dish hd announcement?

[Bobby]

Night Ryder's press release, as humorous as it may be, is not that far from the truth. One speaker had some kind of mushroom patch growing on the side of his head. Probably some kind of multiple fatty cysts. In SD, they were barely noticable. In HD they were positively scary looking.

Did you notice how he attempted to keep that side of his head off camera. That red ugliness was downright scary. It looked like somthing out of "Alien."

 

[AndyMon]

If you think that was fanaticism, ................. Imagine those deals blown up into something as big as a political convention!
Oh that's right. I forgot. That's exactly what'll be happening at the end of August in NY.

Actually, I think it'll be rooted in reality just a tad more than last week's tripe fest was.

 

[RBBrittain]

Political conventions are dinosaurs. The practical constitutional requirements could be handled very well via a proxy card and toll free phone number.

NightRyder

But how else will the parties get three hours of prime-time exposure on ABC, CBS and NBC, plus more on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, etc.? Hey, not everyone is glued to C-SPAN 24/7, even if their ratings went thru the roof during the convention thanks to lack of network coverage.

However, the Dems do seem to be heading that way: This time they did the nominating speeches Thursday afternoon before prime time, then started the roll call during the local news; Kerry went "over the top" somewhere in the middle of Leno's and Letterman's monologues.

BTW, the Constitution says nothing about nominating conventions--or for that matter, political parties, or even a popular vote for President. At this point, the rules are mostly a combination of party rules and state law, with some Federal statutes (i.e., campaign financing) thrown in. The Constitution's first step in electing a President is the selection of electors on Election Day, by any method the state chooses; it doesn't even require a popular vote, though that's what every state has done for over 150 years.

 

[Cyclone]

So is there not a feasable way to add the RSN's in HD? If not, Dish will go splat, and cable companies or other Satellite companies who can show the RSN's in HD will take over. My local NBA, NHL, and MLB teams in HD is simply the most compelling content I can think of. Who cares about old movies upconverted to HD. Not me. GET THE RSN's.........real soon Charlie - or you'll be losing a bunch of us.

The trouble is that in order for Dish to provide the RSNs in HDTV, then it would take new hardware up in orbit as well down here. Dish Currently has about 24 SD RSNs. That would take 8 Transponders to carry them in HD. That would be if Dish decided to make them available to all (ie Sports Packs, MLB:EI, NBA Season Pass, NHL:CI).

Dish could elect to put them on the Spot beam transponders. But again, that real estate is very valuable, because that where their "locals" go, and locals are "gravy" because they bring in the new customers by the boat loads. A single HD RSN could take up the entire space of a small DMA on a TP.

Finally the content. A RSN likely has 3 hrs of HD about 4 times a week and then its just SD. Dish might have a hard time justifying them when the TPs are hard to come by.

Now with all that said, If Dish puts up some new Satellites with much greater Spot beam or other technology, then RSNs HD could find their way onto Dish.

 

[BFG]

Dish only needs about 5 HD Special event channels to be able to cover the Games on the RSNs, theres no need to dedicate a full channel 24/7 for each RSN

 

[RBBrittain]

Dish only needs about 5 HD Special event channels to be able to cover the Games on the RSNs, theres no need to dedicate a full channel 24/7 for each RSN

That will only work if there are five or less games being shown in HD at any one time; that may be true now, but someday it won't be. And if the same game is on two non-affiliated HD RSNs, they MUST agree to share the signal, or else you're in a heap of trouble.

And that's assuming your capitalizing "games" is a typo. I don't think you meant "the Games", as in the Olympics; no RSN will ever do that. I know; I was one of the rare few who actually got the infamous Olympics TripleCast of 1992. (I won it from a radio station; otherwise there's no way I'd have ever paid for it.)

 

[Cyclone]

Well, come next Fall, when there are NBA & NHL games running in primetime, check again and see how many are running at the same time.

 

[GaryPen]

Actually, I think it'll be rooted in reality just a tad more than last week's tripe fest was.

Actually, some people find tripe quite tasty.

 

[Bobby]

Actually, some people find tripe quite tasty.

Ah yes, that Sunday morning Mexican hangover dish, Menudo!!! And you thought they were just a Puerto Rican boy band...

 

[NightRyder]

So's that car you're drivin'. But, it's still fun to a lot of people.

I prefer the term "classic"

With my car what you see is what you get. There aren't many politicians you can say that about. It certainly doesn't apply to their phony scripted love fests.

NightRyder

 

[AndyMon]

Actually, some people find tripe quite tasty.

That's fortunate since they were given quite a mouthful
Tripe is also quite popular in Italy and Poland and I think, much of Europe.

 

[Bobby]

That's fortunate since they were given quite a mouthful
Tripe is also quite popular in Italy and Poland and I think, much of Europe.

The old countries truly believe in "waste not, want not!"

 

[Carl B]

Maybe E* HD annoucement is that instead of giving us more HD channels, they have started over-compressing the ones that we have so that we stop complaining about wanting more HD. That is, they want us to become as disappointed in their HD PQ as we became with their SD PQ. Just a thought!

 

[BobMurdoch]

Actually, they are a lot alike. They polish them up, and try to sell them to a public who knows little about them. It's only after they take it home that they discover the fine print, and find out what a gas guzzler they have on their hands. Either that, or the engine doesn't work, it doesn't do what you THOUGHT it would do, or it has a lot of useless extras grafted on to the deal that can't be removed, and drive the price up.....

 

[DishBacker]

So Scott, in the spirit of why this thread started, any update on the big annoucnement? Are they waiting for Thursday's Retailer Chat or Monday's Tech Chat? Or just waiting to trump DirectTV's announcements that are coming tomorrow with their quarterly results?