from high hopes to high deficit and back: a historic overview of europe’s hdtv policy and...
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Telematics and Informatics 28 (2011) 283–294
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Telematics and Informatics
journal homepage: www.elsevier .com/locate / te le
From high hopes to high deficit and back: A historic overview of Europe’sHDTV policy and reflections towards the future of HDTV
Nils Walravens ⇑, Caroline PauwelsIBBT-SMIT, Free University of Brussels, Pleinlaan 9, 1040 Brussels, Belgium
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history:Received 18 September 2009Received in revised form 18 January 2010Accepted 8 November 2010Available online 21 November 2010
Keywords:HDTVHigh definitionEuropean policyStandardisation processesBlu RayHD DVDSuper Hi-VisionUltra High Definition Television
0736-5853/$ - see front matter � 2010 Elsevier Ltddoi:10.1016/j.tele.2010.11.005
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +32 26291621.E-mail addresses: [email protected] (N. W
This paper describes the standardisation process and introduction timeline of high defini-tion television. The development of the standard is a process that goes back over 40 years,but HDTV is only today slowly finding its place in the home entertainment market. Thispaper explores why the European standard for analogue HDTV was not widely adopted,what Europe’s relation to HDTV means today, and proposes some general lessons thatcan be learned for the benefit of the development of HDTV’s successor, Ultra HDTV akaSuper Hi-Vision.
� 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introducing ‘‘the television of the future’’
After several years of discussion and a long standardisation effort, HDTV is gradually being introduced to market. The tele-vision standard which introduces a drastic increase of image quality and surround sound has been a long time in the making,and its standardisation has followed very different trajectories in Japan – its birthplace – the US and Europe. Although thereare some conflicting reports, it is estimated that around 35% (Létang, 2008) of US households own an HD-Ready televisionand of that share somewhere between 20% and 40% receive actual HD programming. Numbers for Europe are even less clear,but it is generally accepted that they are lower than those for the North American market. In March 2008, a report was pub-lished stating that only 5% of HDTV owners in Europe watches HD content (Murph, 2008) and another one claiming thataround 20% of Western European households owns an HD capable television (Létang, 2008).
So as ‘‘the future of television’’ is finding its way to market, one might forget the long and strenuous standardisation processthat lies at its basis. When Europe found its consumer electronics sector on a downhill slope, experiencing strong competitionfrom the Japanese industry, and it became apparent HDTV would be ‘‘the next big thing’’ for the industry, the Europeaninstitutions wanted to intervene and positively inspire the sector by developing a European standard for high definition tele-vision. HDTV meant an enormous opportunity for national governments, international institutions, but mostly the audiovisualindustry and its successful standardisation would become a top priority in Europe. Today however, the development of theEuropean hardware policy for HDTV is often looked back on as one of the biggest failures in standardisation history. One might– somewhat controversially – say HDTV found its way to market despite Europe’s hardware policy decisions.
. All rights reserved.
alravens), [email protected] (C. Pauwels).
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This paper will examine the process of Europe’s HDTV standardisation effort, taking a look at past decisions and their con-sequences. The work is based on literature on HDTV and its standardisation and European and international policy docu-ments related to the topic. It builds on the work in Pauwels (1995) by bundling some characteristics for standardisationfailure or success found there, and using them to put the current state of HDTV in perspective. The historical analysis willlead to some lessons for ongoing and future standardisation processes, and apply them to the standardisation war thatdecided on the successor of the DVD and to SHV, the emerging successor to HDTV.
2. Global HDTV standardisation: a long and tumultuous history1
This section will contextualise the debate by giving an overview of the state of the European consumer electronics indus-try at the time HDTV introduction was put on the agenda of the industry and policy makers. In Section 2.2 a brief history ofthe HDTV standardisation effort is presented, which resulted in the abbreviation mockingly coming to stand for High DeficitTelevision.
2.1. Overview
The development of hardware and infrastructure required for the production, transmission and reception of audiovisualprogrammes is at least as important as the programmes themselves. Large infrastructural projects are an important stimu-lant for the productivity and competitiveness of national industries (Pauwels, 1995). The production of audiovisual hard-ware, which drives the consumer electronics industry and possible spin-offs in other industrial sectors, has many timesled to intense competition, both on the internal national level, or externally on the international and even global level. Thiscompetitiveness has specifically come forward in several standard wars throughout the history of the audiovisual sector. Theinterests of hardware manufacturers are only sufficiently protected when the technology they develop is standardised in anationally or preferably internationally protected norm, and, without established standards, the distribution of software ishindered. To facilitate these standardisation processes, different bodies have been created, e.g., the International Standardi-sation Organisation (ISO) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), which is divided into several well-knownsubdivisions; ITU-R for radio communications, ITU-T for telecommunications standardisation and ITU-D for the developmentsector. This process makes the standard a trade instrument that can ensure distribution to other markets, or on the contrary,protect the internal market from import. Examples of such standard wars are the battle between VHS and Betamax for vide-ocassettes, and the difficult standardisation process for the resolution of television screens (Pauwels, 1995).
This last struggle has been a constant in the history of television. When black and white TV was standardised, NorthAmerica used a system with 525 lines of pixels, while Europe proposed a system of 625 lines in 1948 (Pirazzi, 2008). TheJapanese followed the American standard. The European and American systems were incompatible and still exist today.
During the introduction of colour television a similar war raged, again with incompatibility as a consequence. In 1953, theFederal Communications Commission (FCC) established NTSC as the standard for colour television in the US, a norm lateralso adopted by Japan. Europe felt the quality of NTSC left much to be desired and started developing different normsthroughout the continent. France developed SECAM, which was later adopted in Eastern Europe and Greece, while Germanycreated PAL, establishing a norm for Western Europe, Brazil and Southern Asia (King, 1999). These examples show that thebest standard from a technological point of view does not necessarily become widely accepted. VHS was inferior to Betamax,and NTSC came to stand for never the same colour (Fasoldt, 1989), which illustrates that not only industrial but also econom-ical, political and even cultural aspects may influence a standardisation process.
