The Format War

[Fading]

Okay I understand that but how does making hybrid discs help out either format? If anything it will just prolong it.

IMO it doesn't help out anyone other than the ones making the hybrid that want a cut of both sides without having to be exclusive. It probably will prolong things further, but probably won't affect the outcome overall. My guess is it'll only be a small percent that buy into them.

The majority of the ppl that seem to know about them on forums like this are the ones who don't want to buy into either BR or HD so their looking for different format. So if a lot of the ppl that buy it aren't buying BR or HD exclusives anyway it probably won't hurt either of their sales much.

Your average consumer doesn't surf around checking out news on either format, let alone buy comp or game magazines to hear the news. Unless they come out with a commercial for it most ppl will be oblivious to it, atleast with BR and HD ppl have seen the commercials or heard word of mouth and can atleast recognize the name.

 

[imdaly]

Still tho, comparing Beta vs. VHS, and HD vs. Blu-Ray is completely inaccurate. Blu-Ray isn't like Beta, and neither is HD. This won't be decided by porn, which both carry, and is far easier and more often gotten via internet. The only similarity between BR and Beta is that Sony's backing it, most consumers don't have that bitter hate for Sony that has been increased this generation by game fans.

As for hybrids, I just don't see them working IMO. Take a movie rental place, they have space set aside for DVD's, and now Blu-Ray's and HD-DVD's, would they have to set aside a new spot for hybrids? If they did release hybrid's too, then it would be fighting for the same sales HD and BR are fighting for, so eventually one of those two would fail sales wise. If they stopped producing HD exclusive movies, then what's the point of a hybrid? Why not just release BR's at that point? Most ppl are going to choose one or the other after their done with DVD's, and most are already confused enough by what the differences are as it is and being introduced to another disk (even if it's simplistic, a new inbetween format will confuse most consumers even more) will just put more ppl off on it.

I agree completely.

The goal of hybrids is supposed to give the consumer the confidence in buying their discs, so that they don't have to worry about their discs one day not working in whatever format player that ends up taking over.

Unfortunately, it also would mean that everyone has a disc that has another side to it that they'll never use, and they'd still have to pay for it anyway.

I can see what they're trying to do with this, but it's just not the answer.

 

[Kritish]

Still tho, comparing Beta vs. VHS, and HD vs. Blu-Ray is completely inaccurate. Blu-Ray isn't like Beta, and neither is HD. This won't be decided by porn, which both carry, and is far easier and more often gotten via internet. The only similarity between BR and Beta is that Sony's backing it, most consumers don't have that bitter hate for Sony that has been increased this generation by game fans.

As for hybrids, I just don't see them working IMO. Take a movie rental place, they have space set aside for DVD's, and now Blu-Ray's and HD-DVD's, would they have to set aside a new spot for hybrids? If they did release hybrid's too, then it would be fighting for the same sales HD and BR are fighting for, so eventually one of those two would fail sales wise. If they stopped producing HD exclusive movies, then what's the point of a hybrid? Why not just release BR's at that point? Most ppl are going to choose one or the other after their done with DVD's, and most are already confused enough by what the differences are as it is and being introduced to another disk (even if it's simplistic, a new inbetween format will confuse most consumers even more) will just put more ppl off on it.

It doesn’t matter, at this moment some films are carried on blu-ray (Casino Royal) and some on HD (Children of men). Besides, it would be my luck I’d buy the format that’s going to lose. That’s the only similarity I’m trying to use.

 

[Zenien]

Not too long after Blu-ray discs reached the 1 million milestone, Blu-ray.com reports that Sony's high-definition format extended its dominating hand to Europe.

Less than two months have passed since the PS3's release in Europe, and Blu-ray has already taken over HD-DVD in the sales race. 64% (and rising) of the high-def movie sales is owned by Sony, with a ratio of 3-to-1 against Microsoft.

Top executives went as far as saying that there is no format war outside the US: Blu-ray takes the cake hands down. It's not difficult to imagine that European sales will come close to Japanese numbers, where 96% of HD movies sold are Blu-ray.

http://www.qj.net/Blu-ray-takes-the-victory-in-Europe/pg/49/aid/93119

 

[TheBat812]

Good to hear, i just want this silly war to end so we can have a definitive next-gen standard. Not to mention, it's the superior format.

