Your TV is about to stop working

And it's the Government's fault. Srlsy.

Most Analog TV will stop broadcasting tomorrow. Over-the-air reception via Rabit Ears is about to join the MITS Altair in the Museum of Dead Technology. It's being replaced with Digital TV (DTV):

CNET is reporting that the President himself has stated, '... I want to be clear: there will not be another delay.' So it looks like it is going to happen, for real this time. Even with the delay, there are still millions of estimated viewers that are unprepared. Local stations may participate in the voluntary 'Analog nightlight' services in which TV stations agree to keep an analog signal turned on in addition to their digital signals to provide information about the DTV transition and to notify unprepared TV viewers of emergencies, such as hurricanes.

OK, it's only the over the air transmission that's changing tomorrow. It's been a long, long time since Chez Borepatch hasn't had a Satellite/Cable/Fiber feed, but we're kind of tech geeks here. It's been quite some time since we haven't had more computers than people, too. If you're at all like us, you won't notice a thing.

You might want to stop by Radio Shack to pick up a Digital-to-Analog converter box for your elderly mother, though. Although the comments at Slashdot warn of an unforseen Denial Of Service attack:

Grandma called up and informed me that her new remote was broken. So I called my cousin, who drives over to her house and finds that the "broken" remote is the result of grandma having put a [redacted] doily on top of the box (blocking its IR receiver).

Heh.