One Week Out - Making It Official
If there was anyone left out there still harboring the hope (or illusion) that some mighty wail of anger and despair would rise up from the still unprepared and knock the transition off course again at the very last moment, those hopes have just been conclusively dashed by the President himself.
Speaking of making things official, the FCC has clarified the fact that while stations have to cease analog transmissions at midnight on the 12th, they don't have to wait until then - they can quit any time on the 12th, unless the new digital assignment interferes with an analog neighbor which has not left the air yet (in which case they have to wait until that station vacates).
According to this Broadcasting & Cable article, we'll be down to 447 analog stations by 6 PM next Friday. After midnight, 99 or so stations will run "nightlight" service (i.e. transition info only) for as long as 30 additional days. And then that will be it!
posted by Bob Colby @ 8:56 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
I'm wondering if allowing stations to switch any time during the 12th could be a bit of a hassle for viewers. Assuming a given station is migrating to a new digital assignment, then it'll effectively disappear until viewers rescan for it. If some stations migrate during the day and others wait to midnight, viewers who want to keep their sets/converters working might end up having to do multiple rescans. OTOH if all migrations happen at the same time, viewers would only have to rescan once.
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