Beating the competition – HDNet vs InHD

In the world of HDTV, there are 4 channels that are exclusive to High Definition TV, HDNet and HDNet Movies, of which I, Todd Wagner and Phil Garvin are the proud owners, and InHD and InHD2. InHDs are owned by a consortium of the largest cable companies.

David vs Goliath. Well Goliath has been saying some not so nice things at seminars and to customers lately, so I thought I would avoid all the clutter and clucking and just throw up some fun facts. Neither of us is perfect, but I can assure you they are a little less perfect than HDNet and HDNet Movies .

One of the claims that they made was that InHD had more programming in HD than any other network. So I had someone on our staff start tracking their schedule starting Nov 29th through the Dec 26th (based on their published schedules). I knew they repeated programming far more often than we did, but I couldnt quantify it. I also didnt know how many hours of programming, original or otherwise that they showed every month. Now I know.

I have to say in going through the results, there were some very, very nostalgic moments. On their schedule was A Dogs Day in Manhattan , Over Arizona and A Day in the Dirt . All very nice programs. I know because they were all we could afford when HDNet first launched in Sept of 2001. Fortunately, even in our first months, we never replayed them as much as InHD does. A Dogs Day, was a dogs 12 days on InHD running 12 times combined on their 2 channels, including FIVE times in primetime ! Over Arizona was repeated 17 times, with 2 prime time plays with A Day in the Dirt rolling by 10 times. Instant HD Classics I guess.

But I digress. Seventeen is a lot of repeats, but its not the InHD champ. That title belongs to the animated film, Santa vs the Snowman. 21 Repeats. InHd has two shows they repeated more than 20 times in less than a month. There were 8 shows that repeated 15 or more times including the World Taco Eating Championships and Korean Sumo Wrestling. My favorite example of repeats however was the showing and reshowing of the Nov 19th University of San Francisco mens basketball game seven times.

How does that compare to HDNet and HDNet Movies combined ?

We didnt have a single program or movie that was repeated 15 or more times.

Thats not to say that we dont repeat some shows a lot. We do. We have 7 programs or movies that were shown 10 to 12times. We repeated our original show, Whats Kewl At Cedia, the most at 12 times. Never during primetime.

We repeat a new episode of HDNet World Report 10 times, with 2 primetime showings. Also repeated were our exclusive coverage of the Race of Champions in Paris, but other than its air date, non of the repeats were in primetime. On the HDNet Movies side, The movies we repeated 10 times were Diner and The Killing Fields.

A number that does give an indication as to the financial committment an HD network is willing to make is the number of different shows available on the network. Since HD is relatively new to the TV world, you have to make an effort to produce original programming or license HD compatible programming from others. HDNet NEVER does any upconverts at all. 100 percent of our programming was either shot with an HD camera or converted from a 35mm negative. Im going to give InHD the benefit of the doubt and assume theirs is as well. Lets see who works harder and invests more in HD programming.

All told in the period covered, across both networks, InHD and InHD2 broadcast 163 different programs, events or movies. Of those 163 different shows, 39, or just under 25 percent were repeated 10 or more times. More than half of their schedule was repeated 5 or more times.

In serious contrast, HDNet and HDNet Moviesbroadcast 540 different programs, events or movies. Those numbers are absolutely correct. We broadcast almostFOUR TIMES as many different shows asInHD and InHD2 combined. Of those 540 different programs, 172 were programs or events shot and produced by HDNet exclusively in 1080i HD for HDNet.

Im proud to say that HDNetshot , produced and broadcast more shows in thismonth period than InHD and InHD showed in total, combined on their networks !

Of course number of repeats and total showsdoesnt tell the whole story. Im not going to argue quality of programming, we have them handsdown in thatdepartment as well.But you can subscribe to HDNet and HDNet Movies to judge that for yourself !

What the numbers do show without question is our committment to great programming and customer satisfaction. HDNet has made the commitment to produce and license shows that our subscribers want to watch.

We realize that HD is a new experience for our viewers. That it is so compelling that viewers come back every day, excited to see more. They want to become addicted to HD !

We dont want them coming back to our channels excited to see what is onand always seeing the same 5 or 10 shows repeated day after day.We want them to be completely entertained each time they turn on HDNet or HDNet Movies and always coming back for more. Knowing that with our variety of great programming, they can always find something fun to watch.It makes for happy viewers, and happy cable and satellite partners !

I like the way we compare to our competition. Best of all, our committment to programming is growing by the day. HDNet Films premieres this coming year. We have new original programming that we will be announcing. More specials. More concerts. The best is yet to come, so stay tuned !