 

[Zenien]

Week ending May 27, 2007

Week: Blu-ray 69 HD DVD 31
YTD: Blu-ray 67 HD DVD 33
SI: Blu-ray 58 HD DVD 42

1. Pirates of the Caribbean DMC BD 100.00
2. Pirates of the Caribbean CBP BD 89.35
3. Apocalypto BD 73.73
4. Ultimate Matrix Collection HD 33.28
5. Letters from Iwo Jima BD 26.68
6. Complete Matrix Trilogy HD 25.88
7. Letters from Iwo Jima 22.06
8. Planet Earth HD 17.55
9. Casino Royale BD 13.64
10. Flags of Our Fathers BD 11.86

http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom060307/index.php

 

[hippie_hunter]

If it weren't for the Matrix (which will eventually get a blu-ray release someday), blu-ray would have crushed HD-DVD completely.

 

[Zenien]

Probably. HD-DVD was getting awfully close these past few weeks though like 50/40 split, when it was getting like twice as many releases. We'll see if that trend continues after the pirates Matrix releases or is goes back to the 60/30 70/30 splits.

 

[imdaly]

If it weren't for the Matrix (which will eventually get a blu-ray release someday), blu-ray would have crushed HD-DVD completely.

And if it weren't for "Pirates...", HD DVD would have crushed Blu-ray completely.

Week ending May 27, 2007

Week: Blu-ray 69 HD DVD 31
YTD: Blu-ray 67 HD DVD 33
SI: Blu-ray 58 HD DVD 42

1. Pirates of the Caribbean DMC BD 100.00 MSRP $34.99
2. Pirates of the Caribbean CBP BD 89.35 MSRP $34.99
3. Apocalypto BD 73.73 MSRP $39.99
4. Ultimate Matrix Collection HD 33.28 MSRP $119.99
5. Letters from Iwo Jima BD 26.68 MSRP $34.99
6. Complete Matrix Trilogy HD 25.88 MSRP $99.99
7. Letters from Iwo Jima HD 22.06 MSRP $39.99
8. Planet Earth HD 17.55 MSRP $99.99
9. Casino Royale BD 13.64 MSRP $39.99
10. Flags of Our Fathers BD 11.86 MSRP $39.99

http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom060307/index.php

Notice that 3 of those HD DVD titles are all expensive $99+ boxsets. Also notice that the "Pirates" movies outsold the "Matrix" boxsets by about a 3:1 ratio...which actually evens things out when you realize that the "Matrix" boxsets each contained 3 movies and cost 3 times as much to buy.

Also, keep in mind that the "Pirates" movies made a combined sale of roughly 47,000 copies. It just goes to show how early we still are in this format war.

Probably. HD-DVD was getting awfully close these past few weeks though like 50/40 split, when it was getting like twice as many releases. We'll see if that trend continues after the pirates Matrix releases or is goes back to the 60/30 70/30 splits.

How exactly does a 50/40 split work out?


Anyway, let's take a quick look at what each format has on its horizon so for this summer...

June 5, 2007
- Blood Diamond (WB)
- Bruce Springsteen with the Sessions Band: Live in Dublin (Sony)
- Coming to America (Paramount)
- Coming to America (Paramount)
- The Cowboys (WB)
- The Cowboys (WB)
- Hellboy (Sony)
- The Messengers (Sony)
- Norbit (Paramount)
- Norbit (Paramount)
- Rescue Me: Season 3 (Sony)
- Rio Bravo (WB)
- Rio Bravo (WB)
- Trading Places (Paramount)
- Trading Places (Paramount)

June 12, 2007
- Black Christmas (Weinstein)
- Blood & Chocolate (Sony)
- Born on the Fourth of July (Universal)
- Breach (Universal)
- Bruce Almighty (Universal)
- Cruel Intentions (Sony)
- Daddy's Little Girls (Lionsgate)
- Daylight (Universal)
- Ghost Rider (Sony)
- Harsh Times (Weinstein)
- Liar Liar (Universal)
- Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (Universal)
- Music and Lyrics (WB)
- Music and Lyrics (WB)
- Primeval (Disney)
- Seven Years in Tibet (Sony)
- Sneakers (Universal)
June 19, 2007
- Bridge to Terebithia (Disney)

