Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Nope. For the first time, DVD sales fell this year.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I make it a point to let others know about how there will be only 2 studios available for HD-DVD when ever possible. I am not out to tell someone you should not buy it no matter what. I tell people so that they can decide for themselves if they want to continue with the purchase or not? I honestly do not think Toshiba is going to be upfront with consumers and let them know, hey by the way our format only has backing of two studios.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

It has to be faster than that to stay ahead of downloads.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Your timeline is very optimistic especially in these economic times when a recession can slow down this industry in a big hurry. I still don't see how the studios can make that work cost effective-wise and still give us catalog titles of HDM at their very best. I'm not talking about big titles like Gone with the Wind or Lawrence of Arabia. I'm talking about smaller catalog titles like King Solomon's Mines or The Ox-Bow Incident. Until I stop hearing studio executives giving me the standard line of "certain titles are under consideration for a Blu-ray release" then and only then will I believe the HDM market will threaten the SD DVD market.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Then they better make downloads a lot simpler than they are now.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Robert,
I think the majority of people would be completely satisfied with building a library of HD films just the way you described and NEVER buy into HDM at all. I know you see a rosy future for Blu-ray but don't you think DBS/Cable HD services offer a cheaper viable alternative to HDM?

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I wouldn't presume.....and I really don't think you should either. It's simply none of your business.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Right now, I have one Blu-ray on pre-order with Amazon (Celine Dion's Vegas Show) and four HD DVDs on pre-order with Amazon (American Gangster, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Into the Wild and Bee Movie). When I look at Blu-rays forthcoming release dates, I just don't see any other titles I want to own. Maybe Crimson Tide. Maybe. But looking at the even more limited HD DVD listing, I see a couple of other titles that I want that I can't even pre-order on Amazon yet.... Bewoulf and the Jack Ryan Collection come to mind.

The bottom line for me is that Universal and Paramount have released far more titles HDM that I am personally interested in owning. Sure, eventually losing Warner hurts but that won't remotely stop me from buying HD DVDs.

Mark

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I do expect that you're fair and balanced when offering information, because I honestly do not think the BDA is going to be upfront with consumers and let them know, hey by the way, our format does not have the backing of four studios (Paramount, Universal, Dreamworks, and Dreamworks Animation) and the player you're buying today (unless it's a game machine) will not access all features on a number of discs that will be released this year, including major Disney releases.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

For all those that might think that HDM is not doing too well and that there is a danger of HDM not surviving, here are some figures to ponder over.

NPD group hardware sales figures for HD players. *These figures DO NOT include PS3 sales*

December '07
Blu-ray = 115,132 (60.19%)
HD-DVD = 76,148 (39.81%)

Which means, that inspite of HD-DVDs far lower prices, they were still clearly outsold by Blu-Ray stand-alone players during the Holiday season sales and this was before Warner went Blu-Ray exclusive.

Week ending January 05, '08
Blu-Ray = 15,257 (51.17%)
HD-DVD = 14,558 (48.83%)


Post Warner announcement:
Week ending January 12, '08
Blu-Ray = 21,770 (92.53%)
HD-DVD = 1,758 ( 7.47%)


Also keep in mind that prior to December '07, the reported sales figures for HDM were already:
Blu-Ray = approx 500,000 (add 3 million plus PS3s)
HD-DVD = approx 500,000 (add 200,000 X-Box addons)

Now compare these with the sales figures of DVD. Here --> Digital Bits - CEA DVD Player Sales

Guess what, HDM is not doing too badly now, is it? In fact if you add the sales for both the HDM formats, the numbers are almost identical to those of DVD in the corresponding periods after launch.

