In memorium-the Tv antenna

With America just hours away from having digital only telly,Elizabeth Gettelman paints a memorial for her rabbit ears.

Hopefully all those government-subsidized converter boxes will keep millions of old-fashioned sets out of electronic wasteland, but what of the beloved antennae? Ever thought of designing a use out of the elegant, retractable numbers? Maybe we could all donate them to music schools to be repurposed as batons. Would they work on drums? As pointers for teachers? Tomato cages?

Interim Digital Britain report is out

The interim digital report is out.You can read the full version here at the department of culture's website.

The report produces a 22 action plan with its main areas of interest being being the creation of a total braod band solution covering the whole of the country by 2012 using a mixture of fixed,mobile and wireless technology with a service up to 2mg.

Allied to that a crackdown on ISP's supporting illegal down loads and file sharing and a relook at the issue of copy right.

Foe digital radio there is a pledge to committ at a future time to analogue switch off but it is unclear what that time frame will be.

For Channel 4 the government comes out in support for the service and recommends an alliance with BBC Worldwide as opposed to any merger with Channel 5.

For public service broadcasting in general,there is a belief that the market will deliver some of the content but excepting that there will be areas where intervention will be necessary to deliver.

On the subject of local and regional news the door has been firmly opened for the newspaper industry to be involved in the debate with over broadcast regional news.

America;s digital switchover-lessons for the UK

As the digital switchover continues in this country it is worth reading this piece in the New York Times which looks at how the old are coping with the same issues in the United States.

Vesta Clemmons, who is 77 and lives alone, relies on the battered Zenith television in her tiny apartment here as more than just a lifeline to the outside world.

and adds that

So Ms. Clemmons was concerned to learn from a public-service campaign that after Feb. 17 the rooftop antenna connected to her television would no longer function properly, and thus neither would her TV — unless she bought and installed an adaptor.

In the United States more than 6,5 million households have not made the switch witgh just over two weeks before the big switch off reports the paper.And as it says

That so many viewers here and around the country risk losing something as basic as a free television signal is a function, at least in part, of the government’s failure to anticipate that those most affected would be among the nation’s most frail and vulnerable.