Not that it may be any better in other parts of the world, including North America, but a new study commissioned by an HD manufacturer finds that British consumers still need lots of educating about all things HD.
LG Electronics, which has seen some rough spots lately in its HD sales ventures, is calling on the industry and others to better educate consumers on what HD is—and is not. For example, many HD set owners apparently don’t know that the only way for them to actually get HD video/audio quality is to tune to an HD channel, not merely any channel.
With such labels being thrown around as “HD Ready,” “HD Ready (Full HD)” and “Full HD” (which is merely a marketing term for 1080p), LGE said it’s no wonder that as many as 25 percent of all Brits think that owning an HD set displaying the “HD Ready” logo automatically makes all programs HD.
And why do many viewers think they’re watching HD when they clearly are not? LGE said one in three London area consumers think the reduction in their picture quality was merely due to poor lighting in the viewing room—not a lack of HD content, per se.
And some blatant mistrust of retailers in Britain probably doesn’t help, either. LGE said nearly half of consumers polled in two London suburbs think CE retailers typically employ specially tuned HD monitors in order to make in-store product demos look better than typical HD content will look at home.
