Here in Canada, we’re less than one year away from the digital television transition. After August 31, 2011, most Canadians will no longer be able to receive analog television transmissions over the air. Digital television promises better picture and sound, the capacity for additional programming, and a more efficient use of the wireless spectrum. An estimated 1 million Canadians will be affected by the change.
Recently, Michael Geist wrote that due to a lack of public education and subsidy programs, many Canadians won’t be ready, and that this transition “could lead to a new digital divide.”
The CRTC has tried to push the issue onto the public agenda, but has thus far faced government opposition and broadcaster indifference. As a result, when Canada’s broadcasters flip the switch next summer, hundreds of thousands of Canadians may find themselves on the wrong side of a new digital divide.
Responding to Geist’s column, Bill St. Arnaud wrote on his blog:
Micheal Geist has recently expressed legitimate concerns about the advent of digital TV and the impact that this will have on those with older TVs who currently don’t subscribe to cable TV or satellite service. I believe that, in fact, digital TV will have the opposite effect and be of much greater benefit for those who cant afford such services as now they will be able to receive high quality HDTV ( in many cases higher quality than over cable or satellite). Digital TV will allow many of us (especially in Canada and the US) to sever the cable and get rid of our outrageously expensive cable TV and/or satellite service. Most cable and satellite companies charge extra to receive HD Channels over their system.
This week, Nora will talk to both Michael Geist and Bill St. Arnaud about the coming digital television transition. We’d love to include some of your questions in the discussion. If you have a digital television question for Michael or Bill, please leave it below in the comments.
I don't have any questions…just a comment. You should look into the work of Greg Taylor, a recent PhD student from McGill who did his dissertation on the transition to digital TV. I know you've probably already got your interviews lined up and all that, but his research is worth a read. Here's a quick link, http://www.mcgill.ca/ahcs/gradprofiles/greg_taylo… , though you can find him talking about it on Business TV too.
Thanks, Jer. Indeed, I've been in touch w/ Greg Taylor. He was very helpful when I did a column about DTV in Canada, and we're hoping to talk to him again about this.
Two questions:
1) When the US went to digital OTA broadcasting, I believe there was a subsidy program to assist with the purchase of set-top converters to allow existing analog-tuner TVs to receive digital programming – has there been any discussion about a similar subsidy for Canadians?
2) I can see the point Bill St Arnaud makes, but I think that's predicated on networks providing compelling content OTA vs what's currently only available as premium paid content via satellite or cable distribution. Will satellite and cable be unbundling premium content to make it available without having to pay for basic channels that are going to be available at the same quality OTA with digital broadcasting?
Looking forward to hearing the interviews on Spark!
According to M Giest's full article the government has already stated that it will sell the highly profitable OTA spectrum that going digital will open up, but they will not be buying or subsidizing any converter boxes for Canadians.
In the US you can still receive OTA digital transmission on the UHF frequencies if your TV has a digital tuner built in or you have a converter box for an older TV. Will the Canadian transition to DTV work the same way with OTA broadcasts and be receivable by areas in the US close to the Canadian border? Or will Canadian broadcasts be set up in such a way that only television sets sold in Canada will be able to decode the OTA transmissions?
As a comment to Bill St. Arnaud's response he is correct that it will bring higher quality TV to people using OTA. However, I have observed in the US that most people don't know they can get OTA digital TV as the cable companies here ran a very successful campaign convincing consumers they had to have cable boxes to get digital TV. Also, cable channels in DTV still is the realm of cable companies. You can't just put up an antenna and get Discovery HD. That is an area I would be very interested in seeing developed both in Canada and the US.
Greg, as a Canadian living close to the US border (I'm in Toronto), I can pick up both Canadian and American OTA channels with my UHF antenna and the digital tuner built into my (fairly recent) TV. AFAIK, Canada and the US have both adopted the ATSC standard, so signals should be compatible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATSC_%28standards%29
Also, very interesting to hear about the cable companies' campaign. Thanks for mentioning it.