June 26, 2007
- American Me (Universal)
- Army of Darkness (Non-Combo Re-Issue) (Universal)
- Being John Malkovich (Universal)
- The Big Lebowski (Universal)
- Black Snake Moan (Paramount)
- Black Snake Moan (Paramount)
- Bulletproof (Universal)
- Dead Silence (Universal)
- Deep Purple: Live at Montreux 2006 (Rhino)
- Freedom: Vol. 1 (Bandai Visual)
- Hustle and Flow (Paramount)
- Hustle and Flow (Paramount)
- Mallrats (Universal)
- Meet Joe Black (Universal)
- Mystery Men (Universal)
- Santana: Hymns for Peace - Live at Montreux 2004 (Rhino)
- Unleashed (Non-Combo Re-Issue) (Universal)
- The Watcher (Universal)
- Yes: Live at Montreux (Rhino)

July 3, 2007
- Blood Diamond (WB)
- Flatliners (Sony)
- The Patriot: Extended Cut (Sony)
- Untouchables (Paramount)
- Untouchables (Paramount)
- The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)
- The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

July 10, 2007
- Billy Madison (Universal)
- Dante's Peak (Universal)
- IMAX: Blue Planet (WB)
- IMAX: Blue Planet (WB)
- The War (Universal)
- The Wedding Date (Universal)

July 17, 2007
- Premonition (Sony)
- Waiting... (Lionsgate)
- Wild Things (Sony)

July 24, 2007
- The Bourne Identity (Universal)
- The Contract (First Look)
- Ghost (Paramount)
- Ghost (Paramount)
- The Host (Magnolia)
- The Host (Magnolia)
- Hot Fuzz (Universal)
- In Good Company (Universal)
- The Nutty Professor 2: The Klumps (Universal)
- An Officer and a Gentleman (Paramount)
- An Officer and a Gentleman (Paramount)
- Out for Justice (WB)
- Out for Justice (WB)
- Purple Rain (WB)
- Purple Rain (WB)
- Scent of a Woman (Universal)
- Streets of Fire (Universal)
- Weeds: Season Two (Lionsgate)

July 31, 2007
- 300 (WB)
- 300 (WB)
- Darkman (Universal)
- IMAX: Roving Mars (Disney)
- Sea of Love (Universal)
- Shaun of the Dead (Universal)
- Shooter (Paramount)
- Shooter (Paramount)

August 7, 2007
- Are We Done Yet? (Sony)
- Arlington Road (Sony)
- Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (Sony)
- TMNT (WB)
- TMNT (WB)

August 14, 2007
- Doctor Strange (Lionsgate)
- Erin Brockovich (Universal)
- The Lookout (Disney)
- Meet the Fockers (Universal)
- Mercury Rising (Universal)
- What Dreams May Come (Universal)
- Wild Hogs (Disney)

August 15, 2007
- Bell Witch: The Movie (Big River)
- Bell Witch: The Movie (Big River)

August 21, 2007
- National Lampoon's Van Wilder (Lionsgate)

August 28, 2007
- Blades of Glory (Paramount)
- Blades of Glory (Paramount)
- Dawn of the Dead (Univeral)
- Face/Off (Paramount)
- Face/Off (Paramount)
- Heroes: Season One (Universal)
- The Hurricane (Universal)
- Notting Hill (Universal)

September 4, 2007
- Nip/Tuck: Season Four (WB)
- Nip/Tuck: Season Four (WB)

September 18, 2007
- Elizabeth (Universal)
- Jailhouse Rock (WB)
- Jailhouse Rock (WB)
- Viva Las Vegas (WB)
- Viva Las Vegas (WB)
- We Are Marshall (WB)
- We Are Marshall (WB)
- Zodiac (Paramount)
- Zodiac (Paramount)

