Many Analog TV Watchers Aren't Aware of Upcoming Switchover 440
A recent poll of TV watchers shows that many Americans aren't aware the end times are coming for analog broadcast signals. "The survey found that the group most affected by the analog cutoff -- those with no cable or satellite service -- are most in the dark about what will happen to their sets: Only one-third of them had heard that their TVs are set to stop receiving programs. Of course, there are solutions. Congress is subsidizing the purchase of digital television receivers. And the cable TV industry is hoping that this will spur the last holdouts to buy pay TV."
Good time.. (Score:4, Insightful)
If TV gets turned off on Americans, maybe it would be a good thing.
And don't flame me. TV is the major issue with American obesity, particularly in children.
You gotta be poor or rich. (Score:2, Insightful)
This is the most hyped non-problem... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:HD-TV (Score:4, Insightful)
What would be exquisitely funny is if they threw the whole upgrade party, and everyone just went on the internet instead.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's too early. (Score:5, Insightful)
That's two or three months rent in many places -- with the matching lower pay.
Re:It's too early. (Score:4, Insightful)
And I just want to point out that if Congress has to subsidize receivers to force this change along, it's probably not a good idea in the first place. And let me also point out that F*@& Congress for spending tax money on paying for unnecessary digital upgrades. Next they'll be buying everyone blue ray and HD-DVD players to fund the HD war. It's frustratingly ridiculous.
Re:There is always stupid people (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Good time.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:There is always stupid people (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Good time.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:There is always stupid people (Score:3, Insightful)
A dish with 2 LNBs is about 60 bucks.
To the mods: my comment was absolutely not meant as flamebait: there are enough alternatives if you still HAVE to watch TV. Tech has to go on, and analog TV (IMHO) just has to die.
Re:There is always stupid people (Score:4, Insightful)
They want the spectrum, and frankly carrying dead weight for some dinosaur broadcast stations is a waste of time. If they don't have a strategy for switching to digital broadcasting, then away they go. Too bad, so sad, welcome to the business world.
Viewership declines because the content sucks compared to other sources (movies, cable, Internet, etc.). That's the long and the short of it. People who can't afford cable aren't going to have any measurable impact on that.
'*free* converter boxes..." (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought basic economics and government courses were requisites in public schools these days.
Of course, TANSTAAFL. The national government will be taking tax dollars from people, taking an administrative cut, then turning around and giving it back to pay exclusively for converter boxes. The net effect is the US national government is screwing with free markets and funding (mostly overseas) consumer electronics companies.
Oh blow it out your ass (Score:3, Insightful)
Christ.
You act like designating sections of the spectrum for certain uses, which is in EVERYONE'S benefit, is some arbitrary intrusion into your bedroom. Digital cameras don't transmit high power EM energy across dozens of square miles.
Re:Good time.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good time.. (Score:5, Insightful)
You can exercise all you want, but if you eat a 14" pizza for dinner washed down with ten pints of beer, and have a full fry up every breakfast, combined with KFC for lunch, you'll be obese.
Re:It's too early. (Score:5, Insightful)
That's because you think it is for the benefit of television viewers, or even broadcasters. It is not. They simply want the spectrum that these broadcasts are currently going out on back, with their relatively long wavelengths, for things like cellular service or long-range (municipal?) wireless networks.
With the way both of these services are growing, I happen to think it's a good idea for a relatively small cost.
TVs themselves dont cost much (Score:2, Insightful)
Irony (Score:5, Insightful)
Who will be voted off the Island? As long as you keep watching, you are on the Island.
Re:There is always stupid people (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Good time.. (Score:1, Insightful)
It could also imply that they do little-to-no activity for longer periods of time, but this seems to obviously what the grandparent poster intended that I feel stupid having to point it out.
I had the opposite impression (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, there's STILL nothing worth watching. Bah! Humbug!
Oh, you mean Television? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This is the most hyped non-problem... (Score:3, Insightful)
Have you seen one of those converter boxes? I haven't and I check every time I go to Best Buy or Circuit City. Not that they can't be built or won't eventually show up. But in adequate numbers? Betcha not.
If Digital TV in the US were a project and I were in charge of it, I'd probably have my resume up to date and be actively looking for a new job. It has been late from the start. Roll out has been rescheduled once. We're 13 months from roll-out and there are way more problems than there ought to be:
Who will buy a new TV set if their mortgage rate has reset to something they can not afford and there is one buyer for every five houses that folks are trying to unload?
My projections for what they are worth (not much probably):
Re:This is the most hyped non-problem... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:HD-TV (Score:2, Insightful)
Do without (Score:2, Insightful)
For me there were numerous benefits:
1. I had more free time, that I never even realized I was spending. Sometimes *five or six hours*, or even more.
2. I quit smoking. Because I wasn't sitting idly, I stopped chain-smoking. Almost by accident.
3. ROOM! I needed room for a grand piano in my house, but never thought I had it. The space occupied by a TV screen, together with the line-of-sight and the seating, is a *huge* investment of real estate. Get rid of it and re-think your room arrangement. You might have ten square meters you never considered before.
Re:Good time.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Irony (Score:3, Insightful)
90% of everything is crap, but we tend to remember the good stuff, so 90% of old stuff seems good.
Re:Good time.. (Score:3, Insightful)
There is always stupid people...on "/.". (Score:1, Insightful)
*Common sense like an nderstanding of physics for starters.
Re:Good time.. (Score:3, Insightful)
not the process involved is simple or complex really isn't an issue.
A calorie defecit is a contra-instinctive thing to subject yourself
to. Your own body will tend to fight you every step of the way.
Most americans simply don't have any will.
Re:Good time.. (Score:3, Insightful)
You exercise.
That is why the phrase "diet and exercise is repeated so often".
You burn extra energy doing whatever and then burn more as your body slowly idles back down over most of the next day.
Re:That's just par for the course (Score:3, Insightful)
(* Or amend it.)
Re:HD-TV (Score:2, Insightful)
I've tried to use OTA DTV for the past two years. Usually it's great, but the signal dies in even marginal weather (the so-called "digital cliff"). I live within 15 miles of the broadcast towers. I've tried powered, directional antennas and mapped out the best orientation for each signal. I've tried outside antennas in different places. Nothing has helped. From what I've read, the only solution is to erect an antenna taller than the nearby trees -- and that's still no guarantee.
Analog TV has always been the old reliable standby. Crouched in the basement with tornado sirens blaring, you could always get a fuzzy picture with reasonable audio even if you were 50 miles from a broadcast tower.
Who is looking out for the public interest? What about the 22 million people relying on analog OTA as their primary television reception? What about the 28 million digital satellite subscribers who use analog OTA as a backup when their satellite signals go down?
The biggest proponents of the digital OTA change seem to be...
Maybe if every member of congress should be forced to switch to digital OTA....
Re:They should leave an emergency analog channel (Score:3, Insightful)