The last week in May was an interesting one for anyone looking for signals about the future of television. In Congress, lawmakers and the broadcast industry on May 26 debated the size of a new subsidy to help people convert their old television sets to receive new digital signals. One day earlier, federal agents were raiding Web site operators in 10 cities who trafficked in illegal copies of the new “Star Wars” movie and numerous other films and TV shows.

Both developments speak volumes about the government’s futile efforts to keep pace with technology and consumer demand. But they also foretell the trouble that lies ahead for traditional broadcasters.

First, the subsidy: A draft bill pegs New Year’s Day 2009 as the date when local TV stations must begin using new frequencies, over which they will offer many new channels of digital video with higher-quality picture and sound. That will render millions of today’s TV sets obsolete. So lawmakers are debating some kind of relief for households still dependent on older analog sets, perhaps a $50 voucher to buy gear that would allow them to still use their TVs . At issue is whether to help out all TV households or only those with the least means.

Republicans are having a hard time with this one. The very idea of a government handout — for television sets, of all things! — tramples on just about every clause in the “Contract With America.” But what else can they do? Face millions of voters in 2010 angry that Washington took away their TV?

What federal agents shut down, meanwhile, was a major “tracker” Web site for users of BitTorrent, the latest flavor of “peer-to-peer” software that lets people download movies, TV programs and other large files. The feds said they were striking a blow for copyright protection. But the technology they were seizing is also striking the death knell for over-the-air TV as we know it. You see, by 2010, all those people with their $50 vouchers may indeed be using the credit to convert their 10-year-old TVs to digital. But they’ll be part of a rapidly dwindling class of folks still relegated to watching whatever their local stations want them to watch at any given time.

Broadcasting, it must be said, is in a heap of trouble. Sure, local TV stations need to make their digital transition. But the way they deliver programs — spraying them out to a wide geographic area — is quickly becoming inferior. More and more people will simply watch TV the way they’re listening to music today: They’ll search online for what they want to watch, pay for it (or not) and watch it on large-screen TVs, laptops, cell phones — whatever hooks into the high-speed Web.

BitTorrent spells trouble for broadcasters because, on the same day as the May 25 raid, founder Bram Cohen announced a new way to use his software that no longer relies on centralized hubs to route traffic. The only way for the law to fight back will now be to go after each individual who illegally downloads a movie or TV show.

The point here is not that resistance to piracy is futile; it’s that piracy is always a precursor for market opportunity — a sign that consumers would pay for this type of video delivery if the quality and value were consistent. That, after all, is how the iPod came to rule digital audio.

All of which is terrible news if you’re a broadcaster, or even a cable or satellite operator. Their networks and business models cannot easily let people watch whatever they want, whenever they want.

It’s not just that they lack a “return path” that would let viewers order shows; cable has that, and local TV and satellite could always partner with phone companies. It’s that they also lack the Web’s ability to scan and serve unlimited programs to each customer. Past attempts to provide even “near video-on-demand” have failed. So now they’re rushing to market new digital set-top boxes with capacious hard drives that offer TiVo-like recording capabilities. But even that makes broadcasters uncomfortable, according to Bob McIntyre, chief technology officer of set-top box giant Scientific Atlanta Inc.

“Many of the broadcasters don’t own the content that they display on their broadcast channels,” he said at a technology conference last month hosted by JP Morgan. “What they own is the right to show it at a specific time of the night at a specific hour on their networks. So being able to throw it on a server outside their control and let anybody watch it any time they want is problematic.”

When people begin using PCs and the Internet for their TV watching, he said, “the value is captured by different people,” such as Internet service providers and peer-to-peer software makers. “Nothing wrong with that,” he added.,“but the service providers, the people that we sell to, want to make sure they control this platform.”

To be sure, the networks have the market power and cash to play in this new world: They’re already striking program search deals with Google and Yahoo. But local stations may be relegated to a kind of publicly subsidized — they’re using our airwaves, remember — basic service for those who lack the money for or interest in Web-based TV.

So go ahead, Congress, write those $50 checks. And go ahead, feds, raid those file-serving hubs and crack down on copyright infringers. Just don’t be deluded that any of that has the least bit to do with guiding the course of technology or market demand.

Mike Mills is CQ’s executive editor for electronic publishing. Next week’s CQ Roundtable: Courts & the Law, by Kenneth Jost.