October 23, 2007
- Scary Movie (Disney)

November 20, 2007
- The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause (Disney)


Broken down by which companies are releasing titles we have the following:

Big River - 1
Disney - 7
Fox - 0
Lionsgate - 5
Magnolia - 1
Paramount - 13
Sony - 15
WB - 13
Total - 55
Total Blu-ray Exclusives - 27

Bandai Visual - 1
Big River - 1
First Look - 1
Magnolia - 1
Paramount - 13
Rhino - 3
Universal - 40
WB - 13
Weinstein - 2
Total - 75
Total HD DVD Exclusives - 49


Look at that! 55 titles announced for Blu-ray 75 for HD DVD...40 of which are from HD DVD-only Universal! In fact, with all the so-called "studio support" we're always hearing about Blu-ray reigning in, it's interesting to see that HD DVD actually has about TWICE as many exclusives announced for the rest of this summer as Blu-ray.

And where's Fox?? They don't have a single title announced! In fact, since Feb. 14th, the ONLY Blu-ray releases that Fox have had were "Eragon" on March 20th and "Night at the Museum" on April 24th!!


Studio support, indeed!

 

[BatMatt]

yea, at the moment. Dates can always be added in, and by the way you were spot on with Planet Earth. Mountains, Ice Worlds, and Deserts are my favorite thus far through six episodes. Those really show of the high definition capability. I love it

 

[Zenien]

Wow you are so annoying. I know if you get found out as a viral marketter you won't get paid and all but come on.

What happens when Universal runs out of old vault titles to burn through and hits the walls of the majority of all the big movies that people will actually want to buy are from BR exclusive studios?

 

[imdaly]

yea, at the moment. Dates can always be added in, and by the way you were spot on with Planet Earth. Mountains, Ice Worlds, and Deserts are my favorite thus far through six episodes. Those really show of the high definition capability. I love it

Yes, the dates could change. I wouldn't doubt it if both sides don't still have a couple titles still to announce for this summer. Heck, perhaps the Blu-ray studios will eventually get around to releasing some of the 31 titles that have been announced this year and then suddenly yanked "until further notice" at the last minute and never heard about again.

And I'm glad to hear you're enjoying "Planet Earth", too! It's freaking great!

Wow you are so annoying. I know if you get found out as a viral marketter you won't get paid and all but come on.

Lol. You do realize that I've been on these boards since early 2001, right? I would hope that you would be keen enough to know that there's no way I have any affiliation to any HD DVD or Blu-ray companies at all, other than that I work at a Circuit City and that I find this format war to be extremely entertaining (which is extremely sad, I know). :-P

What happens when Universal runs out of old vault titles to burn through and hits the walls of the majority of all the big movies that people will actually want to buy are from BR exclusive studios?

Well when Universal runs out of their gigantic library of films because they've already released them all on HD DVD, we'll find out, won't we? My guess? Before Universal is even close to running out of movies to offer all of the currently-exclusive Blu-ray studios will be supporting both...yes, even Sony.

 

[Zenien]

 

[TheBat812]

imdaly, i don't understand your point about Matrix costing a ****load. Even if it is making a similar amount of money, it's still getting outsold, and many more units for BD are being sold. If anything, that just makes it more apparent that so few people are buying HD-DVD discs.

 

[imdaly]

imdaly, i don't understand your point about Matrix costing a ****load. Even if it is making a similar amount of money, it's still getting outsold, and many more units for BD are being sold. If anything, that just makes it more apparent that so few people are buying HD-DVD discs.

Well there's a few points to be made about it.

First, is that, I'm sure the studios are probably interested in making money. If Store A sells 100 apples for $1 each, and Store B sells 33 apples for $3 each, is the sales from Store A any more impressive than Store B? Store A sold 3 times as many units as Store B, yes, but they both made $100.

Same goes for "Pirates" and "Matrix Trilogy". For every 3 "Pirates" sold, 1 "Matrix Trilogy" was sold. But for every 3 "Pirates" sold, it only took 1 "Matrix Trilogy" sale to equal those sales. So it's pretty safe to say that both "Pirates" and "Matrix" brought in roughly the same amount of revenue.



