Apparently, many are not and I can’t understand why. We’ve been ready for months (maybe even a year). When the federal government first started offering the coupons for converter boxes my husband immediately applied and we switched to digital as soon as we received them. We’ve been waiting for the conversion ever since because we lost PBS when we switched, we’re hoping to pick it up again when they switch to the full digital signal.
Millions of households will lose television reception next week when about 1,000 broadcasters around the nation shut off their analog signals and complete their conversion to digital programming, federal officials say.
The government has spent more than $2 billion to ease the transition to digital television, and in the last few months has cut in half the number of households that are unprepared for the final conversion on June 12. But the latest survey by the Nielsen Company indicates that as of the end of May, more than 10 percent of the 114 million households that have television sets are either completely or partly unprepared.
[...]
Michael J. Copps, the acting head of the Federal Communications Commission, said that the people most likely to lose reception are society’s most vulnerable — lower-income families, the elderly, the handicapped and homes where little or no English is spoken. The transition will also hit inner-city and rural areas hardest, he said.
I really can’t understand the problem since all the broadcast channels have been mentioning the conversion for months (even on the Spanish channels). And it’s not like it’s complicated. I think the government treats citizens like kids and this is just one more example. If you can’t be bothered switching, maybe it’s a good thing. More time to read a book.
posted June 6, 2009 at 12:07 pm
We have cable, so it is not a major issue here, but last summer we got the decoder box for the tv in the bedroom. It took more time to open the box it came in than it did to hook it up and get it working. My feeling is that the poor idiots who cannot figure it out probably do not deserve television in the first place.
On the other hand, does anyone deserve television? Isn’t grace supposed to keep people OUT of Hell?
posted June 6, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Honestly, Michelle, you choose the most venal topics. The “big” day is the switch from analog to digital.
MzEllen, I’ll save you the trouble. “Robert, I’m sure you only disagree with Michelle because she’s Michelle.”
Then I’d reply, but when I saw the term “big day” in the title line, I really thought of the Second Coming. Seriously. For Michelle, it’s analog to digital.
posted June 6, 2009 at 1:44 pm
I think the government treats citizens like kids
A good indication that they aren’t speaking to you.
posted June 6, 2009 at 1:46 pm
the most venal topics.
You mean “banal?”
Parousia … yeah, me too. Seriously.
posted June 6, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Well thank you, Robert.