Consumers Union Asks Congress to Consider Delay of Digital TV Transition After Federal Coupon Program Runs Out of Money

[Shane]

Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, today said Congress should consider delaying the February 17 transition from analog to digital TV broadcasts.

In letters to members of Congress, President Bush, and President-elect Obama...

[url=http://www.hdtvmagazine.com/news/2009/01/consumers_union_asks_congress_to_consider_delay_of_digital_tv_transition_after_federal_coupon_program_runs_out_of_money.php]Read Bulletin[/url]

[d6500k]

This falls under two catagories...

1. The lack of planning on your part does not necesarily constitute an emergency on my part.

2. Everybody is a winner in this country, whether they try or not.

Doug k

[raingraham]

A delay now will complicate matters worse than any current issues that may or not exist. Though CU may or may not have a valid argument, let's continue to march; this is another classic example of a choice of bad verses less bad. It is less bad to move on now and deal with absolute issues as they occur after the change.

[cburrows]

Give me a break Consumers Union, this has been going on long enough. Consumers were warned about this change over a year ago and people still have chosen to ignore the whole thing. Now that the time is finally getting close to the great transition, everyone is panicking. If Congress delays this and decides to pass another bill to allow more money for rebates, it will be another year and millions more tax payer dollars before the transition to DVT is finally completed. I say keep the transition going and if people need more funding down the road, then let our wonderful US Congress (who are going to be very busy this year) decide later on what to do.

[FHSPSU67]

And where does this leave operators who have been planning for years to be able to shut down their analog operations, release certain frequencies, and have transferred many resources to digital operations???

[hharris4earthlink]

You guys are really saying that the only thing that counts is YOUR television reception and people should simply allow themselves to be punished by the government's apparent ineptness to satisfy your needs? I think you need to rethink that proposition.

[akirby]

[quote="[email protected]"]You guys are really saying that the only thing that counts is YOUR television reception and people should simply allow themselves to be punished by the government's apparent ineptness to satisfy your needs? I think you need to rethink that proposition.[/quote]

Um...not quite.

a) anyone who wanted a coupon could have applied as late as December 1st and still gotten them (I personally know of 3 that did that). Therefore the only person to blame if you need a coupon and didn't get one is yourself for waiting too late.

b) $60 is not a lot of money for a one-time expense, even for people on fixed incomes. Most would be helped out by relatives anyway.

Another thing to consider is a lot of folks probably asked for 2 coupons even if they only used one. Since the coupons expire if not used we should see more being available as the unused ones expire.

I still don't see any ineptness on the government's part (yet).