Wow, what a day! I hadn't had a chance to peruse the usual news sources and forums today, and of all places, I found out about Paramount and Dreamworks' decision on USA Today's site!
My first reaction was just that, "wow." My second reaction was "this is big."
Enthusiast web sites are getting more traffic than they've seen in a while, fueling endless heated arguments, generating ads, and smoking web servers, all at the same time. That's a heck of a Monday.
I would love to see all studios be format neutral, and I'm probably going to be alone in this viewpoint, but I think the decision today brings us closer to that day.
The format war has done quite a bit for hardware features and prices. Who would have thought just six months ago that we could have $199 HD DVD players and $499 Blu-ray players? Without HD DVD's high functionality from the get-go, what do you think the chances are that we'd be seeing anything close to Profile 1.1 or 2.0 in Blu-ray players in the near future? I'm still not happy with where Blu-ray players are at, but I think they're further along than they would be without a competing format showing them how it can be done (and for cheaper).
Now, we may be seeing the format war heating up on the software side. Things were awfully lopsided on the studio leaderboard. Ignoring the fact that Fox was a Blu-ray studio mostly in press releases only, anyone the least bit familiar with high definition on optical discs probably heard that there were more studios on the Blu-ray side than on the HD DVD side. Blah, blah, blah.
What I see is this. Paramount and Dreamworks Animation, or more suitably, their big name movies, will provide the foot in the door that other studios needed to consider doing the same. I can see another studio following suit, but as much as I'd like it to be Disney, I don't think it will be either Disney or Fox. Someone smaller, maybe two.
Now the scales become much more balanced (if they aren't already).
Studios on both sides figure that there's not going to be an end to the war any time soon. Faced with the choice of 1) continuing to fight a stalemate, or 2) finding common ground and serving both sides, I think (hope) that they will choose #2.
That's the only scenario that has no outright losers. Manufacturers win because they can sell players that will play all the movies being released. Consumers win because they don't have to worry about not being able to play HD movies on they player they decide to spend their money on. Studios win because they can sell to consumers of both camps.
Sure, studios have to pay more money for producing two formats instead of one. Considering the incredibly low volumes of HD media sales right now, that's not a big hit to the bottom line in the big picture. I just don't think that it's that big a factor right now. In the future, yes, the production costs are going to matter when they're moving units approaching what we're seeing with DVD sales. But that day is a long way off and there's plenty of sales to make in the meantime.
Neutrality only works, however, when the cease fire is honored by everyone involved. All studios need to be neutral, even Sony, but it could probably work if there was a single holdout, because their non-participation would be so incredibly obvious that they would be shamed into it anyway.
I shake my head that downloads and some grand conspiracy by Microsoft even comes into the discussion. A lot of companies have their fingers in downloads, but none have succeeded, yet. Movielink has been around for years, but it hasn't taken off.
I think a majority of people want to watch movies on their couches in front of their TV's (displays, projectors, whatever), and until some device allows them to do that easily (low price of admission, non-onerous process of purchasing and fast delivery, and high availability of titles), that's not going to happen any time soon.
Does Microsoft have an interest in seeing things like Xbox Marketplace thrive? Sure. Should they be looking at things that will further that goal? Why not? Maybe someday not everything will be a grand Microsoft conspiracy, but I guess there will always be people with tin-foil hats on the lookout for the black helicopters.
Lastly, much has been said about Bill Hunt and his attitudes about the war. I happen to disagree with his prediction, his reasoning, and his insistence that there is nothing that can't change the tide of the war. However, I have never doubted that his core perspective was still about enjoying movies the best way possible... until recently. His fervor for the hobby and frustration about the lack of a decisive victory from either side must have gotten the best of him. Reading his most recent posts made me not want to read anything more on his site. He's heading down a path of (dare I say it) fanboy-ism that bespeaks tunnel vision, and believing one too many press releases. I know that I visit his site much less than I used to, and I consider myself to be very open-minded.
Here's to hoping that the Paramount and Dreamworks Animation news breaks open some barriers to true studio neutrality!