As technological advances were made in the 1980’s and while economical interests became important across borders, theEuropean Community started developing an audiovisual and telecommunications policy and the institutions gradually be-came more involved in matters of standardisation. During the same period, they became the driving force of a cross borderindustrial policy. As far as the audiovisual sector is concerned, two initiatives were seminal and closely linked to each other.The first was the development of the television equipment of the future, with the main focus being on high definition tele-vision at the time. With the introduction of HDTV the standardisation battle between the US/Japan/Europe triad was reign-ited. A second European initiative was the creation of a pan European fibre-optic broadband network of which HDTV wouldbe one of the most important applications.
The development of hardware and infrastructure needs to go hand in hand with the negotiations for their standardisationif they want to succeed in the market place. At first this was true for the European initiatives: the development of HDTV andthe creation of an integrated broadband network were logical consequences of the harmonisation, standardisation and lib-eralisation initiatives on the continent. Both served the same goal of creating an integrated economical market, thus creatingbenefits of scale and putting forward the European cultural identity. However, these initiatives did not have a chance tocome to full fruition. On the contrary, the development of the technology and the competition initiated by the institutionslead to divergence and disintegration, both on the Community’s HDTV policy as in the field of creating a fibre-optic broad-band network (Pauwels, 1995). The following section will look specifically at the standardisation process for HDTV andcontextualise the failure of Europe’s proposal for a high definition norm.
1 Section adapted from Pauwels (1995) and Walravens (2007).
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2.2. From high hopes to high deficit
In the 1980s, Europe’s consumer electronics industry found itself on a downhill slope. The market was flooded withdevices from Japan that were cheaper and more popular, bringing European companies like Philips and Thomson in serioustrouble. The television market was saturated and the impact the introduction of the VCR had on it was gradually fading way.The industry was in need of a new impulse, something the introduction of HDTV could very well provide. HDTV went farbeyond refreshing the consumer market, as the standard promised more than simply offering new devices to end users;it meant a complete overhaul of the production chain, from recording, over editing to broadcasting. HDTV could meanthe salvation of an entire industry. The interests were so great an international standardisation war broke out, trying to findthe best performing and commercially most interesting standard (Walravens, 2007).
The first concrete initiatives were taken by Japan, with the first research into HDTV dating back to the sixtees. It wascalculated that by 1989 the Japanese public broadcaster NHK (Nippon Hoso Kyoka) had already spent around 148 milliondollar on the development of HDTV (Pauwels, 1995; Kleinsteuber, 1994). By 1986, NHK had created a standard for HDTVcalled HiVision and proposed it would become the new global norm for high definition television. This system came witha substantial disadvantage however: it was not at all compatible with TV sets on the market at that time, which meant everyTV in the world would have to be replaced in order to function with the new standard. Europe responded to this develop-ment by requesting a delay of HiVision’s standardisation with the CCIR (Comité Consultatif International de Radiocommu-nications which would later become ITU-R) and promised to develop a standard that would be at least as capable as theJapanese one and compatible with existing systems, within 4 years of time. To achieve this goal, Philips, together with Thom-son, Bosch and Thorn EMI, initiated the EU95 project within the framework of Eureka, a pan-European industrial–technolog-ical cooperative network. Eureka differed from the European framework R&D programmes in that it focused more oncommercial research of technologies that were closer to market. Member states felt that the EU should maintain a neutralposition when it comes to technological R&D, which is why the framework programmes focus more on fundamental, bot-tom-down, pre-standardisation and pre-competitive research and constitutes the reason why Eureka was brought into life.This initiative by the French facilitated more commercially aimed research and functioned as a network of 23 members (anumber of European countries and the Commission). It offered a framework for international cooperation in technologicalresearch that is close to market and commercialisation, as opposed to the work done in the 4-year framework programmes.The EU95 project had the main objective of developing a standard that could compete with the Japanese one and consisted ofaround 40 industrial partners from the consumer electronics industry and related sectors in nine countries.
The final European norm would later be known as Vision 1250, an analogue standard that was named after the number ofvertical lines the new screens could display. The standard for transmission was called MAC. To counteract the Japanese,Europe suggested a transitional transmission system to ensure compatibility with existing systems called D2MAC. This stan-dard was compatible with PAL and SECAM but already offered a better picture and audio quality. Later the HDMAC standardwould be introduced that was not compatible with SECAM and PAL, but did work with D2MAC. Like the Japanese system, theEuropean signal would be broadcast via satellite and would be available over the air and on cable if these networks wereupgraded. Europe estimated it would be ready to roll out products to market by 1996–1997. It was easy convincing manu-facturers of the need for such a standard as it represented a significant amelioration of image quality, which could reinvig-orate the struggling television industry (Pauwels, 1995).
During the development of Vision 1250 however, several crucial elements were not assessed with the appropriatethoroughness. There was no broad consultation of the actors involved in the field as the standardisation effort was a panicreaction sparked by a self-preservation reflex of the industry. Negotiations were held only with the struggling consumerelectronics companies, who were unable to make founded strategic decisions at that time. Not the European institutions,nor consumer organisations, public broadcasters or foreign companies were consulted during the development of thisnew standard, which resulted in a few critical errors.
There was a structural problem that meant an a priori disadvantage for the European standard: programming could onlybe broadcast via cable and satellite links, due to difficulties with the compression techniques of the time. But most Europeancountries had a strong tradition of broadcasting over the air, a distribution channel that would not be able to support Vision1250. Moreover, the quality of the satellite signal was not on par with the relatively high standards the European audiencewas accustomed to. The developed television sets were not appealing to end users as they were large, clumsy and veryexpensive, plus consumers also had to purchase a satellite receiver, which suffered from the same defects. The most funda-mental barrier for the adoption of this standard however seems to have been a lack of coherence in policy decisions. As muchas the hardware industry was supported in its efforts, as little attention was paid to the software market, in casu the contentproviders. Because hardware manufacturers were hitting delays in developing equipment, problems arose for broadcasterswho wanted to invest in the technology. The material was either unavailable or far too expensive. This posed a particularproblem for broadcasters and content producers, who were being faced with a changing television production environment.Most of them simply wanted to protect their position in the market and could not be motivated to make large and riskyinvestments in new hardware. As a result, there was no compelling high definition content delivered to the end user,heralding the quick demise of Vision 1250.
