Blu Ray is winning the format war but as unsuspecting consumers who have not done their homework discover that their new Blu Ray players are already obsolete what then? Will consumers feel tricked? Some will not care because you can still watch Blu Ray movies on a it's 1.0 standard. But others will wonder why they should buy a new machine to enjoy features such as Picture In Picture (PIP), connect to the internet and download additional content, and take part in community screening, all which is currently offered now in the cheaper to produce HD DVD format. Time will tell but I predict a backlash against Sony in particular as some consumers will undoubtably feel that they have been taken for a ride. A ride back to the store so they can pick up another Blu Ray player for still more of their hard earned money.

Ray, Las Veags, Nevada, USA

What will you do when hundreds of gigabytes of movies on your set-top box, PC hard-drive failed? What will you do when your internet connection is having problems or the movie download service is down just when you’re having the family around to watch movie? It is not as convenient as you make it out to be. Instead of relying on some sort of software to find a movie, you simply pick one at a store, pull one off your shelf, or from under the bed and start watching!

On top of that, you don’t download the true high-definition movies from these services, but rather compressed movie file that looks like an upscaled DVD, with average audio quality, loss of depth, lack of features and whatnot that a physical media with vast amount of space offers. The technology has not progressed far nor penetrated many homes either. For all the pie in the sky promoted by various ISPs, etc, it will be YEARS before they really get there even in within the US.

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Dew, London,

I think blu ray Is the same as HD DVD so why cant we just have both? We have MickyD's And Burgerking, Microsoft and apple, directtv and dish network. Why cant there be HD DVD and Blu Ray??? The only thing that really bothers me about it is that Sony is not working fast enough to develop the format to its full potential. So not that I favor either one of them but if sony is going to screw everyone 3 or 4 times before the players are right then why choose blu?

Randy, Strasburg, VA

You still have to pay for digital downloads. Just like DVD is cheaper than Blu-ray, SD downloads are cheaper than HD ones, but both expire after a certain time. You'd never own a DL unless you bought it. DL still take a long time to DL and take up HDD storage space. Thus the reason why everyone buys CD, DVD, Blu-ray anyway, to own that small piece of the media and hold onto it. What better way to own it than in Blu-ray. Digital downloads is not going to be the wave of the future but only something people will do to watch something they don't care about owning.

Al, Chicago, USA

I feel sorry for the HD-DVD owners saying they will go back to DVD. I had a CDi but when that failed I didn't go back to VHS to spite DVD. So wake up HD-DVD fanboys the futures here and its Blu

Rich, Walsall, West Mid's

Nobody cares. 95% of people have sufficient quality with DVDD.
This is *not* VHS vs DVD.

Steven, Oldham, UK

With regards to digital downloads - even if the infrastructure for ultra high speed broadband was available, what happens when you can't get online for whatever reason?

Exactly....no film.

Sathnam, stick to the business news mate.

Taz, Manchester, UK

Great stat of the 28% over 65 market. This completely illustrates the point that hi tech companies are doomed because that can't seem to grasp the senior citizen market.

Frank, Phoenix, AZ,

Its funny how people predict that "this will be the very last phisical format", due to the media downloads.
But the sin of these people is to predict the way the world will behave, like if everyone on were like them: surrounded by the most recent technology.
What they forget, however, is that not everyone has the most powerful PC model, or is paying high bucks to hire the fastest internet service availiable. Actually a huge lot of people still don't even have a PC at home. But this won't stop them of watching the movies, when they can simply go to the nearest rental store. Prolbem solved.
And if even in developed countries like England and USA things can be like that, wonder how it is like in the rest of world. It is a really huge market, and cannot simply be ingored.
The reality is that ultra-broad band still isn't isntalled everywhere yet, and where it is, it still is expensive. It still has a lot to evolve, and it will still take several years.
Meanwhile, Blu-Ray fills the gap.

Leonardo, Sao Paulo, Brazil

it will be a hollow victory for sony. whoever had 500 million usd to pay to warner would have invested it best in digital downloads. i am completely optical disk free and i'm not even an early adopter. toshiba is into hard disks big time and that's where content is going.

tom french, korschenbroich, germany

"..but..but..digital downloads!"

Harley, TN,

This is exactly the way I see it as well. The High Definition DVD format needed to be cheap enough to attract more adopters and Sonys Blu Ray never will be cheap enough. HD-DVD might have been able to do this as it costs considerably less to manufacture and uses a lot of the existing processes used now in the making of Standard DVD players and disks.
If the price of Hi Def players isn't near to that of standard players then people won't bother and will skip them all together and start using digital streaming/downloads. I get about 30% of my HI Def TV this way already. I really hope Blu Ray doesn't win or HI DEF DVD players will become uneconomic & pointess to own.

Jon, huntingdon, UK

How will Blu-ray only use half of it's disc capacitry, there are already BD-50's out on the market, with Adam Sandlers Click being the first a long time ago. Sorry, but you sound like a HD-DVD fanboy to me, this article is full of it.

Jay, Lancashire, UK

"could be bad news for the company because it will distract it from the real task of developing digital download systems"- that is stupid because broadband across the world has not developed enough for people to be downloading 25gb 1080p video files

daffo, shepparton, AUS

blu-ray is the winner. Live with it. You can spin all you want, but still blu-ray is the winner. Nice meeting you hd-dvd's fanboy, time to move on.

Guest, Chicago, USA

im getting sick of all these theories, all these what ifs. all these pointless articles that go against what the wide consensus is.

