Bye Bye TV — Hello Digital Television

Some of my earliest memories are of television. Ah, I remember turning the knob, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13. That was it. I didn’t have cable. I’m actually old enough to remember Black & White televisions. Today in NYC, the TV of my youth dies — to become better than before.

At no point in time was I unprepared for the switch. My old TV was hooked up to cable, what did I have to worry about? Oh, but with change comes opportunity. I got a new TV and I didn’t hook it up to cable. Could I save myself $60 a month? Do I really need that extra bill? Is DTV a replacement for cable?

Unfortunately, I consider DTV to be obsolete even before it launched. The upgrade is massive improvement, but I consider the Internet to be a more powerful tool for information and entertainment. For me, TV is that box that makes nice background noise while I’m playing online games. Yet, I was impressed with DTV.

With my new $20 antenna, I now have access to a lot more free channels. Some of the channels I couldn’t even get on Cable. One channel is dedicated to showing scenes from NYC traffic cameras. Another channel is just the weather. Wow… it’s the poor man’s cable. The higher quality picture is awesome too. For the longest time, I didn’t see the need for High Definition televisions. Now that more content is start to appear, I’m really enjoying the new technology.

I actually started watching more of the regular TV shows and I was enjoying them… like Hitched or Ditched, NCIS and Wipeout. While probably not as good as cable, a combination of DTV and the Internet was a good enough replacement for me.

The best part — Those annoying commercials, reminding me to prepare for his historic moment, can finally end.