bemis
join:2008-07-18
Reading, MA Reviews:
 ·Comcast
 ·Verizon FiOS
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| TV is a cake walk? The effort would probably make the FCC's coordinated transition to digital television look like a cake walk From a physical infrastructure point of view, probably...
In terms of the users, I beg to differ--
With broadcast TV you have absolutely no way of knowing who has a TV set because they aren't registered and they're sold everywhere. The result was massive delays, huge billion-dollar campaigns for advertising the transition.
However, with telephones you not only know who has them (they all have a bill that arrives each month), but you also have a straight forward way to contact them 
So, you offer up 2 converter boxes for free to each household for a year via notices included in everyone's bills, and you allow robo-calls to anyone who hasn't responded to the fliers or requested converters within the first 6 months. If after a year of notices and robo-calls you still don't have a converter, well, then you're probably too stupid to use a phone anyway.
Just make sure the converters can detect when it's PSTN vs. IP and pass-thru PSTN until the day of the transition, then you're all set in terms of users.
The real issue here is, do the Bell's actually care? Unless they stand to save billions per year by converting PSTN to IP I think they'll say no way to this. In that case the government has to foot the bill.
That said, I think this is just as worthy an effort of government money as many other programs I see out there being paid for. |
