The Perpetually Delayed Transition

FCC Chair Appointee Julius Genachowski

Improvement is often times painful. Different from simple change, where we simply replace one thing with another, improvement is an actual move forward. Although the DTV transition will most certainly be an issue for people lacking the ability to make requisite changes (many will be forced to incur expense for an attic or rooftop antenna for example), the bandwidth-freeing move for increased telecommunications and increased quality for television programming is necessary. Many EU countries and Japan have enjoyed the benefits of digital broadcasting for some time now, and just as many are going through the growing pains along side of us.

This week, the House and Congress voted to push back the transition (again) to June 2009. To me, this is a mistake. In order to not only make the monkey wrench and throw it in the gears, The FCC is allowing broadcasters to still shut off analog on Feb. 17th as originally planned! I can't wait for this patchwork rollout to cause mass confusion and stagnate interest even further.

Although it surprises many that the transition initiative was originally passed back in 1996, it's important to understand that there are many unfortunate folks that do not have the ability or resources to gather the correct information or make the proper changes even if so equipped. To people like me, this is all old news, and although it can get a little tedious when people ask me about something that "should" have been on their radar for a decade, I do understand that many simply don't care and just want their stuff to work. Let me therefore preface the upcoming opinions with a disclaimer: I sympathize with those that will suffer difficulty during this transition period, and it bothers me a little to read comments on other sites such as "let them watch snow", and "too bad old people lol" and other chat room detritus.

That said, we have to stop letting the lazy kids slow the class down. In remarking on the decision, U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said that the delay was made "in the interest of protecting the consumer." Are we to believe that anyone that is ill-prepared after 13 years during the largest consumer electronics transition in history will be ready in four months? FCC Chair Robert McDowell said "I'm glad my colleagues in Congress and President Obama agreed that a delay was necessary and took action to protect the millions of consumers at risk of losing their television signal." These millions had over a decade to get their ducks in a row. In fairness, the same is true for any broadcaster not ready for advancement.

Over-the-air tuners have been available since 1999. Just not free ones.

I recently held a DTV transition seminar this past Fall to a group of retirees. A local bank's marketing coordinator decided that, in the spirit of community outreach, it would be good to have an expert discuss this issue in-depth. The attendees understood that the upcoming change was an unstoppable force, that was going to happen like it or not. I happily assuaged many of their fears (this transition is not a big deal for the consumer logistically), and informed them of ways to make the most of this transition. They ate cookies, drank coffee, and left happy. This was in stark contrast to the near-daily rants on the phone (and in person on occasion), essentially accusing the CE industry and the government of a collusive money-grab on an unsuspecting populace. These sentiments ignore the billions the fed is spending to subsidize the hardware requirements (no folks, you don't have to purchase a new TV; you just need the proper tuner), and an equal fortune spent by broadcasters to purchase new gear to facilitate high definition. In what can only be described as an act of guilty contrition, the fed elected yet again to delay this needed move even further.

Let's face it, all things considered, the benefits of this technology are many. Although the hype is increased picture and sound (which can be dazzling), other benefits such as multi-casting, increased immunity to fluctuations in signal quality, and a host of others makes the format clearly superior. In fact, on the picture quality side of the equation, over-the-air high definition channels typically offer a superior image to the same channel viewed over cable or satellite. Thanks to compression and digitization, broadcasters can fit multiple channels of high-quality audio and high resolution video in the same space as one analog channel.

I personally cannot wait for the analog towers to "go dark" once and for all. Let the new age of programming and media services begin in earnest, sooner rather than later. I personally tire of the delays--delays that only cause confusion and increased cynicism.

For more information, call the FCC: 1-888-CALL-FCC