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To ensure Canadians have access to digital channels after the digital broadcasting transition deadline of Aug. 31, 2011, the CRTC is granting television distributors the option to offer free, local packages to viewers - but the commission estimates they would be charged about $300 for an installation.
"The local package that will be available via cable companies is a good idea, but the "free" is somewhat misleading," Gregory Taylor, an expert in broadcasting policy at McGill University, who is writing a book on digital television, told The Wire Report in an interview.
"There's an installation charge, and it will cost people $300."
The announcement Friday released additional information about the CRTC's policy on the transition from analog to digital over-the-air television, which faces a deadline Aug. 31, 2011.
But some stations may not meet the deadline. Their over-the-air analogue signals may not be replaced on time with digital signals.
Cable and satellite providers will now have the option of offering stranded consumers a local television package that will include regionally licensed television signals.
But the CRTC estimated in the policy, announced Friday, that it will cost $300 per household for cable or satellite installations.
Consumers who opt for the packages will not be able to subscribe to video-on-demand or other additional broadcasting services. They would only receive the basic package, with no monthly fee.
It's not clear whether the cable and satellite companies are prepared to offer the local basic packages.
Ann Mainville-Neeson, Telus Corp.'s director of broadcast regulation, said in an interview that the company does not want to see the local packages encouraging customers to downgrade from their existing subscriptions.
"We don't want anyone downgrading to service that now blocks them from receiving any other service, and if you read the decision, that's what this does," Ann Mainville-Neeson, Telus Corp.'s director of broadcast regulation, said in an interview.
Telus offers its Internet protocol-based television (IPTV) service in Western Canada and parts of Quebec.
Mainville-Neeson said Telus has not yet arrived at an official position on the updated digital transition policy.
Taylor said the cable and satellite providers will probably use the local packages to try to attract potential customers to their paid services.
The CRTC said Friday that 826,000 to 857,500 households"not individuals - now depend on over-the-air television and will require digital tuners to receive over-the-air digital signals after the switch in 2011.
The commission said it would cost about $64 million to purchase the digital conversion boxes for those households.
In the United States, the government initiated a coupon program for digital converter boxes to ease the transition for consumers. The American deadline for the digital transition passed on June 12, 2009.
Canada, so far, does not have any plans for a similar coupon or funding program.
"I don't know what the government will do with this, but they haven't done anything so far," Taylor said.
But Taylor said Industry Canada's consultation process on the digital economy has offered some hope that the government could be more open to assisting the digital transition.
"That's one of the first times where we've seen active interest in the digital future of Canada," he said.
Many broadcasters have said they will not be able to meet the Aug. 31, 2011 deadline. Canwest Global, owner of the Global Television network, which is being sold to Shaw Communications Inc., is one of them.
"As an industry, Canadian broadcasters are struggling to see how there are enough qualified engineers and equipment to satisfy transition obligations by the deadline, and no consumer education program has been developed, let alone decided or executed, despite the fact that Canwest highlighted this very issue and proposed the establishment of a multi-partite task force in the 2006 TV Policy Review and in several proceedings since," Charlotte Bell, Canwest's senior vice-president of regulatory and government affairs, wrote in submission to the CRTC on the digital transition in May.
"Did this decision actually make me feel more comfortable about the digital transition? No, because I didn't get any commitment from government," Mainville-Neeson said.
The Conservative government has said the transition deadline is the broadcasters' obligation.
In Friday's broadcasting policy announcement, the CRTC also said broadcasters should advertise their transition plans on their websites. The commission has set a March 1, 2011 deadline for broadcasters to publish the information.
But Taylor said an educational campaign that starts in March does not leave enough time to properly prepare the public.
"If we start the education campaign in March, that's only giving us four or five months to get the campaign going. The campaign should get started much earlier," he said.
The transition from analog to digital over-the-air television will free up valuable spectrum in the 700 MHz frequency range for mobile broadband Internet services.
Source: The Wire Report, 07/16/2010
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