Old TV finds circa 2009

[Thyratron]

Reading up on the 2009 digital "conversion" lately (not exactly crazy about it; don't get me started) has led to an interesting thought. Many of us make a lot of our old tv finds at the local thrift stores and similar places. Well the "warning" disclaimers have already started showing up attached to the older tvs in many of these places; I would almost take a guess that, come 2009, many of the thrift stores will simply be dumping the "obsolete" tvs that come in, rather than putting them on the shelves only to sit for extended periods of time. I wonder if it's better to stock up now on the good finds that we come across, or will there be a huge surplus of stuff for free/extremely cheap (on the roadside, etc.) once the deadline comes? I'm just afraid that anything that even looks remotely old will end up being tossed in the dumpster before it even has a chance to land on the shelves, due to being "unusable" in the minds of much of the population. Any thoughts?