[opendtv] Comment: I want my DTV, now!

From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2009 17:22:08 -0500
Yet, even Commissioner McDowell is criticizing Chairman Martin on the
switchoff planning, specifically about the call centers.

http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-287892A1.pdf

And Commissioners Copps and Adelstein have written to Congress
recommending a delay

http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-287974A1.pdf

Bert

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Comment: I want my DTV, now!

 
Bill Schweber
(01/16/2009 1:26 PM EST)
URL: http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212901007  
  
Some members of Congress along with staffers at the Federal
Communications Commission are urging a delay in the planned Feb. 17
switchover from analog to digital TV. 
I say, Enough delay, let's do it! 

Depending on how you interpret the numbers, about 20 percent of U.S.
households depend on over-the-air analog signals (there is some
confusion here, since some households do have cable but still use
over-the-air reception for their second or third set). 

Note that I have no personal interest in the transition's timing, since
I'm surviving with only an analog CRT TV and a VCR, preceded by one of
those converter boxes. So I won't be the beneficiary of the
higher-resolution picture that DTV promises. 

The proposed delay is symptomatic of a larger problem: how the political
process has crimped and hijacked the dynamic and creative process which
has brought us our technology-based world. The message is that we can't
do anything until everything is perfect, and we can guarantee that no
one will be displaced or affected negatively. 

The switchover problems--and there will be some people who will have
them--will be yet another opportunity for grandstanding by politicians
and the media. I can already see some poor grandmother trotted out
before the cameras, testifying before a congressional committee that her
whole life fell apart with the TV transition, and there was no one to
help her. And she's still waiting for the $40 converter-box coupon that
she didn't know she had to ask for--and for someone to hook the box up
as well. 

The reality is that this transition has been planned and underway for
years. Broadcasters and OEMs have invested billions in new equipment,
training and other necessities, and now have to support both analog and
digital formats. That's a expensive in terms of space, personnel,
maintenance, and even electric bills. 

Broadcasters have been telling everyone for many months about the Feb.
17 analog cutoff date; you'd have to be living in an isolated, EMI-proof
room not to have heard about it. If you didn't act on the news, well,
I'm sorry, the rest of the public is moving on. 

Not surprisingly, the proposed solution always seems to be the same:
let's wait some more, let's give the bureaucracy even more money, and
let's do some finger-pointing while we're at it. 

This "hurry-up-and-wait" soap opera would be comical if it wasn't
affecting a major part of the electronics industry and its supply chain,
not to mention the broadcast business. The delay would come in the midst
of a very bad recession during which uncertainty is one of the enemies
of investment and progress. 

Let's get on with the DTV transition. 

 
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[opendtv] Comment: I want my DTV, now!

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