum they already own, have begun launching their 4G network. That means Sprint is ahead of the competition in wireless Internet. It also means Sprint and Clearwire stand to benefit from Obama’s push to delay the transition to digital TV: The longer broadcasters use analog signals, the longer Verizon has to wait to get the spectrum it needs for its 4G network—which gives Sprint a longer honeymoon as the only network offering 4G speeds.

There are legitimate arguments for delaying the transition—many TV owners who have requested vouchers for a free analog-digital converter box won’t have the boxes before February 17, in part due to budgetary rules—but the appearance of impropriety is glaring.

Salemme, a former telecom lobbyist who has given thousands to Obama, including $5,000 to Obama’s transition team, has helped Obama craft a policy that will benefit Salemme’s company. This is just the sort of arrangement that led to years of Democratic outrage over the Bush administration’s energy policy.

Sanchez’s detailed and well-reported article on Ars Technica called to light these conflicts of interest—and the fact that Salemme’s name is nowhere to be found on Change.gov. As of yesterday, the Obama transition team still hadn’t addressed the concerns or added Salemme’s name. The transition team did not return a phone call or respond to an email request for comment from this author.

Almost unanimously, Capitol Hill staff and industry sources this week expressed certainly that Obama would get his way, meaning the long-scheduled transition would be delayed. While Obama proposes this delay as a boon to consumers, it’s hard to ignore that it provides a huge profit opportunity to one of his donors who secretly helped him craft the policy.

Not a great beginning for transparency and ending corporate influence in Washington.

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Good-that much longer before I have to upgrade my TV-it's nothing but a fucking conspiracy between government/cable companies/TV manufacturers to get us to buy more equipment anyway.

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Good-that much longer before I have to upgrade my TV-it's nothing but a fucking conspiracy between government/cable companies/TV manufacturers to get us to buy more equipment anyway.