Both camps have an agenda (interlaced vs progressive) and I just so happen to side with the progressive camp.
Exactly the problem - it shouldn't be about an agenda. It's about giving people the right information. However, some people feel the need to justify their own purchases or whatever. 720p vs. 1080i for video geeks has become the new console war. I find both standards to be visually appealing on good equipment. Which is why I try make sure people know that, in practice, they are comparable. There are plenty of other factors in video quality that should be considered. I can imagine someone coming in thinking 720p is better than 1080i and looking for a cheap HDTV buying a crappy $700 LCD (most of the off-brand "budget" LCDs are pretty poor, especially for gaming - despite their progressive image) that will actually look worse than a CRT for that same money simply based on this information.
now tell me if I'm understanding this correctly progressive draws all lines every 1/60 of a second and interlaced does this 1/60 x2 to draw a full image, now if this holds true "p" in any format would be much more appropriate for gaming and fast action then "i" would at almost any given time to my self. if I'm wrong enlighten me please.
Again, its only that simple when you're talking the same resolution. When you're talking different resolutions - it becomes more of a gray area. Thanks to the way the eye works, you don't actively notice the interlacing. People have been watching 480i for years and until HD came around and people started reading about the different resolutions, I never heard anyone say "wow - look at the combing". Now, people are reading the theory and then making claims based on it, not on actually seeing the results. I'd be surprised if you put a Sony super-fine pitch television next to an Aquos LCD (both playing native resolutions) and show it to someone that they'd say it looks any worse.
We can get into details - yes, fast motion (mostly vertical, which is less common than horizontal) can reduce the "percieved" resolution. In practice, this varies based on the amount of motion at different points and is often less noticeable thanks to the fact that cameras and the eye itself have natural blur associated with this motion. Worst case scenario - and we're talking full vertical motion and not accounting for natural blur - estimates have been a percieved resolution around 60% of the total resolution. With little vertical motion, you'll be seeing close to 100% of the full resolution. In practice, it varies and with the way your eye can adjust to the motion in the first place, 1080i ends up being fairly comparable to 720p in motion. In still images, the extra resolution helps.
As for combing (horizontal motion) - it simply becomes less and less of an issue as resolution goes up, because any combing causes less distortion in the image because it is combing at a much finer level of detail. At 1440x1080, it doesn't affect the image much.
At the end of the day, the difference between the two standards becomes less of an issue and other factors would be better for making a buying decision, since resolution is not the only thing that affects picture quality (think contrast, black levels, dynamic range, hell even aesthetics for some people). As long as you get a decent quality set - at either resolution - you'll be happy.
I would make the jump to 480i only because that in itself is a large leap in basic visual quality, but I would prefer 480p over 480i any day of the week. I just think its a waste of time implementing interlaced formats such as 1080i, the world could live with out it and wait for the much more acceptable 1080p
I said earlier that, at the same resolution, progressive is always better than interlaced - so no argument there. My point is that at different resolutions - its not as easy to say that. Hence, its not as simply as 720p > 1080i, or vice versa. In reality, they both look comparable - though in certain specific situations, each one excels. The fact that you say 480i is a significant jump of 240p proves that the little "p" isn't the only thing that matters. That said, the fact that the lower-res, but progressive 720p can stand up to 1080i also proves that the number isn't the only thing that matters either. It's a combination.
As for waiting for the much more acceptable 1080p, its not a matter of waiting. The standards have pretty much already been set for HD. And, I've always believed that BOTH standards were cop-outs. I'd make the same argument as you for the other format - that they shouldn't have wasted time on a resolution that's only 50% higher than standard resolution. But, they needed a progressive standard and it was too expensive a few years ago to make a fixed pixel device with 1900x1080 pixels (same reason they went interlaced rather than progressive on CRT HDTVs - price). Only now that prices are finally coming down on some of the fixed pixel devices are we seeing 1080p - but the standards have already been committed. It would be extremely difficult to try make 1080p a standard when most of the equipment out there right now is not compatible at all. Which is why, going back to my original point, a 1080p device with a good motion-adaptive de-interlacer running a 1080i signal is the next best thing.