Now also consider the following:
1. HDM - two competing formats which led to consumer confusion and also splits the early adopter market. Considering that it is these early adopters who play a major role in spreading the 'word', the split did not help.
2. Both HD formats were rushed to market, specially Blu-Ray, even before they were really ready. Leads to lack of consumer confidence.
3. The gains from VHS to DVD far outnumber and outclass those of HDM over DVD.
4. In the case of VHS to DVD, every single customer gained and could see the advantage right away. Even for those that had small size and/or older televisions. Whereas, the gains of HDM are fewer and also can only be seen by those that have HDTVs and that too atleast of a reasonable size.
5. The cost of moving to HD is far greater than that of moving from VHS to DVD. Not because the players cost more, but because in the case of HDM and for the vast majority of people, it mean't also buying a HDTV.
6. The prices of DVDs was far less than that of VHS, whereas HDM costs more than DVDs. This is specially true in the case of those, which includes a substantial number of early adopters, who moved from Laser Disc to DVD and now are upgrading to HDM.
7. The increased competition from other forms of content delivery now compared to when DVD was launched.
8. Companies like Microsoft & Apple that have their own agenda of promoting downloads as a channel for content delivery, rather than promoting HDM. Contrast this with the push DVD got from the computer industry.
9. The increased storage of DVD-ROM over CD-ROM was of benefit to most, thus the PC industry incorporated it right away. The increase in storage capacity from DVD to HDM, althouhg substantial, is not really required by most. Thus adoption rates in the PC industry is very, very slow.
10. The rise in Internet Piracy. Due to, growth of the internet, better compression algorithims, higher bandwith etc.

I am sure most of you concur with me, that HDM is doing rather well. Also as soon as we have a single format, HDM will definately find it's place in the mainstream alongside SD DVD and they shall both co-exist & compliment each other.


PS: NPD data courtesy digitalbits.com

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Poorly designed algorithms and low broadband throughput in most places make this a bad alternative. I, for one, wouldn't wait 8 hours to download a marginal-quality HD movie.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I couldn't give a rat's ass if Toshiba only sold TWO HD DVD players last week. All that matters is that Toshiba ALREADY has 1 million players in the field and Universal, Paramount and Dreamworks continue to support HD DVD to the exclusion of Blu-ray.

And, should those studios eventually go neutral or Blu-exclusive, I still will not sell my HD DVD player or my HD DVD discs. Why lose money on something that I am perfectly happy with? They will continue to play just fine for years to come.

Why is the format neutral concept so difficult to grasp for so many?

Mark

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Why is the concept of certain people wanting one format for retailers, studios, manufacturers and consumers so difficult for you to grasp? Some people choose to vote with thier dollars and not invest into a format that may not exist one year from now. Others like yourself have decided that investment is worth it. Neither party is wrong in thier viewpoints but for some reason you feel the need to beat the "format neutral is the only way" drum at people that simply don't share that opinion.

You've chosen your path in this war. If others choose to show patience and wait for Universal and Paramount to switch sides then that's thier decision. An inevitable conclusion if you ask me and yes I do happen to be a dual format owner who hopes for the remainder of this format war to run its course quickly, decisively and with one dominant format emerging the victor (which is why I've personally ceased purchasing HD DVD discs outside of a new release that may interest me here or there).

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

They do offer a cheaper future, but the trouble is, that's what it is, cheaper. How many people really care? I am afraid not enough. I think it will be a long time before we can download or pay-per-view (or whatever) a movie in 1080p with uncompressed sound, if ever. I, for one anyway, will buy my movies on disc, and I really believe that the mainstream likes to have their movie collections. A hard drive of any kind, where you can store maybe 100 hd compressed movies on a 750gb disc, is great, but they are all compressed in picture and sound, and what happens when: OH NO my hard drive failed and the information is gone along with my favorite 100 movies I have recorded? Let's be fair that there are many negatives about HDM in other formats than the physical disc.

