By George Olsen
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/pre/local-pre-821636.mp3
DTV conversion delayed until June in eastern NC
New Bern, NC – INTRO - More than 400 TV stations had shut down their analog signals to go digital by this past Tuesday, despite the extension on the DTV deadline from Feb 17 to June 12. That includes ten in North Carolina six of those in the major Charlotte and Triangle markets... but none in eastern North Carolina. George Olsen has more.
The federal government extended the deadline for stations to convert fully to digital to June 12. Stations did have the option to request going ahead with their analog shut-off and full digital conversion and ten in North Carolina received the o-k to do so, including 3 each in the major Charlotte and Triangle markets. But in eastern North Carolina, if you never went ahead and got your converter box or purchased a digital TV, your old analog TV with rabbit ears is just fine for now.
"We had to make out decisions prior to yesterday, and once you say we're going to stay on the air we're committed to staying until June 12th."
Clay Mossman, the general manager for WITN in Washington. None of the major eastern North Carolina network affiliates in the area requested permission to make the switchover on-time or early, depending on your viewpoint. They were ready Tuesday, but when one station says its waiting, from a competitive consideration the others were bound to hold off too.
"If I had my choice I would rather go ahead and get it all done yesterday, but I'm not in a situation where I can shut off my analog transmitter while our competitors leave their analog transmitters on the air."
Doing so could have left a sizable number of eastern North Carolina residents without access to over-the-air TV. Don Fisher, the general manager for WCTI in New Bern said he didn't have access to specific figures in this market on how many people weren't prepared for the DTV conversion but had heard nationally as many as 10% of viewers weren't ready for the switchover.
"We've got some fairly extensive rural pockets of our market and I think somewhere between 5-10% of our market would be unprepared. We serve almost 300,000 households so you're talking 15,000-30,000 households that may be unprepared."
With those figures in mind Fisher says his station was the first in the area to announce it would wait until June 12th. So the DTV conversion countdown you've seen countlessly promoted on your TV screen begins again
"The good thing is that by delaying essentially it means that no one is hurt, no one is without the ability to watch TV until June 12th and it gives them another 4 months to get the set boxes they need to convert to digital signals or buy a digital tv."
at which point we'll see if the federal government chooses to press the re-set button again. I'm George Olsen.