If your grandma’s TV goes dark on Feb. 17, you can thank Republicans in the House of Representatives, who have effectively killed off an attempt to postpone the switch to all-digital television by four months.

The measure, already approved unanimously by the Senate, had plenty of votes to pass in the House under normal circumstances. But yesterday’s  215-to-168 margin, largely split along party lines, was shy of the two-thirds majority needed to pass the bill immediately as a special measure.

If House Democrats backed by the Obama administration decide to try again, the measure delaying the switchover till June 12 could come up again next week as a regular bill – with passage virtually assured. If it doesn’t, the analog TVs in an estimated 6.5 million households will become doorstops on Feb. 17 when broadcasters turn off their analog transmitters in favor of a new generation of digital broadcasts.

Congress set the official Feb. 17 deadline back in 2005, when it also established a $1.34 billion program to provide $40 coupons to help Americans offset the cost of converter boxes that will allow  existing analog TVs to receive digital broadcasts.

This was not exactly an act of largesse, considering that the entire switchover scheme was forced on an unsuspecting public in 1996 by a bipartisan cabal of lawmakers, bureaucrats, cell phone companies, broadcasters and overseas TV equipment makers who saw an opportunity to pick our pockets in the name of technological progress. There was virtually no consumer demand for digital TV, and the most of the billions of dollars consumers have spent on new digital equipment to deal with the switchover have gone to bolster the bottom lines of foreign manufacturers — and increase an already staggering U.S. trade deficit.

Making a bad situation worse, the coupon program ran out of money — or depending on how you look at things, the program can’t use a big chunk of the money appropriated for it until unused coupons it has already issued reach their 90-day expiration date. New coupons can then be sent to millions on of Americans who found themselves on a waiting list, but few are likely to get them by the Feb. 17 cutoff.

Most of the 6.5 million households that will go dark are occupied by the poor and elderly. These constitutencies haven’t exactly turned out in droves for Republicans in recent elections, which may explain the GOP’s willingness to cut them off. In fact, Republicans opposed Democratic attempts to provide more money back in 2005 when the transition legislation was enacted. So it seems ab it strange that a group of GOP lawmakers has sponsored a bill providing an extra $250 million for converters now that it’s too late. Conscience money? Or am I just a cynic?

On the other side of the issue are most of the nation’s commercial broadcasters, who have been transmitting on both analog and digital systems for years and are anxious to turn off their expensive, power-hungry analog equipment. Many haven’t budgeted money to continue dual transmissions after Feb. 17 (although a lot of skeptics like me have predicted just the kind of imbroglio that’s now occurring).

Caught in the middle are the nation’s public television stations. Like their commercial counterparts, they’re spending big bucks they’d rather use elsewhere on electricty to keep both broadcast systems running. But since the elderly make up a disproportionate chunk of their audience (they love PBS news and watch it over analog TVs with antenannas), public stations are likely to suffer the largest proportional loss of viewership when the switchover actually occurs.

Meanwhile, no one knows how many millions of sets — either native digital models or analog sets with converters — will lose at least one of the stations its owners now receive. When you get to the bottom line, digital signals aren’t as powerful as analog broadcasts — and they’re more subject to crosstalk and interference from hills, towers and tall buildings. In my tests with a variety of equipment in several locations around Baltimore and Washington, I couldn’t find a single combination of TV, indoor antenna and coverter box that consistently brought in all the digital stations that were available in analog. That may generate even more complaints than the lack of converter boxes.

Stay tuned!

While most of the world was watched Barack Obama make history on Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission quietly voted for its own little revolution.

Despite furious lobbying by TV broadcasters, Broadway producers, Dolly Parton and rock band roadies everywhere, the panel approved a plan to open up the so-called “white spaces” between television channels for unlicensed wireless gadgets.

Dolly Parton and other show biz names objected to FCC White Space proposal.

Back in the dawn of television, the government left these little gaps in the TV spectrum because broadcast TV stations were so powerful – and the available technology was so limited – that engineers feared the stations would step on each others’ signals if they were too close together.

That issue became less important as equipment improved over the years, and it will change even more with the switch from analog broadcasting to a more efficient and precise digital system in February. For more about that, read my DTV Transition Q&A page.

A coalition of major industry players, including Google, Intel, Microsoft and Motorola, backed the plan, which they see opening up a whole new market for wireless Internet access. Because these white spaces are smack in the middle of the TV spectrum, signals in can travel considerable distances, opening up the possibility for relatively cheap, high-speed wireless Internet service in rural areas.

