YSSMAN
Hate to break it to you, but shoveling money at companies isn't the right way to win a format war.
Pretty much every studio that supported blu-ray exclusively from the beginning stated the copy protection and extra disc space of blu-ray as their reason for doing so.
Warner left HD-DVD because blu-ray software outsold HD-DVD software considerably for 50+ straight weeks. Warner knew HD-DVD was going nowhere and becoming exlusive to them would create somehwhat of a stalemate, but joining the BDA exclusively would effectively end the format war.
When asked if they were paid off Warner has consistantly said "We wish."
And why should you acuse the BDA of shoveling money at companies when Toshiba has admitted buying out exlusive HD movie support from Paramount for $250,000,000?
YSSMAN
There were a lot of people in the tech industry who wanted HD-DVD to win because it was cheaper, easier to use, and far more applicable to technology that was already on the shelf. Furthermore, if you really think about it, the name "HD-DVD" should have been an instant win. People recognize the "HD" name and match that with HDTV, and obviously the "DVD" name with all of the movies that they've been buying for the last eight years.
Does it really matter what the prices are right now? So what if the cheapest 1080p blu-ray player is $100 more expensive then the cheapest 1080p HD-DVD player right now. The format is not even 2 years old. I remember DVD players being $300+ when they first were released, but now anything more expensive then Toshiba's 720p/1080i $200 players is too expensive? I don't think so
Also, Toshiba had to take losses to sell their players so cheap, and that's why very few (if any) manufactures besides them made HD-DVD players, because they couldn't compete with such low prices, they weren't willing to take the losses Toshiba was on every player.
YSSMAN
While your opinion that Sony pushing the format in the PS3 had an effect is partially true, it is an extremely small portion of why the format had eventually succeeded. The formats were essentially even in performance (I'm not going to debate the capacity thing, its not worth it right now), the application/use of HD-DVD was better to begin with, but the problem was that Warner had millions of dollars thrown at them and they chose a side. It wasn't about sales or performance of the format, it was about the instant payoff. They had been planning to go to HD-DVD exclusively with 20th Century Fox in toe, and if that would have happened, this war would have been far from over.
Which is exactly why they didn't. Warner has denied being paid off, and until they do I see no reason to believe they were
YSSMAN
While its nice to finally have a solution to the whole issue, and furthermore, have my choices be that much easier when I decide to buy a Hi-Def player, it by no means makes me any less mad at Sony and Toshiba.
You should be mad at Microsoft, without their backing of HD-DVD the format would have died a long time ago
YSSMAN
But the truth in all of this is that Microsoft is right: Its digital distribution that will win out in the end, and having them bleed-out Sony should have interesting effects a few years down the road. Let this NETFLIX deal go through on PSN and XBL or have more people aware of what they can do with the Apple TV Take 2, and I'd be willing to bet a lot of people give up buying DVDs altogether.
lol
Attack of the downloads
I have a netflix account and can watch movies instantly on my pc but I don't. It's just not that great, especially with a BB connection that only averages around 150kbs download. You get a nice low bit rate picture. Putting a blu-ray disc into your playstation and watching it on your HDTV, theres nothing like that
If downloads are going to win out then may I ask who here has bought and downloaded a movie? (Crickets chirp) That's right.
Microsoft and Apple are very delusional, they think because music downloads are such a success then movie downloads will be too, but thats making things too simple
The average song is 5 mbs
The average DVD is 8,500 mbs
The average BD is 30-50,000 mbs.
Downloadable music is popular because you don't have to buy the whole album anymore, you can pick and choose the hits.
That doesn't apply to movies.
Ipods are popular because they are tiny and are great for those on the go, but once again, that does not apply to movies. People prefer to sit down in a comfortable place to watch a movie on a TV, and the bigger the TV the better.
And who wants to store their movie collection on their PC, which will not only take up alot of your space, but your PC is always vulernable to viruses and corruptions, alot of things that can wipe out your collection. And expect rules with what you can do to your movies. They may say you can make only 1 copy per purchase, or you are only allowed to redownload the movie 2 times all sorts of rules
I could go on and on but the whole download thing is rediculous right now
Maybe in 2020 downloading movies may make up a fraction of movie sales, just maybe
