[Cyberdog]

I wonder if another solution would be for channels broadcast a subchannel which has more frequent i-frames, but lowered resolution and framerate to compensate for it in terms of overall bandwidth. When you surf, the TV could first hit up the subchannel, get the low-rez i-frame, and start showing a lower-quality version of the channel's video feed much faster, then start working on fetching and decoding the "real," full-resolution video feed and switch it over when it's ready. It still wouldn't be as fast and perfect as it was for analog and it'd require some industry collaboration and a bit of new hardware, but it still should be a more pleasant experience for people who just want to quickly see what's on.