Talk:WHDT

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[edit] Conflicts

This article has some serious problems. It looks like it was copied from somewhere, it reads like an advert, and wasn't WRAL first in HD? --CFIF (talk to me) 13:30, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

First of all, I don't know exactly where these people got all that extra information or how this reads like an "advertisement." They should at least cite their sources.
As for the factual accuracy, we have to know whether WRAL broadcasts in HD 24/7 or not. WHDT's official website mentions "First High Definition Television Station" on its home page, and even boasts on its Google meta tag:
"WHDT-TV in West Palm Beach, Florida, is now on the air to become the first in the Nation to bring High Definition broadcasts into your home 24-hours a day..."
I want to know where this is going so that we can clear this mess as soon as possible. -- M (speak/spoken) 17:37, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
"WHDT has since spearheaded some of the most important federal rulemaking decisions which affect today's digital television service. Most notably, the station established the legal precedent for all U.S. digital television stations to have their programming carried on local cable TV systems as a non-degraded high definition signal or in standard definition analog format. WHDT became the first television station to have its HD programming carried on cable under the FCC's digital "must carry" rules [FCC 01-23 MO&O, CSR-5562-Z, adopted 18 January 2001, vote 5:0]."

It reads like a pamphlet the station released. WRAL isn't HD 24/7, but it reads as if it was "The first to broadcast in HD" ever. --CFIF (talk to me) 19:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] talk:WHDT

This article has some serious problems. It looks like it was copied from somewhere, it reads like an advert, and wasn't WRAL first in HD? --CFIF (talk to me) 13:30, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I am the licensee of WHDT and the original author of the descriptive article. I noted that the Wikipedia information was incomplete and I updated it with factual material from the station's public record.
Digital station WRAL-DT conducted some of the earliest OTA digital broadcasts following those of the government's experimental station WHD. WRAL-DT is the digital broadcast station authorization which is paired with full service "television station" WRAL-TV Raleigh. WRAL-DT was first to broadcast a regularly scheduled news in HD and was also the first "commercial" station to broadcast a digital signal OTA (over-the-air).
WHDT did not conduct the first digital OTA transmission nor was it the first to encode its digital OTA transmission as a high definition signal. The first "digital" and the first "HDTV" OTA broadcasts were conducted by the experimental low power station WHD during its initial tests of the 8-VSB digital transmission system. The first commercial high definition (HD) broadcast was made by WRAL-DT using HD format 1080i/60.
The first "television station" to receive FCC authorization to serve its principal community using a digital signal was WHDT Stuart. Because the station broadcasts exclusively in HD format 720p/60, its digitally encoded OTA transmission became the first high definition transmission to be made by a "television station".
The important distinction here is that WRAL-DT was not then, nor is it today, a "television station" as that term is defined by the FCC. WRAL-DT is entitled to inherit all of the rights of its paired and licensed full service "television station" WRAL-TV when that analog station ceases operation. This can occur at the end of the digital transition or eariler if and when the station licensee applies for and is granted this change in status by the FCC.
The legal distinction between WHDT and WRAL-DT is not trivial. Only a full service "television station" is entitled to broadcast on an allocated channel and serve a Designated Market (DMA); is entitled to elect a paired digital channel; is entitled to cable and satellite carriage under the FCC's "must carry" rules. WRAL-DT does not yet qualify as a "television station" because its analog counterpart WRAL-TV continues to operate. Only the paired analog station WRAL-TV is licensed as a "television station". Digital station WRAL-DT cannot, therefore, exercise the usual right of a television station to access local cable TV systems. WRAL-DT can apply for "television station" status when its paired analog facility WRAL-TV ceases its OTA operation.
This may be more information than you wanted to know, but I think it is necessary to fully understand the defined terms, since there are considerable legal rights and responsibilities associated with the term "television station" and the term should not be used loosely.
WHDT properly asserted its claim as the first digital television station because it was the first digital station to operate without an analog counterpart. By doing so it inherited all of the rights and authority of a full service "television station", as that term is defined by the FCC. This is why it is the first digital station to be carried by all local cable TV systems. Cable carriage for WHDT was ordered by the full Commission after a unanimous [5:0] landmark decision that WHDT was indeed entitled to be classified as a "television station". In the years following this decision, many other broadcasters have voluntarilly shut down their analog channel so that their DTV facility could be similarly licensed as a "television station".
Two Federal documents could be cited and linked in the WHDT article which describe all of the above in great detail for interested readers. The FCC's Report & Order on DTV and Memorandum Opinion & Order on WHDT are extensive documents available from the public record. With more than 1700 TV stations in the U.S., only WHDT is cited in these federal decisions and rulemakings. I think that it is reasonable to mention the legal role of this pioneering TV station in the Wikipedia description.
With regard to the article appearing to be an advertisement, I fail to see anything being advertised, not even a logo. Except for the sentence about WHDT producing HD programming for the world market (which is rather unique for an independent station), the balance of statements seem rather bland and factual, especially when compared to Wikipedia descriptions of other TV stations.
To prevent this comment from becoming too long, I will address some concerns of others in a separate response. v. Günter Marksteiner, Licensee WHDT

