HDTV has been broadcasting in some form in Buffalo for about 7 years, so I think stereo NTSC has been around a lot longer than 10 years. Heck, I have a 1986 Sony 13" television with stereo NTSC reception, for both cable and antenna. Sure, some stations were really, really slow to start broadcasting stereo (almost entirely due to budgets), but everything's been there, waiting.

After at least 7 years worth of practical experience in the industry, I would expect close to perfection from most broadcasting stations. And generally the problems I've seen this year have nothing to do with actual technology limitations or even bugs that haven't been worked out - but rather the specific choices made by the station.

For example, it's more work and costs more to set up an auto volume leveller versus NOT having one. However it should cost the same to configure one correctly, verus Global who insists on doing it incorrectly.

And I agree the biggest problem seems to be that stations just don't watch themselves, so no one ever notices that the rear channels are swapped with the center channel, or that the picture breaks up during flashback scenes on CSI (which took years for WIVB to nail down).

Cable companies aren't any better. I recall a few years ago it took Rogers over 6 months to correct a problem where they were only broadcasting CTV with left channel audio. And then the problem switched to two different stations for another month until they noticed. Of course, my reports of the problem fell on deaf ears... I recall one rep saying that "if it were that way, then all of Toronto would be like that"... well, so? :-)