WebJunction

I continue to track the field, lightly, and will run an update when there's enough activity to matter. So far, it's same-old, same-old, except that multiple manufacturers now have Blu-ray players out and reviews have suggested that one of the best, and definitely the cheapest, Blu-ray players is the PlayStation 3. Oh, and the quality-reduction feature in the Samsung player's been fixed. Otherwise: It continues to be the case that public libraries can safely ignore both formats, probably for some time to come.

That sounds exactly right (both asking your patrons--and the response you got). It doesn't help that so many early HD DVD and Blu-ray releases are, to be charitable, mediocre flicks.

There's a really tricky element here--not libraries' concern, but tricky: The evidence that a very large percentage of HDTV owners don't actually get HDTV, and some don't realize that they're not seeing high-def. If you don't see the difference in regular TV (which, of course, you won't if you're not actually watching HD), you're not going to care about the potential difference in DVDs, which are already better than broadcast quality.

I'm in an odd position here: I'm following the technology, partly because I think I did a pretty good job on DVD a while back--but we don't own an HDTV and probably won't for another year or two. The penalty for buying a superior TV a decade ago: It still looks awfully good.

One interesting benefit for libraries may emerge from the HD stuff: If the coating Blu-ray factories use to protect discs is retrofitted to DVDs, it might substantially improve their durability, which is mostly a library issue.

Blog post: "It's official: Toshiba announces HD DVD surrender" --
http://crave.cnet.com/8301-1_105-9874199-1.html


Press Release: "Toshiba Announces Discontinuation of HD DVD Businesses" --
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080219/20080219005651.html

Yup. The manufacturers get to sell us new equipment and the media companies get to sell us new copies of what we already own.

It's hard to know how this is going to end ... but I suspect the consumers will wind up paying (again) for a long, long time.

On the other hand, this is also driven by "newer" and "better" -- both of which may be valid claims. I certainly enjoy Blu-ray on a big screen HD TV when my son graciously loans his Playstation 3 for the purpose.

I don't see how Blu-Ray could be forced. The player price went up once the alternative dropped out of the format race and the average Blu-Ray costs something like 3 times a regular DVD (which I see as a public library opportunity!).

An upgrade DVD player does yield a pretty good picture.

On the other hand, there was a note somewhere (Slashdot?) that led to a link from a Sony press release stating that they would have 50% of the market within 2 years. I doubt it ... unless they're talking about "retail value" rather than raw number of discs ... and then I still doubt it.

Hi Walt,

I'm no doubt parroting the "3X" figure from something else I read ... that might be 3X the average DVD since there are an awful lot of $2 DVDs out there bring down the average.

What do you think of the recent "flash" tech coming down the pike? Supposedly, there's something new out there that's *very* dense and *very* stable ... but far enough out in development that the media companies would have time to milk the Blu-Ray market before it's succeeded.

Interesting.... I would say thought that from a very practical perspective I now plan to buy a Sony PS3 which I will use to play both DVD's (including Blu-Ray) and games. Seems like the exact same sort of decision most libraries would be wise to consider, especially if they need new DVD players (that they could then use for multitasking on a gmae night, eh?).

Exactly. 4% of a library's community is enough to be worth serving--especially now that Blu-rays are frequently available for $20 or less (and even the newest are coming down in price).

I'm gratified that my predictions--of lower player prices--were true, but hardly surprised. Now, that name-brand DVD players are now typically $200 to $299...that's a surprise. (By name-brand I mean actual manufacturers--Sony, Pioneer, Panasonic, etc.--as opposed to shell brands like Westinghouse and Magnavox.)

At this point, PS3s are in fact substantially more expensive than rock-bottom Blu-ray drives--but they're faster than most, more capable than most, and I suppose you could play games on them too.

As to the cited article: Pundits are paid to provide punditry. The fact--and this is simply a fact--that U.S. broadband infrastructure can't really handle on-demand true high-def movies on a large scale is irrelevant to good pundits. The fact (and this, too, appears to be a fact) that most people really don't "get" high-def is more significant, and mostly means that plain ol' DVD isn't anywhere near dying.

Now, let's say that ebooks had 4% of the U.S. book market. Can you imagine the crowing there would be over this incredible level of success? DVDs took a long time to be fully established. I don't believe Blu-ray will wholly replace DVD unless studios do something stupid and potentially suicidal (like stopping DVD production). But that doesn't mean Blu-ray is dead. (Actually, anyone who says 4% is an unsupportably tiny niche should talk to Steve Jobs about the unsupportability of a 4% market share...)

FWIW, a NYT article -- "Blu-ray’s Fuzzy Future" By MATT RICHTEL and BRAD STONE
Published: January 5, 2009 -- http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/05/technology/05bluray.html

Which is true for some people, not for others, but pundits seem to have a problem with situations that aren't black and white.

I composed a comment on the NYT piece earlier, but WebJunction apparently rejected it (unclear why). Briefly, the pundit who says optical discs are all going away in a few years is almost certainly wrong unless "a few" translates to ten-15 years. (Netflix' CEO, who understands this stuff, thinks downloads might pass DVDs for movie-length material in another decade or more.) The person who says Blu-ray probably won't entirely replace DVD, and may never actually surpass it, is probably right--but that doesn't keep Blu-ray from being a success. Unless, of course, "success" requires market domination. (How many folks call the Macintosh a failure, with 5% of the market? None that I know of.)

I use the "Target test," checking my local Target occasionally to see how space in the music-and-videos sector is allocated. What I see there is that Blu-ray has more than twice the shelf space it had three months ago, and roughly one-fifth of the total movie space. That's hardly a sign of failure.

Library question, where real-world feedback would be great to have: Does the hardcoat on Blu-ray actually make the discs more durable than DVDs? It should...but "should" is a tricky word.