Wasteful Irish Digital TV Changeover

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Irish TV is Going Digital

in 2012

This Post is about sustainability and waste of natural resources - it is also a rant!

There is a saying in Ireland; "there are two ways of doing a job, (1) the general way, and (2) the Irish way"!!

Irish TV is going 100% digital in less than a year - so a good thing - eh - yes and NO!!

For the last several years there have been hundreds of thousands of TV sets and PVRs sold in Ireland all with built-in "Freeview" digital capability - a ready made audience out there for Digital TV.

You might say it was an "NO BRAINER" for Ireland to use the "Freeview" system, given so many people already have ready made receiving systems?

Damn it all - you would be completely wrong in your thinking. Why? because you would not probably be factoring in that the decision making is often done by public sector employees who have IMHO no contact with reality. Or additionally or alternatively, there is the good old kick-back system at work - lots of vested interests!!

I already own a TV set, a PVR and a VCR all with "Freeview" capability. Will I be willing to complicate my system and spend more money to add a  uniquely Irish "Saorview" (means actually "free-view") box to my system?  Bloody hell - I will not. For the most part Irish TV is pretty much crap anyway - when compared to the BBC, ITV, CH4 and all the International stuff available on FreeSat.

Spend more money and complicate my system to watch Irish TV - when I already have new and perfectly good equipment that is more than capable of the job - NO THANKS.

Another way for Irish TV to go digital and get 100% geographical coverage was to buy space on BBC FreeSat system - that solution also would be much too logical and way too simple to suit the "Irish" way of doing things. All smacks of the millions spent on unused voting machines - and a dozen other wasteful scandals. The questions that should be asked about how the Irish digital TV decision was made could essentially, IMHO, be boiled down to TWO QUESTIONS: (1) Gougers? or (2) Gowls?

A few million wasted there - ahhhh sure - what the heck - there's plenty more where that came from - isn't that right Seamus?


Here is my e-mail to the Saorview people:

Hi,

Ireland has had hundreds of thousands of TV sets and PVRs with Freeview built into them sold in the last few years. I myself have no less than three items TV PVR and VCR all with Freeview built into them.

But when there is some job to be done in Ireland - there are two ways of tackling the matter. (1) The General Worldwide Way and (2) the "Irish Way".

Some bunch of overpaid public service "gobshites" chose to go bloody "Saorview" instead of the generally acceptable and widely available "Freeview" system.

What does this mean to me - it simply means I will not be bothering with Irish TV anymore after October 2012. I will be damned if I am going to complicate my system and incur further expense adding a saorview - bloody box.

My FreeSat will provide me with more balanced news, current affairs, advert free programming, and movies.

Damn it - I love Ireland and I hate the gobshite way that things are done in Ireland.

Regards,

Tony McGinley

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