New Technology TV

The coming transition to all digital over the air TV transmission on February 17, 2009 is largely considered to be a developing logistical and public relations nightmare. There are a number of reasons for this. The most prominent reason and the one that's most troubling, is the lack of education among the general populace about digital TV. Very few people know what digital TV is exactly, and even fewer know about the scheduled transition to over the air digital TV broadcasts when all of the old fashioned analog TV signals will be dropped. There are basically two challenges to making a successful conversion between analog TV and digital TV signals for over the air broadcasts. The first challenge is to let viewers of over the air TV know that the transition is coming, and the second challenge is letting them know what it means to them and what they need to do to get ready for it. Both of these things are much easier said than done in many ways. For example, people who tend to be more technologically savvy and therefore more likely to keep up with technological developments like the transition are also more likely to have cable TV or satellite TV subscriptions which are largely already digital and therefore supply the hardware necessary to display digital TV on an analog set. Because viewers of over the air TV are less likely to know about the transition and aren't automatically supplied with the necessary equipment to deal with it they're at a double disadvantage.

Then there's the problem of getting viewers of over the air TV to understand what the transition can do for them. Those of us who are more familiar with TV technology know that a digital TV signal provides a clearer picture and higher quality sound than analog TV, but the viewers of over the air TV, don't really care about those sorts of things. If they cared about the clarity of their TV pictures, they wouldn't be watching over the air standard definition TV in the first place! Over the air TV viewers simply want access to basic TV programming without having to pay for it, and would consider things like a crystal clear digital TV picture as opposed to a passable analog TV picture as a nitpicking and esoteric difference. For these reasons, over the air TV viewers are likely to see the coming transition as a plot of big business to get them to buy more electronics like digital TV sets or set top converter boxes.

Because of all of these attitudes held by viewers of over the air TV, it would be a good idea to educate them about the over arching benefits of the conversion. For example, the fact that analog TV signals will be going of the air will free up a lot of bandwidth for things like special digital TV feeds to mobile phones. Of course they typical viewer of over the air TV outlined above, probably won't care about that either. But there are other benefits like increased bandwidth available for emergency services communication, and some of that bandwidth will be used to build municipal WiFi networks, both of which over the air TV viewers can take advantage of.