But TV broadcasters are still worried about newcomers with faulty equipment or intentions interfering with their frequencies, and the people who produce plays and concerts are furious. That’s because the wireless microphones they use every day use those very same frequencies. After an acrimonious battle and repeated tests by FCC l aboratories and a lobbying appeal by country legend Dolly Parton. She conceded that she knows nothing about the technology, but does know a thing or two about how important wireless mics are for musicians in concert. They’re the reason singers can prance all over the stage without worrying about tripping over a cord, and why Broadway musical stars don’t need penetrating “Broadway” voices any more.

In an attempt to pacify the theater and concert producers, the FCC is requiring manufacturers of equipment to set of databases with locations where wireless microphones are typically used, as well as sensors for wireless microphone transmissions. The theory: with current technology, the new wireless devices can avoid frequencies that are being used and switch to unoccupied channels.

With deep pockets on both sides, this isn’t likely to be the end of the issue. Here are good explanations from USA Today  and the Washington Post.

One of the major culprits in the demise of classified newspaper advertising (and the departure of so many of us from the business) is Craigslist.com, the online ad service that lets visitors buy, sell, rent, hire or give away almost anything — at no charge. Now, from The Seattle Times,  yet another sign that Craigslist is the Devil’s Own Tool.

According to a report this week, an enterprising criminal ran an ad on Craigslist that promised respondents $28.50 an hour to show up near a Bank of America branch dressed for work as laborers — in blue shirts, yellow safety vests and protective eye gear. Then the robber — dressed in identical clothing — maced an armored car guard making a pickup, snatched a sack full of money and ran to a nearby creek. There he may have escaped by floating away in an inner tube — or maybe not. But everyone agrees the ad on Cragslist did a great job of recruiting decoys who unwittingly showed up just in time for him to make his getaway.

America is a GREAT country.

There are folks who believe Comcast’s customer relations manual was written by Franz Kafka, and it’s hard disagree. For example, Comcast’s usage cops routinely called up big-time downloaders, told them they were hogging too much bandwidth and threatened to cut off their service.

The downloaders naturally responded, “How much is too much?”

“We won’t tell you,” Comcast said.

“Why not?”

“Because if everyone knew how much they could use, they’d use it.”

Yes, Kafka would have been proud. But when you’re a monopoly, or even a near monopoly, this is the kind of baloney you can can serve.

No more. After the FCC got on its case, Comcast announced that starting Oct. 1, its residential customers would officially be limited to 250 gigabytes of data transfers per month. That includes e-mail, Web browsing, Instant Messaging, uploading and downloading. It was the company’s first public qualification of the “unlimited” Internet use it promised for a set monthly fee. Of course, “unlimited” didn’t really mean “unlimited,” because if you used more bandwidth than Comcast thought you should, the company would start hammering on you to cut back – without being willing to tell you how much to cut back.

With typical circumlocution, Comcast said the 250-gigabyte limit wasn’t really new. That was the bandwidth limit all along– the company just wouldn’t admit it. So there’s really no change, right?

Well, there is a change. Comcast is finally being upfront about what it’s doing. And naturally, there was a chorus of moaning and groaning after Comcast’s announcement — from the people who believe (with considerable justification) that a restaurant advertising an all-you-can-eat buffet should let you eat all the shrimp you want.

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If you’d like to see more access to cheap, high-speed wireless Internet service for handheld gadgets, the folks at Google, Microsoft, Phillips and a bunch of other giants think they can shoehorn it into television’s “white spaces.” The notion has touched off a battle royal between the geeks of the broadcast TV and wireless industries — now joined by PR minions on both sides.

The “white spaces” are unused frequences between TV channels that the FCC allocated over the years, originally to keep broadcasters from interfering with one another. Thanks to better equipment, that’s no longer an issue, and with with the switch from analog to digital broadcasting almost at hand (Feb. 17, 2009 if Congress doesn’t chicken out), an organization of industry giants called the White Spaces Coaltion wants the FCC to make the vacant real estate between UHF stations available to unlicensed digital devices. This week, Google turned up the heat, launching a Free The Airwaves campaign, complete with its own Web site and an online petition for visitors to sign.

“What outrage!” cries the TV industry, which has jealously protected its spectrum from interference over the years — and will have even more trouble with the switch to less robust digital transmissions next year.  ”What outrage!” cries the wireless microphone industry – which just happens to use those very same frequencies in stadiums, theaters and other venues. “What outrage!” cry wireless microphone users, whose numbers include the National Football league and most of Broadway — people with some very deep pockets.

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