The MAC standard for transmission did not have a very long life either. Because broadcasters felt bypassed by theEuropean MAC initiative, they started developing their own transmission standards based on the existing technology. Mainlypublic broadcasters started these developments as they were put under increasing pressure by the liberalisation plans of the
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EU, and were in many cases supported by national governments who also were sceptical of the opening of the European mar-ket. The public broadcasters developed an improved version of PAL, named PALPlus that would have to compete withHDMAC (King, 1999). Combined with the problematic standardisation of MAC, PALPlus would become the default standardfor satellite broadcasts, effectively rendering MAC useless.
Why did the introduction and standardisation of HDTV fail in Europe, compared to the North American case? Part of theanswer can be found in the way the different parties involved were consulted and how the standardisation effort was organ-ised. The situation in the US was benefited by the involvement of the FCC (Federal Communications Commission), a veryinfluential government monitoring authority, for which there is no comparable institution in Europe. The FCC prepared abroad consultation with manufacturers, major networks and other involved organisations to launch an HDTV standard ina more structured and efficient manner. Distribution issues were also handled by investing in compression technology re-search and making possible the broadcast of HDTV signals over the air via digital, rather than analogue standards, somethingthat was grossly underestimated in Europe. The FCC created ACATS (Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service) toassist in the development of the new potential HDTV standards. The development was also financially supported by the USgovernment: as early as 1988 a North American government technology research programme called DARPA (DefenseAdvanced Research Projects Agency) announced a $30 million grant for the development of both HDTV displays and displayprocessor technology. International organisations would be able to apply for this grant, which was not the case in the Euro-pean and Japanese case, and some firms, among which NHK, made project proposals. By the summer of 1989 13 grants wereacknowledged towards the development of HDTV technology. After the FCC emphasised that the newly developed standardhad to be compatible with the NTSC system to allow for an easy transition from the old to the new signal, seven proposals forsystems remained by 1990. By the summer of 1991, five major technologies remained for testing, of which only two werecompletely digital. When the FCC announced it preferred the development of a digital standard, NHK dropped out of the race,and after further development four all-digital systems remained. When ACATS concluded there were still crucial problemswith the remaining four technologies, the FCC proposed they be merged in order to increase the efficiency of development.On 24 May 1993, the so-called ‘‘Grand Alliance’’ was formed bringing together Philips North America, Thomson ConsumerElectronics, Zenith, General Instruments, AT&T and the MIT. The result was an all-digital HDTV system that was compatiblewith the NTSC technology (Pauwels, 1995).
In Europe’s defense, the quality of the standard definition broadcast system PAL is of a much higher standard than NTSC inNorth America. Colour distortions and other quality issues plague the latter and as a consequence the difference between SDand HD is more apparent for an American vs. a European consumer. But at the basis of the ‘‘failed’’ standardisation effort liethe more fundamental issues mentioned in the paragraph above. Europe specifically underestimated the potential of digitaltelevision in general. The MAC standard was an analogue norm, which was technically sound, but proved difficult to workwith and was not ready for the convergence of communications and media that was slowly beginning to manifest itself.
European businesses followed these discussions from close by and, noticing some crucial structural mistakes were madein the European approach, jumped on the North American – and digital – bandwagon in order to cut their losses. Europe wasleft behind with the substantial bill of a non-existing standard and the abbreviation HDTV came to stand for High DeficitTelevision.
In the years that followed, new international standardisation bodies were formed, while others merged or changednames. Instead of being the result of very strict top down policy decisions, a more bottom up approach was found preferableas the norms for HDTV were finalised through cooperation between industry players. The standards that are currently usedto broadcast HDTV are ATSC (North America, parts of South America and South Korea), DVB (Europe, Australia, parts of Asiaand Africa) and ISDB-T (Japan, Brazil) (King, 1999). The screen resolutions for high definition images were finally standard-ised in the mid-2000s by the ITU (International Telecommunications Union) and the SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture andTelevision Engineers). ITU-R Recommendation 709-5 defines how video luminance and colour information is digitised forHDTV. It also specifies the different possible refresh rates for high definition television. The SMPTE, which was founded inthe US in 1916, gathers 200 organisations in 64 countries and has over 400 defined standards on its conto. The 720p,1080i and 1080p standards were defined in the framework of this organisation, in 2001 for 720p – which was considereda transitional technology at the time – and in 2005 for 1080i and 1080p (Communication Specialities, Inc., 2008).‘‘SMPTE274M-2005: This HD standard defines the 1920 � 1080 spatial resolution (image sample structure) and several frame ratesfor this resolution. The 1920 pixels define the active number of pixels per line and 1080 lines are the active number of linesper frame. Frame rates can be either interlaced or progressive. Special consideration is given to NTSC frame rate compatibil-ity by defining 60, 30 and 24 Hz frame rates which are divided by 1.001.SMPTE 296M-2001: This HD standard defines the1280 � 720 spatial resolution at various frame rates. All frame rates are progressive only. There are 1280 active pixels perline and 720 active lines per frame. Special consideration is given to NTSC frame rate compatibility by defining 60, 30and 24 Hz frame rates which are divided by 1.001’’ (Communication Specialities, Inc., 2008).
The SMPTE also defined the standards created by the EU, but these were only used for testing purposes. Some further stan-dardisation work regarding the transfer of the HD signal via coax cable were made, but are too technical to be mentioned here.
