Bush Signs Analog Cutoff Bill

President George W. Bush has signed a budget package that included establishment of a Feb. 17, 2009, hard date to transition the nation’s television broadcasts to 100 percent digital transmissions. After that date, televisions that rely solely on analog over-the-air television--typically delivered via rabbit-ear antennas--will go dark.

Anticipating mass hysteria that would arise from millions of Americans losing their free TV, the Act allocates $1.5 billion toward a subsidy for new DTV converter boxes. A converter box would allow televisions that lack a DTV tuner--still the majority of those sold in the United States--to display the new digital broadcasts. When the amount set aside for the subsidy was debated in Congress, many Democrats raised concerns that it wasnt enough to account for the estimated 45 million televisions among 20 million households that rely on analog broadcasts. Details regarding the subsidy still remain vague, such as who would be eligible and how much of the estimated $50 cost for the boxes it would actually cover.

The analog cutoff will likely not affect televisions that rely on cable or satellite programming. All satellite transmissions from DirecTV and Dish Network are digital to begin with and require a set-top box anyway, and cable operators Comcast and Time Warner have announced that they will continue to carry analog and digital feeds of the major networks.