HD Cable Petition

With the recent wave exposure about poor quality HD cable signals, a petition has been developed by one of the hosts of the popular audio/video podcast AV Rant. In the original posting, it seems that this petition was instigated by problems the host and Audioholics' staffer, Tom Andry, had with his Comcast HD service and a few vocal listeners. From the petition:

We hereby demand that Comcast, Time Warner and all other cable providers put maximum effort into giving us what we paid for - high definition TV free of artifacts, dropouts, and service interruptions. All efforts must be made including exploring new technologies, compression codecs, and reduction of channel load in order to solve the current HD issue. We will gladly give up a channel or two (especially Lifetime or Oxygen) if it guarantees that the big game comes in clear.

While we realize that demand for more HD content is high (it is important to us as well), we foresee more problems than solutions by overcompressing channels. Sure, you'll be providing more content - content that no one will be able to watch because every third word is being dropped or the picture keeps pixilating. As content providers, it is important that you increase the number of HD channels available but at the same time you need to ensure that the channels you already provide are coming in clear. So far, this has not been the case.

While obviously the petition is designed to entertain as much as send a message, it is clear that the issue is not frivolous. Comcast has admitted to using more and more compression on their HD with solutions only theoretical at this point. Since Comcast is the largest US cable provider, they are generally singled out for criticism though other cable providers are using similar compression methodologies.

With the digital switch looming, HD is coming more into the public consciousness. If people run out and buy new TVs based on a faulty belief that their old TV will be useless (and we know that there are plenty of husbands that are going to foster this belief - you know who you are), the perceived value-added of HD may become a national issue.