Copyright Notice: We don't think much of copyright, so you can do what you want with the content on this blog. Of course we are hungry for publicity, so we would be pleased if you avoided plagiarism and gave us credit for what we have written. We encourage you not to impose copyright restrictions on your "derivative" works, but we won't try to stop you. For the legally or statist minded, you can consider yourself subject to a Creative Commons Attribution License .

[Posted at 04/21/2009 08:26 AM by Stephan Kinsella on Copyright comments(9)]

Comments

I believe that the introduction of flat panel HD-TVs for the mass consumer market was delayed by at least five years because of industry squabbling over HDMI standards. We hear over an over again how it is necessary to "protect" the content producers from this an that. But think about it, how many HD-TVs would have been sold without the bickering. The imposition of DRM results in LOST sales ad lost opportunities that hurt business.

[Comment at 04/21/2009 12:01 PM by Steve R.]

Steve: I am far from being a flat panel television expert. Here is a brief history of high definition television. Where does HDMI fit in?

[Comment at 04/21/2009 01:30 PM by Lonnie E. Holder]

I am not an expert either, but we delayed our purchase of an HD-TV until the HDMI connector was provided. Below is an overview. One thing about the overview, the previous standard DVI was implemented before HDMI, but the usual "someone" said it DVI couldn't be used since it was an open standard whereas, HDMI was designed to "fight" piracy, so it had to be used instead. HDMI - High-Definition Multimedia Interface High Definition ICT downgrade delayed Unfortunately, I have to go now. I have not yet run across a story which discusses yet another delay in the release of HDMI. But, these articles a least point out how an established industry standard (DVI) was junked because it was open in favor of a DRM encumbered HDMI cable.

[Comment at 04/21/2009 01:57 PM by Steve R.]

it's going to be AT LEAST 10 YEARS before we have decent online movies on demand Don't we have that already, with BitTorrent and The Pirate Bay? :-)

[Comment at 04/21/2009 05:29 PM by Cabalamat]

I think you mean HDCP, not HDMI. HDCP is a DRM system that works over either DVI or HDMI. HDMI is just a connector that combines audio with DVI video.

[Comment at 04/21/2009 05:34 PM by Jesse]

Jesse: Do you know whether HDCP caused a five year delay in the release of HDTV?

[Comment at 04/22/2009 05:06 AM by Lonnie E. Holder]

Still looking. No smoking gun yet. Wikipedia page on HDCP Wikipedia page on HDMI Jesse is correct that HDCP provides the DRM system, but when conducting searches it seems the two are so intertwined that they are considered "one" technology, even though they aren't.

[Comment at 04/22/2009 08:36 AM by Steve R.]

Actually, I don't believe HDCP delayed the introduction of HDTVs. Why not? Because plenty of HDTVs were released without HDCP before the standard was finalized! That was the problem: if you were one of the early HDTV adopters, not only did you pay an exorbitant price, but you ended up with a TV set that was (needlessly) incompatible with hardware that came later. You might discover that your $10,000 TV couldn't display HD movies at full resolution because the players intentionally limited the quality of analog component outputs or non-encrypted digital outputs. Some of this was mitigated by the industry promising not to do anything too draconian with HDCP until 2010. Still, if you laid down enough money for your TV to buy a quality used car, you probably weren't planning to throw that TV away just a few years later.

[Comment at 04/22/2009 07:33 PM by Jesse]

I guess my perceptions were simply near sighted.

[Comment at 04/23/2009 05:45 AM by Steve R.]

Submit Comment

Blog Post