KOMO-HD now on DirecTV

Mark Crispin wrote:

PS: I am old enough to remember the death of B&W TV. Once PLL tuners made
reliable color affordable for the masses B&W died quickly.

The networks went "all-color" when color TVs were in enough homes to make the
expense of color production worthwhile. This was before PLL tuners were
introduced. NBC had been "the full-color network" for several years for the
purpose of selling color TVs. Once they became successful enough in that
endeavor, ABC and CBS jumped in simultaneously, because the public really
demanded color. Even so, some individual stations did not make the conversion
to color at that time, and most continued to air significant amounts of
non-network b&w programming long afterward.

SD is similarly doomed.

I don't see any similar incentive for HD programming. No TV set manufacturer
owns a network. The general public doesn't seem to be going ga-ga over HD, and
in fact a lot of people can't seem to tell the difference between HD and
SD stretched to fit a 16:9 screen. HD currently has two things going for it:
It's a prestige term, especially for sports, and it's more difficult for the
average person to record and save than SD. Whether it supercedes SD in the
long run depends on whether one HD program can generate more revenue than 4 SD
programs.

On Mon, 14 May 2007, Chris Adams wrote:
Once upon a time, Mark Crispin said:
On Thu, 10 May 2007, jack ak wrote:
Are you suggesting that by some future date all programming will be
HD only?
Yes, but irrelevant to my point.
Not exactly. All OTA signals will be digital by a cut-off date (that
has been a moving target). There is no requirement for HD however, and
some broadcasters are instead sending multiple SD channels on their
digital signal.

However, as the FCC has ruled against multicast must-carry, broadcasters
who send multiple SD channels on their digital signal are likely to get
only one of these on cable and satellite; thus most of the multicast
channels will not have many eyeballs (= will not carry their own weight).

The mainstream networks have all gone HD instead. Non-HD programming will
soon be as much a relic as B&W programming.

Also, there is no requirement that affects cable channels. Given the
large number of cable channels (and the relative few of them that make
the significant amounts of money required for a switch from SD to HD), I
don't expect to see SD programming disappear for many years.

It is true that cable channels (by this, I assume that we both mean
for-cable programming such as CNN, MTV, etc. as opposed to cable carriage
of broadcast channels) are unaffected by this.

However, the SD cable channels will come under the same lack of eyeball
pressure as B&W OTA channels did in the 1960s. A number of these channels
have HD versions but the cable and satellite companies aren't carrying
them yet. You can expect this to change dramatically in the next few
years.

SD is dead. Nothing can stop killer HD.

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

SD is dead. Nothing can stop killer HD.


How about apathy? I don't find it that compelling. It's nothing like
the color tv revolution. That was a huge change! For most of the
stuff on TV nowadays HD would be a waste of bandwidth. Widescreen is
nice, but HD is not that big a deal. There's no way that broadcasters
are going to blowoff the viewers who have SD sets. I wouldn't think
the FCC would even allow that.

A Watcher wrote:
SD is dead. Nothing can stop killer HD.


How about apathy? I don't find it that compelling. It's nothing like
the color tv revolution. That was a huge change! For most of the
stuff on TV nowadays HD would be a waste of bandwidth. Widescreen is
nice, but HD is not that big a deal. There's no way that broadcasters
are going to blowoff the viewers who have SD sets. I wouldn't think
the FCC would even allow that.



Downrezzing and letterboxing, which all digital set-top converters support.

Mark Crispin wrote:

PS: I am old enough to remember the death of B&W TV. Once PLL tuners made
reliable color affordable for the masses B&W died quickly.

The networks went "all-color" when color TVs were in enough homes to
make the expense of color production worthwhile. This was before PLL
tuners were introduced, and TV prices were still far above what most
considered affordable. NBC had been "the full-color network" for
several years for the purpose of selling color TVs. Once they became
successful enough in that endeavor, ABC and CBS jumped in
simultaneously, because the public really demanded color. Even so, some
individual stations did not make the conversion to color at that time,
and most continued to air significant amounts of non-network b&w
programming long afterward.

SD is similarly doomed.

I don't see any incentive for HD programming similar to the color
revolution. No TV set manufacturer owns a network. The general public
doesn't seem to be going gaga over HD, and in fact a lot of people can't
seem to tell the difference between HD and SD stretched to fit a 16:9
screen. HD currently has two things going for it: It's a prestige term,
especially for sports and, temporarily, it's more difficult for the average
person to record and save than SD. Whether it supercedes SD in the long run
depends on whether one HD stream can generate more revenue than
4 SD streams. (Once stations really start programming their SD channels,
there will be public pressure for them to be on cable, must-carry rule or
no.)

On Mon, 14 May 2007, Kimba W. Lion wrote:
The networks went "all-color" when color TVs were in enough homes to
make the expense of color production worthwhile.

Just as the networks are all-HD today.

Even so, some
individual stations did not make the conversion to color at that time,
and most continued to air significant amounts of non-network b&w
programming long afterward.

And that happened when PLL tuners eliminated the last excuse to continue
broadcasting B&W.

The general public
doesn't seem to be going gaga over HD

Been to a Best Buy, Circuit City, Wal-Mart(!!), Sears, Target, sports bar,
etc. lately?

and in fact a lot of people can't
seem to tell the difference between HD and SD stretched to fit a 16:9
screen.

That may be the case but is irrelevant. The equipment is HD capable.

