Re: False or Misleading advertising

Curmudgeon (curmudgeon@xxxxxxxxxxx) wrote in alt.tv.tech.hdtv:
> > In the US, there are no laws that concern this. It's only an agreement
> > of the CE companies as to what "HDTV", "HDTV-ready", "EDTV", etc., mean.
> >
> The FTC has the power from Congress to enforce "truth in advertising".

Agreed, but a device that accepts HDTV signals as input and displays them
could conceivably be called and "HDTV monitor". The CE companies have
volunteered a different definition, but there is nothing that prevents
anyone from choosing their own definition in an ad, since there is no
legal definition.

The FTC hasn't ever bothered to challenge the "lines of horizontal
resolution" claims, and those lies and exaggerations definitely fit the
two parts of "deceptive" far more than calling a device with 853x480
resolution an "HDTV monitor":
- is likely to mislead consumers acting reasonably under the
circumstances; and
- is "material"--that is, important to a consumer's decision to buy or
use the product

The CE companies artificial definition that a device with at least 720
progressively scanned lines is an "HDTV monitor" could be seen as
"misleading" in its own right, since it can't display all HD signals at
full resolution.

Likewise, a device with 1080 scan lines but only able to resolve 1280x1080
can be called an HDTV by the CE standards, but it is fairly deceptive to
the consumer, especially if they have to compare that device to one that
is 1280x720, and is able to display that geometry at full resolution. It
makes the difference much less than the expected 1920x1080 vs. 1280x720
that the 1080 scan lines implies.

--
Jeff Rife |
| http://www.nabs.net/Cartoons/CloseToHome/NamespacePollution.gif
.

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