• by Joe Mandese , June 11, 2009

Tomorrow is D-Day. In case you are a new millennium version of Rip Van Winkle, it's not the day we reinvade Germany. It's the day the U.S. broadcast TV industry transitions to digital from analog spectrum. And, of course, all hell breaks loose. Or maybe not.

Over the past couple of years, I've likened the digital broadcast TV transition to Y2K. I've done so for a couple of reasons. One is that there is a comparable fear and loathing leading up to a technological change that some fear will break down the social fabric and throw us into an uncivilized state of disarray. The other is that, like Y2K, I have a sneaking suspicion that the whole thing will prove to be anticlimactic. And the reason for that, is a third analogous factor. Like Y2K, both industry and government have banded together to invest extraordinary sums and resources in an effort to avoid a meltdown scenario. Okay, so the DTV transition isn't exactly analogous to Y2K, but they both have three-digit acronyms.

I was reminded this morning about how much the television industry has invested in the transition while listening to a briefing for the press held by the National Association of Broadcasters.

Here are a few stats: the industry has donated $1.2 billion worth of public service airtime to educate U.S. TV viewers about the transition. Meanwhile, the press has contributed an unprecedented amount of ink, airtime and megabytes to getting the message out, too -- occasionally alarmist and sensationalist, as the press are prone to be, but all-in-all, a fairly tempered and straightforward account of what will take place, and what people need to prepare for it. Finally, the U.S. government -- or I should say, we, the U.S. taxpayers -- have contributed significant sums toward a federally subsidized coupon program that provides, on request, a $40 discount coupon toward the purchase of a digital TV converter box.

And if that weren't enough, the feds have actually contributed part of the economic stimulus package to pay contractors to make house calls assisting more than 200,000 consumers to hook their analog sets up for digital reception. House calls? Now that's a service you're not likely to get even your doctor to make these days.

And for those who cannot get in-home assistance, special mobile support centers have been deployed in major markets across the U.S., especially in the most needy communities, to offer roadside assistance.

Finally, the government has put together a special task force of dozens of FCC agents to man a special toll-free number -- 1-888-CALL-FCC -- that will answer questions 24 hours a day over the weeks to come.

The public education efforts have paid off. Over the past four months, the number of U.S. households completely unprepared for the DTV transition has declined by 50%. And for those hapless viewers who wake up Saturday morning to find their screens blank, there will be a special analog "night light" signal advising them who to contact for help. All in all, a pretty impressive joint industry/government/media effort.

But there will still be some in the dark. How many, isn't exactly clear, but according to a poll conducted by the NAB last week -- the last in a series of DTV surveys leading up to D-Day -- about 2.2 million households, or about 2% of U.S. TV households are still unready. An estimated 440,000 of them, however, are in the process of either redeeming a DTV box coupon, or hooking one up, so the NAB figures the real number is about 1.75 million households.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the transition is those people who don't give a hoot, and are either waiting until the last minute, or have no plans to convert at all. More than a third of those who remain unprepared said they were going to wait until the last 30 days to do anything about it, and at least some portion don't seem to care one way or another if they can still receive a TV signal come Saturday morning. Naturally, the NAB, the FCC and the rest of the TV industry are all worked up about the potential loss of these viewers, partly because they are seen as people who may not be equipped to deal with the transition -- the elderly, Hispanics who speak a foreign language, etc. But at least some of these are people who have been receiving TV, but may not really care about it. These people are like modern day Howard Beales from Paddy Chayefsky's "Network," who apparently don't want to "take it anymore."

That's one end of the digital TV spectrum. On the other end, the NAB research revealed that a significant number of over-the-air-only people who've already made the transition have discovered that they can receive channels they've never received before. So the digital transition giveth, and the digital transition taketh away. It will be weeks, maybe months, before we know how much exactly.