- "blu ray has won"
- "blu ray may be worse off"
- "how hd dvd can benefit now that the war seems over"

all these silly theories to give either side hope or leverage in arguments.

stefan, Adelaide,

"Blu-ray is out selling its rival HD-DVD almost two to one. "

This is pretty unimpressive when you consider there are something like 10 times as many blu-ray playing devices in the market.

"everyone thought nobody is willing to abandon their huge VHS collection in favour of a new technology when we have seen simalar media in the past like laser disc fail to replace the trusted VHS."

Do you have any idea what you're talking about. Laser disc existed LONG before VHS. It was not some NEW technology that came along to battle VHS. It had pretty well died before VHS had even beat betamax. Do a little reading before you type something that makes you look like you're 15 years old.

All that being said, its clear blu-ray will be the winner. The question this article poses, and justifiably so, is what exactly is blu-ray winning? Depending on how long it takes for consumers to adopt the format (likely it will take YEARS). It wasn't until 2003 that DVD finally outpaced VHS install base.

vc, new york, new york

In regards to Jason's comments:
I don't see how you need to download 25GB of a movie if you don't care about all the special features or the multi language support.

If I just want the main feature in 720p, English DD 5.1 that isn't going to be 25GB. I think this may be the point he is trying to make with digital downloads. Similar to downloading mp3's, you don't get the cool album art etc, you just get the meat and potatoes.


(Full disclosure, I own a Toshiba A3 ;-) )

mgreene, Boston, MA

I totally disagree with your statements. First off, Blu-Ray is NOT just a Sony product. It is the product of a myriad of companies in which Sony played a large part. (Whereas HD DVD was basically Toshiba and Microsoft.)

Physical Media vs. Downloaded Media is an altogether differnent topic. Is Apple currently producing high quality hardware? YES. Miraculously, they are also doing downloaded media with Itunes. They are doing BOTH just fine. Has digital media downloads REALLY killed the Compact Disc? NO.

If the future is downloaded media, and one of your key points is that 28% of those over the age of 65 AND only 57% have internet access (of which, how many of them have HIGH BANDWIDTH access?) how do you propose that the other 72% of those over 65 and the other 43% get their downloaded media? With that one statement, you've contradicted the possiblity of downloads BEING the future. Odd, indeed.

Blu-Ray is the future.... either hop on board, or be left behind.

Frankly, Denver, USA

If your mom is just now discovering the cd then.... well she has many problems deeper than her deciding blu-ray to hd-dvd or blu-ray to digital download. I for one and everyone else I know doesn't want to have all of our movies on a hard drive. I want the physical copy that I can hold and take anywhere I go if I want. Digital downloads for movies have been hyped for quite a while now and I for one won't jump on that bandwagon. My 1080p Blu-rays are all I need. And if I was a hd-dvd supporter I would say the same thing about that format. I won't download my movies just to see my hard drive crash!

Christopher, Milwaukee, WI

Heh, i'll mark your words alright.....EPIC FAIL.

Have fun waiting for your HD movie download to finish....hmm...3-4 days from now.

Your God, Heavenly Earth, Anywhere

this article doesn't make any sense! Sounds like a guy bought a HD-DVD player last week and now whining about it.

Sony is a well run company.Sony unlike Apple and Microsoft, which talk about online download all the time but don't have any content business of their own, in this regard, Sony has a big advantage. Sony Pictures studio is number one movie studio in 2006 with 18% market create movies like Spiderman, Superbad and many more.

Another thing is physical distribution channel like Walmart and Target. If online download take off, they will stand loose like few billions dollars out of 50 billion DVD market. Do u think Walmart and Target will support Microsoft and Apple?

I predict physical distribution channels will side with Sony on this one. This will start to show in the hardware front. U can't download hardware. Sathnam Sanghera, take out your fork and knife, you are going to eat your words.

smoothn00dle, brisbane, queen

You thought Debbie Gibson would be the biggest frmale artist? You were wrong it was MADONNA.

pj, colorado, usa

Success is the greatest failure any company can hope for. Clearly consumers won't have all the benefits of the format war, and will be stuck with a unified choice for HD video until the government gives us T1 lines.

Sometime, just for fun, you should try to download 25 Gigabytes of data to view a movie ,and then do a report on how the internet will change movie viewing forever.

Jason, Los Angeles, USA/ California

Good article, good points. Just one thing: Betamx survived as the industry standard in video production. Consumers weren't using it, studios and broadcasters were. It was killed by the shift to digital technologies by Sony, Panasonic and Toshiba, the big three in studio systems and transmission.

Gareth Pughe, Tokyo,

360 fanboy

guf, huton, pariz

--- "Blu-ray’s victory will be a hollow one" ---

--- "Blu-ray might well turn out to be the worst thing that ever happened to the Japanese electronics company" ---

I disagree with your statements!

Blu-ray is out selling its rival HD-DVD almost two to one.
For example I own two pieces of Blu-ray hardware (Playstation 3 and an Alienware Laptop with the drive fitted) and I have no HD-DVD players nor do I intend to own one.

When DVD's first came onto the market everyone thought nobody is willing to abandon their huge VHS collection in favour of a new technology when we have seen simalar media in the past like laser disc fail to replace the trusted VHS. Right now my VHS collection is in storage and has been for 5 years.

The issue with digital download systems and that Sony must work on developing their own is a good point but with the format wars between Blu-ray and HD - DVD going to end much quicker than expected in my opinion.

Krishan Veerappa, Wakefield, UK