The end of analog TV

If consumers aren’t ready for the transition, and the government is going to get stuck buying a billion dollars of converter boxes, why not put it off indefinitely?  The broadcasters don’t seem to be in any hurry: They have both their old analog channels plus the opportunity to experiment with digital broadcasting. But consumer electronics manufacturers are pushing Congress hard. Switching everyone to digital TV could be the biggest bonanza the industry has seen since the mid-Eighties, when the advent of audio CDs fuelled an enormous upgrade market. 

In addition, both Silicon Valley and your local police force are lobbying for an early analog cut-off.  The reason is simple: when the cut-off happens, TV channels 52 – 69 will no longer be needed, freeing up broadcasting spectrum for other purposes.  Public safety workers have been promised four of these channels — a commitment even more pressing in the wake of the 9/11 Commission’s finding that the nation’s first responder communications systems need a major upgrade.  And companies like Intel and Cisco want to use other parts of the newly freed spectrum for very powerful wireless broadband networks that could offer seamless high-speed Internet service virtually everywhere in the U.S.  Other advanced uses will materialize. Already, cell phone pioneer Qualcomm plans to use some of the spectrum to build an advanced video network for mobile phones. And finally, there’s a bonus for the U.S. Treasury as well—much of the new spectrum will be auctioned off to the highest bidders, raising billions of dollars.

So what’s Congress going to do?  The next move belongs to Rep. Joe Barton, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce committee, who is expected to introduce a cut-off bill sometime in the next few months.  Barton, R-Texas, is a firm proponent of setting a “date certain,” though he is not necessarily wed to the December 31, 2006 deadline. In public comments, however, he has made it clear that he favors a date sooner rather than later — as do other key congressional figures, including Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who won an award for “Best DTV Government Leadership” last month from a major consumer electronics group.  Possible legislative scenarios range from an aggressive decision to enforce the 2006 cut-off to a more gradual, region-by-region approach that might even extend to the end of this decade.  The latter would severely frustrate technologists, but provide plenty of time to ease consumers into the new world.

How will it turn out? At the moment no one really knows. Back in 1996, when the digital television transition was first proposed, media analyst Gary Arlen observed wryly that “it will be easier for Congress to take away Social Security than television sets.”  Ironically, now Congress is worrying about both things at the same time — and neither problem seems to have a painless solution.

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