Saturday, February 7, 2009

Digital Television Update!

My local CBS station just ran a message that I will sum up thusly: "We're going all-digital on February 17th. Suck it up."

So apparently stations can stop analog broadcasting before the federal date, which I was wondering about. Now I wonder--how many will? It costs money for each kind, so if I ran a station, I'd stop analog. Good for WISC-TV.

3 comments:

MacKenzie said...

I hope more follow suit.

Craig said...

So is the deadline when stations are allowed to stop going analog, or when they have to quit using it? Apparently the latter, based on this. I guess the question is which costs more, broadcasting two ways or losing the eyes of those customers that don't have a converter box yet. The answer to that might vary by location. I'd guess an educated populace like in Madison would be more conducive to switching now.

Rachel said...

I still feel like, percentage-wise, there just can't be that many people the digital switch affects. They have to be people who 1. use rabbit ears 2. have a TV that's a few years old (I know that doesn't rule out that many people, but I get digital because I bought a TV a year and a half ago) 3. have ignored getting a digital box coupon(even though they've had over a year) AND 4. aren't willing to pony up $40 to get a converter box themselves.

This clearly bothers liberals more bleeding-heart than I because the only people who fall into that section on the Venn diagram are those with low incomes and clueless old people (as opposed to the with-it old people that got on the ball about making the switch). But still, by sheer numbers? It can't be that many.

And, to Craig's point, those aren't desirable people to market to anyway, so I can't see advertisers caring much.