[opendtv] Re: Canada's Minimalist Approach to the DTV Transition
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 3 Apr 2011 10:11:00 -0400
At 4:35 PM -0500 4/1/11, Manfredi, Albert E wrote:
Not sure why the Scott Hutton feels that the US acted too soon.
Reading the article, it seems fairly obvious that Canadian
households today, two years after the US transition ended, are no
better prepared than US households were. In fact, less so.
Perhaps he felt that we pushed the transition too early; if so I
agree. DTV technology, especially receivers was not mature enough in
the '90s. In reality we did not have decent receivers until at least
2006 or 2007, and limited HD programming until then as well.
As far as being prepared for the transition, the U.S. DID over react.
Most of the country had already abandoned OTA broadcasting, and a
significant portion of the non MVPD homes basically do not care about
TV at all.
Last time I checked, there is no Constitutional right to receive TV
broadcasts; the government should not have created the "cheese
program," especially for an industry that had been feeding at the
public trough for at least five decades (as in virtually free use of
public spectrum for a commercial enterprise). This program, as well
as the receiver mandate, were nothing more than corporate welfare,
mostly for non American companies.
The reality in Canada is that the public is WELL prepared for the
transition. Canadians have had the same access to ATSC receiver
technology and HD programming as consumers in the U.S.; In truth the
DTV transition is over north of the border, including DTV broadcasts
for the few who still use antennas.
I think the US could have ended analog on the original date of 31
Dec 2006 (IIRC) with no big catastrophe. Very decent receivers had
already become available, in quantity, three years prior. It's all a
matter of "getting off the pot."
We could quibble about the date when decent receivers became
available; I would note that the final receiver mandates did not kick
in until 2007. But I agree that the end of 2006 gave the few people
who wanted ATSC receivers plenty of time to plan for and buy new TVs.
If it were left to me I would have ended the transition in 2002 with
NO receiver mandates or government cheese.
I would ALSO suggest that the receivers we have today are marginally
adequate, but this is more a commentary on the poor choice of a
transmission standard than the quality of the receivers. The fact
that we are now looking at another transition to deal with an
appropriate standard for the wireless television broadcast medium
speaks for itself; we knew in 1992 that the spectrum would be used
primarily for mobile devices, not fixed receivers in the home.
Clearly Canada did the right thing.
Regards
Craig
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