The HD-DVD/Blu-Ray War: Has Blu-Ray won?

[stumpy]

In addition to just being better technology, part of the success of DVD over VHS lay in consumer features beyond just higher quality. There were better viewing features (zoom, jump-to-scene, etc.), and many bonus content features easily accessed by a menu. Those were all cool extras that DVD viewers had over VHS tape viewers and I think they drove people to switch.

But, and this is a big deal, most of those things became available without having to create too much more in the way of new content. For instances: the movie was still the movie; the director's/actors' commentary was pretty easy to do (aside from negotiations, which quickly became part of the deal at inception); other movies' trailers were already available (and were already becoming part of VHS movies as an advertising opportunity); and even the deleted scenes/outtakes/bloopers were already there on film somewhere. So, most of the added value to consumers in terms of new content features for DVDs were already available after some editing, often sitting on the cutting-room floor, so to speak.

With Blu-Ray, though, some real additional effort will be required to add something substantial for consumers, besides the HD format. I don't know that the standard extra twenty or thirty minutes of material (plus a commentary audio track) will give Blu-Ray the success that DVD enjoys in terms of prompting people to switch. Will studios and other principals want to go through the effort of including the feature plus a director's cut on each disc? Will movie-makers want to provide basically a whole world of features with each movie, sort of like Peter Jackson / New Line did with the LoTR extended editions?

Don't get me wrong, I think people will switch. That's especially true as the price comes down and more people get HD TV sets. But, I think well before the time people have converted in the numbers they have from VHS to DVD, some better technology will have taken hold.

[thalaw2]

Looks like Toshiba may throw in the towel:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080217/tc_nm/toshiba_hd_dvd_dc;_ylt=AjSga.x2CZSUuHpOoH_Wb5IjtBAF


I remember the first DVD movie I ever saw....It was in my second or third year of college and the movie could be viewed from 3 different angles.  DDD never looked so good.

[GogglesPizanno]

With Blu-Ray, though, some real additional effort will be required to add something substantial for consumers, besides the HD format. I don't know that the standard extra twenty or thirty minutes of material (plus a commentary audio track) will give Blu-Ray the success that DVD enjoys in terms of prompting people to switch. Will studios and other principals want to go through the effort of including the feature plus a director's cut on each disc? Will movie-makers want to provide basically a whole world of features with each movie, sort of like Peter Jackson / New Line did with the LoTR extended editions?

Thats my problem with all the new content options and online features etc... is that about 90% of "special features" are crap.
There are definitely disks that have some worthwhile extras, but even those are bogged down often with 5 other HBO "documentary" fluff pieces originally designed as a marketing tool when the movie was still in theaters. Big freakin whoop. I don't watch most of that now.

When you can fit 10x the lame stuff. Thats just 10x the lame stuff I don't care about.

I will upgrade (someday) primarily for the quality. They have done nothing yet (except in a few specific instances) to show me that all these new web features or storage capability is anything more than space for them to try and sell me something or fill for the sake of filling (we've included every news story about the film from Entertainment Tonight's archives).

This whole thing reminds me of when my company upgrades MS Office. We upgrade cause its now more compatible with some of our newer systems, but in doing so, we get all these other improvements that rarely seem to actually improve anything.

[Ares_God_of_War]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080219/ap_on_hi_te/blu_ray_triumph