RSSCES Countdown #12: Has streaming media already rendered discs obsolete?
By Tim Conneally | Published December 19, 2008, 5:19 PM
This just in, the format war is over. The 18-month honeymoon analysts had given Blu-ray has prematurely ended, and while sales have risen from nothing to something barely eclipsing okay, its successor may already be over the horizon.
In paleontology, there is a concept known as the Alvarez Hypothesis. This hypothesis originally suggested that a giant asteroid impacting the Earth's surface triggered the subsequent extinction of the dinosaurs.
Applying this hypothesis to consumer technology, it could be said that 2008 was the asteroid that will ultimately extinguish disc media.
Digital Entertainment Group data shows that DVD sales actually hit their peak in 2005, stagnated, and are now on the decline. As of November, independent tracking service Nielsen VideoScan reported a 9 percent overall drop in DVD sales, and an even greater drop (22%) in higher-priced, high definition titles.
Since Blu-ray became the unofficial successor to DVD, a number of analysts predicted that sales of the high definition media would eventually come to offset any declines in DVD sales. Parks Associates analysts went so far as to predict that Blu-ray player sales would actually surpass most other electronics items during the next four years as they gain traction in the developing world. Analyst Kurt Scherf predicted that unit sales would climb to around 40 million by 2012.
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| Since the dawn of 'Infinity' |
| Scott M. Fulton, III |
Easily the biggest announcement from CES last year wasn't even from a consumer electronics device company. It was from Comcast, whose CEO, Brian Roberts, dropped what seemed at the time to be a huge bombshell in a town that was otherwise occupied with measuring the biggest plasma display: Comcast would be rolling out a service capable of delivering thousands of titles to consumers through very-high-speed cable lines, all in crystal-clear high-definition, on-demand. |
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The intention was for the company to eventually be able to add 3,000 new HD titles to a perpetually available HD library, every month. Granted, the service is only available in limited regions of the country now, but where it is available, the selection is growing at a relatively exponential rate. Some 500 titles were available last May, growing to 1000 in September, and with the possibility of reaching a milestone goal to be announced at CES 2009. Quality of service has been debatable. Some customers are noticing that picture quality does appear to be compressed, in order to fit all that content through a narrow pipeline. While Roberts touted 100 Mbps connections within the company's reach by, at one point, as soon as 2010, that type of infrastructure expansion may take more than the company had originally planned for. Meanwhile, Infinity has company. Netflix' conversion to a full-time VoD supplier has gone full-tilt, with the addition of Roku's set-top box last May, and the addition of service avaialility through LG's and Samsung's Blu-ray players as well as through TiVo DVRs. While Comcast continues its expensive infrastructure upgrade, which is on the order of a major public works project, Netflix continues to make deals, implement new components of its network, and become a true contender against Comcast for the nation's VoD supplier of choice. |
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However, Neilsen's figures show that not only is Blu-ray not shouldering the weight, but it's buckling under the pressure. Despite the fact that Warner Bros' first BD-Live title The Dark Knight broke all previous Blu-ray sales records by moving 1.7 million units in December, it is still dwarfed next to the 11.8 million DVDs that same title sold.
In July, Netflix CFO Barry McCarthy said that less than 10% of Netflix subscribers have Blu-ray titles in their rental queues, suggesting that adoption was so low that it had little chance to have an appreciable effect on retail sales.
With Netflix and Blockbuster both vending their own on-demand video services that strip out the tremendous overhead associated with mailing, sorting, and maintaining an inventory of discs, it's no surprise Netflix should rebuke Blu-ray in such a way.
During the first Netflix earnings call of calendar year 2008, CEO Reed Hastings waxed prescient and gave DVDs five years to live, saying that he expected them to remain viable due to their affordability and ubiquity, but that streaming media is the way the world is heading.
Downloadable and streaming content has made tremendous leaps this year in availability and relative quality. Users can stream content to even the most humble netbook from one of the surplus of video syndication sites, or access their Slingbox content via Sling.com. High definition fans can hook up to Vudu, and receivestreams in 1080i that cost between 99ยข and $2.99; or can get Netflix on Demand high definition streams through their Xbox 360.
Even Sony, one of Blu-ray's highest profile supporters, has begun to offer streaming 720p content via its Bravia Internet Video Link. Meanwhile, the best-selling Blu-ray player today, Sony's PlayStation 3, is currently trending downward in sales.
The meteor has definitely hit. But the most interesting thing of all is that we've seen it coming the whole time. In an article from the Des Moines Business Record nine years ago entitled "Will DVD Players Replace VCRs?" author Jeanne Lightly said: "The surge in [DVD Player] sales suggests that the new technology is not only catching on where other consumer electronics innovations did not, but that it's also on track to overtake videotape in a few years as the home entertainment format of choice. Until, that is, it's supplanted by 'video on demand'-- the opportunity to retrieve any movie via cable, satellite or, ultimately, the Internet -- which is still some years off."
But the question remains, what is the value of Blu-ray as DVDs senesce, and streaming media comes into maturity?
Some numbers:
Roughly 25% of households have HDTVs. So the best case scenario for BD sales is 25%.
However, regular DVD's are still much cheaper (including bargain bin $5 DVDs) and more titles are available. Also add on that many people have held off buying a high-def player due to the format war and price.
Other detractors are that many people got HDTVs for High Def Cable/Satellite and/or using a game console (even many PS3 owners aren't buying BluRay discs).
So of course numbers for BD disc sales are currently low.
By the end of 2009 we will see a massive surge in High Definition as HDTV prices drop, BD disc prices drop, BD titles increase and I bet many people will see BluRay movies at a friends house and say "Wow!" There is evidence that a combo BD/DVD disc is coming but unless the pricing is there it won't be relevent. Let's see a combo disc for $20, $100 BD players and High-Def TV shows like "Smallville" and "Doctor Who" with the same price as normal DVD-Video but with the advantage of High-Def.
I don't want streaming video. I want to own the discs but watch them from an NFS through my HDTV via DLNA. I'm also concerned about compression of the original source when streaming. Having said that, I could see downloading a TV series but NOT having Cable.
I guess I might have to detract somewhat and say I can see myself using both but even as an advanced computer user I feel funny about hundreds or thousands of dollars of content being in a single box... and how do I loan that to my family?
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|After this christmas the blu-ray disc sales will be way up now that there has been all these special sales on players this season I seen them for as low as $129.
That high price on players is what was really keeping the BR discs from taking off, I have a 1080p tv I love my blu-ray player I also use netflx streaming and enjoy that but there is now comparison in quality it is better that vcr tapes but not by much no where as good as blu-ray and try to compare the sound would be a joke but they do both have there place.
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|No. Why?
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|Anyone remember Super VHS? (or S-VHS) It was higher resolution and better quality VHS and at one time was going to revolutionize home video. (This was LONG before the DVD option was even available.) It actually did have better picture quality and sound and for the most part delivered on its promise. The problem was people just didn't care that much.
I've seen DVD vs. BR and yeah, it's a nicer picture, but not nice enough for me to go out and buy a BR player. IMHO the problem is not the quality or usefulness of the tech, but the ability to make people care. 75% of computers sold today don't have discreet graphics, 80% of cars can't do 0-60 in under 10 seconds. Not everyone has to have the best, whether they can afford it or not.
Reducing this argument to picture quality and resolution and comparing it to the VHS-DVD transition I think glosses over some of the real benefits of DVDs that mattered to people at the time. Namely, easy scene-skipping, menu navigation, less bulky storage, 0-contact media leading to no friction degradation over time, no rewinding, possibility for DVD/CD players. There were a LOT of benefits to DVDs beyond picture quality that just aren't there to push people to BR. At least Streaming HD has convenience going for it. I know I won't buy a BR until I absolutely HAVE to, and I'm not arguing that up-sampling is just as good or whatever. I just don't care that much, and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.
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|"Reducing this argument to picture quality and resolution and comparing it to the VHS-DVD transition I think glosses over some of the real benefits of DVDs..."
And don't forget the general fragility of those old tapes. I lost over $250 of tapes one year because the shelving unit I stored them on was just a little too close to a patio door.
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|I agree. This makes me think of the Edsel. It was a great car, but nobody wanted it. I don't think the Blu-ray proponents understand a hefty part of their market... people who aren't eager to jump at new gadgets just because they're new. Their marketing strategy is aimed squarely at people who actually know and care what video resolution numbers mean. They are oblivious to the people who make most of the buying decisions in households across America and Europe.
