When I was a preteen, I inherited on obsolete manual typewriter when my mother upgraded to a small portable electric. Later, I got an computer and was shocked to find the caps lock didn’t disengage when hitting the Shift key. The manufacturer choose to follow the IBM PC idiocy. Of course I would install a routine which would fix the problem, but over the years and newer computers, some place in a forgotten past, I gave up the fight. I had to be ready to use the computer at hand and a bad standard won.

There are two bad standards in North American television: interlacing and 29.97 frame rate. I was around when we were planning digital transmission, and was just buoyant for the one good change (square pixels in HD). Although Sony was challenging that refinement with 1440 non-square pixels for 1920, we one that battle.

Talking to a colleague, I determined the worst television guideline is the weird frame rate.

Now might be the time to change that. Not to 30 Frames per Second, but 72 progressive FPS (Frames Per Second); or 3 times the film’s rate of 24 FPS. Film projects each of the 24 frames twice.

The main problem interlacing and the slow frame is the lack of temporal resolution. This messes up rapid camera pans, and rapid motions. Some of the new action movies, make fight scenes look like dancing under a strobe light.

I would rather watch my favorite sport, NFL football, on 720p rather than 1080i, but 60 FPS isn’t there. I’m not a big gamer, but the 70 FPS is a noticeable improvement. So, let’s pick a world-wide standard, based on another world-wide gauge the frame rate of motion pictures.