I second the comment about the US marketing campaign. At the time, you had to listen to the "PSA style" commercials very carefully and be generally well informed of the change to not think that you would have to subscribe to cable to get digital TV.
Hi Nora, my questions would be:
1. Is TV Ontario planning to make the switch, if so, when.
2. Since traditional OTA television stations have largely advertising based revenue, how long can OTA broadcasts survive, as a delivery platform, against the popular program delivery options provided via cable, internet downloads (both legal and grey-legal), and internet streaming (home theatre computers, stand alone devices)
Living on the border in Windsor, ON I can tell you that we now recieve about a dozen crystal clear digital channels from Detroit. At the time of transition in the US we went to the states, bought a $40 HD box and we now get some channels in a higher quality then friends I have that are paying $100 a month for their cable package.
I'm generally a big fan of Michael Geist but I wonder how he would propose to move us into the future of OTA broadcasting without a few of us having to feel some temporary pain in the process.
Unless I can pick up OTA digital TV, then on 1 Sept. 2011 I will disconnect my TV completely and watch what I want over the Internet. I will not buy anything new, such as a set-top box nor buy packages from the cable company that I do not want.
Question for both guests: Once TV is delivered digitally to my home, will the CRTC still mandate what I must receive (ie. basic channels) before I am allowed to subscribe to anything else? I happen to have no interest in American channels except for PBS and yet I am now currently required to receive them, if I also want to receive channels like BBC World
It seems that areas that already have access to many channels such as southern Ontario will be well-served by the change but what about other areas? A post on the Canadian Media Guild site: http://newsshift.blogspot.com/2010/09/canadians-i… claims that many Canadians in areas outside of major urban areas will have no OTA at all, as there will be no digital broadcast to replace the analog.
My question is why is it taking so long?
Mu concern is that with the high reliance on cable that broadcasting is not going to survive digital broadcast or not.In Ottawa I should get 6 digital channels, but we can only get two, maybe a trick of geography but i suspect grossly underpowered transmitters . If the networks are so reluctant to serve a market as large as Ottawa with adequate digital signal what hope is there for smaller markets like Quebec City or Winnipeg?
How do I convince my friends know that OTA is totally legal and they can even make their own HD antenna? A lot of them are not impressed by OTA because they are so used to suscription.
Please talk about this question. I find it disturbing that people have become so confused by the copyright, satellite and fee for carriage debates (wars) that they think that receiving OTA broadcasts might be illegal.
I know I'm a broken record on this, but it shows how we need to clarify and simplify laws like Copyright/etc. Things such as the current Bill C-32 go the opposite direction to what I would consider "modernisation".
I should have stated that no Irish tv channels are yet available in digital format FTA. Only British and Other European tv channrls are available free OTA in Ireland. Even German companies sell Digital Freesat systems here pretuned for reception of all BritishFTA channels.Irish tv is slowly playing catchup.Irish channels are available on satellite only if a subscription is paid to a British company.Terrestial digital is not yet available.BBC and RTE plan joint development of transmitters on border of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
In the US the government required that there be cheap converter boxes to convert the digital OTA signal into analog for those who did not want to replace their existing TV sets. Is there anything like that available in Canada? If we purchased converter boxes from the US would we be able to use them in Canada?
I live in Canada and have purchased 'cheap' converter boxes when the US went digital. The signal is much clearer (or isn't there, 1 or 0!) and I was surprised to find that CTV and CBC were already available OTA in digital format which was an unexpected bonus. Now there is the minor catch…I am on my 4th box. They are cheap and do not seem to be very reliable or durable. The first 3 were boxes that were intended for the US rebate program. Luckily the first 2 could be returned to the store under warranty, the third lasted 11 months (90 day warranty). Both stores are no longer carrying digital converter boxes. Reading comments on the internet, I have not had a string of bad luck, the failures are common. So with the one I just purchased, I bought the extended warranty (usually not a worthwhile option). If it lasts 3 years, it is still cheaper than 2 months cable, gives me just the channels I want (can't wait for TVO to switch to digital), but I hate the e-waste if the devices don't last.