The other point I would make would be that since the "Matrix" movies were bundled into a boxset, that's sure to scare away those people who probably didn't want the two sequels, and only wanted the first one. So I'm willing to bet that there are a lot of buyers out there that are simply waiting for the first "Matrix" to be released on its own before they buy it.

The same cannot be said about the "Pirates" movies. Nobody was forced to buy both if they just wanted one of them. They could buy one, the other, or both. This makes it much easier to put down $35 for one movie, than it is to spend $99+ for 3, if you're not too crazy about 2/3 of the boxset.





And for the sake of fairness, I should point out that Sony has just announced "Vacancy" for a Blu-ray release on August 14th, so the new stats for this summer's upcoming releases are as follows:

-------------Blu-ray----HD DVD
Exclusives-----28---------49
Total----------56---------75

 

[BatMatt]

if HD-DVD doesn't close the gap this summer with that many more releases, it's not going to look good for that camp

 

[Fading]

Well there's a few points to be made about it.

First, is that, I'm sure the studios are probably interested in making money. If Store A sells 100 apples for $1 each, and Store B sells 33 apples for $3 each, is the sales from Store A any more impressive than Store B? Store A sold 3 times as many units as Store B, yes, but they both made $100.

Same goes for "Pirates" and "Matrix Trilogy". For every 3 "Pirates" sold, 1 "Matrix Trilogy" was sold. But for every 3 "Pirates" sold, it only took 1 "Matrix Trilogy" sale to equal those sales. So it's pretty safe to say that both "Pirates" and "Matrix" brought in roughly the same amount of revenue.



The other point I would make would be that since the "Matrix" movies were bundled into a boxset, that's sure to scare away those people who probably didn't want the two sequels, and only wanted the first one. So I'm willing to bet that there are a lot of buyers out there that are simply waiting for the first "Matrix" to be released on its own before they buy it.

The same cannot be said about the "Pirates" movies. Nobody was forced to buy both if they just wanted one of them. They could buy one, the other, or both. This makes it much easier to put down $35 for one movie, than it is to spend $99+ for 3, if you're not too crazy about 2/3 of the boxset.





And for the sake of fairness, I should point out that Sony has just announced "Vacancy" for a Blu-ray release on August 14th, so the new stats for this summer's upcoming releases are as follows:

-------------Blu-ray----HD DVD
Exclusives-----28---------49
Total----------56---------75

Flawed logic, it works on food, but not home owned movies.

If 3 people buy 3 $10 Blu-Ray movies, then that's 3 active customers. If 1 person buys one $30 HD-DVD movie then that's one active customer. Meaning that even if it's the same price, 3x as many BR disks were moving, and 3x more customers were actively purchasing movies for BR.

If anything that's bad for HD-DVD. The fact that such a hot series sold less means that the price drove many ppl away and only the core Matrix fans seem to have bought it. Don't get me wrong, I like Matrix (1 more than 2 &3 or course), but it should have moved more copies.

Let's put it this way, I open a circus right across the street from another circus. I charge $5 a customer, and my competitor charges $15. I get 45 butts in my seat, and my competitor gets 15. We get the same money, but I have a full house who can spread word of mouth. I have 3x the base amount of ppl watching my show compared to the competitor's base. Food is a stand alone item, you buy an apple and that's it, you eat it and are done with it. Movies mean that someone has to have a player to watch it on, the more active the buy base of a movie system, the more customers are currently interested in that medium. If ppl aren't buying HD movies, then it doesn't matter if they made equal money because the movie cost more, it means they don't have as active of a base purchasing.

 

[Duende Verde]

If anything that's bad for HD-DVD. The fact that such a hot series sold less means that the price drove many ppl away and only the core Matrix fans seem to have bought it. Don't get me wrong, I like Matrix (1 more than 2 &3 or course), but it should have moved more copies.

Plus, isn't a lower price supposed to be one of HD-DVD's advantages?