[edit] talk:WHDT

As for the factual accuracy, we have to know whether WRAL broadcasts in HD 24/7 or not. WHDT's official website mentions "First High Definition Television Station" on its home page, and even boasts on its Google meta tag: "WHDT-TV in West Palm Beach, Florida, is now on the air to become the first in the Nation to bring High Definition broadcasts into your home 24-hours a day..." I want to know where this is going so that we can clear this mess as soon as possible. -- M (speak/spoken) 17:37, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Neither WRAL-DT nor WHDT broadcasts high definition content 24/7. There isn't enough HD in existence in the world to last even one month.
Both stations transmit a digital signal OTA which is encoded as an HD stream formatted as 1080i/60 (interlaced) in the case of WRAL-DT and as 720p/60 (progressive) in the case of WHDT. If the source of the progam is in HD then the HD signal is passed along to the viewer. Otherwise a program source in non-HD format is reprocessed into the respective HD format of the station for OTA transmission.
If the program source is NTSC component, for example, there is considerably more picture information available than what can be transmitted by an analog TV station. Thus improved image quality can be delivered in the HD-formatted OTA transmission. In the case of WHDT, much of its source material in the PAL format which contains considerably greater picture detail than NTSC sources. Regardless of the actual resolution in the source material, stations which broadcast exclusively with an HD-formatted digital stream always deliver picture quality equal to the source material.
Statements such as 'broadcasts in HD 24/7' confuse the issue. Digital TV stations can alternately broadcast in non-HD digital formats and thus deliver multiple channels of acceptable albeit lower picture quality. If the source material is standard definition then many stations will alter their digital encoding allocation for that particular program so as to permit transmission of multiple channels at once.
WHDT broadcasts 24/7 using all of its available data bandwidth to transmit a single stream of programming. This method results in the highest quality transmission for all of its programming content. Since content (news and war footage) is available in resolutions from poor to HD, it is impossible to maintain a stream of programming that is always at HD level. Stations which claim HD 24/7 transmit only a single stream of data within their digital OTA signal so that HD content within the mix of programming will not be degraded.
Both WRAL-DT and WHDT produce live HD broadcasts each day and re-broadcast HD content from others during certain day parts. WHDT transmits only a single stream of data encoded as HD 720p/60 and does not "multicast" or reduce its transmission bandwidth below HD standards at any time. Stations which "multicast" from time to time cannot claim to be broadcasting at HD datarates 24/7.
Lastly, there is additional confusion over careless use of the term "television station" in various claims. WHDT is legally a "television station", as that term is defined by the FCC. WRAL-DT is the paired digital broadcast station (DTV) of full service television station WRAL-TV, the latter being the television station and which offers no HD. WRAL-DT will become a television station following the cessation of of its analog counterpart. There are now several digital television stations which have been classified by the FCC to be legally "television stations". It is believed that WHDT remains the only television station which broadcasts an HD data stream 24/7. It was certainly the first to do so.

WHDT

[edit] talk:WHDT

"WHDT has since spearheaded some of the most important federal rulemaking decisions which affect today's digital television service. Most notably, the station established the legal precedent for all U.S. digital television stations to have their programming carried on local cable TV systems as a non-degraded high definition signal or in standard definition analog format. WHDT became the first television station to have its HD programming carried on cable under the FCC's digital "must carry" rules [FCC 01-23 MO&O, CSR-5562-Z, adopted 18 January 2001, vote 5:0]." It reads like a pamphlet the station released. WRAL isn't HD 24/7, but it reads as if it was "The first to broadcast in HD" ever. --CFIF (talk to me) 19:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I wrote the above attempting to conserve Wikipedia space and apologize if it sounds like too much legal jargon. I disagree that there is any "advertising" value to this description because nobody really cares about who set which legal precedent except lawyers and historians. I believe the the WHDT description needs to address some historical elements, though, since much of the FCC landmark decisions about the digital television service cite WHDT as the sole example which lead to the Commission's critical decisions dealing with digital cable carriage rights for all HD stations.
Of the 1700 television stations in the U.S., only WHDT was singled out as the unique example in the FCC's Report & Order on DTV. WHDT took on considerable technical and financial risk (plus the rath of the entire cable TV industry) as a result of its decision to 'pioneer' commercial high definition television broadcasting. For years it was the only television station in the country that owned an HD camera. It broadcast mostly its own programming OTA in HD to a market of zero viewers and without the benefit of having a paired analog channel. This entitled it to a dubious distinction at the time as being the nation's first and only digital television station.
I would prefer to remove the FCC citations from the text to make it easier to read, but I am not familiar enough with the Wikipedia system to make links directly to the FCC database resource.
Both WRAL-DT and WHDT are certainly the nation's pioneers of HD. WRAL-DT is the paired digital station of full service television station WRAL-TV Raleigh. Although not yet a legal televsion station, WRAL-DT can fairly claim to have broadcast the first commercial OTA signal encoded with a high definition program. Without conflict, WHDT can claim to be the nation's first digital television station and also to be the first television station to broadcast in HD 24/7. Furthermore, it should be noted that both stations have continuously supported each other in numerous FCC filings and petitions throughout the years.
One should note that the first OTA broadcast in HD was actually conducted by the FCC's experimental low power station WHD during tests of the 8-VSB digital transmission system. WHD was neither a television station nor was it a commercial broadcaster in any sense. WHDT
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