Jim Yanik wrote:
aemeijers wrote in
:
dpb wrote:
wrote:
...
My advice is that you should go to the nearest available tar pit and
throw yourself in.
???? What the hay brought that on???? 
Simply saying I really don't care much one way or the other about DTV
transition as long as the end result is that don't _LOSE_ OTA reception
in areas that presently have it is somehow offensive????
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Nah, he was just (badly) implying that you are a dinosaur. (as in La
Brea tar pits, etc.)
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aem sends...
once the stations switch over solely to DTV at their final planned
operating power level,only then can they determine actual coverage and
install repeaters to regain what once was covered by analog.
(at least the major local stations,not the low budget or LPTV stations.)
TV stations do not want to lose viewers;it affects their ratings and what
they can charge for advertising.It hits them right in their pocketbook.
I suspect after Feb.17,TV stations will be checking their DTV coverage or
soliciting reports on coverage,so they can compensate(eventually).
The first point is, of course, what I've been saying all along -- we'll
only know what we got after we see what we have...other than the FCC
maps of expected coverage (anybody have any clue how those were
generated--I was unable to find anything that gave any hint whatsoever
as to how they made the estimates) there's no indication at all unless
the local stations have made some more informative data available than
any of those here have. The coverage in some of those FCC maps,
however, does show large gaps in much more highly directionally
sensitive coverage than for the corresponding transmitters' analog
transmittal for some areas I have noticed.
I seriously doubt there will be much, if any, worrying over loss of the
rural areas even by the translators in these areas as the absolute
numbers aren't large enough to matter -- it may be a sizable geographic
area, but the population density is simply too low for the economics to
make it pay unless there are incentives for their compliance.
As I said upthread, I think one of the requirements of maintaining the
license _should_ be to not reduce coverage but that doesn't seem to be a
criterion afaict.
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