"In North America we've been using the NTSC TV standard since before my parents or I was born. The standard, while it has held up through the countless years from the days of black and white antenna programming to the current day colored satellite TV and digital cable programming. While most people in the world don't care about how good of quality their programming is, just as long as it's viewable, the aged NTSC standard needed replacing. It has been around for approximately 50 years, while still going strong; it is being replaced by the next evolutionary step; High Definition Television, or HDTV for short."