Physical Media might not be dead, but Physical Media in Retail Stores are accelerating the death (1 Viewer)

[JQuintana]

You point out the main reason I stopped buying discs. Lack of interest in re-watching. Many times as you say the impulse to buy cheap was too great so I'd buy a movie I swore I'd watch many times and in the end, the disc stayed in the shrink wrap and on a shelf or in a storage bin and never was watched.

I think many folks fall into that trap. The desire to own "just in case" outweighs common sense and people toss away a ton of money on movies and TV shows they will never truly watch, or if they do, they watch it maybe once and it's tossed aside.

I am glad I broke those chains and no longer feel I need every show or movie I like or thought I liked. It's liberating for me at least.

 

[Traveling Matt]

I am glad I broke those chains and no longer feel I need every show or movie I like or thought I liked. It's liberating for me at least.

My personal habits are a little different from many others in that I pretty much only buy things I know I'll watch over and over again. So my collection is pretty compact and distilled down just to favorites for the most part.

However I disagree with your earlier point about additional streaming options. From what we've seen so far program material obviously comes and goes, and will likely continue to do so even on studio-owned services such as Disney+, where they will almost certainly find reasons to remove items with low view counts. To say nothing for the massive amounts of extras or bonus materials that will simply not exist anymore if not for the disc.

 

[John*Wells]

My personal habits are a little different from many others in that I pretty much only buy things I know I'll watch over and over again. So my collection is pretty compact and distilled down just to favorites for the most part.

However I disagree with your earlier point about additional streaming options. From what we've seen so far program material obviously comes and goes, and will likely continue to do so even on studio-owned services such as Disney+, where they will almost certainly find reasons to remove items with low view counts. To say nothing for the massive amounts of extras or bonus materials that will simply not exist anymore if not for the disc.

While I am close to completing my collection (Since theres not much in present TV I really care for), I agree regarding extras/special features .. I Consider those of great historical value especially in the Star trek TV Series releases

 

[Josh Steinberg]

From what we've seen so far program material obviously comes and goes, and will likely continue to do so even on studio-owned services such as Disney+, where they will almost certainly find reasons to remove items with low view counts.

True, but Disney+ will not be an ownership service, it'll be a streaming subscription service - in other words, the modern equivalent to having an HBO subscription in the 1980s or 1990s. There is no expectation that the service need to maintain every title in perpetuity.

A more apt comparison might be to a digital retailer like iTunes where you purchase a license to view an individual title in perpetuity. In general, even when a movie stops being sold to new customers on iTunes, customers who have previously purchased the title retain the rights to view it.

 

[Towergrove]

With most of the dvd patents expiring over the next several years (or already expired), in principle anybody will be able to manufacture a dvd disc player. The question is whether anybody will consider this to be viable and/or profitable.

For example in the case of computer dvd drives, there's only two manufacturers left who still manufacture new dvdr drives: LG and LiteOn. (In the case of computer bluray-r drives, only LG and Pioneer still manufacture new drives).

Just about everybody else has already exited the computer dvd/bluray drive business. (ie. Samsung, Sony, etc ...).

Asus also continue to make Bluray drives for pcs.

 

[Towergrove]

You point out the main reason I stopped buying discs. Lack of interest in re-watching. Many times as you say the impulse to buy cheap was too great so I'd buy a movie I swore I'd watch many times and in the end, the disc stayed in the shrink wrap and on a shelf or in a storage bin and never was watched.

I think many folks fall into that trap. The desire to own "just in case" outweighs common sense and people toss away a ton of money on movies and TV shows they will never truly watch, or if they do, they watch it maybe once and it's tossed aside.

I am glad I broke those chains and no longer feel I need every show or movie I like or thought I liked. It's liberating for me at least.

I'm buying more digitally. Still want to own but doesnt need to be physical. There is a market for this business as well and it's on the increase too.

 

[jcroy]

Asus also continue to make Bluray drives for pcs.

Asus' current bd-r and dvd-r drives models are actually rebadged LG current models.

One can crossflash the firmware between the equivalent LG and Asus drives.

 

[TJPC]

(This was to be a reply to message 459, which I wrote but forgot to send a couple of days ago

That’s what I do. I see an outrageous “ bargoon”, and before I buy it, try to picture myself watching it. If I realize I don’t want to, it stays in the store.

 

[Towergrove]

Asus' current bd-r and dvd-r drives models are actually rebadged LG current models.

One can crossflash the firmware between the equivalent LG and Asus drives.

I also notice very few LCD and LED panel makers with rebadged tv in various companies and models. This happens throughout the CE world it seems. Also recently noticed new Verbatim drives, TEAC drives and Hitachi drives. Not concerned about not finding drives in the future I can still buy new floppy drives from microcenter if i choose. Optical media has billions of discs in the wild be it video, audio or data. Someone will make a reader.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I'm not really worried about availability of players either. Even before vinyl records resurfaced as a hip new (old) way to listen to music, it was possible to get players. I don't know anyone who listens to audio cassettes anymore, but those players are easy to find. Same for VCRs.

I think a more pressing concern could be with UHD discs. Unlike every other previous format, UHD discs require a specific kind of HDMI encoded with a specific type of copy protection, and if everything in the chain isn't compatible with that standard, the discs won't play. What happens if the UHD disc format ultimately dies out sooner than expected, and electronics manufacturers move towards a different kind of connection? I think it's entirely possible that we could have a future where DVD and BD discs play just fine, but UHD discs can't be played - not for a lack of existing disc players, but because future display devices might not support the very specific form of copy protection that UHD discs demand in order to play.

