DTV Transition Mostly Smooth, Windows Media Center Problems 223
dritan writes "While most of the transition to digital seems to have gone smoothly, those who use Windows Media Center saw their screens go dark. Users are complaining that Media Center did not pick up changes to channel assignments that took place on Friday. Someone forgot to update the static channel lists distributed with the program guide. Users either have to wait for Microsoft to fix the problem, or manually edit the configuration files."
Reports indicate that the FCC received upwards of 300,000 calls on Friday from consumers seeking late help with the transition, but they were prepared, with over 4,000 operators available to handle problems. The FCC's DTV website also had over 3 million hits on Friday. Both phone and Internet traffic have now tapered off, and supplies of converter boxes appear to have held out just fine.
It Worked (Score:5, Insightful)
I must say, a federal government agency actually worked; albeit to the tune of two billion dollars.
One can only wonder what one-thousand billion dollars can do.
[/sarcasm]
Well Done (Score:5, Insightful)
Reports indicate that the FCC received upwards of 300,000 calls on Friday from consumers seeking late help with the transition, but they were prepared, with over 4,000 operators available to handle problems. The FCC's DTV website also had over 3 million hits on Friday. Both phone and internet traffic have now tapered off, and supplies of converter boxes appear to have held out just fine.
Much of my comment history has been dedicated to chastising the government when they get things wrong. I should also recognize when they get it right.
Nice work, guys!
Re:It Worked (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Anecdote (Score:3, Insightful)
Only in Slashdot will a totally unrelated... (Score:5, Insightful)
...discussion on something as mundane as Digital TV turn into Microsoft Bashing.
Its Incredible.
I mean we are discussing the transition from analog to digital TV and somehow the submitter thought to add his two cents in bashing up Microsoft.
MythTV has it.
Ubuntu has it.
BUT NO! He has to bash Microsoft.
What an asshole.
Re:I made the switch. I switched to OFF (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28694 [theonion.com]
Seriously, why should we care? (Score:5, Insightful)
I "get" the background and the technological reasons to switch to digital TV and all that. But honestly, how many millions of our tax dollars are being wasted on this "dear god we need to drop everything and help everyone switch because lord knows we can't trust them to handle their own affairs!" game? Seriously. Why should we care? It's only television.
Having to hear every four seconds about how it's going to be some kind of goddamned tragedy because some portion of lazy motherfuckers sitting on a couch somewhere can't be arsed to replace or upgrade their own equipment (or get someone to do it for them!) when we've been listening to the same goddamned twitter about this switch for three fucking years is really wearing thin. Now we're going to have to hear three more years of whining about how the new digital TV is no good, so-and-so can't get such-and-such channel anymore, and woe is me, my reception sucks now. I have a better idea: Why don't we just turn the whole thing the fuck off? I quit watching TV when I was a teenager and honestly, my life hasn't been any less enriched because of it. I have a TV, but it's an old analog one that I use as a monitor for my game consoles. I don't have cable, I don't have a converter box, and I don't even have a damn antenna for the thing. I don't care, and I don't see why anyone else should care enough to be treating this like some kind of disaster.
Way back when this digital switchover was announced in the first place I held the vain hope that some portion of people might wake up and decide to do something else with themselves instead of park in front of their (soon to be useless) TV. Like, I dunno. Read a book. Learn some stuff on the Internet. Go the fuck outside for some reason other than to go to work or to the liquor store. Interact with real people. Learn something about the world.
I don't characterize myself as a very smart person compared to most, and I'm fairly young and therefore am automatically assumed to lack experience. Yet somehow I am continually amazed at the sheer ignorance that many people I meet display about absolutely everything. Science, literature, fiction, history, geography, mechanics, anything. Yet they can recite to me chapter and verse what happened on Survivor or American Idol. The one that gets me is how they can complain to me about the war in Iraq, yet they don't actually know where Iraq is. These are people who are older than me -- people who should be "old enough to know better." Yet the only thing they know about the world is what they see through the damned box at the other end of the living room.
And it pisses me off. These people don't need pampering. Let them flounder. Maybe it'll force them to learn something about the world, even if it's just some tiny inconsequential thing that they need to hook up to get their fucking idiot box working again.
Re:I made the switch. I switched to OFF (Score:5, Insightful)
You are enjoying the outside world so much you came to post on Slashdot?
Where do you live that you have no UHF and can enjoy the outside world? Usually those two don't go hand in hand.
Re:It Worked (Score:3, Insightful)
I must say, a federal government agency actually worked; albeit to the tune of two billion dollars.
The spectrum sale was quite successful from the government's point of view.
The migration to digital frees a lot of space for other uses - and the geek - the techie - directly and indirectly is quite obviously one of the prime beneficiaries.
Since he rarely admits to ever watching broadcast TV - I am not quite sure what he is complaining about.
