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C

I must say I’m disappointed by this announcement, though not surprised. Having bought a new HD TV recently to receive the new services I eagerly checked which channels would be available to me on digitaluk. I see there will be the standard BBC channels, ITV1 & 2, Channel 4, E4, More4, Five, a couple of news channels and a couple of children’s channels. What about ITV3 & 4? What about Film4? What about documentary channels, music channels, sports channels? There is at least one of each on the full Freeview service. Not to mention the other popular entertainment channels such as Dave and Virgin 1. And from what I have read elsewhere there will be no Freeview HD service at all.

Whilst any extra channels is a good thing, it must be noted that the landscape of TV broadcasting has changed a lot since 10-15 years ago when everyone was limited to channels 1-4. Good quality programming does not sit on just a few channels anymore – it’s spread across a wide spectrum of broadcasters. To not provide a full TV service is in effect leaving the users with less than they had in the past. Receiving less than a half of the full Freeview service and still being expected to pay a full licence fee just adds insult to injury. Whilst using Freesat does allow some of the extra channels to be picked up, several of them are not available unless you pay for a Sky subscription. And of course the vast majority of properties have only one or two satellite points at most, and some can’t receive satellite TV at all. So you won’t be able to watch HD channels in your bedroom like everyone in the UK.

In the future it seems that this will only get worse. Once the digital switchover has been completed in the UK then the frequencies currently used by the analogue channels will be freed up for use by more channels and HD services. Unless I am wrong then none of this extra content will be available in Guernsey, and there will be no way of receiving HD television without a satellite dish (which is not available to all of us). Of course another way to get around this would be to use the internet, but the current internet speeds are not fast enough to allow the streaming of HD content.

Lastly, let’s not mention the chaos that will ensue on the switchover date. Most UK authorities have allowed 3-6 months for people to switch over. Here it seems the change is going to be instant. There will be people who weren’t aware of the changeover, people who find their cabling or TV aerial is not able to pick up or carry the digital signal, and no doubt a shortage of equipment. And this will all happen at once.

As ever with the States of Guernsey, it’s one step forward and three steps back.

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4

TL

Yes, it does appear that they are turning off the analogue at the same time as turning on the digital, rather than running the two in parallel for a while like they did in the UK.

I assume that they are confident that it will work. And maybe Guernsey will not suffer from the problem that happened in the UK where not all areas were covered initially and so it had to be phased in.

As for people not being aware, it is probably better to do it in one hit. Otherwise people will put off the day of getting a box or a new TV and then will get caught out when the analogue is finally turned off. At least this way there is a single well advertised event. Anyone who has bought a TV in the last few years probably has a digital receiver built into it anyway. Existing cabling is absolutely fine (based on my experience in the UK).

Like C, I am disappointed by the low number of channels available. Freeview in the UK has about 50. Maybe they plan to add more later?

But frankly I could not care about HD. When did any of us actually look at our screens before HD and say “I really wish I could see more detail”?

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