I think many of us have invested money in a DVD player and don't see a major advantage in scrapping a player that works fine to buy a new player to play a new type of media that mostly works like what we have now. I already had to buy a new DVD player last winter to play newer DVDs that the MPAA has encrypted. I got movies for Christmas that wouldn't play on an older machine. I had to get rid of my three-year-old player, and it still worked. That really annoyed me. I'm definitely not ready to shell out more cash for a new player because the picture is better.
Telling me about the improved resolution rates leaves me feeling unimpressed. I'm content with the picture and sound as they are now, and I'm pretty sure I'd have to buy better speakers to actually hear the new sound quality enhancements if I did buy a Blu-ray player. So that's even more money to spend on something I don't think I want.
I'm more likely to spend extra cash on something I don't have at all. I'm far more interested in a DVR device right now and devices that can stream movies to my TV. Then I don't have to go to the store and buy a movie when I discover that I'm in the mood for a comedy. I can sit at home where it's warm and browse around until I find something interesting. I can click on it, pop some popcorn, and watch the movie. Now that's something I can get more excited about. :) It's also something I understand without any boring numbers and terminology.
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|"Has streaming media already rendered discs obsolete?"
No.
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|Well I don't really want to get too involved in this heated argument. But I think we're forgetting some important parts of the equation.
Although broadband is/has been spreading and many households have access to high speed net' - there's still a significant portion of people on dialup who don't have access to this stuff but DO have their DVD collections going. Granted, I don't personally know anyone who owns a BR player that's on dial-up, but that's another topic. I'm not talking about people lacking money either, there's still a big part of the population that hasn't necessarily adopted "the internet". They check email and play yahoo chess and that's about it. Also attached to this is the 'stigma' of a monthly bill....With the internet, we have a bill to pay per month, like a cell phone and whoever starts depending on streaming will always have that stigma as a part of the 'cost' of viewing their content. Finally, like VoIP - you need to net' to watch this stuff. This isn't the case with BR, you pay oand you own the disc with your content on it. So for eg. I may choose to watch 30 Rock and The Office on Hulu or my Roku player BUT I'm probably going to buy my Star Wars and Jurassic Park BR DVDs because I want to own them and I know I'll be watching them over, and over, and over, and God forbid there's a hurricane/natural disaster or I lose my internet for some reason - etc. etc. etc. (You get the idea).
Secondly, the higher the adoption for high speed internet, the more companies are going to [want] to or maybe even [need] to cap. Comcast has already started and it's only going to be some time before dsl and other cable/internet providers start capping. When that happens, we have no idea what effect that will have with our Hulu or Roku limits. I mean, we don't even know how they'll cap. Assuming they sense the dependence on their services, they could easily cap for money/greed - where they'll charge more per 10gb or something. OR, they could cap out of necessity, in order to limit people from really bogging up their networks. We just don't know what will happen.
So, my opinion is that we still have some waiting to do to really have any initial insight to what's going to happen. It's just too early to tell. If we were guaranteed that 1. we have unlimited downloading forever for today's prices and 2. everyone would embrace streaming and digital downloads then yes, I believe that BR would go the way of the VCR. But since neither of those are solid...I think that like me, people will strike a happy medium. They'll watch/catch up on their TV shows on services like hulu and netflix, and they'll still go out and buy the movies/tv they LOVE on BR. And I say BR because I believe that studios will finally adopt fitting BR discs with the regular DVD version AND BR in order to speed adoption along.
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|BR's licensing still specifically precludes hybrid players.
One wonders why Sony does not revise that and enable the hybridization of players to be compatible with standard DVDs and CDs...as well as including both formats on recorded media. But then, one still wonders why they have not been more active in reducing both player and media prices to more actively compete, as that is the single largest impediment to its adoption.
As far as providers capping bandwidth usage, many folks seem to think that providers have an unlimited amount of available bandwidth! This absurd notion is just that - utterly absurd. They are already poviding a multitude of services over their available finite bandwidth. Thus the notion that they can support the growth of existing services while simultaneously supporting the normalization of everyone downloading higher requirement bandwidth material is doomed to reach a hard limitation without either some radically new method of multiplexing signals or overbuilding their networks to provide additional capacity - be it by simply duplicating their existing technology or augmenting it with newer alternative delivery methodologies such as WiMax - realizing that this is still dependent upon the existing truck capacity.
In other words, the increased capacity has to come from somewhere. And in providing this, the customer is going to pay for it - most probabably by shorter term peak usage restrictions, and in the longer term by increased subscription prices to pay for the expansion of infrastructure.
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|Good point. I'd rather pay more to improve capacity over time than to stick with short-term band-aids just so I can get cheap service. It makes sense that we'll have to spend money, lots of money collectively, to make sure the entire country has consistent, reliable coverage. It also makes sense that those who use more bandwidth should pay more for it.
I would like to find a way to widen the coverage area for broadband so that it becomes an option for anyone who chooses to subscribe. Ideally, I'd like to see a time when geography isn't a barrier. From what I've read, the internet backbone is still outpacing broadband growth right now. That's a good thing, and it seems to be continuing to grow.
On the flip side, Comcast is a player in the streaming video game. They are actively encouraging it. So customers aren't just doing something crazy on their own. I think ISPs need to post their bandwidth caps and other limitations prominently and in plain language so that customers understand what is expected of them. I also think they need to be clear about the charges they require from people who go over the limit. This will help customers to make informed decisions and will foster a partnership between ISPs and their customers. Since Comcast is a proponent of streaming video technology, I think this issue has to be resolved in an amicable way. That includes solving the bandwidth debate.
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|It will be interesting to see as the providers have their own interest at heart first, rather than simply the widening of high speed access...but WiMax is the disruptive technology that currently best represents that possibility.
WiMax basically does to cell, what cell did to landline - with a greater range and throughput, at a lower cost, and with an open format.
But....we'll see how the various players choose to roll out and control their networks - and Verizon and AT&T have already opted to go the more proprietary closed route. Surprise, surprise.
Its nice to see Sprint and Clearwire going WiMax.
And its even nicer to see such upstarts as MetroPC trying to change the market paradigm!
But again...we'll see.
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|I agree with you on capping....and I pray that people know that bandwidth isn't unlimited. It would be completely illogical to even entertain the thought that throughput is infinite. HOWEVER - I don't understand why you'd raise speeds so considerably and then cap, it feels a little sneaky, no? I mean marketing is marketing. But if you know that you need to cap in order to prevent your network from slowing to a halt or curb potential or repeat offenders from hogging your data pathways then why would you then almost double your consistent speeds? It's like handing people the rope to hang themselves with. Granted, right now it's a reasonable cap, and I have no problem with the idea of capping BUT my issue is that if they're using these tactics now - what's to stop them from reducing that cap to something ridiculous (just for arguments sake, 5gb) in a world where we've all switched to digital downloads and streaming. And we're not just doing movies/tv we're doing music and radio, podcasts, etc. in addition to our daily chunk of surfing and gaming.
While the statistics may show that the prices of the devices and media are the issue, one has to wonder. I mean, personally....I'm speaking from my own opinion/thoughts here....I'm not too bothered by the prices. I've always said that once the BR player hits 150 or so that I'm game. I know where to shop, and I don't need to buy my DVDs brand new. So, if I wait even a week or 2, I can find many BR dvds for $10-15 used which is fine. My problem is that I can't use my laptop or my PC to play my BR discs....not without buying a BR player for them. This would be totally different if each disc contained content that could play on all of my devices. Yes, some have digital copies which may be played on your PC/Laptop but they are drm'ed and as far as I know, expire (I don't know - but can only hope and assume, that they can be 'renewed' somehow). So, in essence it'd be simpler to just ship the discs as DVD compat. I'd def. buy into BR then, and I bet so would many others.
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|http://www.prweb.com/rel...008/12/prweb1776184.htm
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|LOL!
"Across Europe as a whole, over 6.5 million units of software have been sold to date, with year on year growth up 320 per cent."
That's 6.5 million TOTAL cumulative sales to date.
Meanwhile, sales of the regular DVD release of ONLY Batman:The Dark Knight ALONE sold 11.8 million DVDs in December alone!
But wait! There's MORE! "In France, Blu-ray's share of the optical disc market is expected TO DOUBLE next year to 6 per cent*.
Let's see...if the market penetration of BR maintains its juggernaut rate of increase of 3% per year in France, it will only take an additional 15 years until BR sales simply EQUAL the market percentage of sales of regular DVDs! Hmmmm....
Yup, standard DVDs are dead.
Here, let us help you a bit.
When sales increase from 1 unit to 2 units, that is a 100% sales increase. When they increase from 0 to 3 sales, that is a 300% sales increase.
