The question is, are they smart enough to see that it's better to sell millions of copies for 50 cents rather than turn the buying public into their enemies. Your article about HDTV was very informative. Opinions seem to vary on whether it's any better. You seem to be a proponent of watching HDTV via your PC through add-in boards. Your column is informative.
Digital cable is infinitely better.
In my opinion, analog cable looks awful. It's generally full of noise and ghosts. Digital signals should take care of most of those problems, although I prefer digital satellite to digital cable myself. I use a combination of digital satellite for video and DSL for Internet access. Ideally, manufacturers should make a board to tune and decode the HDTV signals and send it to your computer monitor.