Re:Wow manually edit configuration files. (Score:5, Insightful)
Never mind that I type and edit all day, editing a configuration file or typing
What they type all day is English. What you're trying to get them to do is type in some weird computer-ese language that they don't understand.
Re:Anecdote (Score:3, Insightful)
All my local stations had some problems around that time. On Thursday night, CBS had an audio problem (using the wrong channels from the surround sound, I think, so music came through but voices did not.) On Friday morning, ABC was dropping frames, so movements looked jerky. An analog repeater station also somehow switched from PBS to religious programming for awhile. Then on Friday night, PBS digital, a Spanish station, and NBC all went black for awhile (during the hockey game!) But I think they're all settling down now.
Re:Progress (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally it would have been better if Canada had been in the same step as the US and done the transition at the same time. Nope gotta wait another 2 years or so. By that time she'll probably be living in a city instead of out in the middle of no-where. It's not a bad idea, I thought of it but she decided against it. She's as stubborn as I am.
Re:Wow manually edit configuration files. (Score:4, Insightful)
The only way the process could be automated is if you designed a mechanical robot to press keys on the keyboard for you.
Or if the guide software edited the configuration for you, like it's supposed to. That would be automatic editing, would it not? Last I checked "mechanical" was nowhere in the definition of "automatic", therefore it can, by definition, be carried out by software.
Re:Seriously, why should we care? (Score:3, Insightful)
Translation: I'm better than them, even though I lack the skills or intelligence to express my point without profanity, rants, insults, and belittlement. Really, I'm better than them! I'll even explain why. Someday. Somehow.
Translation: I'm better than them, even though I have nothing interesting to say, so I'll go insult and belittle someone for their choice of language.
Re:Progress (for the suburbs) (Score:1, Insightful)
It's completely unwatchable.
That could be said of TV before the digital switchover too. 20 minutes of mind numbing commercials per hour pretty much forced people to get a TiVo or the like anyway. And the other 40 minutes? Not usually much better.
A perfect case of "and nothing of value was lost".
Re:Seriously, why should we care? (Score:5, Insightful)
I personally hope the griping about "i don't get reception" or "i wasn't prepared for the switch" stops as well. Hopefully, the self-righteous "I don't even watch TV" crowd will STFU then too.
It's cool that you don't watch TV. But more than 238,000,000 people do...so, yeah. The DTV switch is kinda important.
Re:Anecdote (Score:5, Insightful)
There's another group of people who prefer the OTA signal: those of us who like quality of broadcast HD more than the over-compressed signal coming from the cable companies. And let's not forget those of us who don't want to pay for premium service that has as many commercials as the advertising-sponsored OTA broadcast of the same show.
Sure, there are some folks out there who don't understand the issues and might complain. But there are groups who not only understand the issues but have made conscious decisions to eschew cable, dish and IPTV-subscription services (e.g., U-Verse) in favor of OTA, DVDs, internet-based VOD or some combination of the three.
MOD PARENT UP (Score:2, Insightful)
OTA HD + Boxee is your friend...
Re:Seriously, why should we care? (Score:2, Insightful)
No, it's not important. It's popular, but that's not the same thing.
Even if 238,000,000,000,000,000 people watch it, it's still just television, a form of entertainment. If millions of people were to suddenly *stop* watching it, nothing terrible would happen as a result. Lots of people watch it, but it's not *important* that they watch it. It's just something they do because they're bored. If a whole bunch of them decided to do something else instead, there would be no dire consequences.
Re:Seriously, why should we care? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, if a whole bunch of them decided to do something else instead, there would be no dire consequences. If a whole bunch of them were forced to on the other hand...say, because their signal went blank during a switchover...well gee, what could possibly go wrong?
Aside from general anger at the situation, we have:
$116 BILLION (46.3 BIL in the US alone) in revenue generated from Television Advertising in 2007 alone (the most recent report I could get with a quick google search, though you can be sure that number only goes UP each year). I'm sure our economy could handle losing that money without ANY problem whatsoever.
Numerous jobs, all the way from grips to production assistant to program manager to the more illustrious positions of each show on television. Let's not forget maintenance positions, linemen, customer service...I can't find any numbers on this, but I'm sure you could imagine, it ain't a small number.
How about the cultural impact? Say what you will about the value of television as a cultural export, but the fact remains that part of our culture today is the result of shows from yesteryear. Additionally, a decent amount of money changes hands just exporting this cultural medium between countries.
That's only a few examples I could come up with after waking up from 2 hours of sleep- if I were more awake, I'm sure I could come up with more. Either way, it seems you have a very subjective opinion on what is and isn't important.
It's not important that people watch tv for the content, but the world has adapted to television, and relies on it at the very least from an economic standpoint- this is true whether you agree with it or not, whether you think it SHOULD be that way or not, and whether you WANT it to be that way or not.
Yes, in this case the popularity of the medium has has made it important.