If the Federal Communications Commission gets its wish, all you adult TV watchers will be buying new digital-ready TV sets after March 1, 2006.
The FCC voted unanimously to order TV set makers to have all 25- to 36-inch screen sets digital-ready four months ahead of the original July 2006 deadline the commission set three years ago.
The FCC also wants smaller sets (13- to 24-inch screens) digital ready by the end of 2006 instead of mid-2007, but they'll vote on that sped-up deadline after a public comment period, the commission announced June 9.
"Having embarked on this important transition – which will deliver high-value broadcasting services to consumers, enable exciting new broadband applications to be developed, and provide more spectrum for public safety uses – we cannot take any steps backward," said FCC commissioner Kathleen Abernathy, announcing the new order. "Rather, we need to push the transition to its conclusion as expeditiously as possible."
"[T]his order highlights the importance of manufacturers and retailers providing needed consumer information to buyers before they become owners of sets," said FCC commissioner Michael Copps in his own statement. "We will only succeed in accelerating the digital transition when we – government and industry both – confront head-on the significant consumer confusion that exists in this area."
An FCC deadline for 50 percent of new midsize TV sets to have digital tuning by July 1 of this year remained, in spite of concern from retailers and set makers that it slowed the digital transition because buyers still bought less-expensive, traditional analog sets.
The FCC acceded to the sellers and set makers in speeding up the overall transition, though the set makers hoped for a March rather than July 2006 deadline for that.
"While I am sympathetic to the claims that requiring only 50 percent compliance will cause some unanticipated problems in the marketplace, the proposed delay simply would exact too great a cost on the overall progress of the DTV transition," Abernathy said. "Yet I applaud the Consumer Electronics Association and Consumer Electronics Retailers Association for ultimately recognizing the independent value of accelerating the end point of this transition, independent of the delay they sought on the front end."
The CEA had warned pushing the digital-tuning deadline to the end of 2006 for small sets would mean sharp price hikes for the sets bought mostly by lower-income consumers. "The unfortunate result of accelerating the tuner-mandate deadlines for all sets would be to decrease the number of [digital TV] tuners in the marketplace, which clearly does not serve the transition," said CEA president Gary Shapiro.
"[T]his Commission is committed to moving the digital transition forward," Copps said. "Each time a consumer purchases a set with a digital tuner, we move one step closer towards accomplishing the transition."
