Big Picture Big Sound

We first heard it at CES in Las Vegas, when the heads of several major studios -- all members of the BDA (Blu-ray Disc Association) -- sat on a panel to tout their "inevitable victory" over the HD-DVD camp. In fact they even circulated a newsletter declaring the victory, using various research firms' predictions and prognostications regarding future hardware and software sales of both formats.

Although Sony proclaimed the PS3 game console, with its built-in Blu-Ray Disc player, to be the "HD-DVD killer," it's more likely to be the content, not the hardware, that deals the deciding blow in this battle. Perhaps the most compelling part of the Blu-ray argument was made with a single PowerPoint slide where they brought up the 20 top-selling standard DVD titles in 2006. Of the 20 top titles, 19 were released by studios who support Blu-ray, either exclusively or in conjunction with HD-DVD. Seven of the eight major movie studios support Blu-Ray Disc (five exclusively). Only one title on the list ("King Kong") was released by a studio who exclusivly supports HD-DVD - namely Universal. Can the HD-DVD format continue to be viable with the support of just a few studios? That is a very good question.

Sure, HD-DVD may be the choice of the adult film industry (which may ultimately have decided or at least influenced the VHS vs. Betamax format war of the 1980s), but is that enough? With the ubiquity of adult-oriented entertainment in other media (namely, the internet), does the adult film industry really matter here, and will they be able to swing the odds back in favor of HD-DVD? Doubtful.

Now that Blu-Ray Disc Players have begun to address the quality issues in the very early first generation players, and now that 50 GB Blu-Ray Discs are a reality (so more room can be dedicated to things like picture quality and extras), the formats are on a pretty level playing field in terms of sound and image quality. both formats offer enormous improvements over standard DVD, and both will make your fancy new HDTV really shine. It will be the content, not the technology, that decides the winner.

And along these lines, Sony Pictures' chief David Richards recently told Video Business that the latest sales figures show Blu-Ray disc outselling HD-DVD titles by a margin of two to one in January. Sony plans to capitalize on these statistics with an upcoming marketing campaign declaring Blu-Ray Disc the winner.

The intent of the campaign is to bolster consumer confidence in the format by alleviating the FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) associated with an ambiguous battle for format supremacy. No one wants to sink several hundred or even several thousand dollars into a new format only to find their lovely high definition movies unplayable in a few years as their first generation players begin to break down. Eliminate the doubt, and you eliminate the main reservation that consumers have when buying content to enjoy on their high definition televisions and in their elaborate home theaters. That's the plan anyway.


And assuming that the Blu-Ray momentum continues unchecked, with more content, more hardware, proliferation of the PS3 console, and the inevitable decline in hardware pricing, it is likely that Blu-Ray Disc will ultimately become the dominant format between the two contenders. But the real question is, "Does It Matter?"

Some speculate that the age of physical media has passed us by. Albums, tapes and CDs have been dwarfed in populariy by digital music downloads. Over the past few years, movie download services such as Cinemanow, MovieLink, Vongo, Amazon.com's Unbox, and iTunes have also made inroads in delivering movies on demand to consumers. But inherent limitations in file size, download times and current consumer-unfriendly content distribution restrictions have slowed the growth of movie downloading from becoming a legitimate (and popular) service offering.

Even with the most advanced data compression codecs, a "near-DVD Quality" movie takes up 700 to 1000 Megabytes. This can take from one to several hours to download, depending on the technology used and ultimately the end-user's bandwidth. Considering high definition content requires anywhere from 6 times to 15 times as much storage space as standard def content, you can begin to see the technical challenges faced when delivering high definition content on demand via an internet download.

Over time, the download challenges will be remedied as the consumer's download pipe gets fatter and fatter. The bigger challenge is getting the content owners (the movie studios) to agree to a business model that makes sense for them - one that allows them to recoup their considerable investments and hopefully make a healthy profit along the way - but which also makes sense to consumers.

Give me downloadable access to a movie in high definition quality the same day and date as the theatrical release (or even a week or two later), and allow me a couple of days to watch it and I'll gladly fork over $10-$20 of my hard-earned cash. Give me the option to purchase it a few months later (along with downloadable artwork) for an additional few dollars and you'll get that too. Implementing such a system without alienating the movie theater owners would be a challenge but not an insurmountable one.

If the studios can figure out a way to support and embrace the download model, then the ultimate "winner" of the Blu-Ray disc vs. DVD format war may eventually be just an unremarkable footnote in the history of the consumer electronics and entertainment industry. And this would not, after all, be such a bad thing.