 

[Zenien]

Notice that 3 of those HD DVD titles are all expensive $99+ boxsets. Also notice that the "Pirates" movies outsold the "Matrix" boxsets by about a 3:1 ratio...which actually evens things out when you realize that the "Matrix" boxsets each contained 3 movies and cost 3 times as much to buy.

Also, keep in mind that the "Pirates" movies made a combined sale of roughly 47,000 copies. It just goes to show how early we still are in this format war.

I'm really surprised to see you use this logic since it's so easily turned around on you. I would have taken a different approach where I in the HD-DVD camp.

Matrix is probably yhr biggest release HD-DVD has had, yes they are 99 dollar box sets but you're totally ignoring that, aside from Matrix, HD-DVD got destroyed this week by Blu Ray movies that aren't Matrix and don't have the brand power of the Matrix. Not a single regularly priced HD-DVD title had a decent showing aside from Planet Earth, why isn't the Blu Ray version of Planet Earth in the top ten? Probably because BR owners have other movies that people actually want to own in the mass market aside from Matrix.

We are still talking about the HD war appealing the the hardcore movie lovers, not the causals. I would have expected Matrix Trilogy to do a little better.

It's not impossible for Universal to retake the lead and win, but let's see what happens in 4th Quarter 2007:

- PS3 price cut will substantially boost sales along with hit games.
- Pirates 3, Spiderman 3, Simpsons, Die Hard 4, Silver Surfer *these will be big sellers in Q4 even if some are released in Q3*
- Much closer price gap between Blu-ray and HD DVD vs 4th Q 2006 (PS3 wasn't readily available in late 2006)


HD DVD has:
- Toshiba players possibly at $199
- Battlestar Galactica, Heroes, Bourne Ultimatum. And that's really it. Catalog titles don't sell for **** unless it's a blockbuster. And Universal isn't exactly loaded with blockbusters that don't happen to have Spielberg's name on it. And as we've seen with Matrix boxsets, they also don't sell so I don't expect Battlestar Galactica to sell well. Heroes will do well, and Bourne alright, but I think Spiderman 3 alone will outsell all of these combined.

Software sells hardware, typically. BR has the big mass market movies.

 

[imdaly]

Flawed logic, it works on food, but not home owned movies.

If 3 people buy 3 $10 Blu-Ray movies, then that's 3 active customers. If 1 person buys one $30 HD-DVD movie then that's one active customer. Meaning that even if it's the same price, 3x as many BR disks were moving, and 3x more customers were actively purchasing movies for BR.

Not necessarily. If the three $10 Blu-ray movies were all sold to the same person, then it would be 3x's the discs sold, but equal the amount of revenue and equal the amount of supporters.

The two "Pirates" movies sold about even between the two of them, which means that it's probably pretty safe to assume that most people who bought one movie bought the other, too (I know I would have). So I'd say that it's probably much closer to a 1.5:1 advantage in the number of unique customers for the "Pirates" movies as compared to the "Matrix" trilogies.

If anything that's bad for HD-DVD. The fact that such a hot series sold less means that the price drove many ppl away and only the core Matrix fans seem to have bought it. Don't get me wrong, I like Matrix (1 more than 2 &3 or course), but it should have moved more copies.

It's a $99+ boxset with 3 movies, 2 of which are widely considered to be very underwhelming movies to most people. How many people were you expecting to buy a whole trilogy of when so many people only like the first movie?

And how about the disappointment of the two "Pirates" movies, which are much newer, much more fresh in people's minds, were kid-friendly, and which were timed to release at the height of the hype for "Pirates 3"? The second movie was the 3rd Highest-grossing movie of all time worldwide just last summer, and is released on a format that is supported by the PS3 which has roughly 1.5 million owners in this country, and yet the two movies combined only sold about 47,000 copies? Is that not a disappointment, too??

Let's put it this way, I open a circus right across the street from another circus. I charge $5 a customer, and my competitor charges $15. I get 45 butts in my seat, and my competitor gets 15. We get the same money, but I have a full house who can spread word of mouth. I have 3x the base amount of ppl watching my show compared to the competitor's base. Food is a stand alone item, you buy an apple and that's it, you eat it and are done with it. Movies mean that someone has to have a player to watch it on, the more active the buy base of a movie system, the more customers are currently interested in that medium. If ppl aren't buying HD movies, then it doesn't matter if they made equal money because the movie cost more, it means they don't have as active of a base purchasing.