When sales increase from 10 million to 11 million, that is only an ~10% increase.
But you would have us believe that a 300% sales increase is necessarily better than a 10% sales increase? Hmmm. You are missing a larger part of the story, fanboy.
LOL!
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|ahhh!! what kind of idiots do we have posting here!!!??...
I love how you guys just make things up around here and try to convince people you even have a clue what you are talking about....
we have foxfyre spouting nonsense like he is some industry insider about how BD is doing so poorly yet sales are up...he fails...
he says you can't benefit from BD on a 720p or 1080i set...and again he is wrong and fails...
he says there isnt a difference between upscaled DVD and BD...again he fails...
he can't refute the fact that DVD took 7 years to overtake VHS so he brings up that blu-ray was hyped back in 2002 even though it was not on the market haha!....he fails again...
he got absolutely OWNED by speedmeister on the DVD price point, but he won't care...he will continue to spout his nonsense about BD pricepoints because its one of the only arguments he has..
he also obviously has no experience with BD if he thinks one can't notice the difference between upscaled DVd and BD on a 720p set...he obviously doesn't know that upscaling is not real HD...and is only taking a calculated guess at what information should be displayed on the screen....
so nobody needs to replace their 720p sets with 1080p ones....BD plays just fine on those, and looks tons better than upscaled DVD...because simply put 1280x720 is still a heck of a lot better than upscaled 720x480 ANY day of the week...period...i won't bother to talk about audio...he wouldn't understand it anyway....
and yountmj...im just gonna copy your whole post for its hilarity...
"And to add to that, the legacy titles that are available are not that impressive to begin with. Studios can remaster their back catalogs all they want, but if the source was not filmed digitally in HD originally, the end result is usually dramatically less than stellar over what the same upscaled DVD releases offer."
you poor poor people who might look to this person who has ANY idea about what it going on...
you do realize that those old back catalog films were filmed on something called FILM right?...and you do realize that FILM has an MUCH higher resolution than 1080p right?...yeah even back to the Gone With the Wind days and earlier...all those studio masters are higher resolution than 1080p...so therefore it doesn't matter if the master was shot digitally or not...because film is actually a higher resolution...so there is NO problem with scanning old studio masters to 1080p for BD...but im sure you knew all of that already right??...
how can anyone take these people (foxfyre, yountmj im looking at you guys) seriously??? they have shown time and time again that they have NO facts to back their arguments...
they just spout nonsense and try to pass it off as fact...
they, along with the "editors" at BetaNews still can't accept the fact that BD beat out HD-DVD...they can't stomach the fact that a Sony backed product is gaining momentum while everyday they swore for an entire year that BD was already dead and HD-DVD had won...
they continually show a total lack of knowledge about home theater tech in general...lets see everything they have been wrong about...
BD equipment launched at too high a price...debunked by just looking up the launch prices of DVD hardware and movies...
HD-DVD would win because it was cheaper...failed...
BD would be dead in a year....failed...
BD sales suck...failed...BD sales are WAY up this year...
old BD players will not play profile 1.1 and 2.0 discs....wrong again...
we could keep going...but it will do no good...they won't admit defeat...they will keep on trucking with their same old lame reasons why BD will fail even though they will continually be proven wrong on ALL of their points...
i know the response will be "sony fan boy, too blind to see that DVD owns all!" blah blah blah...these guys are pure entertainment for me...and BetaNews...keep cranking out these "Blu-ray is Dead" articles...maybe if you write enough of them...you might have an impact on something...blahahaha!
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|Wow, nerd rage.
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|If we placed a mop, a broom, and a vagina in front of him, I bet he couldn't point out the vagina.
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|Again, the cost-to-benefit ratio for everyone (and not a small minority) is completely lost on you.
I suppose you would have everyone go out and purchase a new vehicle for no other reason than it simply looks better than their old one... even though their old one may only be 2 or 3 years old.
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|haha, there you go making baseless comparisons that have nothing to do with the actual discussion
im blown away by how factually based your argument is
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|DH, debate anything you like, but its hilarious how you counter with blantant lies.
NO ONE said you can't tell a difference between upscaled DVDs and BR.
NO ONE said that there is no benefit to watching BR on 1080i or 720p.
What we did say was that between the tradeoffs and the differences, that they were not sufficiently COMPELLING!!!!!
Watching underscanned video on a 1080i or 720p set is NOT compelling.
And the small incremental difference between upscaled DVDs and BR is NOT as compelling as that between VHS and DVD - a difference that you utter fail to understand! A distinction which makes your citing the different adoption rates all the more interesting.
But you succeed admirably in providing a case study illustrating quite nicely what kinds of idiots post here!
But then, you are unable to distinguish between net sales and the rate of change in market percentage - which was revised DOWNWARD by the industry! Oh.... you mean there's a difference?
And because someone is now FINALLY selling a lossleader discounted BR player while Sony continues to introduce $900 player ONLY units, you seem to think that the market has suddenly rushed to buy them. All while the INDUSTRY revises market sales percentage projections DOWNWARD.
You are absolutely correct. I don't care. And neither does the VAST majority of the market! As BR simply fails to present an overwhelmingly compelling reason to abandon standard upscaled DVDs.
And no, not even the forced migration to digital convinced the majority to get a 1080p set! That alone should tell you that most have decided that they don't consider 1080p necessary. Or are they simply stupid too?
But that doesn't deter you as you just plow ahead claiming we will all be possessed by the pod people and will suddenly and uncontrollably rush out to buy $25 a pop movies made by Will Ferrel and Adam Sandler - while the vast majority of legacy and classic titles REMAIN UNAVAILABLE on BR.
Its amazing to listen to the fanboy make all sorts of unsubstantiated claims regarding sales and market percentages that simply aren't there. But WalMart has an entire 6 feet dedicated to $25 a pop BR Adam Sandler and Will Ferrel titles! WOW!
You're right I have no experience with BR. Really... Unfortunately I have, and the differences are not compelling. Neither to watch Will and Adam, nor talking cars. And while you claim there is much more to be seen in the classic movies, titles such as film noir and those in black and white don't need it, nor do they desire it. They had the options then and intentionally did not chose it! But being the film historian you are, you haven't a clue as to why B&W was intentionally chosen! But thanks Ted turner!
The differences between videotapes and DVD were compelling both interms of quality, convenience and price. The differences between BR and upscaled DVDs - Nope. And the market concurs.
But keep telling us how we really prefer BR and that we will rush out and buy them despite our not caring about the differences.
But its always fun to watch a fanboy project his fanatacism onto others. And you do it in spades.
Some of us prefer to look at market realities rather than to proselytize based upon belief and wishes.
And just who claimed that the profile 2 players wouldn't play earlier BR editions? But it is funny to see the profile 2 players - you know, the version that was SUPPOSED to actually be the very first version to market - but which Sony failed to do - FINALLY begin to be sold this fall. Yup, just another missed release target. But he will counter that all those with an earlier release player dont't really need the added capabilities, while out of the other side of his mouth he will tout the added capabilities.
And BR ausio capabilities? WTFcares about video sound just to listen to explosions and to sit and critically evaluate how realistic the sound of a star exploding is. Or of the fundamental problem that video soundtracks are intentionally mixed, not for true surround, but to PREVENT people from turning their primary focus from the FRONT screen. Oh. Care to cite YOUR experience in an audio mixing facility. Some of DO have substantial audio experience in a multitude of roles.
Again, DVD sufferes from the same shortcomings, but the sound is already good enough to listen primarily to vocals and special effects - and talking cgi cars. Much less demanding than for high quality audio recordings. But then you seem to think MP3s constitute hi quality audio as well! LOL!
So, you have made all sorts of claims. The only ones you haven't convinced, aside from many here on the forum are those who continue to buy DVDs at a 10:1 margin over BR titles - and that includes all of the HD-DVD folks who simply need HD as well who are buying BR titles.
10:1. Yup, BR is taking over. So exactly when are standard DVDs ceasing production? But it must be a fascinating existence to live in front of a game console and to tell others that the facts of the market figures are simply anomalies and that BR is taking over.
So, please tell us why the industry projections were DECREASED instead of increased? Hmmmmmm? I would love to hear you explain that which you find more convenient to simply ignore.
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|Yup, just as you cogently explained the industry revised downward rates of growth for BR.
Oh wait, even the PS3 sales are trending downward as well! It must be because the market is saturated and everyone already has 2 units at home! LOL!
