Dark anniversary coming up GE takeover of RCA

[andy]

It's a shame the FCC was such a pushover back then

Yeah, it's nice to be living in a time when the FCC is on the side of the people. I'd hate to see them mandating an unpopular TV standard change over so they can sell the public airwaves, allowing lobbyists to put copy protection on TV broadcasts and pushing anything off the air that a few special interest groups find morally offensive.

[NowhereMan 1966]

Originally Posted by nasadowsk

As far as GE? Ever read that Pittsburgh area paper story on the rise/fall of Westinghouse? GE's rumored to be looking into dumping Appliances and a few other things... IMHO, Welch and Immelt's chase for the almighty dollar is going to kill them inside 20 years...

Count me in on B-2's link request too. I'm always looking for Pittsburgh history since I live here in "da Burgh."

[NowhereMan 1966]

Originally Posted by andy

It's a shame the FCC was such a pushover back then

Yeah, it's nice to be living in a time when the FCC is on the side of the people. I'd hate to see them mandating an unpopular TV standard change over so they can sell the public airwaves, allowing lobbyists to put copy protection on TV broadcasts and pushing anything off the air that a few special interest groups find morally offensive.

Yeah, you do have a point, auctioning off the airwaves, a limited resource because of the laws of physics, is wrong. I consider myelf very conservative in a social and religious sense, being registered Republican as well, but I am more of a Teddy Roosevelt Republican than a Rockefeller one. We do seriously needs someone like a T.R. or a William Jennings Bryan populist today.

'Nuff politics, but like you, when I take a look at things like the FCC mandating HDTV at the expense of all of us who own perfectly functioning NTSC sets. At least there is a drive to issue vouchers for convertor boxes for people who need them and cannot buy them but all in all, although the FCC isn't the toyboy of Sarnoff anymore but it is still in the pocket of the monied interests.

[nasadowsk]

Who killed westinghouse:

http://www.post-gazette.com/westinghouse/default.asp

[old_tv_nut]

[QUOTE=Telecolor 3007Maybe "R.C.A." would be in a better situation today if it had manufactured P.A.L. tv sets or other stuff for the Europeanen market.
[/QUOTE]

European manufacturers always managed to maintain a protectionist position that prevented American manufacturers from getting into the market. The adoption of PAL and SECAM was as much about that as about technical improvement. This kept prices high and also led European consumers to look for expensive degrees of quality in TVs. For example, I was told by my boss at Motorola (who had come over from Germany) that some buyers in Europe would measure the horizontal linearity in the store with a test pattern and a ruler before buying a set, while U.S. sets were much looser (and hence cheaper) in their specifications. Not sure how the European manufacturers fared when the Japanese started producing sets. In the U.S., dumping was claimed, but the U.S. Gov. made it a long and difficult process to prove it, so by the time some claims were granted, it was far too late. (The best way to prove harm from dumping is to have the factory shut down and jobs lost.) My personal opinion is that the U.S. government deliberately did this in the 70's for political reasons of keeping good international relations with our major ally in Asia, and thus sold out the U.S. industry in a calculated way. Not to say this was the only reason for decline of the U.S. TV industry, but it was certainly a factor.

[Telecolor 3007]

The Japps where pretty smart. Anyway in the '80's, I think bouth Europeanen and Japanesee tv sets where selling fine in Westeren Europe.