Going with the circus analogy, a more accurate analogy would be if you open two circuses (circi?) across the street from my one circus. Each circus of yours has a $5 admission. My circus sells their shows in 3-show packages for $15 per package. Your first circus sells 150 tickets, and most of those people went to see your other circus next door afterwards, selling another 150 tickets. My circus sold 100 ticket packages, and thus had 100 viewers each of the 3 shows. We both ended up earning $1,500, you just had 150% of the number of customers as I did.

 

[TheBat812]

Yes, but your analogy is not at all what we're tlaking about. Profit is really the smallest concern for Blu-ray and HD-DVD, they care about how many people have their products, because that will determine which system will win. Profits are completely irrelevant in this sense.

 

[imdaly]

Yes, but your analogy is not at all what we're tlaking about. Profit is really the smallest concern for Blu-ray and HD-DVD, they care about how many people have their products, because that will determine which system will win. Profits are completely irrelevant in this sense.

True, but it all ties together.

When studios see that something brought out on HD DVD can bring in just as much income as something on Blu-ray, they might start rethinking their being exclusive to Blu-ray. If, say, Lionsgate were to realize "hey, there's a lot of people on that side over there that would buy our stuff if we gave them the chance to buy it", and they start releasing HD DVDs, that then will add more sales to the HD DVD side, thus giving HD DVD an even better chance at winning.

The studios have got to start realizing how much money the HD DVD folks are ready to shell out. When one side has 1.5 million players out there, 6/8 major studios supporting it (4 exclusively), more CE companies supporting it, and a few more movies out there, how can you not wonder why it's only outselling it's competition by a 2:1 margin at best, when the competition is running on only maybe 200,000 players, only 4/8 major studios supporting it (2 exclusive), and basically Toshiba with the only players out there?

Blu-ray is outdoing HD DVD in studio support, CE support, number of movies out (though by not many), and by FAR by how many people have their players...yet HD DVD is trailing right behind.

The average HD DVD buyer is buying many more discs than the average Blu-ray buyer. And at times like this when the HD DVD players are at $300 each ($200 in some places) and stores like Circuit City and Best Buy are FINALLY advertising it, you'll see more and more people grab a player, and soon enough our strong "few" will be outselling Blu-ray once again.

 

[Timstuff]

Good lord your logic is annoying. You're essentially saying "HD-DVD is not losing by as much as I think it should, so studios are going to throw their support behind it!" If HD-DVD wasn't going down the tubes, Universal would not be its only serious backer. The USA is the only place where a format war even exists at this point.

When I look at the format war, this is what I see: the Blu-Ray camp came out with a superior format and full support from one of the game industry's key members, and now they're getting closer and closer each day to being the definitive next-gen format. But when I look at HD-DVD, I see Toshiba saturating the market with cheap players that no-one wants, and I see Universal flooding the market with almost every catalog title they can find, both in a last ditch effort to save the failing format that they both wanted to win so badly.

Toshiba wants HD-DVD to win because they want to keep the grip on the movie market that they've so comfortably had over the past 5 years. Universal wants it to win because they hate Sony, and Sony is a founding member of the BDA. Why does Universal hate Sony so much that they'd go on such a reckless suicide bombing run to save HD-DVD, even though all signs say they lost? My guess is that they are REALLY pissed about how the UMD disc for Doom sold.

It's a shame, because Universal does have some of my favorite movies of the last 30 years in their collection. And unfortunately, the only reason we're seeing such a rapid succession of releases from them is because they're trying to single-handedly save HD-DVD. Even when the inevitable happens and Uni has no choice but to join the Blu-Ray camp, they will probably end up dragging their feet when it comes to the high-profile releases.

Oh well. It might take a while, but I'm sure that eventually, I have my Back to the Future Blu-Ray boxed set safely in hand. It's only a matter of time before Sony puts an end to Uni's little rebellion by unleashing the Manhattan Project of movie releases-- the Spider-Man trilogy on Blu-Ray. There is nothing in Uni's library that can hope to take Spider-Man on head-to-head. Uni bet on the wrong horse, and they're not going to admit it until the bookie refuses to give them back their money.

