Two big dates back to back. 1/20/2009 and 2/17/2009. Fortunately we are all too prepared for the former… it’s been a long time coming. The latter… well… few are prepared and even fewer know much about it besides its few PSA’s running on affiliates. Free TV is going to cost you $20 or so with a government coupon.
If you pay for TV, no need to worry other than why you’re paying for commercial television. Remember when commercial-free was a promise of subscription TV?
The NTSC (Never the Same Color) broadcast standard will be screeching to halt and its lovely replacement ATSC (Always the Same Color) will take its place. The 4:3 standard and its oddball frame rate of 29.97 frames per second will stop echoing off of clouds and buildings. It will forever snow on channels 2 through 83.
Lots of folks will lose their local news, Price is Right, mid-day Hogan’s Heroes, Prime Time line ups, and possibly their church. But what about that Global Thermo Nuclear War? What if someone does want to play a game? Or… What if there’s a flood and everyone has to get to higher ground? What about those many who don’t get the set top box in time? Will they have to use a radio for emergencies?
The Thinman and I have been early adopters of ATSC broadcasts. Mostly all of the consumer TV’s now have ATSC tuners. But sadly… I fear that a huge chunk of the population will be missing out on their stories as well as their Emergency Broadcasts… although that system is pretty archaic.
Is there a need to panic? Prolly not, but there should be more outreach. Someone’s going to miss out and be all like, WTF?
I will be having an “end of broadcast” party at my house btw.
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