Mexican TV is going digital. But there’s a catch. Actually, there’s a few of them, said Tony Payan, director of Rice University’s Baker Institute’s Mexico Center. 

“Moving people from analog to digital TV requires people to buy televisions,” he said. “Unfortunately for Mexico, many of the sectors and rural areas or many of the different households are not quite ready for this switch.”

Digital televisions can be expensive — about 5,000 pesos.

“Now think about that,” he said. “The minimum wage is 73 pesos a day.”

That’s about $4, which means buying a TV on a minimum wage job would take many days of work. To help, the government has given out about 10 million TVs to the poor.

Will Hahn, is a principal analyst with Gartner, an information technology research and advisory company. He notes that there’s another group that wants to see this transition succeed: advertisers.

“Within a couple of years, you and your neighbor, even watching the same show, will not see the same advertisement.”

Digital TV means a clearer picture for advertisers, too — they’ll able to tailor ads to viewers more carefully. Of course, there’s an alternative to both analog and digital: Don’t watch television.