 

[Fading]

Not necessarily. If the three $10 Blu-ray movies were all sold to the same person, then it would be 3x's the discs sold, but equal the amount of revenue and equal the amount of supporters.

The two "Pirates" movies sold about even between the two of them, which means that it's probably pretty safe to assume that most people who bought one movie bought the other, too (I know I would have). So I'd say that it's probably much closer to a 1.5:1 advantage in the number of unique customers for the "Pirates" movies as compared to the "Matrix" trilogies.



It's a $99+ boxset with 3 movies, 2 of which are widely considered to be very underwhelming movies to most people. How many people were you expecting to buy a whole trilogy of when so many people only like the first movie?

And how about the disappointment of the two "Pirates" movies, which are much newer, much more fresh in people's minds, were kid-friendly, and which were timed to release at the height of the hype for "Pirates 3"? The second movie was the 3rd Highest-grossing movie of all time worldwide just last summer, and is released on a format that is supported by the PS3 which has roughly 1.5 million owners in this country, and yet the two movies combined only sold about 47,000 copies? Is that not a disappointment, too??



Going with the circus analogy, a more accurate analogy would be if you open two circuses (circi?) across the street from my one circus. Each circus of yours has a $5 admission. My circus sells their shows in 3-show packages for $15 per package. Your first circus sells 150 tickets, and most of those people went to see your other circus next door afterwards, selling another 150 tickets. My circus sold 100 ticket packages, and thus had 100 viewers each of the 3 shows. We both ended up earning $1,500, you just had 150% of the number of customers as I did.

I'll skip the analogy since we can nit-pick back and forth and fine tune it all day heh t:.

As for the amount of Pirates movies sold, that's all guess work on who bought what. I'm sure a lot of customers did buy both disks, but some might have had the first on DVD and didn't care to buy it again and just bought the second on BR, or vice versa. We really can't know, with the Matrix box set however we know that that many customers bought it.

Also I disagree with Pirates should have sold more. IMO Pirates was a summer flick type movie. It appealed to kids and adults, something the whole family could see and enjoy on the big screen. Past that tho it's not quite as good as it's hype IMO, it's something you see at a movie to have fun, it's not the type of movie you buy every piece of merchandise for however. The Matrix on the other hand (atleast the first) is a cult classic. Heck it has fans who believe it's real and the Wachowski's were just delivering the message thru movie form. To me, the Ultimate Matrix collection with every bell and whistle they could add should sell more copies or atleast close than Pirates with some extra commentary and a mini-game.

Plus as you said, Pirates is fresh. The ppl who bought the movies probably bought them less than a year ago on DVD. Whereas the Matrix movies have been out of theaters for a bit and have fans chomping for new material to be released. Like how Star Wars releases new DVDs every few years and they sell like crazy.

Anyway, I'm not trying to make an excuse for either, the HD market hasn't penetrated much yet or both would have sold more. Just saying it's reverse logic coming from you heh. Your not the biggest PS3 fan if I remember right, and your arguing that it's just as good to sell low numbers of a high cost item, then argue that Xbox 360 > PS3 because the 360 has sold more consoles.

 

[hippie_hunter]

All blu-ray has to do in order to kill HD-DVD is just release a few key titles from each of the major studios:

Columbia Pictures: the Spider-Man movies, the Adam Sandler movies, and a few movies that are part of Columbia's back catalogue such as Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Dr. Strangelove and Lawrence of Arabia

Disney: release the movies that have been re-released in a Platinum Edition and the Pixar movies

20th Century Fox: The X-Men movies, the Predator movies, the Alien movies, the Planet of the Apes movies, the Die Hard movies, Titanic, and the Fly movies

Warner Bros.: release all the movies that are currently only on HD-DVD

Lion's Gate: release most of their library, it's not that big in the first place

MGM: The Wizard of Oz, Terminator, the Robocop movies, the James Bond movies, and the Rocky movies