5.0 out of 5 stars Must read for any history or tech enthusiast

J.M. · December 11, 2024

One of the most memorable and fascinating books I've read. There is so much to learn from the stories and unfolding events detailed. It introduces little-known history about televison and the politics behind its creation. It's incredible what battles and obstacles were fought that ultimately led to the television marvels we have today. There is a lot to appreciate from this book and the people who made it all happen.

5.0 out of 5 stars Very well-written and interesting book

I.J. · September 12, 2009

This is a facinating and well-written review of the development and introduction of HDTV. It focuses on the political interaction of government agencies, the broadcasters, and R&D efforts, more so than the technology. It is ironic that although the U.S. led the Japanese in the research and development of digital TV, by that time there was no domestic TV manufacturing capability to take advantage of this.(Note: I read the original hard cover edition and not the soft-cover 2009 update.)

4.0 out of 5 stars Defining Vision

C.E. · April 27, 2013

A good read, if you are in the TV industry, on the technical side. Goes in-depth on the history of how digital TV came to be what it is today.

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow! What a ride!

W. · March 22, 2011

I've owned my copy of this book for some five or six years now, found at a thrift shop for $2. Haven't read it until just now, just put it on a shelf and forgot about it because I don't really care about HDTV. So what?, pretty pictures! Who cares? Don't even have cable -- what's on the network news shows and PBS wastes too much of my time already.Well, one day I was short of reading material so I picked up Brinkley's book. I never had considered the multibillion-dollar stakes, the political infighting and outfighting, the corporate and international competition, nor the technology of digital broadcasting.What I found most intriguing about the book was the supposition that digital broadcasting was considered by all the "experts" to be absolutely "impossible". It took a non-broadcast engineer, Woo Paik, to pull it off -- and only because, as he said, he didn't know enough to know that it could not be done.Brinkley's narrative reads like a techno-thriller, which I suppose it actually is. He covers the doings of the tech engineers, the corporations that in the end combined into the Grand Alliance, the original digital HDTV inventors the Japanese NHK engineers, the machinations of the Broadcast Barons, the Cable Mongols, the FCC, the radio and satellite guys, the politicians and of course the lowlife lobbyists and lawyers.Probably the most disgusting part of the story is the original motivation for creating HDTV by the Broadcast Barons and their lobbyist lackeys. No, it was not for any lofty, noble reason such as serving the public interest or bringing quality programming to the masses. It was actually for their own greedy self-serving interest: that of protecting their portion of the radiofrequency spectrum from takeover by public-service agencies such as the police, fire departments, and emergency medical services. And when they realized that actually getting HDTV into broadcast operation would cost them big bucks in equipment upgrades, they actually worked behind the scenes to undermine HDTV once their political purpose was accomplished! It's all right here in this book; read all about it!Remember back in the '40s and '50s when they all said TV would result in an uplifting of public awareness and public virtue, what with all that quality educational programming and dutiful community discourse making our business and government "leaders" accountable to the public ? What up with that? Remember, we're talking about the very same people who brought us that! That's probably why nowadays everything in our society has to be presented as entertainment.And because everything has to be entertainment, that's one of the root causes for the current state of our national and societal situation.

5.0 out of 5 stars HDTV sort of by accident

C.T. · March 27, 2009

The government ordered all telecasting beginning after a date certain (this year) to be digital, creating a big increase in the number of channels in the electromagnetic spectrum available for broadcasting. Digitizing spectrum use had its beginning in broadcaster interest in improving the quality (making more life-like), the picture available on our TV screens. Efforts in the States on behalf of that goal, begun shortly after World War II, were desultory until the Japanese came up with pictures that were a lot sharper than anything theretofore known. This drove American broadcasters and the whole TV industry bananas. These Asian makers of nice little automobiles simply could not be allowed to sweep the television world.That the Japanese advance was not true HDTV but the result of closer pixel lines, clever, but not breath-taking, afforded some relief. The holy grail of true HDTV was still undiscovered, an elusive target. Nonetheless, the Japanese pictures were sharper, ergo better, so the push for the real thing continued.I don't know whether the digital road provides the only conceivable path to true HDTV, but that was the path to success. It is also the path that had been urged on the industry by the Federal Communications Commission.The Commission, inevitably involved by virtue of its regulation of broadcasting, considered that the digital road presented the best chance for making TV compatible with computers, allowing for communications matchups of unimaginable possibilities.The story of how it all came about is brilliantly laid out by Joel Brinkley in "Defining Vision," a work of thorough research and deep understanding of the technology involved. The politics, the goals of winners--and losers (are there any?)--with the arrival of true HDTV, make for an incredibly complex story. Brinkley not only makes it clear and intelligible, but exciting and fun.A book deserved of the rating of five if any book ever did.Charles Tillinghast, author of "How Capitol Got the Beatles, and Then What Happened," and "American Broadcast Regulation and the First Amendment: Another Look."