IT WAS supposed to be announced today. But it won't be. The government of Chile has postponed its selection of the standard to be used for digital TV broadcasts.

Chilean site El Mostrador reports that late last week, a government spokesperson informed that the official decision on the DTV standard adopted by the country -which was supposed to come today as part of a government pledge, will be announced instead "at the end of March". According to the report, the National Television Association ANATEL agreed with the decision to delay the standard selection "as long as it helps to make the right choice", as the standards selection will impact the local TV industry "for the next 30 to 50 years."

As we recently reported, two influential players voiced their support for the Japanese ISDB-T HDTV standard for the country, which was adopted by Brazil, but the decision is still up in the air. Some favour the U.S. ATSC standard, and there's of course the big European lobby of telecomms and mobile phone manufacturers peddling the DRM-infested, pay-per-view friendly DVB. Certainly, a single standard adopted by many countries would be preferable for the region instead of a hodgepodge mixture of different digital standards across borders.

Chilean engineer Patricio del Sol, head of the council at Chile's Channel 13 said recently that the Japanese ISDB-T "has won many supporters even within the management and technical circles that early this year supported the (North) American ATSC standard". This decision by the government to postpone the selection of its DTV broadcast standard will surely give hopes to the Japanese camp, as well as those who think that a unified standard in the Southern Cone would be a good thing. µ

L'INQs
ElMostrador.cl