If I had to choose one motto that I live my life by (other than "don't pee into the wind") I think it would be "the less you have, the less you need."
I still use bunny ears for my television. I have had my good old reliable antenna for well over a decade now, packing them up with whatever TV I had at the moment and taking them with me. Paying an extra fifty bucks a month for cable so I can watch reruns of Tool Time just never seemed worth it to me. With my bunny ears I have pretty much gotten all the TV that I need - the News, the Simpsons, the Thursday and Sunday night line-ups, and movies on the weekend. And these days if there is anything special we want to watch, we just download it or watch it online.
But for the last few months, the airwaves have been increasingly inundated with warnings of the switch to digital. I was told countless times this summer that as of Aug 31st I would have to say goodbye to my loyal rabbit ears and finally buy in to what the cable companies have been aggressively trying to sell me if I wanted to watch any TV. at all. ever again! dun dun dun......
I am happy to say that the CRTC's scare compaign did not shake my good faith in my simple antenna. Or I didn't care enough to be bothered by it. Well, we turned the TV on when we got back from our trip, did a bit of jimmying and some minor adjusting, and lo and behold, we still had free television!
The channels are different but they were easy enough to find. We don't get Access anymore but now we get OMNI which seems like a fair trade. CBC is gone but instead we get this weird channel that only plays old shows, so I get to revisit my youth by watching Alf again! And see The Waltons for my first time ever. So there's that. Still get City TV and Global so my line-ups are intact. And even one more channel, which I can't recall at the moment. The best part is the new channels are HD now or something because the sound and picture is fantastic!
So there, take that CRTC!
I am very happy for you, I really am! It makes me actually want to get bunny ears...all this money wasted for cable...
ReplyDeleteLucky, we no longer get any channels :(
ReplyDeleteActually the CRTC did good this time. The switch was to force digital content and improve picture quality, while freeing up spectrum for cellular technology improvements.
ReplyDeleteOn newer TVs antennas can be connected to the ATSC tuner (rather than the classic NTSC tuner) so that they can receive the digital signal directly. Older TVs can get a digital converter (the CRTC was offering a huge rebate on them making them basically free for months leading up to the change-over) which tunes digital and delivers it over the analog connection to the TV.
Some stations will not broadcast over-the-air (OTA) any more, but that's there decision. Others may not be reachable in your area as the bandwidth requirements for digital are higher, requiring a cleaner signal. Those who want to stay with antennas may need to buy a better antenna, or place one outside pointed toward the nearest major broadcast center. Jennelle, for you that's probably Detroit.