A Note on a The Death of Analog

If you own an analog television, do not have cable and have not gotten your converter box, you only have two days to do so. You are also an idiot.

Congress passed a law that all signals transmitted by television stations had to be digital. Why did they do this? Well, a lot of stations had already made the transition. Digital transmissions are sharper and more efficient. They also use less airwaves---this is the key point. Now, the guvment will tell you that these airwaves are being freed up for altruistic uses like emergency phone lines and saving burning puppies. And that's true, some of the freed up airwaves will be used for boyscout purposes. Most will be auctioned to the highest bidder in order to be used in newly developed technologies. I'm sure congressmen all over the place got kick-backs from television companies and somewhere some senator's son is impregnating an underage girl in a sports car purchased using television lobbyist bucks. It's a beautiful world we live in people.

But that law, necessary or not, was passed a looooooong time ago. I myself have viewed over 70,000 commercials featuring old people who look about ready to shit their Depends asking questions about analog conversion boxes and warning the rest of us to make the switch. You've had plenty of time.

I guess the most amazing thing that I'll come away from this knowing is that our legislative branch spent time on, passed a law allocating millions of dollars toward (each American household is entitled to a $40 coupon for an analog conversion box), and required the advancement of television technology. Whether or not the bill was necessary or even amoral pales in comparison to the realization that television has entwined itself with American Life so thoroughly that a change to the art form requires government mandate.

That's the big time, folks. I think T.V.'s here to stay.