 

[jcroy]

Optical media has billions of discs in the wild be it video, audio or data. Someone will make a reader.

In principle, at this time I'm guessing anybody can probably make a patent-free computer dvd drive that can only read pressed dvd discs.

Though this wouldn't be a very useful drive, if it can't read dvd-r and dvd-rw discs. Many of the remaining dvd-r and dvd-rw american and european patents will expire in 2020/2021+


This is from looking at the patent expiry dates on various long lists of dvd specific patents.

 

[Towergrove]

In principle, at this time I'm guessing anybody can probably make a patent-free computer dvd drive that can only read pressed dvd discs.

Though this wouldn't be a very useful drive, if it can't read dvd-r and dvd-rw discs. Many of the remaining dvd-r and dvd-rw american and european patents will expire in 2020/2021+


This is from looking at the patent expiry dates on various long lists of dvd specific patents.

I thought patents can be renewed and if not renewed it opens up the market so anyone can make them? According to legals "No one else can manufacture or sell your invention unless you give permission. ... Depending on what you've invented, your patent will expire in either 14 or 20 years. When this occurs, anyone can copy your idea and market it. When a patent expires, the protection it offers ceases to exist."

 

[jcroy]

I thought patents can be renewed and if not renewed it opens up the market so anyone can make them? According to legals "No one else can manufacture or sell your invention unless you give permission. ... Depending on what you've invented, your patent will expire in either 14 or 20 years. When this occurs, anyone can copy your idea and market it. When a patent expires, the protection it offers ceases to exist."

The older dvd patents were easier to understand the expiry dates. IIRC if they were first filed before mid-1995, the maximum american patent duration was 20 years from the date of the first filing, for many of the older dvd patents. These have expired already. After mid-1995, the maximum american patent duration was less precise. (Though it appears the maximum duration was still 20 years from the date of the first filing).

As for "renewals" for already existing patents, I get the impression it doesn't always change the expiry date. In the various lists of dvd patents, some of the updates (at later dates) were filed after the original patent was already granted. For quite a few of these "renewals/updates", the expiry date was still the same as the original patent.

In the case of dvd-r and dvd-rw patents, many of these were filed and/or granted after y2k.

 

[jcroy]

Anyways I strongly suspect the patent-free status for dvd in the very near future, will probably not make much of a difference when it comes to the market. Current internal computer dvd drive models and generic standalone dvd players are already at rock bottom prices around $20 a pop (or less).

Other than the manufacturer saving a few dollars on not having to pay dvd patent royalties anymore, most likely such generic computer dvd drives and standalone dvd players will still be $20 a pop in the near future. (Or just tracking inflation).

 

[jcroy]

The big thing that being patent-free entails, is that the original patent holders can't simply "bury" something and take it completely off the market.

For example, the patent holders for HD-DVD can keep it buried and off the market until all the relevant patents expire (probably sometime in 2030). Though in the case of HD-DVD, it wouldn't matter anyways.

Hypothetically if the bluray patent holders wanted to take bluray completely off the market and bury it for good, in principle they can do it easily. Basically recalling and destroying all the unsold inventory and not allowing anything further to be manufactured via enforcing the patents. In such a market, only the already existing players and discs in private hands will still be around. With time, the number of functional players will decrease until all the relevant patents expire sometime after 2030.

 

[mark27b]

This year, for some reason, season 4 of “Fear The Walking Dead” has only thus far been released in Europe.

Amazon USA yesterday had the Blu-ray as
Release date March 5, 2019
and was available to pre-order but now says not available

 

[mark27b]

In the U.K. the 97 year old company HMV, the last joint B&M and online dedicated physical media retailer, went into bankruptcy again in early 2019 as it did in 2013

This is the main price matching comparison for physical media on Amazon UK

https://www.nme.com/news/music/could-hmv-be-saved-after-all-2431758/amp

 

[Towergrove]

Anyways I strongly suspect the patent-free status for dvd in the very near future, will probably not make much of a difference when it comes to the market. Current internal computer dvd drive models and generic standalone dvd players are already at rock bottom prices around $20 a pop (or less).

Other than the manufacturer saving a few dollars on not having to pay dvd patent royalties anymore, most likely such generic computer dvd drives and standalone dvd players will still be $20 a pop in the near future. (Or just tracking inflation).

Isnt it possible that we will see very inexpensive region free players. These manufacturers will not be required to conform to any of the region locking if they choose not to.

 

[jcroy]

Isnt it possible that we will see very inexpensive region free players. These manufacturers will not be required to conform to any of the region locking if they choose not to.

Probably the only difference is that they can actually officially publish instructions to change the region on a standalone dvd player.

In the case of computer dvd drives, this would mean removing/disabling the region check altogether. Though with computer dvd drives being so inexpensive these days (ie. $20 a pop or less), one can already just buy a second dvd drive and set the region to something else.

For example if somebody living in america (region1) buys a lot of european (or japanese) released region2 dvd titles, they can already buy a second computer dvd drive and set it ro region2. (Their first primary computer dvd drive is set to region1).

 

[stringbean]

It's also predicted, and only a prediction mind at this stage that the next Gen Xbox, known as Scarlet and the SONY PS5 will not come with DVD/Blu-ray Drives!! It's affecting the gaming industry too.