HDTV stands for high-definition television. With HDTV, you should be able to see such details as individual faces in crowds and blades of grass on a football stadium field, or so claim the companies that manufacture HDTVs and equipment. The caveat is, you must have a television that has HD capabilities, and the media you are viewing must be broadcast or recorded in HD format.
The technology has been around since 1993 and became readily available in the US in the late 1990’s, although HD-capable televisions were basically like all other TV sets at that time, since there was little HD content to watch. In the last five years, media companies have finally begun broadcasting HDTV and movies on a regular 
basis, especially as cable companies prepare for the final “switch” from analog to digital broadcasting that is being mandated by the governments of most Western counties, the US included. Now, consumers can finally make use of the HD functions on their older sets, while a major advertising drive has fueled new purchases of HD televisions.
There are several versions of HDTV out there right now. There is the free content, which is broadcast over the air (OTA). You would need an HDTV, obviously, but you would also need an HDTV tuner (also called a digital or ATSC tuner) in order to view OTA HDTV broadcasts. Even if your TV says “HDTV Ready,” that doesn’t mean it can receive OTA broadcasts, such as those put out by local TV affiliates. Federal law in the US stipulates that any TV manufactured after 2007 has to have a built-in tuner, but if you don’t have an HDTV tuner on your older set, you can buy an indoor HDTV antenna. The quality of OTA HDTV is often actually a lot better than that of other types of HDTV, and it does have the advantage of being free.
Another type of HDTV is via pay cable or satellite TV service. The cable or satellite TV company provides the tuner that allows you to receive their broadcasts, which are either transmitted via actual cable or received by a satellite dish. Often, the quality of the picture is worse than that of OTA HDTV, because the company only has a limited amount of bandwidth for transmission of their services. This limited bandwidth results in “soft” or blurry pictures and pixilation, especially on “less popular” channels in their lineup. The company will often shift the majority of the bandwidth to their “popular” (i.e., premium pay) channels.
Another HDTV option is streaming media, such as from Hulu and Netflix. They advertise free HDTV broadcasts of movies and programs, but you will find quickly that the free content is actually low quality, with a lot of softness, blurriness, and other visual problems. Like paid cable and satellite, they operate with limited bandwidth and also shift that bandwidth to their premium offerings—which are, of course, paid.
You would assume, given the obvious cost and quality benefits of OTA HDTV that it would be really popular, right? Wrong, actually. The Consumer Electronics Association recently conducted a poll that determined that the approximate percentage of US HDTV viewers who primarily watch OTA HDTV is 8%, and that this percentage is dropping. Why? Most likely because they don’t know about it. Also, most Americans now have cable or satellite service, and if they want free content they’ll stream from the internet, because they can use their computers or mobile devices to watch. TV sets are, after all expensive and cumbersome…you can’t simply walk around with them.
The CEA stated in the paper announcing their poll’s results that they believe that the bandwidth used by OTA HDTV should be auctioned off to the highest bidder. This could theoretically allow pay services to improve their quality if they get in on that opportunity. However, selling off the bandwidth would forever close the door on free OTA HDTV as it currently exists, because once it’s sold, it will always cost something.