September 14, 2005 3:24 PM PDT

Senate to postpone action on digital TV bill

The Senate Commerce Committee likely won't move toward passing legislation that sets a hard deadline for a national transition to digital television until late October, a committee spokesperson said Wednesday. Originally, such legislation would have to be passed by this Friday in order to coincide with action taken by the Senate Budget Committee, but that committee is postponing its action until Oct. 25 because of Hurricane Katrina's messy aftermath.

Senators have suggested setting a hard date of January 1, 2009, by which all American television sets and devices would have to be capable of receiving digital broadcasts. They have said they would allocate some of the freed-up analog spectrum to emergency communications and auction the rest for use by broadband services.

 

Join the conversation

Add your comment

The posting of advertisements, profanity, or personal attacks is prohibited. Click here to review our Terms of Use.

Inside CNET News

1-2 of 12

Scroll Left Scroll Right

RSS Feeds

Add headlines from CNET News to your homepage or feedreader.

Markets

Market news, charts, SEC filings, and more

Related quotes

Dow Jones Industrials (-0.19%) -23.99 12,850.05
S&P 500 (-0.18%) -2.37 1,349.40
NASDAQ (-0.16%) -4.68 2,926.71
CNET TECH (-0.12%) -2.56 2,046.58
  Symbol Lookup