Some points:
1) VOOM from Dish is the lowest quality that this material has ever aired in. When VOOM was broadcasting directly, the channels were in 1440x1080. When they went to Dish, it was a mixture of 1920x1080 and 1280x1080. Then Dish took all of the VOOM channels down to 1280x1080.
2) Dish has never publicly announced that they lowered the resolution. They continue to promote the VOOM channels as an exclusive and wonderful addition to their HD lineup. Indeed, we pay an extra premium to get these channels.
3) When Charlie had a VOOM rep on a recent Charlie Chat, the VOOM rep spoke at length about all of the "true HD" they had in their library and thanked Dish for providing a venue to airing it. No mention was made that all of the content was being down-rezzed.
4) Dish previously told members of this forum that it was their intent to restore VOOM to 1920x1080 after making fiber upgrades. Upgrades that were scheduled to take place in 2006.
5) Dish is now placing the blame on VOOM and claiming that VOOM is providing them with HD upconverts, i.e., material that is sub-HD that has been upconverted to 1080i. However the vast majority of VOOM's library is not sub-HD, it is true HD. VOOM's library is not the problem.
What Dish needs to do is to come clean in all of this. They should openly acknowledge that VOOM is being broadcast in a pseudo-HD 1280x1080i format. That this is being done at Dish's request in order to provide 15 channels. They should state one way or the other if they intend to restore VOOM to 1920x1080i. And they should stop laying the blame on VOOM.
Just be open and truthful.
Of course, DirecTV could stand a little truthfulness in their HD claims too.