HDTV and Its Impending Problems?

NeuroManson asks: "With the growing hype surrounding HDTV and copy protection, and as further corporate control of the FCC becomes more commonplace with the inevitable arrival of the technology thanks to Hollywood, you will have no choice in the future of watching anything else, since your TV, VCR, etc, will be forced into obsolescence. There are two things that this brings to mind that should be addressed: who will be paying for the retrofit to the thousands of CRT and TV manufacturing plants around the world to make this possible; and assuming that this is going to be a US only problem in the short term (approx 3 years), how do they propose to safely dispose of all those outmoded TVs?" About the only way that this can happen by the recently proposed deadline of July 1st, 2007, without trashing and replacing the majority of our current televisions, American television owners would have to have their TVs "serviced" by a qualified technician to continue to receive broadcast signals. Having a secondary tuner would not work as that would break the "trusted" display chain that Hollywood is seeking to establish.

"Assuming there are approximately 300 million Americans, with 2/3 having upwards of 2 TV sets, that amounts to close to 500 million or more perfectly functional TVs that will wind up in landfills or third world 'recycling' countries like China. These are not exact figures, but you get the idea. As this grinds on, it looks like economic and ecological impacts are the predominate risks involved, as well as not being able to record the latest Star Trek because they put a copy-block flag into the digital broadcast. This is something that I think everyone, from the geek on the web to the little old lady across the street, through the average soccer mom should be concerned about. Any suggestions as to how such could be made publically known, organized against, and promoted, in such a way that the public would know it as a threat, not only to their way of life, but also to their pocketbook and health?"

Comments

It's not that extreme.

[rob_from_ca]

It was tough to find the questions buried in that long commentary, but here are the answers:

1. Who pays for the factory retrofits?

It's not like we're talking about a completely new way of generating images that makes all old factories completely obsolete. Most of the parts stay the same, there are a few new ones, and some need to be built with better specs. The manufacturers are constantly upgrading their facilities, because it enables them to sell more TV's cheaper. So they'll pay, and if it does cost a lot, they'll pass some of it on to the consumer, just like they always do, but I'd be suprised if there's a huge jump in priace in 5 years. HDTV Tuners started out at $1000 and have dropped to $500 in about two years, and they're still not really being manufacturered in quantities yet. Plus, tuners to upgrade old sets don't need to be high-res, which makes them much, much less expensive.

2. Where do all the old TV sets go?

Where do they go now? Into landfills. That problem has got nothing to do with HDTV. There will be an easy, cheap, external box to buy that will make your TV continue working. Hollywood doesn't care about low-res, NTSC analog outputs, only the higher-resolution ones, so they don't need a "trusted chain".

There are things to be worried about for when it comes to freedom of digital media going forward, but this isn't one of them.