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|Oh, and as far as film having unlimited resolution where you evidently think transfering is a simple matter, you have a bit of learning to do. Analog film sources, expecially the vintage films have a few other issues that do not lend themself to simply hitting play and transferring it.... There is, among other issues, and small issue known as noise. And the S/N ration is not as great as with newer technologies, nor with the newer digital techniques using film.
Celluloid film negatives deteriorate over time, and some digital discs are pulled from degraded film stock. Additionally, in the past, studios would often make many duplicates right off the original negatives, damaging the master with each copy. When these prints are transferred to digital, no number of pixels can make them look as sharp as they should.
As of now, BR is primarily only releasing NEW titles. And what legacy titles are being released are from large studios who have a history of preserving the original film stock. So they are able to cherry pick the releases.
Thus the burden is being born primarily by regular DVD production houses. Still, not all Blu-ray discs look good, including some new releases. An example, per Premiere.com: The Blu-ray disc of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford has overly enhanced edges that give the picture an unnecessary halo effect. Another is the grainy quality of Close Encounters of a Third Kind.
Not to mention the small problem with the old acidic nitrite film stock... But you are familiar with FILM, right? No problem scanning vintage films huh?
Oh wait...do you mean that there is a bit more to this than simply horizontal resolution and scan rates and hooking up a few interconnect cables and pressing play and record?!?
But all you can think of are current movies recorded on current film stock.
Tell you what, for just ONE or TWO examples of the only imagined problems, investigate the various digital releases of John Wayne's film entitled McLintock, as well as the obscure title called The African Queen.
Report back to us regarding your findings! It will be interesting if you have the cahones to provide a complete and accurate accounting. It should be easy for you - after all, you know ALL about FILM...right?
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|Nope. Many simply don't have access to the bandwidth necessary to handle streaming HD. The ISPs aren't exactly eager to actually serve up that much either since they bank on people using only a tiny portion of what is offered.
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|I agree that streaming media is getting more and more momentum and taking some of the market of fixed media formats. Right now we can already get 1080p streaming. And the fact is not all people care about the extras that come on DVD's or BD's . But truth also is that there is a market that does care about premium quality. That has listened to lossless DTS Master Audio or Dolby TrueHD. That does care for a finer image quality that is non existent in 1080p HD streaming. And that simply loves to see all the extras. This is the market of people that actually go out and BUY movies. As blu ray players become the norm there's no reason for people to continue buying DVD discs. And those 11.8 million sales that went to Dark Knight DVD version will simply move to the BD format. It is just a question of time. What we do can be sure is that there is no need for another fixed format for quite some time.
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|I would agree.
I find it strange that a few fanboys persist in the fantasy that all will run to adopt a one size fits all monolithic model where all of the usage patterns and needs and desires are identical.
There will continue to be a variety of needs and desires. And among this diverse model will be an increasing availability of a streaming online distribution option.
Will everyone suddenly demand hard copy BR media as long as its priced significantly higher than standard DVDs? No. Will all demand hard copy media? No. Will all demand volatile pay per view streaming media delivery. No. Will there be a variety of appropriate options given the variety of needs and uses? Yes.
But within this product/delivery mix, the percentage of each market will s*** as technology advances. And no one should be surprised at this.
But will everything coalesce to one single format or delivery method in the near term?
Hardly.
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|Streaming media is fine and has its place and use. But there is simply no way on earth it will compete with BluRay. Now that most larger LCD's are sold with 1080p, it would be a joke for those people to give up BluRay which supports 1080p and over 40mb/s bandwidth, and go with streaming video. So called HD streaming media is a joke. Why would people buy a 1080p set and settle for 720p or 1080i???
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|"Why would people buy a 1080p set and settle for 720p or 1080i???"
For the same reason as why the MAJORITY of HD sets sold (due primarily to the forced march to digital - not because anyone necessarily really wanted one) that only support 1080i and 720p would not need BR.
BR will remain, at best, a niche until players and consumable prices equal those of traditional DVDs.
But that 6 foot wide shelf at WalMart - the largest BR retail outlet, sure is a wasteland of worthwhile titles to buy! In fact, the vast majority of those insipid titles are best streamed as they are not worth archiving, let alone viewing the first time.
But if you like Adam Sandler or Will Ferrel and are enamored with 6 year old far jokes, you are in luck. Ugh!
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|Great run down, but you failed to mention any stats that show the adoption of any of the downloads services.
Of course the reason for this is obvious, it's because there are no signs of success.
The sad fact is the technology most poised to eat discs' lunch is your cable co's VOD. And since everyone hates their provider, this isn't going to get headlines anytime soon.
And let me get this straight, the last standalone VHS deck was just discontinued, which over 20 years after its introduction, and DVD is going to be dead in 5 years -- VHS combos are still available. Interesting prediction.
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|Consumer VCRS were introduced in the 70's. ;-)
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|Unique viewers on sites that stream professional content, Oct. 2008 (Source: Nielsen Online, VideoCensus)
Fox Interactive Media---- 18,481,000
Hulu ---- 9,069,000
Nickelodeon Kids and Family Network ---- 6,565,000
NBC Universal --- 9,649,000
ESPN---- 7,775,000
CNN Digital Network---- 8,263,000
MTV Networks Music ---- 4,417,000
Overall online video usage (U.S. only) October 2008
Unique Viewers--- 120,711,000
Total Streams--- 8,894,164,000
Streams per viewer --- 73.7
Minutes per viewer--- 171.7
(I've got inquiries pending about the more direct competitors...AppleTV/iTunes, Vudu, Netflix, Unbox, Blockbuster, PlayStation Network)
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|Ah, stats! Love stats. Thanks.
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|here goes BetaNews again....sales are WAY up for BD and you still can't stomach the fact that HD-DVD lost out can you???
DVD didn't take off until the launch of the PS2 nearly 3 years after the format was introduced...
DVD didn't surpass VHS for nearly 7 years after it was introduced....
DVD didn't have its first HUGE seller until 1999 (The Matrix), 2 years after introduction, and BD gets its first monster seller this year with The Dark Knight about 2 years after introduction....
BD is doing more than fine...it is perfectly on track....
now to the rest...digital distribution makes me laugh...yeah its the future...i know that 100% and when its ready ill jump on board...but its not, and wont be for years...
the biggest problem? it can't match the quality of Blu-ray...PERIOD...there is NO source other than BD or HD-DVD that can offer high bit rate 1080p video with HD or uncompressed 7.1 channel audio...period...its just not there and won't be for some time...
the cable/com companies want nothing to do with increasing their bandwidths...heck they are even capping people!!! i'd love to see how long it takes the average betanews user to actually DL 50GB worth of BD quality material from the net...and then have them tell me its a worth while delivery system right now...HAHAHA...
laughing at BetaNews and all the people still trying to un-bunch their panties since Warner went Blu-ray exclusive...
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|"BD is doing more than fine...it is perfectly on track...."
And BR sales are "way up" ...
Nonsense.
...That must be why even the industry fanboys are even readjusting their BR sales projections downward...
And "DVD didn't surpass VHS for nearly 7 years after it was introduced...."
DVD was a major format transition! BR from DVD is NOT. It is simply a version change requiring an upgraded player!
And while you can keep telling yourself the the resolution is higher...SO WHAT! That is like saying everyone is dumping their 1080i or 720p TVs to run out and buy a 1080p TV! Nope!
The difference compared to an upscaled DVD is simply not compelling to watch freaking Adam Sandler title! And if we want a legacy or classic movie title- of which there are a million BETTER titles available, BR DOESN'T deliver!
And like I need 1080p to watch some quirky CGI title with talking cars.
As the market data shows, standard DVDs are STILL creaming BR. BR's cost of entry and cost of consumables is still far too high, and the quality difference is simply not compelling compared to that which DVD offered both in terms of video quality but more importantly, in AUDIO quality - which is what REALLY defines the HT experience.
But you keep telling yourself BR is going to take over any minute just as you are anticipating Linux to dominate the desktop!
And cable companies 'don't want to increase their bandwidth'? Huh? Do you have a clue? Their problem is that they are bandwidth constrained! Cable and fiber can only carry so much data! They are limited by the medium to how much bandwidth they have to allocate to the various channels and services!!! They are capping people because they have to make all of their services fit in the same transport medium! That is why they can't give everyone unlimited bandwidth, you nitwit! It has nothing to do with greed or desire! There is only so much bandwidth in which to fit all of their services!
NEWSFLASH! There is more to understanding the technology than simply having bought a PS3 console!
Next time you want to talk about fanboys with their panties in a bunch, get a clue regarding the technologies you are talking about.
