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The transition WILL happen. The program has had one major tweak to allow people in nursing homes to get coupons. I expect another tweak will fix the current coupon problem (with some delay) by a vote to allow recycling the expired coupons.
Not sure what you mean by "Mainly, the converters may or may not work properly. It seems if you program a particular channel in, the station will not be there or found on another channel. " As far as I know, the converter boxes work as designed, that is, they display the station's historic channel number (unless the station has programmed it into its data incorrectly). All the boxes have a menu item to scan for active channels, so the user does not need to "program a particular channel." There is one slight hitch left in that some stations are changing frequency after the analog shutdown, so people need to re-scan the channel line-up on their converter or DTV on Feb. 18. A few PBS stations that can go to their new assignment early are doing so and shutting off analog in January. The Zenith and Insignia boxes (and I believe others) even have a choice to add channels without redoing the whole scan.
I know people love to rag on the government, but except for Congress not anticipating and providing for people who procrastinate, they and the broadcast industry have been doing an excellent job in getting the word out, and in most cases the coupon contractor has been doing well on the coupon program. In fact, most people I come in contact with these days are saying "enough already with the messages."
IMO, the only thing wrong with all the publicity to date is that it didn't say "convert now" instead of "convert on Feb 17" The digital signals are available and have been available for months. Have you converted your mother. grandfather, great uncle yet? If not, shame on you! You are a greater problem than Congress! You are the guru in your circle of acquaintances. You should be finding out if there are any problems beforehand, not after analog shuts down.
So, yeah, the bill was written a little goofy, but the program as a whole appears to have worked very well even given the limitations that were put on it by Congress.
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