In 2005, an effort was made towards consumers to clarify the different HDTV standards. The European Industry Associ-ation for Information Systems, Communication Technologies and Consumer Electronics (EICTA) (EICTA, 2006) created the‘‘HD Ready’’ logo, which indicates some minimum requirements towards displaying high definition images on television sets.
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The following section will take a step back and explore where misjudgements were made and how they influenced thestandardisation process.
3. The failed European HDTV policy?
After the Vision 1250 standard failed, Europe took a step back in the active R&D of HDTV. In 1989 the Commission pub-lished a document arguing that the 1250 standard should be implemented as soon as possible. At the time, the following fivegoals were put forward:
� To make every effort to ensure that the European industry develops in time all the technology, components and equip-ment required for the launching of HDTV services.� To promote the adoption of the European proposal based on the 1250 lines, 50 complete frames per second progressive
scanning parameters, as the single world standard for the origination and exchange of HDTV programme material.� To promote the widest use of the European HDTV system throughout the world.
� To promote the introduction, as soon as possible – and in accordance with a suitable timetable from 1992 – of HDTVservices in Europe.� To make every effort to ensure that the European film and television production industry achieves the capability, expe-
rience and dimension required to occupy a competitive position on the HDTV world market and to allow the memberstates to make their own cultural contribution (EEC, 1989).As it turns out none of these goals were met in the proposed timeframe. In 2004 a new working document was released
which carefully examined the situation and made some preliminary recommendations (Commission of the European Com-munities, 2004). It is mentioned in quite clear terms that there should be no policy related intervention with regard to HDTVas a ‘‘policy approach to HDTV would be counterproductive’’. It goes on to say that ‘‘coordination between the member states isneeded’’ in order to successfully stimulate HDTV adoption. These are quite vague statements, which lead us to believe Europewill not be hard-pressed to take a position in the debate on HDTV. It is stated that coordination is required, but not whoshould organise it. There seems to be more confidence in a bottom-up approach in which the television industry itself drivesinnovation. An efficient audiovisual policy should include a wide consultation of the field and a striving towards consensus.This implies creating an environment that stimulates consultation and cooperation via both formal and informal channels.The approach should however try to avoid one major pitfall, namely that the consultation process and the reached consensusare dominated by the most powerful actors. When comparing the American approach to the European one, some clear dif-ferences become apparent. One of the most predominant reasons the European HDTV policy failed was the lack of coordi-nation, consultation and consensus development between the most important and interdependent actors like producers,networks, telecom organisations, device manufacturers and political bodies. The entire Community strategy was based onthe suggestions and interests of the largest and most influential industrial actors. Compared to that of the US, the Europeanpolicy approach neglected the input of smaller organisations, companies, research institutes or university laboratories. Evenpublic broadcasters, who had always played a valuable role in technological advancement, were not consulted during theHDTV standardisation process. This almost selective consultation of actors would contribute to the demise of the Europeanstandard.
The EU’s methods also lacked coherence and long-term vision. By ignoring the interdependence between the involvedstakeholders like producers, telecoms, political institutions etc. the typical chicken-and-egg problem became abundantlyapparent in the television industry for the first time: no hardware without software, no production without distributionand vice versa. Instead of making sure such issues could not arise, the European hardware policy fuelled them. Introducingthe standard with success would be dependent on the availability of adapted and appropriate content and the possibility andwillingness of broadcasters to air the programmes, which was realised too late. There was also a substantial discrepancy be-tween the budgets allocated to software development on the one hand, and hardware on the other. While the MEDIA pro-gramme (stimulating content production in Europe) was still in its experimental stages, ambitious hardware projects likeRace or EU95 received over 50 times more funding (Pauwels, 1995). Even though continuity and a long-term vision wereambitioned in theory, the practice of allowing industrial interests to be dominant is witness to a short-term perspective.It was an ad hoc solution that was devised to serve the interest of some major European concerns in a short time span.In this process, it was automatically assumed that the other actors in the field would follow the proposed strategy. But theseother stakeholders were put under pressure by different audiovisual liberalisation measures enforced by Europe, leadingthem to either not support the Community’s plans for HDTV, or to downright oppose them. This is illustrated by the publicbroadcasters developing an SD standard to compete with HDTV, as was mentioned earlier.
If Europe had followed a comparable trajectory to the US and set up a wide public consultation and cooperation processwith smaller research firms, university labs and public broadcasters, some long-term issues would have undoubtedly beenidentified sooner and could have been considered in the policy decisions. In Europe, there was a fundamental difference be-tween the principles the institutions advocated vs. the policies they actually implemented: while open competition princi-ples were preached, strong industrial–technological intervention seemingly was practiced. Above all, the complexity of thetechnological case requires an intense international cooperation effort. The North American approach in the HDTV develop-
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ment was based on this international reflex, as opposed to the European and Japanese effort, which feared foreign R&D input.European and Japanese companies were thus shielded from technological advances made in other countries that could havebenefited the research. In both cases a nationalist and protectionist reflex was present, a priori stifling the development oftransnational agreements and standards.
Whereas the US organised a public debate on HDTV, Europe in general chose to exercise its policies behind closed doors.Dissonant views hardly reached the public opinion and institutions that were called into life to play a verifying and validat-ing role, like the European Parliament or consumer organisations, did not have enough information to adequately performtheir tasks.
A last aspect that led to the failure of the European HDTV standardisation effort was the so-called consumer interests thatwould be defended by the enacted policy. Both in the case of the fibre-optic network and that of HDTV a completely over-estimated and maybe even non-existent consumer demand led to the demise of the projects. There was hardly any consumerdemand for an improvement of the image quality in Europe, and the industrial and Community bodies followed a push strat-egy to position the products in the market. Consumer research only gained traction in the late eighties, so although there wasa lot of polemic and discussion on consumer interests, it was not founded in research but based on the interests of the indus-trial parties. Together with the other elements cited above, overestimated consumer demand did not give the EuropeanHDTV policy many chances for success.
