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The Consumer Impact on FCC Rules about HDTV

The relationship between the FCC and the HDTV industry is long and somewhat complicated. It is complete with opposing companies forming alliances for the greater good, angry cable companies, and confused consumers. In the end, HDTV is here to stay.

HDTV History

The FCC first became involved with HDTV in 1987. At this time, the FCC ruled that HDTV standards needed to be compatible with current NTSC service. Therefore, the standards were confined to existing UHF and VHF frequency bands.

In 1988, the FCC had 23 different HDTV and EDTV standards proposals. All of the proposals were for analog or mixed analog and included a variety of options for bandwidth, resolution, and interlace. By 1990, however, the FCC declared that HDTV would be broadcast simultaneously. It also announced that its preference was for a full HDTV standard, rather than the previously proposed EDTV, which had a reduced resolution.

The General Instrument Corporation submitted a proposal for all digital HDTV system later that same year. Later still, the ATRC also announced its intention to develop digital HDTV. Zenith, AT&T, and MIT soon followed in their footsteps. This threw four major contenders in the mix for HDTV. All of these systems were tested over the following year.

By February 1993, the FCC decided to move forward with all digital HDTV systems, but couldn't determine which company should continue the testing. Therefore, the FCC ultimately decided to form an alliance amongst GI, AT&T, Phillips, MIT, Sarnoff, Zenith, and Thomson. In this way, the best features of all four previously tested systems would be used to create the HDTV standard. The remainder of the year was spent determining the features of the HDTV standard.

The systems were constructed in 1995, and the FCC set the new standard by the end of the same year. By late 1998, HDTVs were available on the market. Furthermore, the FCC dictated that the top 10 markets needed to start digital TV broadcasts no later than April of 1999 and that it must be broadcast to the top 20 markets by October of the same year. With this plan in place, HDTV would reach approximately 53% of all households with televisions.


Currently, the FCC standard specifies that HDTV format is 1920x1080p and contains digital surround sound. Furthermore, the FCC has a goal to phase out conventional NTSC broadcasting by 2006.

Consumer Impact

The ever-growing consumer interest in HDTV has forced the FCC to work more quickly on regulating HDTV. Consumers are anxious to take advantage of the new technology, but unhappy with the FCCs slow progress in getting broadcaster's on board. In fact, the broadcast regulations set forth by the FCC are not monitored or truly enforced. Instead, broadcasters are expected to simply comply with FCC regulations in regard to HDTV.

Consumer protests have also drawn a great deal of attention to the FCCs 'down resolution' proposal. Down resolution is the purposeful reduction of resolution quality that is provided through a broadcast. Many broadcasters purposely implement down resolution in order to discourage home recordings and piracy.

The Home Recording Rights Coalition (HRRC) has, however, addressed the FCC about this issue. The HRRC's stance being that down resolution punishes those who have purchased HDTVs for better picture quality, only to have that quality reduced. The FCC has responded by stating that broadcasters can't purposefully decrease resolution. The FCC has, however, stated that it is ok for broadcasters to utilize a decreased bandwidth for broadcasts, so long as the quality of the picture remains the same.

The FCC is, however, attempting to respond to consumer concerns. In addition to regulating broadcasters, the FCC has mandated that all televisions made after March 2007 contain digital tuners rather than analog tuners. Digital tuners are not the same as HDTV tuners, but a television must be capable of receiving digital signals in order to receive HDTV signals.

Despite the controversy surrounding HDTV and FCC regulations, nearly half of all consumers intend to make their next television HDTV according to a recent survey by the Consumer Electronics Association. This is partly due to the FCC's mandate to switch to digital tuners. In fact, 2005 sales of digital televisions surpassed those of analog sales for the first time.

With the combined FCC regulations and the consumer interest in HDTV, this technology will be around for a long time.

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