And considering that the BR hype began in 2002 with Sony's announcement, its getting pretty close to the 7 year mark where DVD surpassed VHS - a radically different transport model - and your BR isn't coming close. In fact, its market percentage rate of growth isn't even growing, its SLOWING! At it wishes it had 10% market share!
So you keep laughing. You will need that capability as you watch BR whither as DVDs continue to dominate the hardcopy realm and streaming to eat away at the HD niche.
But by all means, enjoy your Adam Sandler titles.
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|20 mbit up/down, and I've yet to see any steaming service that didn't choke eventually.
That said, I never buy physical media anymore. Digital distribution is where it's at.
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|30 down / 15 up, VUDU works flawlessly, high def and standard.
It, at least *is* ready for prime time.
Then again, I'm on fiber, not cable.
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|Haven't bought a DVD in ages. I've had netflix for quite some time and since they started their streaming, I've rented a lot fewer.
In the last several months, I've had 3 delivered...and watched countless through streaming.
it's just easier. Plain and simple. Would my Mom do it? Probably not.
Discs won't totally go away (like the album hasn't gone away), but once the 20-40 year old crowd replaces the 50-60 year old crowd, they will be on their way to the same niche as albums are now.
Just my opinion...
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|I have Netflix as well and have used the streaming feature. I can't say that its dramatically cut back on the number of DVDs I have rented though. For one thing not everything I am interested in available to stream. Even the videos that are available don't always stick around for very long.
I definitely prefer the convenience of being to watch videos via the instant watch feature but until Netflix or some other company can secure rights to a much larger catalog its hard to see myself watching the majority of my movies via Internet streaming.
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|BR is not going to take over unless there is a radical change in price rendering the price of players and media to become equivalent to existing DVDs, and IF the catalog of legacy and classic titles is RADICALLY increased.
But as far as streaming versus hardcopy.
Everyone can tout the advent of viable streaming capabilities, but this will only substantially appeal to the tween and 20's market - just as MP3s have demonstrated. There is still a SUBSTANTIAL market that, for a variety of logistical as well as simply preference will demand hard copy or simply forgo the market entirely.
And while the distriutors would like nothing less thant to move to a virtualized streaming delivery system as it reduces their costs SUBSTANTIALLY, they will do so exclusively at their peril - that of risking a significant loss of the precise portion of the marketplace with the largest expendible income.
Hard copies aren't dead yet.
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|I agree with you 100%.
Has streaming media already rendered discs obsolete?
For me, not a chance. Though streaming and downloaded content is quite convenient, I'm quite fond of my material possessions.
For me, it's the same as replacing a well-populated bookcase in my home with hundreds of megabytes worth of e-books. It's just not the same, and simply doesn't compare.
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|Blu-Ray will catch on although it probably won't last as long the DVD format will. I have seen Blu-Ray players on sale for as little for less than $130. I would expect to see the entry level price point for Blu-Ray players drop below $100 early next year since we are starting to see more third part manufacturers getting into the market.
I would think that the distributors wouldn't be looking forward to a streaming system since many of the distributors could get cut out of the process entirely.
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|"For me, it's the same as replacing a well-populated bookcase in my home with hundreds of megabytes worth of e-books. It's just not the same, and simply doesn't compare."
So always available doesn't compare to taking up many SQ. feet of space? If only we could still be hearing the clomp clomp clomp of the horses now as they take us to the grand ball at the Count's Palace! So much fun!
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|"So always available doesn't compare to taking up many SQ. feet of space?"
No... that is, of course, assuming that the streamed on-demand content is indeed "always available". Taking into consideration all the factors that could interrupt that service, it may not be available always.
My bookcases and DVD/Laserdisc shelves are always a short walk across the room. To me, that is "always available". They also function as more than just simple decoration and as an excuse to put something against a bare wall. They add to the atmosphere of the room and serve to better reflect its intended purpose.
People still ride horses, by the way... even though "better" modes of transportation exist. For those, it's more about the journey than the destination. Some people (myself included) can in fact acknowledge and encourage progress and also choose to hold on to some aspects of the past. Just because something better comes along does not automatically mean that what preceded it is no longer viable and relevant.
Although there can be some common ground and compromise, one person's idea of what's "better" is not always everyone's. There can be a majority opinion of what's better also... but as far as I've seen, that majority has not decided that streaming on-demand content is better (yet). It's simply an alternative that more and more people are starting to take advantage of in addition to physical media, regardless of your personal decision to never buy discs again.
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|You're missing the point!
Regional distributors will be largely put out of business! They are NOT the major publishing houses! They constitute a major independent service industry distribution management 'layer' that services the major publishing firms. They are an expense to the major labels - not a profit center!
Its NOT the regional distributors who want online distribution, but the major publishing houses who want to flatten their distribution networks, remove additional supply chain distribution costs as well as simply avoid the exorbitant expense of physically shipping and maintaining/storing hard copy inventories - plus the cost of returing said material via cut out and end of life cycle processing!
The major publishing companies would LOVE to simply virtualize everything and make a one shot downloadable transaction and be done with it. They earn the same income without the multiple layers of distribution and management costs. Thus their profit increases.
BR will remain, at best, a niche player unless the cost of players AND CONSUMABLES become commensurate with DVD costs - and I don't mean simply new titles. Additionally, it won't matter until the library of available legacy titles is available on BR. I don't care how many new mediocre Adam Sandler and CGI talking car titles they introduce. I and many folks don't buy them now, regardless of format.
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|I remember when computers started becoming commonplace and everyone started getting one that people made predictions that books and paper would disappear since it could all be stored on disks. That never happened. I don't see dvd's or bd's disappearing either. Keep predicting it...doesn't matter really.
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|;-))))))
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|What?!?!?!?!?
You don't work in a paperless office?
;-)
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|I don't think I missed your point in regards to the distributors. I agree that publishers want to eliminate the distributors from the process. I am not too sure how you thought otherwise from my comments.
The media is still more expensive but difference is generally about $5-10 per disc. The lack of older titles was also true 10 years ago about DVD but that didn't seem to prevent its adoption. Most of the first titles tend to be newer titles that appeal to younger audience because those people are more likely to be early adopters. As the market for Blu-Ray grows you will start seeing the studios remastering more of the older titles for Blu-Ray. That's going to take years since the process of remastering an older title can be expensive and they aren't going to bother with it if they don't think there is the market for it. You noted this yourself in another post that there are still some older titles that aren't even available on DVD. It shouldn't be surprising that it would also take years for a large selection of classic titles to be available for Blu-Ray as well.
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|The delay in converting older titles is more fundamental - as many of the original master are deteriorating and many are simply being lost. These titles literally can't wait another 10 years! And the market for BR WON'T wait 10 years.
And the title I was referring to was the obscure(sic) The African Queen with Bogart and Hepburn (sad that I have to explain that for some out there like DH who will have no clue as to what or who it is!)
The fact is, Sony is not reducing licensing costs in order to get more low cost players out there (as you think they would - and make it up on disks!) If that were the case, they would have done this long ago instead of introducing $900 player ONLY models this fall!
And price differentials for media are not $5-10! They are more like $10-$15 - with the ONLY exceptions being the titles immediately released which quickly drop for regular DVDs, but which remain inflated far longer for BR and which fail to drop much below $20 - while these same titles quickly approach the $5-$10 range. Just take a gander at the expansive racks at WalMart for verification of this FACT.
Price is a critical market determinant. And BR will remain a niche product as long as their costs are not equivalent to the commodity DVD players and consumables that are readily available and already have a substantial base who are not looking to spend more to replace perfectly satisfactory systems with quality with which they are quite satisfied.
In other words, there is no compelling reason to change something that works just fine and is already commodity priced with superior product availability and compatibility.
My issue initially was in the distinction between distributors and publishers - as I was not sure of the degree of difference you were ascribing to the two...sorry if there was confusion there.
...As there is a significant difference, as one simple needs product distributed as efficiently as possible and at the lowest possible cost, while the distributors are the supply chain for hard copy goods and constitute those costs the publishers would love to eliminate. ;-) And it is this precise differnce that is driving the publishers to develop the online distribution model to replace the hard copy rental market - potentially even to displace online middleman distributors such as NetFlix.
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|You know what else? What puzzles me the most is the fact that films have been shot digitally for quite some time now, making transfers to DVD and HD DVD / Blu-ray much faster and far easier than ever before. Yet, the prices for the releases have either stayed the same or gone up. There's simply no good reason for it. But, as you mentioned, at least the prices for new DVD releases don't stay there for long.
