interesting theory on the studios,
The main reason why you do not see much 1080p being served is bandwidth, cable does not do 1080p, due to the face it eats so much bandwidth, I don't see this changing for a few more years, I think for HD content we are stuck mainly with 720p/1080i, until bandwidth can deliver the quality of a blueray.
This is one of the more popular reasons why we don't have an
TV capable of 1080p playback. The core of the reason is generally true. Yes, American internet infrastructure is hobbled by relatively slow broadband speeds. Some say this is a function of America being such a big place compared to- say- Japan or Korea while I tend to lay the blame on the cable & phone companies owning the pipes, and not wanting to upgrade them to outpace the world for fear of disrupting their very lucrative cell phone and cable subscription business models.
After all, if the pipes were not "constrained", we could all probably dump our cable & cell phone subscriptions, getting all of our television entertainment directly from the companies that make the shows (cutting out the cable middleman) and all of our phone communications could quickly switch to wireless wiMax VOIP (cutting out a lot of the phone company's thievery).
But regardless of that, a high percentage of computer users don't need the power in the steady advances being presented as the latest Macs, but apple keeps advancing them anyway.
A high percentage of the public doesn't need the full power of the latest iphones or ipods, but Apple keeps advancing them anyway.
A high percentage of the public may not need 1080p playback functionality now, or even in the next few years, but since many competitors are able to build it into their variations of an
TV, why doesn't Apple advance
this technology anyway?
To some degree, I could care less that the American pipes are not big enough to sell me 1080p movies via iTunes. In my own case, I have shot home movies in 1080p, edited them in Apple software, and can export them in Apple-friendly video containers. But I can't watch those on my HDTV unless I hook something other than
TV to that TV.
Apple regularly suggests that iTunes content is about selling more hardware. Apparently, Apple makes its money by selling more hardware, not movies via iTunes. The next
TV that I want to buy needs to be able to match the output capabilities of cheaper devices like the Western Digital HD box, and that is the same capability being promoted by the CE industry as "true HD" (presumably we have "false HD" in anything less than 1080p
)
Apple's own software, including the "free" one (iMovie) that comes with any computer purchase can read 1080p video and write 1080p video. So, the weak link in the chain is that the
TV can't actually show that video.
Someday, maybe America will finally be able to access higher capacity bandwith. There are other markets in the world where
TV could be sold, and where average bandwith far exceeds what we get in the U.S.
Certainly, Apple has the capability to somewhat futureproof a new version of
TV by giving it a capability that may not be needed by many Americans for a few more years, much like my Macs don't utilize every bit of hard drive space, nor every cycle of their processors, nor every bit of their RAM today.
The new iphone 3GS has advanced features like tethering and MMS that we don't get to enjoy in the U.S. yet because AT&T says no, not because it can't be provided. Apple built these features in anyway, even if the (AT&T) "pipes" may not be able to handle them today.
If the logic is that since the bandwith limitations would impede our ability to buy 1080p movies from iTunes, there is no need for an
TV that can playback anything more than limited 720p, that same logic should work against advancing every other Apple product that has features beyond the needs of what many customers can utilize today.
Long rant short, obviously my biggest wish for September is still 1080p playback hardware without compromises. And no 1080p iTunes content, studio approval, or enhanced broadband infrastructure is required to grant this wish. All that is needed is for Apple to simply decide to build it and let that other stuff happen when it happens.