However, although this policy might not have led to a unified European HDTV standard, there are positive effects andoutcomes that can be attributed to it. Philips found a breath of fresh air and survived the crisis it was going through. Thepresence of innovative HDTV production companies like Alfacam Group in Belgium, Sky in the UK (who both started broad-casting in HD quality quite early in Europe) or other European HDTV-based industrial actors, indicate the policy decisions ofthe late eighties–early nineties have not been entirely in vain.
Of course the context the EU is finding itself in at the moment cannot be dismissed either. After several referenda blockedthe introduction of the European constitution, Europe found itself in an existential crisis, which is only today slowly beingresolved. In such a context it is hard to practice any form of policy, and even more so with regard to quickly evolving (mostlytechnical) dossiers.
All these external difficulties should be considered when evaluating the EU’s HDTV policy, and as always,contextualisation is important in understanding its particularities.
4. Lessons learned
With the HDTV standardisation effort often referred to as a failure, there are some general lessons about hardwarestandardisation in the audiovisual sector that can be learned from this case’s history. This section by no means has the inten-tion of providing an exhaustive list of guarantors for successful standardisation. It does however take some key elements thatwent wrong in the European HDTV standardisation and generalises them to fundamental aspects that should be taken intoaccount when thinking about the standardisation of the successor to high definition television, which will be elaboratedupon later. These aspects were derived from the thorough methodological framework developed in Pauwels (1995,235–379). It combines multidisciplinary methodological tools and frameworks to create a holistic scheme to broadly analysemedia policy in general. From this scheme, crucial elements for the case of hardware standardisation were withheld.
4.1. From the drawing board to reality
Many cases in the past have shown that technological advancement cannot easily be planned, despite the efforts of devel-opers or lobbyists who might like to see it otherwise. More than the social construction of technologies theory, according towhich users may find uses for technology unexpected by their developers, surrounding factors like politics, economics, inter-national relations or even culture can have an impact on how, when and if new technology is adopted. The European HDTVstandardisation effort is a prime example of how contextual factors and the results of hastily made decisions had more im-pact than the incredible impulse the EU institutions tried to give the norm. When developing new technological standardsthat have such a direct impact on the consumer market, more time should be spent on considering potential factors thatmight inhibit or alter adoption patterns in earlier stages of development. This can be achieved by involving as many relatedactors as possible in a setting that allows open discussion, and is related to the choice between a top down or bottom upapproach (Section 4.2).
An extra element that can be taken into account in this context is the importance of control during the developmentprocess. Even though Community money was involved, the HDTV standardisation was largely carried out behind closeddoors and at industrial meetings with limited public access. The effort would have benefited from transparency so that inde-pendent control organisations like the European Parliament or consumer groups could have access to status updates duringdevelopment, and the ability to step in when it became apparent certain important elements were overlooked. Implement-ing a thorough control system can ensure that unexpected shifts or emerging contextual factors can be responded to withproper action and before it is too late and the effort fails.
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4.2. Top down vs. bottom up
When developing a standard of which the success or failure can have important political and economical consequences,as was the case with HDTV in Europe, there is a clear danger of pulling the protectionist card and not inviting enough rel-evant parties to the discussion. As was proven in the case of HDTV, a one-sided approach to such a radical technological inno-vation will usually have detrimental effects. It is of critical importance to organise a wide consultation of the field, beforeundertaking concrete action. A bottom up method and a striving for consensus on fundamental issues should be a preferableapproach.
This becomes abundantly clear when comparing the European to the American case. The European sector responded tothe international HDTV standardisation efforts with decisions founded in a panic reaction. Therefore no broad consultationwas organised, omitting some crucial players such as the public broadcasters and the end user from the standardisationdevelopment. This hasty process would only serve the interests of dominant, established organisations, leading to the failureof the HDTV initiative. In some cases a strongly centralised effort can be successful, but generally speaking, and especiallywhen considering the audiovisual sector where hard- and software should go hand in hand, a broad consultation of the fieldshould be essential.
4.3. Avoiding chicken-and-egg
As was touched upon in Section 4.1, an audiovisual policy should try to look beyond the technological development of anew standard, but keep in mind contextual aspects in order to avoid the chicken-and-egg problem. Unfortunately, in the caseof HDTV, this problem became painfully clear. When the standard was finalised and devices were pushed to market it quicklybecame apparent there was not enough compelling content broadcast in high definition to attract consumers. Hence, theneed for coherence in any audiovisual policy becomes clear. There was a balance between the development of the actualHDTV hardware and its distribution, via the Race project, which researched the possibilities of an integrated Europeanfibre-optic broadband network. It is accepted the HDTV policy failed severely in supporting the content industries. As men-tioned in earlier sections, a disproportionate amount of funding went to the development of the hardware, compared to whatwas spent towards the development of HD programming.
This problem still persists to some extent in the current HDTV landscape, worldwide. Although the world has settled onthree standards for HD screens several years ago, only now initiatives for HD broadcasting channels are gradually becomingcommonplace and even then there is disagreement on which broadcasting norm is the most efficient one. The chicken-and-egg discussion seems particularly relevant for the audiovisual industry, where development of hard- and software should gohand in hand. In the specific case of screen resolution standardisation it has been the content industry running behind thehardware manufacturers (also for example in the 4:3 vs. 16:9 transition, which still creates problems today) and this wouldalso seem to be the case for the successor to HDTV, which will be elaborated upon in Section 5.
