The Senate Commerce Committee was busy last week, resurrecting a bill that would delay the shutdown of analog over-the-air television from February 17 to June 12.  Committee Chair John Rockefeller (D-WV) and ranking minority member Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) appear to have settled disagreements that stalled the original delay efforts several weeks ago, announcing a new plan last Friday evening.  Among other things, the compromise version would allow (but not require) stations to delay their analog shutdown, and give a kick-start to get the coupon box program running again, this time allowing consumers to reapply if their unused coupons had expired.

If this bill is adopted by the House and signed by President Obama, what will the real-world effects be?

For broadcasters who are operating on temporary digital transmitters until the transition date, the delay means that these stations will wind up underserving the majority of viewers who have taken the necessary steps to prepare for digital.  Our Elmira station, for instance, only puts out 270 watts digital on temporary channel 2; until they shut down their channel 18 analog transmitter, they can't fire up their permanent digital channel 18 signal at 45,000 watts and reach their entire digital coverage area.  If this only affected the roughly fifteen percent of viewers who watch the station with an over-the-air antenna, it would still be a problem... but the temporary digital signal does not deliver a reliable signal to many of the cable head-ends in the area.  Bottom line: many cable viewers, who have been assured that they won't be affected by this transition, may not get reliable reception of local stations until this delay period ends.

For wireless broadband providers that have paid the federal government nearly twenty billion dollars to use the channels being taken away from broadcasters, and have spent considerable sums of money on new equipment that should have been turned on next month, this means a substantial financial hit during already tough economic times.  There is talk that the largest players -- Verizon and AT&T -- might receive some form of government financial assistance; Qualcomm's chief operating officer Len Lauer commented that the proposed delay should be dubbed the "economic de-stimulus act."

For viewers in general, the result will be more and prolonged confusion: instead of having the majority of stations change their facilities on one well coordinated date, it is likely that the analog shutdown and any remaining digital buildout will happen piecemeal, leaving viewers with a constantly changing channel lineup that forces them to keep rescanning their digital sets and converter boxes.  Rather than providing a comfortable cushion for the unprepared, this variable delay actually adds a dangerous element of unpredictability, as viewers now have no way of knowing exactly when their analog signals will go away.

For taxpayers, it's yet another hit as we wind up paying to extend the coupon bureaucracy and paying still more bailouts to companies that can't do business effectively because of our government's institutional inability to foresee the results of its own legislation.

So now what?  What should you -- an over-the-air viewer -- do about all of this?  Mainly, keep plugging along.  If you're already set up and watching DTV, congratulations!  If you have the equipment but haven't set it up, do it now!  Make sure it works so that if you do need to upgrade your antenna, you will be able to pursue that before analog stations go away.  In the Syracuse area, every station is already broadcasting in digital... so you have nothing to lose by setting up now -- actually, you will pick up more channels.  And if you haven't even started...  well, I'd get moving.  If you haven't applied for a coupon, do it now so that you'll be earlier in the list once the logjam clears.  Buy your converter boxes while they're available, and get them hooked up while you still have whatever time remains.

Regardless of what the politicians decide, one thing we do know: eventually the analog signals are going away.  Whether it happens in three weeks or five months, you still need to be ready.

The starting gun is sounding  -- again.  Sure hope it's loaded with blanks...

-- Jeff