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House Kills Digital Tv Delay

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by Megan Barnett
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Jan 28 2009 2:23pm EDT

House Kills Digital TV Delay

Wired logo Wired reports: The House, led by minority Republicans, killed a bill Tuesday that would have delayed the nation's switchover to digital television, now still on track to occur Feb. 17.

For trivia fans, the vote will go down as perhaps the first legislative defeat for President Barack Obama, who requested the delay before he was even sworn in. The U.S. Senate obliged Obama, unanimously passing the "Digital TV Delay" bill Monday, and House passage was seen as following easily.

The bill would have ostensibly pushed back the switch to pure digital TV to June 12, but in fact it would have allowed stations to decide when, between now and then, they might individually make the switch rather than support both analog and digital delivery.

This lack of definitiveness in an initiative intended to restore order to a process that had somehow still left an estimate 6.5 million households not ready surely played a role in the bill's defeat.

by John C. Abell

Also on Wired.com:
Obama Urges DTV Delay as Time, Resources Run Out
DTV Upgrade Proves Costly, Headachy
Comcast Gives Free Cable TV to Rabbit-Ear Households
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