Thanks to a researcher named Marcel van de Burgwal that may all be changing.  He's designed a microchip that would completely eliminate the need for satellite dishes and solve a few other problems as well.

The chip utilizes a series of flat antennas that could be built right into set-top boxes.  The antenna array wouldn't even need to be physically aimed, since it would be fully capable of aiming itself electronically.

"Software-defined radio may seem much more complex," says Burgwal, "but we can pack so much computing power into the space taken up by a coil that it more than repays the effort."

Burgwal says that this new chip could be used in cell phones and other portable devices too.