4.4. The consumer as an excuse
The European HDTV case also illustrates how consumer welfare can be used as a justification to attain certain goals. It isaccepted that the development of HDTV in Europe was inspired by the distress of the European consumer electronics indus-try while consumer demand was drawn on as a pretext. Tools to measure consumer interest were not put to use in timeduring the development process, as opposed to the North American approach involving a broad consultation of the market.In Europe, market research into HDTV potential was carried out too late and no consumer organisations were involved in thestandardisation process. Over the last years it seems there has been a shift in this field, and consumer interests have certainlygained importance. When considering the most likely candidate to succeed HDTV, Ultra High Definition Television aka SuperHi-Vision developed in Japan, it quickly becomes apparent that consumer research is now a lager part of the developmentstrategy (cf. Section 6). However, the quite gradual adoption rate HDTV is seeing across Europe can be explained by thesomewhat artificial demand that is created by the consumer electronics industry. Hence, when a standard is developed,especially in the consumer electronics segment, consumer welfare should be crucial and guarded by organisations that keeptheir best interests at heart.
The following section will explore a different standardisation case related to HDTV, but taking place more recently: theso-called standardisation war between to potential candidates to succeed the DVD.
5. A war within a war
This section will apply the four policy related issues listed above to another standardisation effort closely linked to HDTVstandardisation; the one that would determine the norm for the successor to the DVD. First a brief overview of the standardi-sation effort will be given, followed by a closer look at the four policy issues. This last section will demonstrate that lessonsfor policy makers may also be applied to ‘purely’ industrial standardisation efforts.
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5.1. Blue vs. red
While international organisations standardised the different screen resolutions that constitute a high definition image,another standards war broke out in the HD ecosystem. The goal would be to become the next leading format in home enter-tainment after the success of the DVD. The two main competitors were both based in Japan, namely Toshiba and Sony, withthe first backing a format based on the red laser found in DVD players called HD DVD and the latter supporting Blu Ray, basedon a new technology using blue lasers. The technological specifications are not relevant here, but both formats support largerstorage capacities than DVD. Where a double-layered DVD can hold up to around 8 GB of information, HD DVD supports15–30 GB of data and Blu Ray discs can hold between 25 and 50 GB of information. This increased capacity is required tosave the larger amounts of data that go together with digital audio and high definition resolution images.
Both Sony and Toshiba quickly gathered consortia of hardware manufacturers, production companies and major moviestudios around the two standards. The HD DVD Promotion Group became the successor of the DVD Forum, which promotedthe format several years before and was also headed by Toshiba. The main members of the Promotion Group wereHewlett–Packard, chip builder NEC, Microsoft, Fujitsu, Paramount Home Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros.In May of 2002 Sony also gathered a strong group of organisations around its format in the Blu Ray Disc Association (BDA).Some key members were Apple, Walt Disney Studios, Samsung, Matsushita, Twentieth Century Fox, Pioneer and Thomson(BDA, 2008). While both formats were being developed simultaneously there were several attempts to avoid a no doubtexpensive format war. The associations tried to reach an agreement to develop a single standard in early 2005, but therewere too many differences in approach and the consortia could not be merged (Nakamoto, 2005). In August of 2005 bothparties announced negotiations had failed and the two incompatible standards would be brought to market.
In March of 2006 Toshiba launched its first stand-alone HD DVD player in Japan, about 3 months before the first commer-cial Blu Ray player would be launched (Perry, 2006). However, Sony also announced their next generation video game con-sole, the Playstation 3 would support Blu Ray, both in movie playback and as a basic format for the games. Thisannouncement made the PS3 the cheapest Blu Ray player available, costing around half of a stand-alone HD DVD playerat the time (Smale, 2008). For a long period of time the two formats were competing equally, with studios releasing recentand classic films in high definition on both formats. Warner Bros even attempted to bring together both formats by announc-ing Total Hi Def, a disc with a Blu Ray film on one side and the HD DVD version on the other (TimeWarner, 2007). The productwas never released to market.
Gradually the industry preference seemed to shift towards Blu Ray as it started selling more discs than HD DVD, the inte-gration of a Blu Ray player into the PS3 video game console cited as the main reason the format was being dropped. Sony wasalso better at attracting Hollywood studios to the format and had the advantage of being a major player in the industry itself,through Sony Pictures (Smale, 2008). In the winter of 2008, Warner, the only studio that was releasing content in both for-mats, announced they were dropping support for HD DVD (TimeWarner, 2008). This led to a chain reaction of retailers drop-ping HD DVD, creating a point of no return for the format. On 19 February 2008, Toshiba announced they would no longermanufacture HD DVD players and discs and would allow Blu Ray to become the industry standard (Toshiba, 2008).
The standardisation conflict between Blu Ray and HD DVD is often compared to that of the Betamax and VHS norms forhome entertainment videocassettes. However, there are some differences. A deciding factor that is often cited as one of themain reasons VHS became the more successful format is because it was backed by the porn industry. This has not been adecisive factor in the high definition disc ecosystem as the largest producers of pornographic content chose the HD DVD for-mat, which lost the standards battle and because of several contextual changes. It is for example generally accepted that theinternet has become the predominant platform for the porn industry. Another factor that differentiates the latest format warhas been the role of video game consoles. Microsoft’s Xbox 360 supports HD DVD movies via an add-on player, while Sony’sPlaystation 3 has a Blu Ray player built in, putting two major parties in the video game industry in an extremely competitivesituation. Never before did the gaming industry have such a strong impact in the home entertainment sector, and after a veryslow initial uptake, the Playstation 3 became popular with its Blu Ray feature heavily marketed by Sony (Smale, 2008). Thefirst consoles were shipped with free copies of Blu Ray films, without doubt creating an advantage over more expensivestand-alone HD DVD players.
This battle of the formats is interesting compared to the HDTV case, as no government contribution or policy decisionswere involved in the process. The HDTV standardisation was problematic, but its failings cannot be solely attributed tobad top-down policy decisions, as the HD DVD case shows that a completely industrial standardisation process, free fromgovernment influence and taking place in the market, can be equally problematic. The following section will explore ifthe ‘lessons learned’ from the HDTV government-driven standardisation effort can be applied to the more industry-basedBlu Ray vs. HD DVD case.
5.2. Lessons from industrial standardisation
The first aspect under consideration (as described in paragraph 4.1) is the potential discrepancy between the planned roll-out of a technology and the contextual factors that may interfere with this planning. More so than the European HDTV stan-dardisation, the one described above came to the surface more organically instead of being pushed by one large policymaker, with two global companies building on their legacy technology and expertise to create the new standard. Regardlessof this distinction in the standardisation process, there seems to have been too little attention for potential contextual
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changes or emerging competing technologies. It would appear both consortia underestimated the potential value that is nowemerging in online (high quality and high definition) video streaming and downloading services, e.g., Hulu and iTunes. It hasbeen argued that as the penetration of broadband increases, together with the popularity of ‘unlimited’ data plans, this typeof services may become more important than physical media to deliver high quality content to end users, something that canbe observed in the music industry already (Cheng, 2009). The consortia around them, but mainly Sony and Toshiba, investedvery large amounts of money into the development of the two physical formats, while perhaps not fully taking into accountthe growing importance of digital media distribution. And although Blu Ray won the standardisation war, Sony is also takinginitiative in digital distribution today. The firm recently announced a new version of their portable gaming system, the PSPGo, which does not use physical media to play games (Kuchera, 2009). Rather, users purchase digital version of the games inSony’s online store, where a catalogue of video content can be downloaded as well. High definition video content can also bypurchased via the Playstation 3 console, bringing Sony’s digital distribution platform to the living room, indicating Sony isalso interested in this new way of non-physical content distribution.
With regards to organising a broad consultation of the field in order to avoid decisions inspired by panic for example,errors in judgment were made on both sides. The two parties were able to attract large consortia around the respective tech-nologies but it was generally accepted that Sony and Toshiba were the main parties in conflict. As a result, organising a broadconsultation across an industry becomes exceedingly difficult as media organisations are in many cases linked to each other(strongly or weakly) through different commercial agreements, umbrella or parent corporations, boards of directors etc. Byinitiating discussions to merge the standards too late in the process, it had become nigh impossible to do this as the interestsof the companies involved had become to diverging.
The content that was available for both new media depended on the consortium backing the standard, and gave a greatdeal of power to the major Hollywood studios. Without qualitative content the hardware is virtually useless, as has beenshown in the audiovisual industry’s past many times. Even though HD DVD was cheaper to produce and could deliver at leastequal performance to Blu Ray Discs, the latter became standard as it was backed by the largest number of content providers.Toshiba was unable to keep the content providers it had initially attracted, resulting in the remaining ones also leaving theconsortium. Added to this was the fact that both stand-alone HD DVD and Blu Ray players were expensive, loud, slow andbulky devices (Anderson, 2006). Only Sony was able to circumvent this by enabling the Playstation 3 gaming console to playBlu Ray Discs, making the device the cheapest Blu Ray player in the market at the time (at $499 and €499 for the low-endmodel). It shows again that any hardware standardisation effort, be it industrial or government-driven, needs to be backedby strong software and vice versa as the two are intricately connected.
During the time both formats were in the market, both parties repeatedly claimed that this competition would be goodfor consumers, as it would keep prices low and allow for a quick adoption by end users. The incompatible standards howeveronly led to consumer confusion and frustration with early adopters (Kim, 2007). There were hardly any benefits towardsconsumers except perhaps indeed for a quicker lowering of prices. However, when it became apparent that Sony and BluRay had won the ‘war’, research indicated the price of Blu Ray hard- and software had stopped decreasing and actually in-creased slightly (Hruska, 2008). It can be concluded here that having competing standards in the market in this case did notlead to particular consumer benefits.
The entire situation was confusing from a consumer point of view and required severe investments from the involvedfirms. The case demonstrates how certain actors can have a great deal of power over a value network, i.e. the Hollywoodstudios having tremendous impact. From this case we could conclude that the four proposed criterions are also importantfor standardisation efforts that are industry-driven, but more research into this aspect would be required.
The following section will focus on the HDTV standard specifically and take a look at the future of the norm.
6. Outlook
After the failed policy, the EU did not continue to intervene in the HDTV case. Standardisation was left to the industry,with some initiatives in a European context, like the HD-Ready logo by EICTA. The technology is now slowly gaining tractionwith content producers, distributors and consumers, and is likely to gradually become the new television standard in thecoming years. Recent figures indicate 90% of sold television sets are HDTVs, of which around half support 1080p, the HDnorm of the highest quality. Fig. 1 shows this growing adoption of HD capable televisions (Young, 2008).
Prices for HD capable screens are also decreasing dramatically as manufacturers perfect the technology and production ofparts becomes more affordable. It can be expected this trend will also positively influence HD adoption, at least with endusers. Fig. 2 gives a price projection for various sizes of HD capable screens, including both plasma and LCD technology(Young, 2007). Examples in the market seem to indicate prices are currently already lower than the ones projected in Fig. 2.
Keeping its history in mind, it can be assumed that the EU will not intervene in the development of the successor to HDTV.Since the mid-1990’s, Japanese public broadcaster NHK has been working on Ultra High Definition Television (UHDTV) orSuper Hi-Vision (SHV), of which the latter term seems to be used more frequently, as the next step in the standardisationof TV screen resolutions (Sugawara, 2008). This standard has a resolution of 7680 � 4320 pixels, 16 times sharper than anHDTV image, and will most likely be accompanied by 22-channel audio. Because the resolution is a multiplication of currentHDTV standards, the aspect ratio of the screens would remain the same, making SHV backwards compatible with HDTV. Thehigh pixel density will quite likely lead to larger screens in the consumer electronics market, with display sizes varying
Fig. 1. Share of HDTVs sold vs. classic screens.
Fig. 2. Price forecast for HD capable displays.
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between 100 and 200 inches. The transmission of this large amount of data is one of the key research challenges in the fur-ther development of SHV. Currently the SHV signal is broken up into 16 channels that are compressed after recording usingexisting compression techniques like MPEG-2, transmitted separately and recombined when they arrive at their destination.Any slight discrepancy in recombining the different streams can cause motion sickness in the audience, so great care must betaken in further researching compression methods (Sugawara, 2008). A prototype of the technology was first presented atthe 2005 World Expo in Aichi, Japan, and a further developed version of the norm was shown at industry events in Europeand the US throughout 2006. NHK would like to start test broadcasts for SHV via satellite in 2015 and roll out the technologyon the Japanese market around 2025.
Considering the four general lessons to be learned from the HDTV standardisation, we can make some careful observa-tions about how the SHV standardisation seems to be evolving.
� Technological determinism: as far as we can judge from current information, it would seem SHV, like HDTV, constitutes inthe first place a technological standardisation process. Japanese public broadcaster NHK is developing the standard,although this time around, there seems to be more willingness from the Japanese to seek forms of international cooper-ation, both with the public and private sector. The BBC, EBU and the RAI are currently supporting development of SHV asthe follow up standard for HDTV (NHK, 2008a)� Top down vs. bottom up: as NHK is Japan’s public broadcaster, there is clear government involvement in the development
of this standard. NHK is financed through a system of viewer fees (NHK, 2008b) so SHV is not entirely developed using abottom up approach. However, there has been an effort to attract international partners, both in the public and privatesector, with success it would seem: SHV is being developed in close cooperation with the BBC, RAI, the EBU and Siemens.This interesting presence of European broadcasting and technology companies would seem to indicate a differentapproach will be taken, compared to the HDTV effort (NHK, 2008a).
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� Chicken-and-egg: the content production sector will need to be even more closely involved in the SHV effort. The HDTVstandardisation teaches us lack of content was detrimental to the adoption of the standard, with consequences still abun-dantly clear today. The cooperation with European public broadcasters is laudable but a broad range of content producersneeds to be attracted. This will be a crucial element in the successful adoption of SHV.� The consumer: at the moment, SHV is not significant yet as an end user product. As the technology only becomes relevant
for screens larger than 100 inches, it will not become the standard for home entertainment in the close future. However, if100+ inch screens become more widespread, it is likely that the argument of consumer demand for more quality will beused to rationalise the move to SHV. However, even in this quite early state of development, the role of the consumer ismore closely examined than during the HDTV research, because of a particular reason. Like mentioned earlier, when theSHV streams are not properly recombined, motion sickness may occur in audiences, something that is undesirable forobvious reasons. A recent article mentions how consumer testing will be a crucial aspect of the success of SHV (Sugawara,2008).
At the time of writing, SHV appears to be the only potential successor to HDTV with no other standardisation effortsknown to the public. Again it is the Japanese public broadcaster and the Japanese government that initiated the fundamentalresearch with regard to the next generation in television hardware production and distribution. Given the European historyand the path laid out by the HDTV standardisation, it is highly unlikely the institutions will take initiatives in this field. Thereis still a great deal of active research on the development of hardware related to the audiovisual industry in the EuropeanFramework Programmes, although the focus seems to have shifted towards projects on future network technologies withincreasing attention going to the mobile world and energy efficient technologies. Unless the Japanese experience fundamen-tal problems in the development of SHV or there is a global disagreement on its adoption, it is doubtful Europe will under-take a standardisation effort of comparable magnitude to that of HDTV in developing its successor.
7. Conclusion
This paper gave an overview of the standardisation process of high definition television in Europe, in a global context. Theglobal history of HDTV was outlined, describing the context in which the standardisation effort took place. After Europe tooksome hasty decisions and the standardisation process on the continent failed, the European institutions withdrew fromintervening in this branch of the industry and allowed a bottom up approach. After that, some general lessons that canbe learned from this tumultuous history were described. Firstly, technological innovations cannot be seen in a vacuumand are influenced by various external elements; secondly, a centrally organised, top down approach was favoured over abottom up initiative which led to resistance from the industry and other actors; thirdly, the content industries were not suf-ficiently supported to make HDTV programming, resulting in a chicken-and-egg deadlock between hard- and software andfourthly, consumer demand and welfare was used as an excuse to push forward the industry’s agenda. After the evaluation ofthese criterions for the HDTV standardisation, they were first applied to the standardisation war between Blu Ray and HDDVD and subsequently to SHV, the likely successor to HDTV. A careful first analysis seems to indicate that more effort isbeing made to address the issues that were raised. There is room for improvement when it comes to avoiding a technologydeterministic approach and especially towards steering clear of an impasse when it comes to hard- vs. software, but it mayalso be too early in the standardisation process to judge these criteria. The history of HDTV does however explain why theEuropean institutions seem reluctant to play a role in the introduction of SHV and can hopefully provide some valuable les-sons towards the further development of the latter. There are strong indications that the industry will push 3DTV (based onthe HDTV standards) before launching SHV on the consumer level. It is to be expected that the recommendations describedabove are also valid for 3DTV, which should be the subject of further analysis.
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Glossary
ACATS: Advisory Committee on Advanced Television ServiceATSC: Advanced Television Systems CommitteeBDA: Blu Ray Disc AssociationCCIR: Comité Consultatif International de RadiocommunicationsDARPA: Defense Advanced Research Projects AgencyDVB: Digital Video BroadcastingEBU: European Broadcasting UnionEICTA: European Industry Association for Information Systems, Communication Technologies and Consumer ElectronicsFCC: Federal Communications CommissionHD DVD: High Definition Digital Versatile DiscISO: International Standards OrganisationITU: International Telecommunication UnionITU-D: International Telecommunication Union DevelopmentITU-R: International Telecommunication Union Radio CommunicationsITU-T: International Telecommunication Union TelecommunicationsNHK: Nippon Hoso Kyoka – Japanese PSBNTSC: National Television System CommitteePAL: Phase Alternating LinePS3: Playstation 3SECAM: Séquentiel couleur à mémoireSHV: Super High VisionSMTPE: Society of Motion Picture and Television EngineersUHDTV: Ultra High Definition TelevisionVHS: Video Home System