[opendtv] Re: 5th gen receivers

At 12:02 PM -0600 1/22/05, Doug McDonald wrote:
>There is no spectrum space. A single HDTV program is all that
>will fit in one channel. Anything more than one other SDTV channel
>will ruin the HDTV quality.
>
>OTA digital is about HDTV, not multicasting. It's time to face that
>fact.

Let's just say that we disagree about BOTH points.

With improved video compression, HD is less of a challenge - when it is needed.

But your comments completely miss the point.

The current DTV standard is EXTREMELY wasteful of the spectrum 
allocated to broadcasters. We are replacing one inefficient system 
with another inefficient system. There is no question that we can 
double or triple the number of 6 MHz channels available to each 
existing market, while adding even more channels to provide 
sub-market coverage.

And this does not even take into consideration the bandwidth 
multiplication effect of delivering content to local caches for 
asynchronous consumption (e.g. premium services  such as movies on 
demand).

As for OTA being about HDTV, you are dreaming.

HDTV is an application. In terms of what local broadcasters can 
deliver it is one of the least interesting applications. This is not 
to say that ALL TV content should not improve. That is easily 
accomplished if we simply let go of the legacy of interlace, 59.94 et 
al.

Video is going to proliferate at MANY resolutions, according to the 
requirements of the applications - from video on cell phones and PDAs 
to HD on the big panel display hanging on the wall. Please stop 
trying to make force the future of motioning imaging into one rather 
poorly designed box.


>
>The broadcasters need to get on the ball and get HDTV to everybody.
>We still, for example, still don't have CBS in HD, or PBS on at
>all, not to mention WB in HDTV. CBS is supposed to be a big
>network ... they should be leading the HDTV parade, not terribly
>lagging. They should say to the locals "go HDTV or else". In our
>market, I'm quite sure that the WB station would be delighted to
>fork over the bucks to put in the HD equipment if CBS went to them.
>They are already full power, and CBS is running 1/800 their
>allocated power.

Even if every station you list carried every HDTV program their 
networks offer, you would not have a viable HDTV service. The total 
hours of HD offered by these services is still only a fraction of 
what is offered in Prime Time. And, with the exception of PBS, these 
programs are filled with commercial interruptions.

HD is important. But it is not the end game.

The end game is the ability to deliver digital media content without 
having to suck up to a handful of powerful companies that seek to 
keep us all prisoners inside their walled gardens.

Regards
Craig
 
 
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:

- Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at 
FreeLists.org 

- By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word 
unsubscribe in the subject line.

Other related posts: