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What will upstage DVDs ?

What is hard is the bandwidth and the network capactiy. Check out what's going on in the UK with iPlayer, the BBC and the UK ISP's to get a preview of what will happen when companies try to move to digital distribution as a primary distribution channel. It won't be pretty because the ISP's are going to fight it tooth and nail!

Oh indeed - I touched on this in my first post, and posts in threads of this kind before.

The problem is everyone agrees that billions need to be spent upgrading internet infrastructure over the next twenty years. The problem is no-one can decide who will pay for it - hence the ludicrous demands from ISPs for the BBC to chip in.

Eventually the businesses will club together, make some kind of deal with governments and we will get these upgrades, everyone needs a Net connection these days and there is a huge market for downloading, so the ISPS really need to take the hit to their bottom line and get investing.
 
I hope it's not downloading. . .

Practical

1. I like my movies to be transportable. I have VHS tapes of movies that I bought in 1985 and I can still play them on any TV with a VHS player (which is a remarkable number).

2. I like my movies independant of my other media (ie. I don't want to have to worry about my storage space when I download my films.) I don't want to have to delete one thing to download another, and I want to be able to share one movie with a friend or family member without having to lend out my whole collection.

Legal

1. As mentioned above, with physical movies, I can play them wherever and whenever I want for as long as the media lasts. (With my VHS tapes, that is over twenty years and running). With a digital copy of media, now I can only play the film on the televisions/computers authorized by some company. I can't lend a movie to a friend, etc. Because the media is independant of physical media, it will almost necessarily be far more restricted in its use and usability than physical media.

2. With a digital format independant of media, I can easily forsee the film industry creating the same problems that software companies cause--ie. time limited use of movies, changing formats (such as "upgrading") for no reason, and dropping support of old formats. The digital world changes far more quickly than the physical ones, and I for one don't want all my movies to be dependant upon a piece of software to run. As long as I have a VCR, I can play my old movies. Now try running programs designed for WIN 98 on Vista and see if it's just as easy. Some may run, but a lot won't.
 
I would love to agree with you but Sony see things differently: they expect to take over 50% of the market by the end of the year. I find them to be quite optimistic. Must be their victory against HD-DVD.

:wtf:

You are referring to the market for DVDs and BDs, right? Considering nowhere near 50% of the market will have HDTVs by the end of the year and an even smaller percentage give a damn about BD, I'd like some of what Sony's smoking.

This appears to be the original source of the claim: http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20080407PD201.html

Note that Sony is already claiming a 20% market share in the United States and Japan. I imagine that Chubachi is referring to the current sales ratio of Blu-Ray to DVD players.

P.S. Does anyone have a good source of information (in English ;)) on the HD market in Japan? It wouldn't surprise me to learn that it's been far more successful there than in North America and Europe. Most people consider MiniDisc a failure because it didn't catch on in North America, yet it was phenomenally successful in Japan.
 
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The problem isn't who will pay for it, you and I and every other consumer/taxpayer will pay for it, just like always.

The problem is, who will be the middleman? It could be government, so we call it tax, or it could be corporate, so we call it service charges, or it could be financed by advertising so we pay through increased costs on every item that gets advertised, kind of like a private sector tax...

And what holds everything back is the infighting and lobbying between all of the possible middlemen, each fighting for a piece of the pie, and each with some incompatable method of both financing and providing. It could have been done years ago, if the people/govt had the will to say, "OK I know everything hates taxes, but we're going to tax and then get this thing done and it will be great. You can't build something worthwhile without paying for it."
 
I would love to agree with you but Sony see things differently: they expect to take over 50% of the market by the end of the year. I find them to be quite optimistic. Must be their victory against HD-DVD.

:wtf:

You are referring to the market for DVDs and BDs, right? Considering nowhere near 50% of the market will have HDTVs by the end of the year and an even smaller percentage give a damn about BD, I'd like some of what Sony's smoking.

This appears to be the original source of the claim: http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20080407PD201.html

Note that Sony is already claiming a 20% market share in the United States and Japan. I imagine that Chubachi is referring to the current sales ratio of Blu-Ray to DVD players.

P.S. Does anyone have a good source of information (in English ;)) on the HD market in Japan? It wouldn't surprise me to learn that it's been far more successful there than in North America and Europe. Most people consider MiniDisc a failure because it didn't catch on in North America, yet it was phenomenally successful in Japan.

Shit.... they can "claim" all they want... We sale BD of course and i'd say it's well below 10% at my store. Course, thats MY store
 
Eventually the businesses will club together, make some kind of deal with governments and we will get these upgrades, everyone needs a Net connection these days and there is a huge market for downloading, so the ISPS really need to take the hit to their bottom line and get investing.

It's actually really funny if you think about it... the ISP's are probably the only industry ever that is actually complaining that people want to use more of their services. It's so short sighted too... investment in upgrading their networks now improves their prospects long term and makes everyone happy.
 
Eventually the businesses will club together, make some kind of deal with governments and we will get these upgrades, everyone needs a Net connection these days and there is a huge market for downloading, so the ISPS really need to take the hit to their bottom line and get investing.

It's actually really funny if you think about it... the ISP's are probably the only industry ever that is actually complaining that people want to use more of their services. It's so short sighted too... investment in upgrading their networks now improves their prospects long term and makes everyone happy.

Agreed. The problem is you know very well that the reason the ISPs are being so short sighted is that their technical people know very well the issues but their bosses do not, and probably wont listen.
 
Agreed. The problem is you know very well that the reason the ISPs are being so short sighted is that their technical people know very well the issues but their bosses do not, and probably wont listen.

Yup. It's sadly par for the course with this sort of thing.
 
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