FRAMINGHAM, MA — If you are one of the 22 million Americans who use free over-the-air analog broadcasting to watch television, exactly one year from now your screen will go blank. What’s worse, according to MassPIRG, stores like Circuit City are ready to sell you some “fixes” that are unnecessary and very expensive, like telling you to get a new TV.

MassPIRG did a “secret shopper” survey of retailers around the country to make sure electronics stores were prepared for consumer questions about the DTV transition. They found that clerks were offering inaccurate and misleading information.

MassPIRG is asking the publi to tell Circuit City, one of the five national outlets surveyed, to get their story straight by clicking on the link below, or paste it into your browser.

http://www.masspirg.org/action/media-internet/dtv?id4=ES

The Digital Television Transition: What You Need to Know:

On February 17, 2009, all TV stations will begin broadcasting exclusively in digital signals. If you have an older analog TV and you receive over-the-air television, your TV will not show pictures, unless you retrofit it with a digital converter box. Consumers with cable or satellite service will not be affected.

Consumers do not need to buy a brand new television set. Instead, analog television users will need a converter box, on sale in many retail stores for $40-$70.

To find out where to get a coupon to offset the cost of the converter box, read the report and see what they’re saying about this in the news, go to: http://www.masspirg.org/media-internet/dtv?id4=ES

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