FCC official worried about digital TV transition

By Rachelle Younglai

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - A Federal Communications Commission member said on Tuesday more must be done to ensure that U.S. viewers are not left in the dark when broadcasters are forced to switch to digital signals early in 2009.

"I am really worried about the entire transition process. We have got to start really taking this seriously," Commissioner Michael Copps, a Democrat, told the National Association of Broadcasters' annual conference.

Broadcasters are required to switch to digital signals from analog by February 17, 2009. If owners of analog televisions do not get a converter box, subscribe to satellite or digital cable, or replace their TV with a digital television by that date, they will not be able to watch television.

The federal government plans to subsidize the cost of buying a digital-analog converter box by offering $40 discount coupons to anyone who owns an analog television.

But Copps, who worked in the Commerce Department when the world was preparing for Y2K, or Year 2000 software problem, said more planning, preparation and education had to be done. "I guess the guiding principle has got to be, no consumer left behind here," Copps said.

"Everyone said it was overkill, but at the end of the day there wasn't a crisis," he said, referring to the largely uneventful day when computer clocks hit January 1, 2000. "This DTV transition is a stealth process compared to that."

The Y2K problem was feared to be a ticking time bomb because a practice in early computer program design caused some date-related processing to operate incorrectly on and after January 1, 2000.

The National Telecommunications & Information Administration, the Commerce Department agency responsible for the converter coupon program, expects to have a system in place to accept requests for coupons by January 1, 2008.

However, it remains unclear exactly how the coupon program will unfold. The Commerce Department has said a decision about when to start sending out coupons would be made after it monitors retailers' ability to process the coupons and have stock on the shelf.

At least three manufacturers have announced prototypes for the converter box. Various industry groups have pledged to make the transition as seamless as possible.

"We have to make sure that we are doing the outreach so that consumers know that the hard date is coming," Copps said.

"We need to do what we can so that when consumers go into Best Buy or Circuit City to buy a TV set or TV monitor ... they know whether it can or can't receive the digital channel after the hard date."