For those who don’t know, Chatroulette is the latest form of social media—social voyeurism. You sit (or not) in front of your PC’s webcam. You appear in small box on the lower left of the screen. On top of you appears a blank black box. Press F9 and you’re put in contact with a random stranger (literally named stranger). You can romp through these one-on-ones with complete strangers and move on to the next whenever you get the urge.

Chatroulette

Of course there are rumors about Chatroulette. While I only encountered one in the act of masturbating in front of his webcam, it was the topic of conversation for most of the others.

At four in the afternoon East Coast time, I found myself transported to bedrooms in Wales, the UK, and Australia. Impassive young men stared blankly into their webcams.

Stranger 1: I swear this guy just had a photo of himself as a place marker. I don’t know if he would have showed his face if I’d been more his type, but I got no movement—not even an eye blink in response to my friendly waving.

Stranger 2: A sweet 20-something in a tie-dyed shirt and big headphones. Willing to talk. Said he liked to chat but that there were far too many naked guys jerking off in front of their cams for his taste. When I said it was time for me to move on, he teased that “he liked older women and that I should stay a while.“ It was my Mrs. Robinson moment on Chatroulette.

Strangers 3 and 4: They whipped right past me before I even knew what hit me. They must have decided that they didn’t care for my looks before I even registered their presence.

Stranger 5: Had a really cool LCD projector in his room. I thought that he was standing in front of an outdoor billboard. Not too cool on my part.

Stranger 6: A guy who looked a bit closer to me in age. He was from France. Then my phone rang. It was my daughter, who is probably older than most of the guys I’d been talking to. I felt totally weird and told the Frenchman I had leave.

Stranger 7: Wow a girl…at least I think it was a girl. She vanished so quickly all I saw was a waiflike body and some shoulder-length hair.

Stranger 8: Finally, the moment I’d feared but also sought out, arrived. Eight clicks into Chatroulette and I had my first naked masturbator. The camera was nowhere near his face; his pants were down around his knees. I had the feeling of interrupting something very private.

According to the Huffington Post, Chatroulette is 13% pervert, 89% male, and 47% American. Well, two out three ain’t bad. I did not meet an American (or one who would ‘fess up to being an American) in my Chatroulette travels. I met no people of color, no Asians.

I won’t be going back to Chatroulette anytime soon. In comparison, it made what little I can remember of the singles bar scene seem like an enlightened place. Without reading too much into my sub one-minute encounters, there was something sad.

And now that I’ve learned that Chatroulette maps, a mashup that lets you locate the people you’re talking to by tracking the location of their IP address, can put your photo on its big board, that’s enough for me. Voyeurism in the name of research is not my game.

While the consumers were slowly waking up to the fact that their TVs would go dark, the TV stations were chomping at the bit to pull the switch. The stations have been investing in new digital towers, in educating their viewers, and in advertising and preparing for the switch for years. That’s the reason that over 400 stations have ignored the delay and have already transitioned to a digital-only signal. The bill that was passed, which specified the delay, offered stations that wanted to go digital a chance to do it earlier if they had FCC permission. As of this week, about 25% of the nation’s broadcast stations were granted permission and have launched their digital programming. Consumers who are waiting until the June cutoff date are going to have to catch up on the favorite programs they’ve missed. With some stations switching and some waiting, we’ve got digital TV anarchy.

One report says that four million customers are still waiting for their $40 government-funded coupons to help pay for their digital transition. A Nielson study found that five million Americans are not ready for the transition to digital. The highest number of unprepared live in the Albuquerque/Santa Fe area. Hawaii, on the other end of the spectrum, went ahead and managed a statewide switch well in advance of any national cutoff date. Maybe trying to change the entire country’s TV infrastructure on one day was silly idea from the onset? Perhaps a more regional rollout would have been more sensible? As it stands, we’ve got digital TV anarchy. Anarchy usually winds up costing us all in one way or another. We may need to start looking at a DTV bailout before we’re through.

Confused about which of your favorite stations jumped the deadline?

On the government-sponsored DTV Transition website the following notice appears:

Some of the TV stations in the US will transition from analog to digital broadcasting on Feb 17th. The remaining stations will transition from analog to digital broadcasting between Mar 14th and Jun 12th.

AARP (877-698-806) and the FCC (1-800-CALL-FCC) have both set up hotlines to get you through.