DIRECTV Getting Sued over HD Lite

[charper1]

Those lawyers must not know about C band satellite Hi-def which blows the pizza dish "HD" away.

Hey that could be another great thing to come of this, although I know it won't I would love for the C/Ku BUD to make a huge comeback.

 

[bgilga]

I think Directv could be in a lot of trouble. Contracts are a two way street. They make us live up to a one year or two year commitment, but they don't keep their commitments to us. Week 1 it was TNT HD, week 2, HDNET, what next? I am paying for a low budget HD package and I am not getting it all the time. I was watching the Jets game on my R-15 and the picture sucked. Three years ago I would never believe this would happened, but it has happened. I hope Rupert sells to someone that gives a damn about the consumers because it is obvious he doesn't.

 

[dkheersink]

Charper, you're right and that's a very good analogy. I see D* as having a good case based on what this individual claims, but if there were a public policy argument made about why D* isn't being honest AND is giving us crap, and depending on which judge hears this case, this could be one of the best chances of a court looking at this issue and doing something. Higher courts usually don't like to hear cases unless there is an actual injury (so to speak in legalese), and this guy appears to have suffered that since he can show a before and after difference and he relied on how the PQ was before. There could maybe be a class action suit, but just like the case at hand, D* will (persuasively, unfortunately) claim that they are simply doing what other providers are doing. IMO, like I said in my last post an amicus curae brief could help the judge see the public policy behind this case from our- the D* subscribers' and HD consumers' in general- point of view.

 

[charper1]

Oh I agree, I do see something coming of this, but I just have no good expectation it will be the best end result we all want. I just hope ha has a great lawyer that really read and knows that user agreement inside & out. Is this the exact claim they filled? It seems he is just going after the way they market it, not the product itself. Thoughts?

"Claim that DirecTV engaged in unlawful or fraudulent business practices by lowering its HDTV picture resolution in September 2004"

 

[JohnH]

BTW: HD News is actually sending their stories to the studio at 1440 X 1080.

 

[minorthr]

I'm not big into lawsuits, but where do I sign up for this one. We were having this exact discussion at my house 2 weeks ago flipping between D* HD and Comcast HD while watching the eagles game. There was a big and extremely noticeable difference. The D* picture was a lot softer and almost had a haze over it. While the comcast feed looked fantastic. If the series 3 tivo wasn't $800 I would probably leave D*.

 

[Plywodstatebum]

If I wouldn't have spent 700 bucks on my new Dell 24' monitor. I would have got a new Series III ... they sent me a email saying they would transfer my Lifetime sub for a 150 bucks and I could keep using my series II for a year free.. Of coarse I allready ordered my Monitor. Story of my life...a day late and a dollar short.

 

[slacker9876]

someone asked what can we do to help his cause; can't we seek to join the class action?

I am glad to see someone asked! That was going to be my question. Even I am not an ATSC expert but certainly somewhere it is documented that HDTV is 1920x1280 or 1280x720 ...

I'll sign in on this one on principal. The point when my local FOX station and NBC station (free) look better than something I am paying for, above and beyond (HD Pkg) normal "cable or sat service" it should have quality.

I have no sympathy for D* on this matter. They have two brand spanking new satellites up there and are more than capable of transmitting the 30-some HD available channels in MPEG4 at full bitrates.

 

[Soundteck]

When our local channels have multiple channels on their digital channels (weather.. traffic.. local info..) doesnt that take away from the signal that we would recieve via OTA thus making it "HD LITE" as well?

also isnt this a basic contract issue? The day he signed it channels were full HD.. then they changed it after he signed without notification? Does anyone know if the small print says anything about if that is a breech of contract or not? I would suspect that it doesnt.. that D* can do prettymuch anything they want, cause i assume that the contract (that prob 1% of the people out ther actually read it... and no I am not in that 1%) is SOOO onesided on the side of D*...

 

[bytre]

Best of luck to Mr. Cohen! I hope Dish sees the suit and lets it influence a change before it, too, is the subject of one.

 

[TheForce]

As some of you know I have always pooh poohed the whole myth of HD lite when the transmission is 1080i x 1440 or, 720P x 1280. IMO that is not HD lite but just HD as it is speced in HDCAM acquisition and or HDCAM distribution format. If you anti - HD lite zealots really want HDCAM outlawed, be prepared to have about 2% of the total HD programming because the HDCAM standard is so wide spread in the industry.

OK, having said that, lets come up with a realistic definition of HD lite.
Likely the courts may have to define that in this suit as well
How about this HD is 720P x 1280 or 1080i x 1440 or higher. I know many of you would like to have the higher number of 1920 but if you knew anything about the technology, you'd understand how silly that idea is considering what the entire industry is doing.

Let's try HD lite is 480P widescreen or any 1080i x 720 pixels H or any HD advertised channel that is sent at a bandwidth less than 13 Mbps.

