Does the digital TV transition matter to ed tech?

So the House failed to delay the transition date for Digital television here in the States. February 17th is it. For sure. No delays or second chances. As I walk around most of our schools, I see a heck of a lot of TVs that are certainly not ready to receive digital broadcasts. All of those media carts, the TVs, the VCRs...none of them will be able to receive broadcast stations after the 17th of next month.

So do we care? Quite a few schools have agreements with cable and satellite companies to provide television services, making the digital TV issue moot. The DTV issue only applies to full-power broadcast stations. The FCC won't be re-examining digital transmissions for cable providers until 2011. The cost to schools, if and when we do need to upgrade, could be extraordinary, given all of the legacy multimedia equipment sitting in our buildings.

Does this affect anyone right now? Take this poll and talk back below.

[poll id=90]

I'm inclined to believe that broadband access for schools will become far more important than TV access by 2011. Most educational content of value can simply be streamed or downloaded. As far as I'm concerned, the days of TV in school are over anyway.