Up until June 10th we received great reception for CBC Montreal on a new digital tv and antenna. Starting yesterday we get a message on screen stating reception is low. Can we overcome this?
A reply from SJM on Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/stevenjmay/statuses/806492…
"Your Spark listener in MTL who watches OTA DTV should try moving around her antenna. Also, use a circular UHF antenna."
What kind of antenna do you use? Is it on your roof? Does it feed more than one TV? Specific recommendations are tricky without knowing how you have things arranged. I live about 60 miles South of Chicago and with the right antenna (e.g. Winegard HD9032) on top of my (~= 10m) tower I could probably get most of the Chicago stations. I would use a masthead preamplifier to compensate for the length of coax from the antenna. It might be worth consulting a local antenna expert if you have one.
in America, we've transitioned for 2 years plus, the analogue signal carried both the voice and picture as one stream. But digital does not. Sometimes we have out of sync voice with picture. This may happen in Canada. Harry Shearer's LeShow covered much of the transition in a humorous way
I was just wondering what the screen resolution would be over the air. Would it be 720p, or maybe even 1080p? If the resolution is greater than standard definition cable, I'll definately be canceling my cable tv.
I would like to follow up on Gail's question from Montreal. The question was why she couldn't get a signal _when she had before_! I picked up on this because I have just brought a new ATSC digital TV out to my cottage 100 km west of Ottawa. I get quite a good analog picture on both CBC and CTV, but the TV does not find enough signal for any digital channels at all!
That's the nature of digital signals (perhaps especially digital television in North America because of some curious choices made by the ATSC). An analogue television will pick up a weak signal and try to render it as best it can – perhaps with snow or 'ghosting' caused interference by reflected signals. A digital television receiving a marginal signal is likely to just admit defeat and display nothing.
I'm not sure how this works in Canada, but with the digital transition here in the U.S, some stations have changed their transmission frequency and power level. It may be disappointing to lose some (or all) of the stations we could receive as analogue signals, but it's not entirely surprising.
Looks like there's more than just me complaining about this.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/cbcs…
My TV has a DTV option, but it is greyed out. I wonder if it may be because there is no DTV signal, can you tell me if broadcasters will activate DTV transmissions for testing prior to Aug 31st?
Depends where you are. In Ottawa and most cities there are a number of DTV channels up and running, like CBC and RadioCanada. Just do a scan with your new TV and you'll find them.
FYI – I've been told by friends, and by using TVFool.com, that I can maximize the reception I get in these remote areas by 1) aiming the antenna properly, 2) using a pre-amplifier, and 3) waiting for CBC to up their signal strength once the digital switch is done (the last was also sort of confirmed to me by a CBC tech).
Hello, at our cottage approx. 100km north of Ottawa we used to get a number of channels just fine with a regular antenna. We just lost ch 24 the other day and so tried the digital converter box we had purchased. Followed all the instructions and funny thing is we can only bring in CBC while at home in Arnprior (just outside of Ottawa) we are bringing in 6 channels now and expect to get the rest on the 31st. If we can only get CBC with rabbit ears at the cottage does that mean that all we will get with digital TV? What should we do?
Tina, you may need to get a roof top antenna that is more sensitive to get more than CBC at your cottage. Remember that part of the problem is that some stations will use less power, but the other thing is that you cannot get a channel unless there is enough power to give a perfect picture – no more of this fuzzy picture stuff way out in the boonies.
I live in the Richelieu Valley in the Monteregie area south of Montreal. I purchased a new television in preparation for the switch to digital. Since the switch to digital I no longer receive CBC. I still have every other channel I had before, including several American ones, but I lost CBC. Can you help me?