Whether it supercedes SD in the long run
depends on whether one HD stream can generate more revenue than
4 SD streams.

That's a no-brainer. The cost of 4 SD streams is *FAR* higher (don't
forget, there are fees to be paid to the content providers); and what's
more, you're competing with yourself for eyeballs. That's why only PBS
and the sleazy broadcasters - PAX, televangelists, etc. -- are
multiplexing right now, and that's not likely to change.

The mainstream network stations have HD programming and perhaps a weather
channel or something dinky like The Tube on a single SD subchannel.

(Once stations really start programming their SD channels,
there will be public pressure for them to be on cable, must-carry rule or
no.)

Doubtful. There isn't much public pressure for cable to carry the current
crop of multiplexed channels, much less additional ones. Anyone hoping to
create such pressure has a chicken/egg problem in that if cable doesn't
carry it, only people with OTA will know about it.

Multicasting is like OTA pay-TV -- it sounds like a great idea that you'll
make a mint on, but nobody ever has and a lot of people have lost a lot of
money trying.

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

On Mon, 14 May 2007, A Watcher wrote:
There's no way that broadcasters
are going to blowoff the viewers who have SD sets. I wouldn't think
the FCC would even allow that.

Sorry, bunkie.

The FCC not only is allowing that, it is *requiring* that.

Analog is going away. The majority of digital sets are HD.

A handful of cheap digital sets are SD-only, but they are fully capable of
receiving HD broadcasts and downconverting. The same is true of any
OTA digital-analog tuner.

Analog is the only reason for a broadcaster to provide an SD signal. When
analog goes away, that reason goes away.

If you want to watch SD afterwards, you'll either have to have a digital
tuner (which can receive HD and will downconvert) or subscribe to a
service that will downconvert for you.

Many older satellite tuners are SD-only, but at some point, it will become
cheaper for DirecTV and Dish to forcibly upgrade customer satellite
receivers to HD-capable models that can downconvert than it will be to
continue to provide a separate SD feed of the same material for those
people with old, SD-only satellite tuners. That's why DirecTV switched to
a leasing model; to have the ability to force customers to upgrade.

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

Mark Crispin wrote:

Just as the networks are all-HD today.

Not all network shows are HD..

Even so, some
individual stations did not make the conversion to color at that time,
and most continued to air significant amounts of non-network b&w
programming long afterward.

And that happened when PLL tuners eliminated the last excuse to continue
broadcasting B&W.

PLL tuners had nothing to do with it.

The general public
doesn't seem to be going gaga over HD

Been to a Best Buy, Circuit City, Wal-Mart(!!), Sears, Target, sports bar,
etc. lately?

Retailers are looking for the highest profit items--they don't make the
trends. Wal-Mart(!!) has at least as many SD sets as HD. Bars and other
such places are showing SD programming stretched to fit their wide
screens.

The mainstream network stations have HD programming and perhaps a weather
channel or something dinky like The Tube on a single SD subchannel.

The Washington DC ABC station has original local programming on an SD
channel. The Baltimore Fox station has a TVLand-like SD channel.
Broadcasters are only starting to ramp up because so few people have the
necessary receivers. And how dinky was MTV when it started out?

There isn't much public pressure for cable to carry the current
crop of multiplexed channels, much less additional ones. Anyone hoping to
create such pressure has a chicken/egg problem in that if cable doesn't
carry it, only people with OTA will know about it.

I know the above-mentioned Baltimore subchannel is on cable; don't know
about the DC channel. Promotion is definitely necessary, and will happen.

Multicasting is like OTA pay-TV -- it sounds like a great idea that you'll
make a mint on, but nobody ever has and a lot of people have lost a lot of
money trying.

The digital TV era has barely begun and you're talking like it's done.
Broadcasters have a history of wanting multi-cast capability. It's the
reason our analog FM stereo system was chosen, the reason the current FM
digital system was chosen, and now digital TV. None of these systems
are/were the best available technology for delivering a high-quality
program, but they all allow for multiple streams on one signal.

The public at large has shown over and over that they really don't notice
picture quality. Broadcasters will bet that they can get the public to
notice more channels.

I have a question that may seem simplistic:
If I continue to stubbornly use my standard definition television with
my satellite TV even though DirecTV has supposedly upgraded their
signals to fully HD at some point in the future,
I maintain it won't make any difference if the signal is HD or not my
set will always be incapable of HD and it will output SD no matter
what signal is downlinked.....
Or,will my SD screen go dark similarly like what will happen with OTA
in 2009? In other
words,will I have to buy some converter box for satellite to down res to
my standard definition TV? Just curious...

On 2007-05-24, SAC 441 wrote:
I have a question that may seem simplistic:
If I continue to stubbornly use my standard definition television with
my satellite TV even though DirecTV has supposedly upgraded their
signals to fully HD at some point in the future,
I maintain it won't make any difference if the signal is HD or not my
set will always be incapable of HD and it will output SD no matter
what signal is downlinked.....
Or,will my SD screen go dark similarly like what will happen with OTA
in 2009? In other
words,will I have to buy some converter box for satellite to down res to
my standard definition TV? Just curious...

It's all about your satellite receiver. If you buy a satellite receiver
which only outputs HD, you would have to upgrade your TV. If you ensure
you have a receiver that outputs SD, even with HD input, then you'll be
fine.

--
This is my .sig