HDTV putting the cart before the horse

On November 12-13th 2007, Understanding and Solutions, a UK based industry analyst, organised in Barcelona a conference to look at the state of High Definition in Europe. You can read more on it on watchmojo.com.

Let me quote some of the more interesting statements by the major stakeholders in HDTV in Europe.

...countries like France and the UK still only have around 10-12 channels, none of which have enough HD content available to provide original programming 24 hours a day.

Content is king but not for HD. There are a lot of HD Ready sets out there but most people don't even realise that they're watching upconverted SD content. As we can learn from these quotes:

The rapid transition to HD Ready flat screen TVs in Europe is creating a ‘content gap’ that European broadcasters in most territories will struggle to fill, leaving a pent-up demand for other sources of high definition video entertainment

Now unfortunately the on-going battle between the two competing HD disc standards does not help here either. Costs to produce for this format is quite high for independent content creators, leave alone, the public broascasters.

I remember attending some five years ago a conference sponsored by the European Commission that issued warnings on this content gap. Unfortunately, a lot of cars are sold now but we'll have to wait for the roads to drive them on. Don't tell me they did not know this was coming.

The confusing array of logos facing a TV buyer is a key issue (one speaker had counted 17), as is the widely varying terminology used to describe the new ‘1080p’ flat screen panels

Confusion is an opportunity today. Just walk into any large consumer electronics retailer and try to get unbiased advice. Most of the time, the sales staff don't know what they're talking about and just sell what they're told to sell.
Cable companies are piggybacking on the technology refresh and the confusion to serve you the same content but charge additional fees.

UK: <4% of Sky subscribers take HD services; 4.5% of Virgin subscribers take HD services

France: <2% of CanalSat subscribers take HD

Italy: 1.2% of Sky Italia subscribers

Just have a look at these numbers...