[HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: Yearly TV Licence? ...Really?

[Lee Storm (God Is The Healing Force)]

| [> Carol]:
| > In the U.S., do you mean? Wonder why no one ever told me about 
| coupons
| > for free converters! No one else of my acquaintance has them, 
| either.
| > Do you mean that the cable companies will all go broke or change to
| > Internet providers because no one will need their services and a lot
| > of people spent money on satellite dishes for nothing?

[Lee]:
There are still places where one needs a dish or something because there's
no cable and antennas won't work, but, for the rest, it depends on what they
will be happy with.  Cable will still have tings the regular broadcast bands
won't.  Of course, with the state of TV programs nowadays, it's probably no
great loss. <Evil Grin>

[Carrol]:
| > And where can I buy a converter box? (Radio Shack?)

[Lee]:
Uh--Walmart, actually. :-)  The coupons are for $40.00 each and there are
converter boxes that run at the same price which means all you may have to
pay is tax.

| Annemehr:
| Yep, we're in the US (in the Pittsburgh TV market).
| 
| Lots of questions answered here:
| 
| http://www.dtv.gov/consumercorner.html#converter
| 
| The first question regarding converter boxes tells you where to go to 
| get your coupons.
| 
| (The bit about the free coupons running out may turn out to be a 
| false rumor -- it was something my husband heard somewhere.  But this 
| site says every household gets two).

[Lee]:

Amazingly, there are still a lot of people who are unaware of the whole
change-over thing.  I've seen commercials for it on some channels, mostly
the broadcast band ones.  The Cable Only channels don't carry much on the
subject, probably because the cable people will do to the others what they
did to me...send me a note that says I'm going to lose channels as of
such-and-such date and need to contact them for a new digital box which I
can have free for a year and then pay through the teeth for.

I'm now in possession of their box and will hurry and get mine when my
coupons come in.  In this way, I can have my cable without paying for their
I/O and digital box.  <Hee-Hee!>
 Cheers,

Lee :-)