Battle of HDTV

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The uphill battle of HDTV: Can format overpower content?

My sources informed me months ago not to buy an HDTV monitor right now, and John Dvorak's article in the May 2002 issue of PC magazine confirms the inside story. You better wait until the monitor you buy is not "HDTV compatible" but "HD-DVD compatible."

The new encryption scheme that is being developed by the major studios, designed to prevent copying of their movies in a widescreen, high-definition format, will use electronics in the monitor itself to decode the encrypted signal. That means if you don't have the right kind of latest generation monitor, you'll be out of luck when the studios release their films in an HD-DVD format. Just think of all the disgruntled consumers! But it won't be the first time the glad-handed salesman with their sugar-coated promises, blaring from radio commercials, have become the purveyors of planned obsolescence.

The wide CRT's and Plasma screens available in the electronics stores today are, to be sure, amazing. Never mind the higher, Beta-SP-like resolution of the DVD format itself — that's fine for the purists like you and me. Anamorphic DVD was an even more compelling selling point, which for the first time ever, brought us wide screen movies on a wide screen monitor in our homes — the first real advance in television technology in decades.

Beware also of another issue: I have heard and seen of limited life in PLASMA screens—do these expensive, elegant devices really go kaput after only about five years?? Check your search engine for the latest word on this.

But the networks and the electronics industry have had an uphill battle with broadcast HDTV. As one of the two emerging media frontiers, HDTV is an expensive, high definition, broadcast format that currently offers a very limited amount of programming, and that seems to have very little momentum in terms of public acceptance or, indeed, broadcaster interest, despite the fact that such interest has been mandated by the FCC with it's power to assign broadcast spectrum.

HDTV has had to plod along without support of e-commerce or any of the other incentives that the internet has used to prosper and develop. The flexibility and easy programmability of the internet is easily superior to the stiff and inflexible HDTV format.

A couple of years ago we were asking: will any of the majors release any of their classic widescreen movies on DVD? Due to the hackability of DVD, the initial response I got from some of my industry sources was an emphatic "No way!"

Copy protection is the linchpin of the studios' strategy for hi-definition DVD. And I think we will have to be patient until some collection of technologists develops a foolproof copy protection scheme. Burying the decode in the electronics of the monitor seems to hold the answer.

Releasing widescreen epics on DVD without solid copy protection is tantamount to opening one's vaults to the public, and invites the same troubles the music industry has experienced.

And another factor: Surely Japan's next generation of game machines will run on HDTV monitors.

The game is in play; whoever is willing to step forward first can seize the initiative and gain an important strategic advantage in this new medium.