The last parameter is one that I like and if the providers maintain that bandwidth everyone including those not using a true HDTV but an HD lite monitor will even see the difference. Tghis bandwidth spec predisposes MP2 encoding as that number would need to be different for MP4.

Oh, what is an HD lite monitor, you ask? Well this HD lite sword cuts both ways. If you own any of the traditional Plasma monitors with less than 1440 pixels H for a 1080i signal it is HD lite. If you own a monitor with a native resolution that is less than 1280 pixels for a 720P HD signal it is HD lite.

I fully support the lawsuit against DirecTV. I recall back then I was monitoring their channel bandwidth with some special equipment I had then and it was running typically at 9 Mbs for Showtime and 11 for HBO. HDNet was peaking at 16 as was Discovery HD but later when HDNet Movies started, both HDNet channels and DiscHD went down the toilet as well.

If any of you have both DishNetwork and DirecTV the difference is day and night. IMO, people who are complaining that the resolution on Dish is 1080i x 1440 need to send their complaints to Sony, not DishNetwork. It was Sony who set the HD standard for HDCAM) Frankly, I think most of the true HDCAM produced programs on Voom and HDNet are just stunning on Dish while on DirecTV, they deserved to be sued, not just by us but by Mark Cuban, HBO, Showtime, Discovery, as well!

 

[fkostyn]

I will say that I can SEE a difference, I tried cable HD for a bit - and had D* and cox on and switched between to two. There IS a visable difference.

 

[Jimbo]

I think Directv could be in a lot of trouble. Contracts are a two way street. They make us live up to a one year or two year commitment, but they don't keep their commitments to us. Week 1 it was TNT HD, week 2, HDNET, what next? I am paying for a low budget HD package and I am not getting it all the time. I was watching the Jets game on my R-15 and the picture sucked. Three years ago I would never believe this would happened, but it has happened. I hope Rupert sells to someone that gives a damn about the consumers because it is obvious he doesn't.

How about M. Cuban, he agrees with our points about full resolution HD !!!

Jimbo

 

[slacker9876]

Yeah I told a neighbor I would jump on this today and she said "What'll get, $10.00" to which I replied, none of us would want the money ... we want the full bandwidth!!! The overall PQ has decreased soooo much since the late 90's it all looks like crap on a large TV anymore. My solution ... watch my 24" Sony 4:3 ... what a sad-sad situation.

 

[vurbano]

If I had the money I'd sue too.

 

[Bulldog]

If I had the money I'd sue too.

Well, it's a class action lawsuit, so the real winners will be the lawyers; subscribers will get (if they win) perhaps at most a 10 % reduction in the HD fee. WOW!

 

[SRW1000]

Although I agree something needs to be done; I see this just like juice. You can buy different brands of juice in the store; or things that are all CALLED juice. Even though some don't contain any REAL juice or are only 10% real juice, they can still, BY LAW, be called juice.

Good example, except that federal law requires the percent of actual juice to be put on the label. HD Lite providers do not provide any guidelines, or in the case of some previous advertising, they do list true HD resolutions, which they don't follow.

In the case of juice, at least a consumer has information up front before making the purchase. In the case of HD, this information is almost impossible to find (unless you come to these types of sites).

If nothing else, this lawsuit may educate more consumers.

Scott

 

[Satmeister]

If I had the money I'd sue too.

Wow...what a shocking revelation.

Here's another...you don't need money to be part of a class action. If it makes it to any kind of trial schedule, a list of all HD D*TV customers will have to be constructed and a mailing of notification of the suit sent out. That's the way the majority of class actions work. These happen all the time (and rarely ends up with significant individual results). I've been on at least 6 of these "lists", filed the paperwork (more for the entertainment value than anything), and saw new benefits amount to less than $100 combined. I made no claims on any of them, and let my "winnings" die a quick death.

The only real potential "benefit" would be that the courts would agree with the filer and force D*TV to amend their current practices for HD broadcast. Chances of that are very slim (as HD is not defined clearly beyond a generic range of transmission standards), but we can only hope.

That way, we will save countless hours of time having to see the countless whiney posts about "HD Lite". Hurray. Now that's a prize worth winning. :up

 

[leww37334]

In court, you can demonstrate that the HD lite format is not anywhere in the ATSC spec, which is the definition of HD.

http://www.atsc.org/standards/a_53e-with-Amend-1-and-2.pdf

Clearly D* loses, what next?

D* agrees to broadcast at 1280X720P or 1920X1080i, thus meeting the ATSC spec, however either a) they compress the hell out of the signal or b) they drop HD channels to gain the needed bandwidth and D* viewers still lose. D* is determined to use their new satellites for Local into Local transmissions. They can obtain new revenue that way by getting more people to sign up for the HD package. D* simply is not interested in providing any additional national HD channels.

 

[hdtvtechno]

WOW What a great day.... !!!!!
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