[SBE] 4 more months? Slight, hopefully positive thread drift..

[Adrienne Abbott]

When Reno station KOLO-TV did an early turn off of their analog signal, the
event was well-documented by station staff as well as the NBC and CBS
affiliates in the market. The turn-off was scheduled for the mid-day (11:00)
newscast, with live coverage of the GM pushing the button that replaced the
normal programming on the analog signal with a slate giving viewers
instructions on what to do to receive the digital signal. The slate ran
until midnight and then the analog signal went silent. The other stations
with news staff covered the end of analog broadcasting on KOLO-TV as a news
event and everyone agreed that the early turn-off probably benefited the
entire market. In addition, KOLO-TV's early turn-off coincided with a series
of market-wide "soft tests" so the Nevada Broadcasters Association had set
up a call center to help viewers who had questions about the loss of
KOLO-TV's signal as well as the digital tests on the other stations.
Overall, there were very few calls to the call center and to KOLO-TV, and
we've been handling those one at a time, getting everyone up to speed on the
transition. The prevailing opinion is that having a station do an early
turn-off will probably benefited everyone in the market, stations and as
well as viewers, and the market is better prepared for the end of analog
broadcasting ends, whether that happens this month or in June. 
Adrienne



-----Original Message-----
From: sbe-bounces at sbe.org [mailto:sbe-bounces at sbe.org] On Behalf Of Tom
Bosscher
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2009 6:39 PM
To: sbe member discussion mail list
Subject: Re: [SBE] 4 more months? Slight, hopefully positive thread drift..

If I may,

    I would like to ask all of the TV engineers involved in the analog 
shutoff to do one simple thing:

Video tape it.

    I know, in many cases one could dial up the remote control and shut 
down the analog.
But this is a historic moment. Use a station camera or a simple cam 
corder. Then put a twenty second wrap around it, and put it up on You Tube.
Label it "Analog Shutoff WXYZ", so we can all find them.

Twenty years from now, when we are all in our rocking chairs at my new 
broadcast engineering retirement home, "Sign-off Acres", we can look at 
the videos, after we transfer them to 16 mm, and watch them on our Bell 
and Howell movies projectors!

    Most seriously, please pass the word and ask all TV engineers to 
video tape the moment.

    Tom Bosscher, a radio engineering type guy...


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