Digital TV Could Bring Unpleasant Surprises

Michelle Madigan, Medill News Service

The television industry says it's on track to switch to all-digital TV. But the chair of a powerful House committee wants it to hasten the conversion, and to protect consumers from shouldering the costs of the move--which may include built-in copy controls.

Television broadcasters are required to switch to digital, copy-protected signals by January 1, 2007. When this happens, more than 300 million televisions and VCRs will be useless.

Broadcasters, cable companies, manufacturers, and consumers on Wednesday commented on a draft proposal for what Congress and the Federal Communication Commission could do to make a smooth transition to digital television. They spoke before the House Energy and Commerce Committee's telecommunications subcommittee.

The draft being considered by the House subcommittee also lays the groundwork for "broadcast flag" content protection. Broadcasters would send their video encoded with a security "flag" that would prevent customers from taping a program on one system and moving it to another for viewing. The FCC should require all digital devices to contain such copy controls by January 1, 2006, according to the subcommittee's draft recommendation.

The issue of copy controls was not a focus among the testimony, however, which dealt more with the timeline for the switch. "This transition has been underway for over ten years and we are not as far along as we need to be," said Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-Louisiana, who chairs the committee.

Charging Consumers

One of the few voices testifying for consumers Wednesday was Gene Kimmelman of the Consumers Union, who says the burden of converting to digital TV is in the wrong place. After broadcasters switch exclusively to digital transmissions, consumers will be forced to buy digital TVs or converter boxes for their existing analog sets.

"Such a requirement would put the digital changeover squarely on the backs of consumers," Kimmelman said.

But consumers have little incentive to switch to digital now, because such televisions are expensive and only a small portion of programming is available digitally. Consumers are still buying equipment that doesn't comply with the digital technology proposed in the draft legislation.

Kimmelman says an average U.S. household has two to three television sets and one VCR, half of them have DVD players and half have computers. The transition to digital will cost thousands of dollars per household. He urged the committee to "go back to the drawing board" and not order conversion until manufacturers have the new equipment and consumers know the cost.

"Let's make the industries that are going to benefit take the burden," he says.

Consumers can eventually benefit from the new technology, Tauzin says. Still, he added, "I have a real concern about consumers being forced to go out and spend money for a converter box--and will end up getting nothing new for the additional cost. This cannot be allowed to happen."

Eventual Benefit

Broadcasters say they are making steady progress and can reach the 2006 deadline, and consumers will begin to see the benefits of digital transmissions.

"Broadcasters have invested billions of dollars to bring digital television to American consumers," says Michael Fiorile of the National Association of Broadcasters. "Only when a consumer can purchase a digital TV set from a local retailer, take it home, plug it in and begin enjoying digital television--through cable or over-the-air--only then will the end of this transition be in sight," Fiorile says.

The representative of the Consumer Electronics Retailers Coalition, Alan McCollough, reminded the committee that consumers want reliable service.

"Customers also expect consumer electronics products to work predictably and reliably," said McCollough, president and chief executive of Circuit City Stores. "We begin with the premise that it is simply un-American to pay too much."

"The transition can only succeed if we honestly give the customers what they want and not what we want them to have," he added.