It is not looking good in the HD-DVD camp as of late. Warner Brothers is now exclusively supporting Bluray. With Warner Brothers comes sister company New Line (and Lord of the Rings). HBO (also owned by WB) hasn't announced their plans, but we'll see what they decide.
That leaves HD-DVD with Universal and Paramount. Or does it?
The latest rumors say that Paramount has an out clause in their contract with HD-DVD and they are thinking of jumping ship in light of WB's announcement. If Paramount decides to support Bluray exclusively, this format war is officially over. And I couldn't be happier.
I feel bad for all the consumers who own HD-DVD players. I really do. I know I'd be pretty pissed off right now if I owned one. But I just want this to be over. I never wanted a war to begin with. I would have been happy with either format, but I wanted only one from the beginning. Now that I own a PS3 and have a few Bluray movies in my collection, I have a bias favoritism for Bluray, but either way, one format needs to win. HD-DVD is on the ropes right now so I wish Paramount would just deliver the final blow and get it over with.
The only ones losing are the consumers. It is pretty amazing just how little either company did to educate consumers about what was going on when HD-DVD and Bluray first hit the market. Everyone I know had no idea what I was talking about when I would say "Bluray" or "HD-DVD". Most still don't. I think both companies, in their attempt to grab the market share, rushed to the scene well before they should have. If they would have held out and tried to compromise, I think everyone (including the companies themselves) would have been better off.
With Bluray on the verge of victory, it is not all going to be smooth sailing for them. Check out this article.
Here are the highlights:
"Unlike HD DVD, which mandated features such as local storage, a second video and audio decoder for picture-in-picture, and a network connection from the very beginning, the companies behind Blu-ray took a different approach. Initial hardware players lacked these capabilities in order to keep costs down. None of the Profile 1.0 players can be upgraded to Profile 1.1, which was finalized recently, with the exception of the PlayStation 3 -- whose update arrived in mid-December. Likewise, Profile 2.0 is expected to arrive in October bringing Internet connectivity that Profile 1.1 players lack."
It continues to say . . .
"In addition, the BD-J interactivity layer, based on Java, has continued to evolve since the introduction of Blu-ray Profile 1.0. This means that early players may have a buggy implementation and perhaps more importantly, they are not powerful enough to play the latest films properly. When BetaNews asked developers of BD Live whether they were concerned about a backlash from early adopters who supported the format from the beginning, we were told: "They knew what they were getting into."
And finally . . .
"When BetaNews asked why these manufacturers rushed out players that were not fully capable and potentially buggy due to their BD-J implementation, the Blu-ray partner pointed blame across the room to HD DVD. "We should have waited another year to introduce Blu-ray to the public, but the format war changed the situation," he said. HD DVD was already coming and the BDA had no choice but to launch Blu-ray."
"They knew what they were getting into"? Well that is a really nice thing to say to the people who took the plunge and backed your format well before any clear cut winner was appearing on the horizon. I am pretty sure those early adopters did not know their current players would not be 1.1 or 2.0 compatible. They did not even know there was going to be a 1.1 or 2.0.
It looks like the Bluray group really dropped the ball with the implementation of their early players and really did not plan ahead or seem to care about the consumer in this regard. The HD-DVD camp were clearly more prepared and because they were, forced Bluray's hand.
Again, this goes back to my earlier point that both companies did a poor job of educating the consumer of what was coming and that they were released too soon. Bluray, specifically, was not ready. Shame.
We'll see what the future holds.
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