I say this because, just last, week, my best friend who is also a high def nut finished a 750gb hard drive from Dish Network. It held 118 high def movies from assorted channels like HBO HD, HDnet, ect. He went to play a movie last week when I was over, and WHAM...notice came up that the drive is faulted. We didn't know what that meant so he called Dish. Then the next day he called Seagate and they had him hook it up to the computer. The drive failed and chances are about 5% that he would be able to retrieve those movies and for a very high cost of a professional fixing the drive and correcting all errors. Seagate sent him a new one, but his favorites from the last year are gone. This would never happen with a blu-ray or hd-dvd disc.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I agree with you, some of them are awful, and I don't think some of them are really high def, in fact a few of the dvd transfers looked better. But there have been many films that were simply stunning. Take How to Murder your Wife, Auntie Mame, The Music Man, Unsinkable Molly Brown, In Harm's Way, Two Mules for Sister Sarah, Towering Inferno, Blazing Saddles, Earthquake, On A Clear Day You Can See Forever, Man of La Mancha, and many more which would take too long to list, that I think will make beautiful blu-rays or hd-dvd's with the transfers I saw. I was really stunned at how good some of them were, and as you said, some are awful. It's always a 50/50 thing that you are going to get a very good high def transfer when watching these channels. But my point was I have seen many films that were not blockbusters that appeared to me to have beautiful hd transfers.

Then there are the ones advertised as being in hd which truly are not, like ABC's yearly showing of The Sound of Music. They had advertisements for the film to "see it in true high definition" and the dvd (40th anniversary edition) beat the showing completely in quality, and worse, they keep showing it in 1:85:1. They are still using the older transfer that ABC had before the 40th anniversary edition transfer.

All I can do is hope that the classics finally get the treatment they deserve. Many great transfers have appeared on dvd over the past 5-7 years that I think would show marked improvement on a high def disc with the transfers already produced, others will need new ones and we can only hope the studios will do it for our favorites at the very least. That includes uncompressed soundtracks on these, which I hope Warner realizes, finally, is important. There has been no word on the soundtracks yet of Fox's upcoming Sand Pebbles, Longest Day and Patton blu-rays, but I am keeping my fingers crossed that they continue their DTS Master tradition and don't take the road Warner has taken so far and only offer Dolby Digital, because these soundtracks can have alot more punch when not compressed. Sorry to go on, but this relates. My friend has been a projectionist at some of the premeire theaters in Minneapolis since 1952. He actually recorded on 4 track reel to reel the soundtracks to movies like Ben Hur, Hello Dolly, ect. He recently played these for me and we compared them to the dvd soundtracks. My jaw fell to the floor. There was 100% improvement, they were stunning.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Can I ask you how you arrived at 1 million players in the field?

With Sanjays numbers in post #1480 you get 592,464 stand alone players. Even if you add in the approx 200,000 X-Box add-ons you get to 792,000. Still far short of 1 million.

Also the format neutral concept is not hard for me as I have both formats.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

You don't understand. These are NOT broadband services. Copying HD movies are instantaneous.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

"One format" is the ONLY way for HD to survive (not talking downloading etc here) and certainly the ONLY way that it would ever replace the SD DVD. It´s the ONLY way to get the real masses behind HD. Period.

Rest of this talk is just that, talk and "format debates" in the forum. Here are the only facts at the moment:

Blu-ray:
*Warner
*Fox
*Sony/MGM
*Disney
*Lionsgate

HD DVD:
*Universal
*Paramount/Dreamworks

FORMAT NEUTRAL:
*NONE (bigger studios)

If the "format neutral concept" is really working, someone forgot to tell the studios about it. In real life, there´s no "format neutral concept". There´s a war - or not.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I´m sure you understand, that this is purely your opinion? I mean what titles interest you.

It´s impossible to say (it really is) that which format "have better titles", since it depends from who you ask. Some like "Bee Movie", some like "Cars". Some actually like both.

So people saying that "HD DVD has this-and-that" or "Blu-ray has this-and-that" is actually a bit irrelevant in the end if we talk about which format "is better". I doubt that the people have suddenly forgot their "SD DVD-days", when people actually bought the movie based on the "movie", not the "format". If you have chosen one format, then you ALWAYS miss out at least something. It could be 1-2 movies, it could be 5 or it could be 30. Still you always miss something.

With one HD-format, we don´t have to choose the "format". We can start choosing "films" and stop this nonsense. Like we have done many years with SD DVD. It´s amazing how people many times forget that.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

But the overall point is, Jari, that a good number of people look at HD DVD and see far more titles that are of interest in the Paramount and Universal camps. I made my decision to get HD DVD (first, before Blu-ray) mainly based on what I saw available from those two studios (Paramount was neutral at the time). Had Paramount abandoned HD DVD instead of abandoning Blu-ray, it would have been a FAR bigger impact on my personal preferences.