By the way, I had to check my list of Laserdiscs earlier. When you mentioned The African Queen, I thought I may actually have that one (I haven't purchased all of mine through the years... some were gifts). Sadly, I do not have that one. It fetches quite a pretty penny on some collector sites.
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|The issue with converting older films to digital is independent of the decision of whether or not to adopt Blu-Ray. This problem would have been problem with or without Blu-Ray. The very early films(before the 30s) are already badly deteriorated and generally have few copies to work off of. Some of the more recent films have either been lost or badly damaged due to poor storage techniques.
I am not too sure you could call any film with Bogart and Hepburn from the 1950s obscure. Both had done a number of well known films by 1951. I don't think it's one of their better known films but I have actually heard of the film prior to your referring to it here since I remember that my parents watched it on VHS ~10 years ago.
I won't disagree that price is a factor in people's purchases but as time has gone on that has became less and less of an issue. Sony, Samsung, and Panasonic have all released players with MSRPs below $300 and resellers regularly sell those models in the $200-250. We have seen sales of some of the cheaper Blu-Ray players well below the $200 price point this holiday season. As the market becomes more competitive we will no doubt see the price come down in the next year.
I am sure the publishers would love to flatten out the supply chain and use the savings to pad their pockets. Whether they can make that process simple enough so that end consumers can easily find the products that they want remains to be seen.
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|You are not familiar, nay INTIMATE, with The African Queen??? And its not one of their "better known" titles?
Heaven forbid I didn't mention the Marx Brothers, or Grant-Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby or Holiday, Errol Flynn's The Adventures of Robin Hood, Captain Blood or SeaHawk, or the Thin Man series, or....well, if I have to point any of them or thousands of other titles out, I think the problem is already in evidence!
Oh gee...and while they are not my favorite performers, I guess we need to explain who Elvis and the Beatles are if we are discussing legacy music titles. ;-)))
Obscure!? Hell, I couldn't have used more understatement if I had TRIED!
The fact is FEW legacy titles are available on BR!
BR is a niche product for many reasons, ranging from price of entry (and sorry, $300 for a player is absurd!) to price of consumables, to compatibility to LIMITED availability of titles.
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|Disks will be around for a while. With ISP's capping downloads and some people not being able to get high speed at all disks will be around for a long long time. Plus the fact Blu-Ray has better video and audio quality then any download I've seen.
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|I think it will and here is why. People love instant gratification. Digital cameras and digital downloading of music for instance. People want that instant gratification where they can take a picture and send it in seconds, where they can download a song and listen to it right away. The same is going to happen with on demand. People won't have to get off their butts to go rent a movie, or they won't have to wait until netflix sends them their movie (plus they won't have to get up and mail the envelope and worry about sending back movies).
Even companies that make blu-ray players are starting to make them with on-demand built in just in case blu-ray flops. You have on-demand set-top boxes, and the Xbox 360 has Netflix viewing built in, before long I'm willing to bet Sony will have some kind of on-demand movie viewing on the PS3, and I wouldn't doubt if the Wii 2 has some kind of movie streaming as well. We have streaming on our cell phones, people stream tv shows and movies off their computers. Its the wave of the future and it'll get faster adopted as more media gets put on for people to view. When netflix goes from 15,000 movies to 100,000+ movies you'll see a huge jump. Now the nay sayers are saying "well its going to take a while before we see 15,000 to 100,000+". Well as hard drive storage gets cheaper and bigger, and also as broadband gets cheaper (the lower end 3-6Mbs, as more companies make 10-20Mbs speeds) we'll see more movies and more people adopt the idea.
Also pricing, someone said they'd rather pay $2 for on demand than $5 to have to go to get a physical movie. This is the way most people are also going to think. I'll be cheaper and right here right now instead of waiting.
I movies will go their first then TV will start making its way that way. Instead of watching CSI on thursday at 9pm on CBS you'll just go to CBS on demand on your TV and all the episodes for that season will be streamable. Episodes will come out on a specific day...say thursday...but you won't have to wait until 9pm to watch it. This may take another 10 year or so because TV studios will have to make another change and I'll be slow also because cable and satellite TV providers will also have to adopt the change. I'll happen though.
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|"People love instant gratification."
Yeah, the tweens and 20 year olds absolutely do.
The rest value tangible non-volatile hard copies that persist and maintain value. That isn't going away anytime soon, despite the advent of the availability of widespread 'pay per view' volatile sourcing.
Streaming will definately have a market. But there will remain a market for hard copy archival source as well.
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|I agree to a point but not to the extent I think you're going at. My father for instance use to buy movies like crazy, he has over 500 movies but since on-demand (which is free with Uverse if you have the pay channels...but they still have pay rental early movies too) he hasn't bought a movie. He just picks a movie from the list and watches it. I think most people will be like that, plus as more and more stuff gets put on on-demand servers people won't have to buy a movie. Movies of DVD's and such will be worth less over time because you'll just be able to watch them at home by on-demand.
Look at news papers. Not as many people buy news papers because you can read the news on the internet. As e-book readers get less expensive and better people will buy them and download books instead of buying them. You'll still have your collectors, but collector generally don't touch the stuff they collect. Look at comic book collectors, most of them buy the comic books to read and another copy that they leave in plastic. If those were on e-book readers then the person can buy a clean copy and read the other on an e-book. I see how movies on film and tape being collectible because they deteriorate even collectible, but as things become digital I think DVD and blu-ray movies will be of less worth. Only die hard collectors will collect physical copies of movies and books while most of the population will download them.
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|Even if the service were available 24/7 and every title in the universe were available.
I am not going to pay for EVERY viewing of a title over my lifetime, when I can buy once and watch whenever I want, INSTANTLY.
And I can copy it - regardless of what the RIAA or MPAA says and move it to any format of my choosing for MY convenience. AND its non-volatile!
My cost is less in the long run and my convenience is significantly greater than whatever is available online.
And newspapers? I don't buy disposable crap - just like I don't watch disposable crap (OK, I try not to...) - which is exactly what online streaming provides! The current product mix available for distribution has at most one or two titles I would watch! And NO legacy titles of repute. I buy material that has lasting value and that is worth watching many times, not just once and wondering why in hell I wasted 1.5 hours at that!
You don't have to be a "die hard collector" to want a copy of a movie or music that has persistent value. Just as you don;t have to be a die hard collector to have a persistent thing called a "book".
And I should be constrained by what most of the population does?!? You mean the same ones who can't find Chicago on a map or identify to which continent Mexico is a member? And for whom more believe in ghosts then believe that we actually landed on the moon?
There is (I am convinced!) a bit more to life than simply belching and scratching and voting for whomever promises to give us the most!
Or so I keep telling myself...
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|Look at the Ipod, you download music and you have it on your computer/ipod, backed up. I can see the same with movies, maybe you watch the movie and its saved on your drive if you want to buy it for $10 or just rent it for $3-5. Digital media doesn't have to be disposable. Plus most people watch a movie once and thats it. I a couple people who watch movies more than once and I may watch one or two movies (like The Matix) more than once, but most movies I'll see in the theater and maybe then watch it with friends a second time and thats it. I can see myself and most people watch a movie and if they want to watch it again its like $3-5 and find it worth it. Music if I had to pay for a song every time I wanted to listen to it I would understand because their are songs I listen to often, but with movies not so much. I think most people would think like me. Thats why CD sales are going down because of downloadable song from Itunes (which with DRM I think sucks) or Napser, or Walmart (with no DRM which is better).
Only time will tell who's right. I just see the trend with other media and see movies going that way too.
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|Having over 3500 music CDs, the reason sales are down, aside from the fact that kids think they are entitled to it for free, is that there is hardly any new music being released worth buying.
And the only folks whining about DRM are those frustrated with copying an redistributing the disks. Others don't care. In fact, most did not even know it was there! Just like the folks whining about the RIAA. If you aren't downloading, copying, and/or redistributing files, the issue is moot.
And there is PLENTY of classic movie titles NOT available by streaming that one will watch MANY times. And these predate the Matrix by quite few years, and are MUCH better than the Matrix.
And video files are user friendly for all uses? Not to mention the severely restricive nature of having to have access to the server, not to mention the small issue of having to HAVE a music server to begin with, versus a $60 upscaling DVD player? And yeah, like I am going to allow my young children access to my computer to watch an insipid Barney video over and over again, when its simply easier and cheaper to just buy the stupid DVD and burn them a copy that they can care for in the usual manner of children without fear of it being damaged. And they can play it when thy want - again and again and again... :-S
If you want to deal with volatile low fi music files and the volatile nature of data storage, even with backups - which MOST people don't even do with CRITICAL data - be my guest. And if you want to try to source all of the legacy titles, be my guest. If it suits your needs, great.
