Digital broadcasting standards. Is there political interference?

i wonder what they really up too? i don't feel like paying my TV license any more
 
If a new technology comes along then it would be better to adopt the latest one, providing the benefits outweigh the older technology of course.
For South African government I'd rather expect some back-handed deal than true interest in the best technology.
 
evilstebunny said:
If a new technology comes along then it would be better to adopt the latest one, providing the benefits outweigh the older technology of course.
For South African government I'd rather expect some back-handed deal than true interest in the best technology.
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I have to agree with you on that.
 
Doesn't seem to be much between the two except that the Brazil implementation of ISDB-T is using H.264 and AAC, while DVB-T is still using MPEG2 for HD broadcasting...
edit: didn't look hard enough, DVB-T also uses H.264
 
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evilstebunny said:
If a new technology comes along then it would be better to adopt the latest one, providing the benefits outweigh the older technology of course.
For South African government I'd rather expect some back-handed deal than true interest in the best technology.
Click to expand...

I agree 100% however as stated in the article, the Japanese standard is not new, and not better. Thus there can be only a single reason for the sudden shift. That reason would be that progress was starting to be made and this being South Africa, we obviously cannot have progress made in the technology field.

I have come to the conclusion that the ANC are all Mormons. They hate technology and think it is evil, wont be happy until we all living the good life circa 1600.
 
quite frankly I don't understand why SA is looking to migrate to digital terrestrial broadcasting when we can skip over straight to sat or other tripple play technology. If it makes sense for the Northern Cape to go over to Sat as part of the square array telescope then why not migrate the whole country in the long term. TopTV has brought out a R499 stb which is less than what other stb for digital broadcast is likely to cost. All free to view channels are accessible on sat and multichoice has an easyview service already so it would be relatively easy to systematically on a geographic basis get everything onto sat and require the paytv providers to provide free access to free channels. Ultimately the state is going to subsidise whatever service is adopted so we might as well adopt a course that is going to be the most cost effective from a broadcasting point of view.
 
The Square Array Telescope has a Fibre optic link if I remember correctly.

But my memory is cr@ppy at the moment. Most probably mistaken but yeah for the few SABC channels it would be cheaper.
Just remember that Gov wants to "interact" with the people with the stb's and that ain't really possible with the cheap satellite setups.
 
DTT means everyone will need a set-top box to watch ScrapABC, meaning that if you don't pay your TV-license, you won't have telly.
So, the government needs to convince the masses that paying R400-R700 for a set-top box to watch Mzanzi-fo-sho, plus an monthly TV-license fee is GREAT!!. Of the masses, only about 20% (tops) currently pay for a TV license.
It's obvious that the delay is caused by the fact the Government and the SABC knows this and should they go ahead and roll-out DTT, the SABC will go bankrupt, because not only won't they masses want to suddenly pay for TV, people like me with DStv will finally kick them under their asses immediately because my DStv subscription already includes my TV-License fee.
 
interactive services of the sort wanted shouldn't be subsidised by the state. Iirc the areas where the telescope is going to concentrated will need to go over to sat to prevent interference. My point is that the least populous areas should move over to sat simply to prevent interference and the most populous would benefit from having even more frequency spectrum to pass around for other communication technology. Digital terrestial broadcast is made redundant by affordable sat and converged communication.
 
If they want to change the standard, they can go for DVB-T2... (Which is at a draft stage, but specifies much better error correction codes (which reduce bandwidth requirements)) If they change they should at lest get something using LDPC for FEC and H.264 / something comparable, like Dirac (VC-2) for video, a decent audio codec (Vorbis / AAC)...
 
Removing compulsory TV license fees would create a big problem for SABC since the are already having financial problems
 
I recently emigrated and have been living in Perth since 13 May. It took me a while to work out how they could have a TV guide and HD broadcasts from a normal aerial. I realized they have had DVB-T for a long time already. I must say it is awesome (just like everything else over here). I just wonder if my 42inch Sinotech LCD (4 years old) will be compatible.
 
evilstebunny said:
If a new technology comes along then it would be better to adopt the latest one, providing the benefits outweigh the older technology of course.
For South African government I'd rather expect some back-handed deal than true interest in the best technology.
Click to expand...

Except that (from the article), ISDB-T is NOT new technology. It was around at the time that DVB-T was selected. It is only now (that some funds have exchanged hands in an underhanded manner) that government has suddenly decided to consider ISDB-T instead of DVB-T.

They don't even have a real excuse for changing course so far down the line.
 
lcbxx said:
Quite sure. If you check the yearly subscription to only watch the free-to-air channels + SABC and E, it works out to about R7 more than a normal TV License.
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Bull.They receive a carraige deal fee,like any other channel...on any other network...anywhere in the world.
Its amazing how you just can do simple maths and bum,the evidence is there.
 
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Paul Hjul said:
...... Ultimately the state is going to subsidise whatever service is adopted so we might as well adopt a course that is going to be the most cost effective from a broadcasting point of view.
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'the state' = the taxpayers
which also means we will prop up all the lousy ideas those idiots come up with. None of those pricks pulled that idea out of a hat. It was probably introduced at a lavish, all expense paid holiday, hosted by people who watched Zuma's corruption charges evaporate.
 
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