Blu-Ray dectrators echo 1990s DVD hate
CNET goes back the the mid-1990s to excavate the reasons given then why the new "DVD" laserdiscs would never be a success. The punchline is, of course, that most of them are identical to the reasons now given why Blu-Ray will fail.
The first three: No-one will re-buy movies they've got on VHS; there aren't enough movies on the format; recording is expensive and annoying.
Conspicuously absent from the earlier griping, however, is the modern ubiquity of broadband internet, and "on demand" movie services from Cable providers. These are Blu-Ray's real challenge, not decade-old philosophical objections to the movie industry's greed.
Photo: Jovike
DVD will fail? Sounds a lot like Blu-ray [Cnet.com]
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The big difference this time is that there's no feature that makes BluRay better than DVD. Anyone that ever watched a degraded VHS and then the DVD immediately saw a benefit. You also didn't have to rewind the DVD when you were done.
So BluRay has a better picture? Good for it. Now I just need a TV and a player that's capable of delivering the quality. Former summer blockbusters and nature shows look great in high-def, but everything else doesn't get much benefit unless you enjoy counting pores.
So some of the arguments are the same, but they are also different because the previous formats had major shortcomings. The barrier to entry was also lower. Add in new digital offerings that threaten to make the disc obsolete and I only see an uphill battle for BluRay.
I won't buy a medium that can get scratched. Digital delivery FTW!
I started watching the TV show Jericho, mainly because the new PlayOn beta has all of the episodes. A friend came over yesterday and said "ooh, I have the season 1 & 2 box set, let me run back to my apartment and get them for you." I told her not to bother, I'd rather watch the PlayOn versions that have a commercial every 10 minutes and aren't DVD quality just so I don't have to get up and change the discs.
Again, Digital delivery FTW!!!
I agree with "No-one will re-buy movies they've got on VHS [/DVD]".. When DVDs came out, people started collecting more than previously with VHS because DVDs supposedly last longer, don't need to be rewound, etc. I have 600+ DVDs that look pretty good when upconverted. Not that Blu-ray isn't great looking, but DVDs don't look as crappy as VHS.
There's a huge, and easily visible difference between VHS and DVD.
But I can't really see anywhere near the same quality jump from DVD to BR. I have a 60" 1080p set, fed by an unpconverting DVD player and a PS3 BluRay, both using HDMI cables, so the problem isn't in my setup.
Yes, its sharper. But not by much. Certainly not to the point that I feel a need to rebuy anything.
I wonder what will happen to all my VHS movies and other recorded programs? Is there an easier way to transfer VHS programs to digital? And I do agree about the unsightly differences between DVD and BR. We have a 65" plasma TV and everything looks clear and sharp, even if its just VHS.
"I won't buy a medium that can get scratched. Digital delivery FTW! "
Then you will never own a movie again.
BR has a real chance because the economy is slumping.
What's the first thing to go in tough times? the Cable. Now people in lean times don't upgrade their movie players, but they are more likely to rent and buy movies rather then pay 150 a month to have access to on demand. A habit that Blue ray will depend on for its base of customers.
#6:
Never say never. There's a billion ways the future could make you eat those words.
I hate DVDs. I like to pause and rewind and come back a day later to finish something. DVDs, particularly when played on a computer, always screw this up somehow.
Downloaded movies, though, are awesome.
Downloading is renting, for whatever extended period. Physical media is to own.
I just recently jumped on the blu-ray bandwagon. And I don't plan on purchasing any HD versions of the DVDs I already own, but I, for one, welcome our blue-laser bearing overlords.
Wait, I lied. I have to get a few Pixar flicks in HD that I already own.
This is only tangentially relevant to the discussion, but I realized something today: it's actually a bad idea to buy the current crop of Blu-ray movies, in most cases, because those discs are the "first batch". Remember the first batch of DVDs that came out? With often bad transfers (some look like they were grabbed from VHS masters!) few or no special features, and so on.
I bet you that, 3-4 years from now, IF the blu-ray format becomes as ubiquitous as DVDs are now (which is far from certain) we'll start seeing reissues and remasters with new features, new documentaries, even better transfers, etc.
And then the current crop will end up in bargain bins, being sold for 5-10$.
Before DVDs came out, only a few movie buffs bought video tapes, and then probably only a few. Most movies were priced for rental, or for those movie buffs — $60 and up. DVDs came with the notion that they might be sold in stores like CDs, not just rented.
Why is this relevant? Because the "No-one will re-buy movies" point is a good one after all.
Why is this relevant? Because the "No-one will re-buy movies" point is a good one after all.
I would argue that is unlikely re-buying is a large part of the blue ray market. I expect they more want to give people a reason to keep buying, and at moderate increase in price.
To further prove my point I would note that it took years for them to develop a DVD/VHS Machine when really that could not have been that big a technical challenge, yet BR players started out with DVD playing capacity.
I don't want to buy into an optical media that I can't back up easily.
I don't want to rent digitally unless it is significantly less than walking 10 minutes to my locally owned rental store.
I won't buy DRM'd digital downloads.
DVDs seem like the only medium that I can enjoy currently. I buy the disc, archive it on my media computer, and put the disc away, almost never to be pulled out of the case again.
Then again, I'm definitely not an average customer.
Digital downloads won't offer the quality of Blu-Ray for a long time. They don't even offer the quality of a DVD right now. Given that a 2-layer Blu-Ray (damn, why couldn't they just make it Blue Ray??) disc holds 50gb, more with multi-layer, it's unlikely to be matched for many years. Ten years? Fifteen? Think about how downloading 4gb seems now - and the gap between DVD's roll-out and when 4gb is will seem like a reasonable download.
[And yes, I download 4gb files, but I don't want to do it every day.]
A friend of mine and me have had quite a bit of conversation on the topic of media storage lately. We've came to the conclusion that Blu-Ray is going to wind up being the modern age 8-track. Now scoff all you will but here's why.
The answer is flash drives. Currently flash drives are somewhat expensive but prices are coming down on more and more memory every month. Furthermore, each month flash drives are holding more and more memory. I've seen a 32GB drive recently, which is more memory in the space of a finger than my first computer had in hard drive space 9 years ago.
The reason flash drives will take over once the memory is comparable and the prices are down is due to their size and durablility. My friend and I have often wondered when some computer game company will realease a game on a flash card. Imagine, you bring the game home, slip it into your usb port, and boom, you're in the game. No installation, no sucking up hard drive space and in a smaller and more durable media form.
#6: Me not owning a movie ever again is completely fine. The last DVD I bought was the Animatrix in 2003, and that was only because it didn't seem to be on the rental store shelves at the time.
I'm weird though, a movie has to be really, really special for me to watch it twice. There usually has to be at least 5 years in between viewings as well. I've never understood the need to have shelves of plastic boxes full of DVDs, it just seems like it's an incredible waste of space.
DreadJester, that is very interesting. I hadn't thought of flash drives as competition for bluray. I wonder if the speed of cheap flash drives over USB 2.0 is enough for high quality video? (googling)
Well, theoretically USB 2.0 is fast enough at 480mbps - Blu-Ray being 54mbps according to blu-ray.com. The flash chips and USB implementation are of course an unknown.
Well, if prices come down a lot, it might just be a possibility. Of course, you'd still want some sort of media device to play it; most people don't want to hassle with a PC when watching a movie. (And I don't blame them.)
I have recorded a DVD maybe twice in all those years. And I have watched films on DVD less than a dozen times.
I presume someone else has already pointed out that if you don't BiCapitalize it and are reading too fast, Blu-ray starts to look awfully like Blurry...
OK, maybe it's just me.