It doesn't suit my needs. Nor do I prefer the method for anything other than the way I treat pay per view - a transitory viewing of an inconsequential title simply for one shot entertainment.
But streaming will, and should, replace the labor and capital intensive one shot hard copy rental business model.
The notion that one method of distibution should supplant all others is ludicrous. It assumes one single model of usage imposed upon all. And that is nonsense.
Streaming will have a legitimate place just like pay per view, and it will (and should) be used to replace the capital and labor intensive hard copy rental market.
But it does not supplant hard copies for archival reference and repeated viewing. And that is a point the 'hard copy media is dead' folks miss.
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|First of all not as many people steal music as you think, maybe like 5% of the US population. You make it sound like its at 70%.
And people don't notice their is DRM until their Ipod breaks and they have to put their DRM music on a new one in which case with Itunes you have to buy all the music again. DRM free music you don't have to do that, you can have it on your Ipod and computer. Also people were borrowing their friends tapes and recording them way before the internet and their were more people doing that before downloading. Also a lot of people who download music for free then buy the downloaded songs they like, they just want to listen to the album before they buy it.
Yeah their are OLD movies that may not be made digital and those will be collected...but newer movies and popular older movies that are on DVD now will probably be streamed in the near future. Also movies on servers ready for streaming are easily backed up and put on different media as new media comes out (when hard drives become old news)while DVD's and Blu-rays have a shelf life.
Ok so your worried about buying a server which can be made cheap with linux and the parts don't have to be brand new. My friend made a media server with a 3 year old computer when he bought his new one. And you can hook the computer to your TV and have a remote control just like a set-top box on the TV so your kids don't have to touch the computer.
Low fi? I have over 5000 songs on my Ipod at 128 bit sound which sounds pretty good to me on a good stereo. Maybe you collect records still and like analog, but most people listen to their music on some form of MP3 player now a days. I even got my 70 year old father into an Ipod and he plays it in his car hooked up to his stereo and he loves it.
You seem to think in the past and you don't want the future to come. The future will come and either you'll go kicking and screaming or you'll be left behind. One thing I notice about technology is as soon as something better comes along the old stuff is thrown away....maybe except turn tables which are used for rap scratching records...but even that is starting to go digital now.
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|In making small points, you miss regarding the increasingly diverse larger marketplace... ;-)
Few copy and redistribute music on P2P sites? Right... Sorry, but demographic studies and history simply refute that contention!
And DRM is only a problem for those whose iPods have broken. Then who cares about such an insignifcant percentage. But then, no one shares music files anyway, right? Yeah...
And to make an argument only for music on iPods makes as much sense as saying that since you can get streaming video and NFL games on your Sprint phone, that large screen HD TVs are dead! It is to focus on one application to the exclusion of an icreasingly diverse, rather than a more limited, larger market.
Old movies not digitized? What are you talking about? They are simply NOT available on BR! MANY are on DVD. And transfering non-HD masters to BR offers no advantages. Especially at $25 bucks a pop!
Worried about buying a server? Hell no! A server is just damned inconvenient in MANY scenarios except in a dedicated installation!Who cares if you can use Linux on a server? I have more copies of Windows version whatever than I will ever use in several lifetimes, and MS keeps sending more copies free each quarter.
And like someone is going to give small children a server. Do you only think of yourself as the sole usage model for society?
And yes, the plethora of current MP3 offerings are low fi compressed songs. But then my playback system is not a set of ear buds either! And who gives a #$@% about hip hop which simply serves as an unmusical model for people who are incapable of playing music? Even if the lyrics had anything to say worth hearing!
There IS an increasing market for convenient streaming. It will replace much of, if not all of the hard copy rental market. This only makes sense as it is much more cost effective.
And market business models are evolving! But such a simple monolithic business model does NOT address, nor will it supplant uses that you seem neither to understand nor appreciate. Just as ditribution models are changing, the ability to store large volumes of previously unobtainable data is creating a similar opportunity to acquire much greater material! The various interests and usage patterns are not simply conracting - they are flattening in greater horizontal breadth as well!
Obtaining and maintaining libraries of entore series and related resources are increasing just as disposable ease of use and acces is increasing - simultaneously.
But you seem to be focused only on one tread to the exclusion of all others - as if everyone will coalesce to only one useage model based on the same end desire! And that is simply ridiculous.
And if you think that there is no market for archival hard copy, you are sadly mistaken. Just as there is a continuing market for books.
And you are sadly mistake regarding whether analog recordings are dead, and that CDs are obsolete for archival purposes, and that these have simply been discarded by all.
And to think so demonstrates that your vision of life is limited simply to a momentary disposable model where nothing possesses any persistent value. And in this, you misunderstand a significant market segment as well and you as demonstrate an ignore-ance of other uses and purposes.
Some don't just buy a movie or music as some toss away toy unworthy of being archived - although I will agree that MUCH of what is being produced currently warrants exactly that!
I am not going to source old episodes of the Twilight Zone one at a time via download. I do not want to be limited to an archive only located on a hard drive limited to a server located in a home theater. Neither meet a more flexible need.
Your enlightened vision presents one size fits all scenario that is limited at best, and unsuitable for many who demand a more flexible usage model - and yet who desire higher quality additional material than the bare basics and highly compressed music purchased by the SONG!, it is interesting to hear you simply ignore the stated desires of those just on this forum! Yet you envision everyone in society, regardless of their socio economic level or living situation to obtain a monolithic server to maintain their movies and music - and you call this convenient.
Sorry, but many of us who can afford MANY such servers and much more, still find your onse size all monolithic model where all music exists for an iPod, and most movies are throwaways and few want to build a library of high quality non-volatile archived copies, exstremely limiting and will opt for a non-volatile storage medium that compliments a file on demand model.
But then I guess you think that hard copy books are dead too. Even with the advent of downladable text files... Unfortunately, the only thing that seems to be decreasing in that respect is the ability to read and benefit from the knowledge in them!
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|Until the last 25% of the US that doesn't have broadband is finally served, discs aren't going away. That's doesn't mean automatic gains for high-def media..the consumer didn't care about HD or Blu-Ray a year ago and he doesn't care now. We're still waiting for big screen TVs to be affordable (their very close now).
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|Even most cable and DSL connection aren't fast enough to stream HD content. It's not uncommon to find a Blu-Ray disc where the average bitrate where the bitrate exceeds 20 megabits. In many residential areas one can't get Internet access at speeds anywhere near that Until internet connections with speeds in excess of 15 megabits/s become ubiquitous at a reasonable cost Blu-Ray will be the only practical option for watching HD content for many people.
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|Lets face it this was projected a year ago and the more ground On Demand gains in the HD market means less shelf space for Bloray.
What they fail to realize (they being BLORay) the price point is what is important now as people are more concious on their spending. I for one have decreased my spending on movies and have increased my spending on other areas of entertainment (ie games).
Id rather pay $2 for HD than $5 at blockbuster to rent or $30 for the disk at Bestbuy. (BOGO offers aside or Amazon)there should be more compeition for prices rather than more in city stores charging those prices and forced to go online for any chance of a deal.
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|Currently most streaming is DVD quality if even that good. Most of the 'HD' content that is available online isn't comparable to Blu-Ray. The minimum bit rate on 'HD' videos on iTunes for example is 1.5 Megabit. That's less than a tenth of the bit rate of a typical Blu-Ray disc. You might not notice on a small monitor but most people will notice a difference if you are watching on a large 1080p screen.
I certainly don't know of anywhere that rents HD content for $2.
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|No, it hasn't. I'm glad I could help.
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|Wow, I would think that a writer at BetaNews would have heard of the product life cycle by now. After 2 years of existence, Bluray is taking 13% of the overall video market for TDK. So where do you think it will be this time next year - 20%, maybe 25%? Also, the sales of Bluray software have more than doubled over this time last year.
This is typical performance early in the lifecycle - very fast growth, but still small in percentage terms. Even though Bluray is small, the revenue generated by it dwarfs that coming from Internet downloads - what you see as the bright, shining competition.
I see you can also parse a factoid to only express your viewpoint, so you pick up a Netflix comment from July, but not the one from December where they announced that Bluray was increasing far faster than their forecast. And (unsaid) that they can't buy enough copies of hot new releases to keep up with customer demand.
When PC shipments decline in the US in 2009, will that signal the end of computers? I will wait to read that story on this site in 2009.
