| |
Converters Signal a New Era for TVs
At midnight on Feb. 17, 2009, the rabbit ears and the rooftop antennas that still guide television signals into nearly 1 of every 5 American homes will be rendered useless — unless they are tethered to a new device, including two versions unveiled yesterday, that the government will spend as much as $80 a household to help families buy.
The V-shaped rabbit ears, which have stood sentry in some living rooms and dens since the early 1950s, risk going the way of the eight-track tape player or Betamax in 20 months because that is when local television stations will cease sending their signals over the analog airwaves, and instead begin transmitting their programming exclusively over the more modern digital spectrum.
The change, which was set in motion by Congress and the Federal Communications Commission in the mid-1990s, is being made at least partly to give viewers a better quality picture and to make it easier for stations to broadcast their signals in high definition.
“The moment coming is the end of something that has been around for 60 years — conventional television — and it has been a wonderful era,” said Richard E. Wiley, a former chairman of the F.C.C. who led a government advisory panel on what was then known as “advanced television” from 1987 to 1995.
“With that ending will come this new digital world, this much greater world,” Mr. Wiley said, “but many people aren’t yet ready or haven’t gotten the word.”
Those families still using antennas on their roofs or atop their sets to watch David Letterman or “Desperate Housewives” — nearly 20 million homes, according to government figures — will eventually be unable to see their favorite programs, at least not without a digital-ready television or a converter that will serve to translate the new signals for old TVs and their antennas. (Those viewers who already get their television from satellite or cable providers are not expected to have much disruption.)
That is where the government vouchers come in. Yesterday, the National Association of Broadcasters, the powerful trade lobby representing the nation’s television networks and stations, lifted the curtain on two prototypes for those basic, digital converters — one made by LG, the other by Thomson, which is distributed under the RCA brand — that will start appearing in electronic and department stores in January, at an expected cost of about $50 to $70.
To ensure that viewers’ uninterrupted access to free, over-the-air television does not pose a financial hardship, a government agency with a name that sounds like it was borrowed from the old Soviet Union — the National Telecommunications and Information Administration — will issue $40 gift cards to consumers who want to buy the converters so they are not left behind when television as we have always known it goes dark in early 2009.
Beginning next January, consumers may apply for up to two coupons each, for a total of $80. (More information on the program is available at an F.C.C. Web site, www.dtv.gov, or the broadcasters’ site at www.dtvanswers.com.)
All told, the government has set aside $1.5 billion to help viewers pay for the converters, although it expects to recoup that cost — and more — by later auctioning off the portion of the broadcast spectrum being vacated by the TV stations. While some of the unused spectrum will be given to public safety agencies like police and fire departments — because those frequencies are useful at passing through buildings and walls — much of it will be bought by cellular and other wireless companies seeking to expand their services.
The legislation establishing the $40 coupons was passed by Congress in late 2005, with the support of telecommunications and software companies, at least some of them expected to either manufacture the digital converters or to bid for the older frequencies being returned by the stations.
Consumer groups, however, have expressed concern that some families will have neither the means to buy the converters nor the savvy to successfully obtain the vouchers.
The broadcasters’ association said yesterday that it was embarking on a public service campaign intended to ensure that some viewers know they have to update their equipment or risk losing their television access.
When the value of the advertising time being donated by the stations is taken into account, the broadcasters estimate the value of their awareness campaign at $100 million.
“Our No. 1 goal,” said Shermaze Ingram, a spokeswoman for the broadcasters’ association, “is that no one loses TV reception because of a lack of information.”
Among the advantages of digital television being touted by the broadcasters is that the signal required is so compressed, or efficient, that a station may be able to send out four streams of programming where once it had only one. WETA, a public television station in Washington, D.C., has already begun transmitting a supplemental digital channel aimed solely at families, in addition to its regular programming.
That the digital signal provides a far superior image on the screen than its analog forebear was made evident yesterday morning, when representatives of the broadcasters’ association set up a makeshift experiment in a conference room at the Hearst building in Manhattan.
On one side was a television receiving a traditional, over-the-air signal from a local Fox affiliate, its picture grainy and chattering with static. Next to it was a television tuned to the same station, this one with its antennas connected to the converter prototype made by LG, which was not much bigger than a cigar box.
The image on its screen was as clear as if being transmitted from a DVD player.
