HDTV to finally hit mainstream in the UK next year

[AlexJ]

Well, it's been a long time coming (early HDTV's must be nearly ready to break and need replacing) but finally broadcasters other than Sky have woken up to the fact that HDTV is the future.

Last week, ITV announced they'd have a HD simulcast of ITV1 up and running by next Spring. Yesterday, the BBC announced they'd got the go-ahead to turn their BBC HD test service into a fully fledged channel "as soon as possible" and today Channel 4 say they'll have Channel 4 HD available by December. I can't see C5 getting left behind (especially as most of their stuff is imports already made in HD) so hopefully by next Spring all of the terrestrial channels will be available in High Def.

[Harrison]

That will be good. I can't understand why it has taken them so long to catch up, except for the investment cost and extra bandwidth required for HD filming and broadcasts.

But as you say, many programs being shown are US imports that are originally filmed in HD so there wouldn't be much additional cost to broadcast them in HD.

Although I did hear recently that ITV are starting to struggle for funds and will even be cutting down on the amount of regional news they show each day because they can't afford to pay their news readers as much. If they are in such a situation this would surely effect the quality of HD transmissions.

[AlexJ]

Although I did hear recently that ITV are starting to struggle for funds and will even be cutting down on the amount of regional news they show each day because they can't afford to pay their news readers as much. If they are in such a situation this would surely effect the quality of HD transmissions.

I think the regional news thing is partly to do with HD. My understanding was they were going to reduce the number (not time) of regional news services by merging some of the regions. At present there are (about) 26 regions & sub-regions throughout the UK each taking up a full channel space on satellite. By reducing this number, ITV are hoping to free up space for a HD service (which off the top of my head requires equivalent bandwidth to about 4 SD channels) and save a bit of cash on having to run two lots of news studios, readers, reasearchers etc.

[Harrison]

Makes sense. Although the whole point of regional news is so we have news for our own region. I don't want to be sitting through the news of London or the West Country when I am watching it to see what the suspicious circumstances of a house burning down in the next road to mine are!

So soon we will have even more "unskilled" people without work. What could a news reader do other than read the news? Public speaker? Conferences? After all, all they have to be good at is reading from an Autocue.

The networks could save even more money and replace the lot with someone just doing a voice over. After all, do we really need to sit and watch someone reading it? We could be looking at something much more interesting than that. Look at EuroNews. They already do it this way and it works well.

[J T]

My neighbour 'trains' newsreaders for the BBC. Apparently it's not quite as easy as we all think.

I thought it looked pretty damn ('flipping' - Ed.) easy. So maybe it is, then, ever so slightly tricky-ish the first time round.

[Harrison]

Have you had dealings with the general public? Most of them are complete idiots! I would hate to try and train most of them to do anything, let alone a job! I often wonder how most of them manage to tie their own shoe laces, let alone lock the front door when they leave the house. The fact that most of them drive a car is just too scary to think about.

[AlexJ]

Makes sense. Although the whole point of regional news is so we have news for our own region. I don't want to be sitting through the news of London or the West Country when I am watching it to see what the suspicious circumstances of a house burning down in the next road to mine are!

Have you watched ITV regional news recently? I did the other night and half the programme was a nomination tape for a "Carer of the Year" feature they were doing and a competition feature (calls & texts charged at 25p plus standard network rate). I want news, not some award show or competitions - I'd watch GMTV if I wanted those. Luckily the local BBC news hasn't succumbed to this yet, so that's what I watch and the ITV closures really won't bother me.

[Harrison]

That is very true. I always watch the BBC regional news instead of ITV.

[v85rawdeal]

It really does come to something, and show how desperate a channel is, when it gets to that state.

However, I imagine bulletins will soon start as follows:

"There now follows an emergency news bulletin, sponsored by Daz, the soap you can all beleive..."

[Harrison]

So, much like America then! I just hope it doesn't get quite as bad as the US where the news readers are also doing the adverts!