HDTV owners: Time to pray.... (1 Viewer)

[RichardMA]

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-0...s%2Dbusines s

 

[Chuck Anstey]

"My feeling is, would you rather not have it at all? They certainly have the right just not to release it," Kummer said.

Yes, I would rather them not release it at all than cripple my Sony G70 and every other HDTV, which already have inputs for the HDTV STANDARD set forth by the FCC, and make it useless. What idiots. Did CSS prevent pirates in other countries from making pirated discs? Hell no, they just duplicated the entire disc, encryption and all. What makes them think that isn't going to happen all over again?
Chuck Anstey

 

[Dave Scarpa]

I know that America is Sue Crazy, but I wonderif a suit could be brought forth? After all they agreed on a standard

now they want to renig ???

 

[Glenn Overholt]

I see one of two things coming out.

1. A legal black box that will allow the old HDTV sets to get the good signal.

2. Same as 1, but not legal.

Glenn

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Don't they realize they're biting themselves in the ass? The people who care about HDTV already own HDTV sets... by making a new standard, you're alienating your core base. Besides, this could easily be the target of a long, exspensive, class-action lawsuit if current HDTV set owners were interested.

And Mr. Kummer is wrong... unless they want to stop broadcasting period, they DO have to release it. Isn't that what this digital mandate that's costing taxpayers so much is all about?

 

[Dave Scarpa]

I Had asked that on another forum, how real is the possibility of a Lawsuit. To me it's misleading to set a standard, adopt it, get alot of people to buy into it, then change it. I feel if that's the case then a lawsuit is a legit way of voicing disaproval

 

[Chuck Anstey]

Unfortunately no lawsuit would stand up. The FCC set the standard for broadcast HDTV, not all things HDTV. The studios / manufacturers are free to come up with any standard they want for a pre-recorded movie. I guess the arguement would have to be the studios and manufacturers colluded to deny the public their "fair use" rights or made false advertising about their HDTV sets compatibility. The only other way is to get Congress to pass a law requiring any HDTV material to be unmolested on analog outputs but they seem to fully support Hollywood with the DMCA.

Chuck Anstey

 

[CharlesD]

1. This is going to royaly piss off HDTV owners... heck it already has me pissed off.

2. No mater what they do, there will be a way around it developed within months of this anti-consumer scheme going public.

Are they on crack? Any new peroduct with this scheme on it presumbably would be targeted toward the existing 2,600,000 people with HDTVs in the US, but they are deliberately excluding almost heir entire consumer base with this scheme!

When are these guys going to get a clue? Consumers are not mindless sheep that exist only to be milked for as much money as possible by corporations (well msot aren't). And most people are not criminals. Out of my 100s of DVDs exactly 0 are bootlegs.

DVD encryption has been cracked and no amount of jack-boot tactics are going to put that genie back in the bottle, and in any case that technology is mostly used to allow people to watch DVDs on systems that don't otherwise support DVD playback. Sure some people "rip" DVDs, but for the most part hose people wouldn't buy the DVD in the first place so the studios aren't losing much revenue.

.

 

[Ryan Spaight]

This whole thing just disgusts me beyond words and has basically wiped out any enthusiasm I had for HDTV. I don't feel bad about my HDTV purchase, since DVDs look spectacular on it, but I've pretty much given up hope of ever seeing actual HDTV on it.

Just remove all copy protection and apply the death penalty to piracy -- that's my solution. Stop punishing the innocent for a change. (I *am* joking, but just a little.)

Ryan

 

[RobertR]

Christ, this pisses me off big time, and just when I was feeling good about the whole D-VHS thing. The argument that "don't worry, limiting the analog outputs is just an option, they don't HAVE to do it" falls completely flat with me. Why bother to make a capability you're not going to use? Assholes.

If someone somewhere makes it possible to bypass this, I will take advantage of it.

 

[Ryan Spaight]

If someone somewhere makes it possible to bypass this, I will take advantage of it.

You betcha. Funny how the more copy protection gets slathered on, the more people are determined to get around it by any means possible. You'd think a four-year-old would have figured that out by now.

Ryan

 

[MickeS]

So this HDMI is a complteley new type of interface? Does that mean that even those who bought the very few JVC products with DVI inputs, that supposedly were "future proof", are screwed too?

It also says that HDMI products won't be out in stores for at least a year. Does this mean that products sold currently will be sold with a warning sticker, saying they'll be useless for anything other than OTA HDTV and progressive DVD's? I doubt it, but that would be the only fair thing to do.

I don't have a HD set yet, in part because I've been waiting to see how this thing panned out. But apparently Hollywood can just dictate whatever they want, to hell with us consumers, so I guess it will never really pan out.

This really pisses me off, and all because Hollywood doesn't want us to timeshift (I bet that's what all this is leading to eventually, talk of "piracy" is just damn smokescreen, I suspect).

/Mike

 

[Jack Briggs]

Ever get the feeling, sometimes, that Hollywood is declaring war on home theater itself? What makes this situation all the worse is the feeling of helplessness the consumers experience--as if we're throwaway pawns in game of corporate brinksmanship.

 

[RobertR]

Ever get the feeling, sometimes, that Hollywood is declaring war on home theater itself?

Yep. I'm getting the feeling that Hollywood is setting up all the technological and legal dominoes to enforce a pay per view model for seeing movies at home, and they're so hell bent on doing it that they're willing to piss on all current HDTV owners in order to acheive it. They don't have the balls to openly admit it at this stage, of course. They'll continue to blather on about "piracy" (real pirates, of course, won't be deterred by these measures).

 

[CharlesD]

I'm getting the feeling that Hollywood is setting up all the technological and legal dominoes to enforce a pay per view model for seeing movies at home...

Yup I think that's exactly right. They want a pay-per-view ONLY future for movies on HDTV (cropped to 1.78:1 of course)

 

[Chris]

Pay for play. No recording.. *gasp* where is Circuit City at.. are they involved in this at all?

(DiVX flashbacks)

 

[Jack Briggs]

If only there were a consumer-advocacy group representing the interests of HDTV owners. If only Home Theater Forum could make itself heard more effectively to these groups of people.

 

[MickeS]

If only there were a consumer-advocacy group representing the interests of HDTV owners.

Well, Vic Ruiz was trying to get something going before... check here for some more about that: http://www.ilovehdtv.com/hdtvoa/homepage.html
/Mike

 

[GlennH]

If only there were a consumer-advocacy group representing the interests of HDTV owners.

There is:
http://www.digitalconsumer.org

 

[MickeS]

Oh, and yes, I'm sure that in just a few years time, the only HD content on TV will be pay-per-view or D-VHS.

The OTA HD-frequiences will all be taken over by "interactive" services like AOL and gameshows, and the cash that it generates for the companies (thanks to the free frequencies that were handed out by the government to the corporations) will be used to create more wealth for the executives and a few lucky actors, producers and enterainment industry bigwigs, while the consumers will sit there and get even more pissed off at ever increasing commercial breaks, station bugs and PPV costs.

/Mike