So, the DTV transition is on the way, no stopping now.

For those of you who have been following along, I've been a bit upset with the whole DTV thing, not just because I think it's a huge waste of money and time, but also because of the major technical deficiencies in the DTV standard we're going to be using, ATSC.

On January 20th, there was an event in Washington, DC, it was a pretty big deal. You know, the sort of a big deal you might want to watch with your kids, the sort of a big deal that you think might be a great way to test the complicated huge freaking antenna and low-loss feedline and fancy DTV tuner device you bought for the computer big deal kind of big deal.

On the Analog system, I got a snowy, but viewable NBC and CBS out of Philly, and a snowy, but viewable ABC and FOX out of NY, depending on which way the antenna pointed.

On the Digital system...well, words escape me, so I took screen shots:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30796655@N08/

I get channel 69, which shows 4 variations of useless, and channel 39, which will help me learn more Spanish from an anthropomorphic bird-thing. Great, just great.

If this is the DTV I can expect in the future, I'm just going to cut the antenna down and put it into the recycling bin.

We got a live feed via Hulu.com just fine, but I know that in an emergency situation, I can't count on land-based connectivity or even 3g wireless.

What a mess.

The basic rule for technological progress needs to be "Never accept something new unless it does everything the old system did well and advances from there." It's like VoIP phone calls and 911 service - what a mess that is too.