What is this country going to do with the televisions thrown out once the airwaves switch to digital? More..?

Question

1) 118,094,097 households X 2.73 televisions/household = 322,396,884.4 televisions...

2) Toxic chemicals in these sets (cathode ray tubes, etc.) that will fill our landfills...

3) How can the Federal Government make this decision?! For OUR benefit based upon the government's concern about our entertainment & PICTURE QUALITY? GIVE ME A BREAK!

4) Consumerism frenzy--We all must buy new sets? Gee, who is benefiting?! (I know, I know...not everyone has to buy new sets...Cable boxes, etc...But appparently we must now buy new "boxes".) But average price of a new set: MINIMUM $250 X 322,396,884.4 television sets replaced in America = $80,599,221,109! Who's making this profit? That we all must contribute to?!

YIKES!

5) Is this really Okay?!

6) WHO is behind this?!

7) Why isn't anyone asking these questions?!

Answer 1

Probably throw them in yet another land fill.  Hopefully some environmental groups will come up with a way to recycle them. It's called "planned obsolescence" and big business has had this in the works for years.

Answer 2

Calm down already.  Those who get cable will see no difference, and the remainder can use digital converter boxes for off-the-air signals.  These aren't expensive anyway, they'll be subsidized, and there's precedent: in the 1950's, people had to buy UHF converters to receive channels 14 through 83, and they weren't cheap.

Who's behind it?  The Federal Communications Commission, in point of fact.  The current analog method of sending TV signals is exceedingly wasteful of radio bandwidth, and by going to digital transmission we can free up this spectrum for lots of wireless services.  We've already done this, in fact: back in the 1980's, the FCC decided that nobody was using the upper UHF channels--the ones above Channel 70--for the most part.  And so they took this spectrum and auctioned it off.  You know what resulted?  The entire wireless telecommunications industry, that's what: all your cell phones.  

And so the change is a good one that will benefit just about everyone.  All TV sets made in the last few years are already equipped to receive digital signals, so chances are the situation isn't as grave as you may think.