The problem as I see it is that Blu-ray fans are assuming that Universal and Paramount will go Blu (neutral or exclusive) sooner rather than later. I believe the exact opposite will be true.... it will be later, if at all. And I don't want to wait until later to enjoy their titles. I want as much high def goodness as I can get right NOW.

Time will tell how this all shakes out but I have very very serious doubts that either studio will change their stance this year, if at all. Even your buddy Blu-ray Bill Hunt suggests it "might be by the end of the year". That doesn't sound very imminent to me!

Mark

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

No offense here, but this is still your opinion. I doubt that you can speak of behalf of all HD DVD-fans? Sure, Universal and Paramount are now the key for HD DVD to "survive" etc, so it´s natural that the fans "love their titles", but like I said, if you´re a "film fan", it´s difficult to choose films just from two major studios (even if they have zillion POTENTIAL titles).


At least I assume, that the war will be over in the summer - OR at least during this year. Sure, I could be wrong, but we are now so close to end this thing. I´m certain that the companies will do the "right thing" here and think about the future of HD. I know that the idea of HD DVD "fading away" would be a real blow to the thousands of fans, but they´re in some ways the "casualties of war". There´ll be unhappy people at the end of the day, it cannot be helped.


Sure, here here, but the "masses" don´t think like you and me. They don´t rush to the stores to get "two players".

So

a) We have two HD-formats and eventually the format war continues = No masses. Both HD-formats will be our own niche thinghy. Perhaps some people like that, but I don´t.

b) We have one HD format = Potential masses (even with one format, nothing is certain). This is still the only way to go.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

No, you do. You have no idea what other people are interested in, and the sales figures say the exact opposite of your "theory".

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I said a "good number of people", yet you react like I said "everyone". I base my comment on the comments I've read across 5 different forums and blogs. Forum polls have already indicated the average age of an HD DVD player owner is about 10 years higher than the average age of a PS3 owner. The older crowd is more interested in the legacy movies.

I stand by my comment.

Mark

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

And all of the actual data shows that HD DVD owners and Blu-ray owners are more or less identical. You can't feed me a line of BS about maturity and age, when the #1 HD DVD is the exact same as the #1 Blu-ray, and the #2 HD DVD is essentially a video game thats based off a kid's cartoon. You're attempting to prove that your opinion and ginned-up "forum polls" are trends, not posting any actual facts.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Format neutrality does work. Warner had the largest share of the market. HP 5's combined sales actually beat the Bourne Ultimatum. BR also had strong sales in both formats.

Format exclusivity is the main contributor to confusion. Hd-dvd and blu-ray appeal to different groups. Were it not for exclusivity the choice would be simple. Blu-ray gives you the best picture possibe but you pay a little more and hd-dvd can give you a picture that is nearly as good but you pay a little less.

Even though dvd sales have dropped, dvd is still the king. Dvd sales on new theatricals dwarf hd sales by better than 10-1. The difference in going from
vhs to dvd was like night and day. While there is a difference, going from dvd
to hd, the question is are people willing to pay for that difference? Are people willing to pony up to buy another copy of a movie they already own? I don't see hd media taking off until player prices and disc prices match dvd prices.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Fixed that for ya. You're welcome.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I don't care what format it's on, don't trivialize my Transformers.

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

"Warner extends HD DVD support" (3 weeks):

TG Daily - Warner extends HD DVD support

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

I don't want Transformers. That's why I bought the game console to play movies.

_Man_

Re: Breaking News!! Warner is soon to be Blu-Ray Exclusive!

Most likely a misunderstanding.

There's at least one major error in that article (Warner stops releases in June, not May), and it looks as if they saw the news about catalog releases coming 3 weeks later and reposted it as extending everything 3 weeks later. Notice that they say "Bonnie & Clyde" and "Twister" were no longer exclusives? They never were exclusive, they were both officially announced as delayed, coincidentally enough within the last 24 hours.