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|Basically with your support of Bloray your going to have to understand that as the article points out the honeymoon is over and the unoffical declaration of the winner has been announced there still should be an INCREASE in sales. Whereas right now Bloray hasn't gained ground on DVDs. The HD's nearest competitor now is on DEMAND HD which seems to be attracting more consumers because you don't need to purchase over priced peripherials (like a POS3 or a 300 - 400 bloray player). The prices are within an acceptable range (.99 to $2) whereas the price of a bloray disk is ($25 - $39).
With an ecomomic crisis on the horizon this seems like the way consumers are going to go. I myself support On Demand HD and oppose paying 30$ for an HD disk. I choose to purchase DVD's more so than HDs. As soon as ON Demand hits the satelite market I will be on board with that tech but all the signals pointed this way a year ago before Toshiba backed out of the format war.
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|Witness: Capacitance Electronic Discs
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|Wrong.
And by virtue of your own example.
BluRay has not grown quickly enough.
CDs and DVDs were a radical change in format from the previous generation. BR is NOT. CD& DVDs were augmented by the industry ceasing to produce the alternative legacy product as they could not support exorbitant supply chain costs tht did not add revenue but only supplied duplication of existing titles - in other words, shipping multiple formats of the same title still resulted only in the sale of one copy.
BR has not resulted in the demise noreven in the reduction of supply of the legacy DVD format. In fact, if one were to argue as to which was the most feasible to support relative to the ditribution ROI, the standard DVD wins hands down.
BR should have seen a much faster rise in popularity and a much greater percentege of sales in a much shorter period - significantly hampered by the exorbitant price of entry in the cost of players and consumables. And in previous evolutionary formats, the price of entry became essentially equal to existing product MUCH faster - unlike BR which remains significantly more expensive than the existing alternatives that already satisfy most people's quality standards.
And the fact is, most people, my self included, while I can see an advantage to the video quality in BR, the differences relative to existing upscaled sources is simply not a compelling reason to invest in the platform.
Regular DVDs are no where close to being supplanted by BR - on any platform. And aside from Adam Sandler movies, the product depth for legacy titles in BR format, in a word, sucks.
But I love to watch how so many BR fans simply refuse to look around as they and their selectively attention, chant 'pay no attention to that man behind the screen".
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|"Wow, I would think that a writer at BetaNews would have heard of the product life cycle by now. After 2 years of existence, Bluray is taking 13% of the overall video market for TDK. So where do you think it will be this time next year - 20%, maybe 25%? Also, the sales of Bluray software have more than doubled over this time last year."
I imagine BR will have
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|$300? Most stores are selling players for under $200. I have seen sales for less than $130. Now that we are seeing third party manufacurers making Blu-ray players we are starting to see the price come down. Within a few months we will start seeing Blu-ray players below $100 in which case your point on cost of the players will no longer be applicable.
The primary barrier to the adoption for Blu-ray is the cost of acquisition of HDTV. Since most people are going to watch their video on a TV there isn't really much value to any HD content for someone who doesn't a HDTV.
Until most copyright holders embrace video on demand services it's hard to see video on demand replacing Blu-Ray as the primary means of watching HD content. The majority of movies on DVD aren't available on any video on demand service. If the trend continues on Blu-Ray it's hard to see video on demand killing Blu-Ray anytime soon.
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|Nice analysis, thanks.
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|WRONG...
Blu-ray is growing just fine...
CD's and DVD's were a radical change yes, but it still took DVD nearly 7 years to catch up to VHS sales...
is price all you idiots have to go on?? lets be serious...does anyone actually remember what a DVD player cost back when the format was launched??..here is a hint...it was as mich as a BD player...price is a factor, but not the ONLY factor in this...
you guys act like DVD showed up and the next day there were no VHS tapes out there and everyone went out and bought $5 DVD's and $49 players that first year...well you're ALL WRONG...
this exact same argument was going on back in 1998/1999 where people talked about how DVD was not going to kill VHS etc...well guess what? it did 7 years after its introduction....
it was not until the launch of the Ps2 really in 2000 that DVD took off because the PS2 put a DVD player in the hands of every little kid who wanted the best video game system....
everything takes time....my god, and you say the BD fans refuse to look around??...please...i think thats the rest of you guys...
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|NONSENSE.
How much were DVDs when they were introduced? You ask, so how about answering!
Were they almost twice the cost of a new VHS? NO!
Were DVD players almost 3 times the cost of an upscale VHS player? NO! Six years after DVD players were introduced - you know - 2 years before they overtook VHS, was the price of the AVERAGE PLAYER almost 6 times the cost of the average upscaling (or Super-VHS HIFI) player and the price of CONSUMABLES STILL almost 2 to 6 times the price of media? NO!
And are the improvements in resolution, both in video AND audio as dramatic with BR versus upscaled DVD as they were between DVD and VHS? NO!
You mightwant to review REAL history instead of you assumed notions of it!
And like the PS2 had any impact on adults buying DVDs! Get real. I still don't care about the PS2, let alone PS3!
How old are you? You talk like all of this is ancient history.
Most of us also experienced the entry into the market of the VCR that took almost 15 years to happen!
The problem: BR offers only a small incremental improvement at a high cost of entry. DVD offered a substantial improvement in quality for a relatively small price of entry. BIG DIFFERENCE! One that is evidently lost on you.
You (well, many who are old enough) already saw what happened to Beta versus VHS, so don't try to use the old saw that an incremental improvement in quality, regardless of cost, is insignificant!
And also, as many have only upgraded to "HD" in terms of a 1080i or 720p set, what incredibly compelling reason do they have for buying a product that only provides its optimal return on a 1080p set that they do not have and are not about to run out and buy to replace their 2 year old 1080i or 720p set?
Oh?....
So tell us, fanboy, just what title can't one watch on an upscaled DVD with quality sound that doesn't already offer sufficient video and audio quality that is equal to most theater experiences?
And just what COMPELLING DIFFERENCE does BR offer that DVD can't? And sorry, but seeing whether someone shaved this morning is simply not compelling. And in CGI, what is the difference? Sorry, but the incremental differences don't justify the cost of entry and the outrageous ongoing cost of consumables at $25 a pop for yet another Adam Sandler title and no legacy title support.
But you keep telling yourself whatever it takes to convince yourself that you are winning. And hug your Linux box and convince yourself that Linux on the desktop is 'just around the corner' too!
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|And to add to that, the legacy titles that are available are not that impressive to begin with. Studios can remaster their back catalogs all they want, but if the source was not filmed digitally in HD originally, the end result is usually dramatically less than stellar over what the same upscaled DVD releases offer.
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|Exactly!
And to add insult to injury, I'm STILL waiting for The African Queen to just come out on DVD!
;-)
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|http://www.amazon.com/Af...d=1229810093&sr=1-1
Heh... :)
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|Nope. But thanks for trying!
I originally thought that was the case as well. Unfortunately that is an import analog VCD transfer from tape.
They are still trying to 'develop' the DVD, and there is a pre-order option as well.
I am not sure what the exact hold up is - whether the master has deteriorated or if there are legal entanglements, or some combination thereof or additional issues of which I am not aware...
But then I am still also lusting after the re-relese of Steve Miller's Journey From Eden- Recall the Begining that has never been released on CD either - despite having a couple of copies of the album.
Oh well....
;-))
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|"How much were DVDs when they were introduced? You ask, so how about answering!"
Since nobody else seems to remember I will answer. Try ~$1000. Source DVD Demystified.
http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#1.5
At that time one could have bought a cheap VHS player for under $100. So there definitely was a large price difference when they were released but there was a small number of people that bought them anyway. I specifically recall going to event Toshiba sponsored in late 1997 where they gave away one of their DVD players and the retail prices at the time were well in excess $500 which isn't that different from what prices were just two years ago for Blu-Ray players. It took about 3 years for the prices for DVD players to get below $100. About 2.5 years after the release of the first Blu-Ray players we aren't too far away from that point now. Most stores regularly sell entry level Blu-Ray players for under $200 and some of the better sales you see models selling for under $150. When even Wal-Mart is including Blu-Ray players in their TV ads you know that Blu-Ray becoming mainstream.
I think that reason that the market embraced DVD had less to do with quality then with some of the features that DVDs had that VHS didn't. For example I can randomly access different parts of DVDs whereas on a VHS tape I would have to wait for the tape to advance to the appropriate location. The compact size of the discs made them far easier to collect. DVDs can have multiple language tracks or subtitles that you can turn on or off whereas you would have to create a special version on a VHS tape.
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|Ahh, a "proper" release. I honestly thought you were kidding at first. :)
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|