"Blu-ray U.S. disc sales have tripled in the past year, according to The Digital Entertainment Group, but there's a slight problem--Blu-ray sales are still lower than where film studios would like them to be, and there's no indication that Blu-ray sales will top DVD sales anytime soon. The studios blame Blu-ray's performance on the economy, and claim that if we were enjoying better economic times, the format's sales would be higher. But there's one person, Bill Mechanic, a film producer and former Fox Filmed Entertainment chief, who believes there's more to this story."
It seems as if HD-DVD isn't Blu-ray's greatest challenge. The venerable DVD is still putting up a fight against Sony's fledgling format. While Blu-ray has been around for years now, its sales are not meeting expectations. I have to agree with Bill Mechanic's idea that DVDs are hurting Blu-ray sales more than the economy. While Blu-ray definately provides more features and a sharp HDTV signal, it seems that most people aren't willing to pay a high premium for the extra content and clarity. Having an HDTV myself, I can certainly appreciate 720p and 1080p video, but DVDs fit in that category of "good enough" for me to watch most things. In fact, when shopping, I find myself thinking that Blu-ray is only worth it for certain videos, like documentaries, or movies that provide a lot of visuals. The rest, I look for in the bargain DVD bin! Am I the only one here? Is everyone else busy replacing their DVD collection with Blu-ray discs?
While Blu-ray definately provides more features and a sharp HDTV signal, it seems that most people aren't willing to pay a high premium for the extra content and clarity.
Yep, that's it. There is really nothing wrong with DVD; it is certainly good enough. It's certainly not the same as the difference in quality between standard and hi-def broadcast television.
Same here. I buy DVDs for the bargain price, compatibility with laptops and other devices beyond the living room TV. Plus DVDs without the extra layers of DRM are easier to rip for personal use on my mobile electronics. My DVD player is not even an upscaling player but my TV does a good enough job upscaling the content over component that for my purposes it is simply good enough and I have no desire for anything more right now.
Its a shame HD DVD did not win this battle. I think the COMBO format (DVD and HD DVD on the same disc) had great potential for people not ready to fully give up DVD. Also even just the name HD DVD would have been self-explanatory in the market. I think there is a large number of people that don't really get what Blu-Ray is.
Some of the slow sales are probably due to the difficulties early adopters had trying to get discs to load on the first and second generation players. Evidently there were/are enough ambiguities in the specification that studios could create discs which didn't load on all players.
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Originally Posted by Hooch Tan
In fact, when shopping, I find myself thinking that Blu-ray is only worth it for certain videos, like documentaries, or movies that provide a lot of visuals.
I agree with Hooch. Another reason is simply that the expense of a Blu-ray disc is not warranted for run-of-the-mill movies. I only buy Blu-ray discs for movies with large special effects or for those titles where the visual experience is much better in high definition than regular definition. Some titles sold as "high definition" don't look any better than in regular definition. As such, it is clear some studios are taking advantage of the hype of the format and are releasing titles that are "high definition" in name only.
My bottom line is that both formats will be around for awhile and consumers should assume that the formats will coexist.
I bought a Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive, not because I wanted to watch HD-DVDs but because it made for a dirty cheap DVD drive for my netbook.
Just out of curiousity, I rented a couple of HD-DVDs from the UK equivalent of Netflix to see how much of a difference there was. The results were mixed. Some films gained a great deal from HD but many didn't.
I prefer the price, flexibility and minimal DRM on DVDs. I can't see myself swapping over for at least three years.
My current guidelines:
1- If I have it on DVD I'm not buying it on BD
2- If I don't have it on DVD and it is visually worth the investment, I won't buy it at all. I can wait until the studios realize Sony suckered them with promises of $50 BD retail sales and "unbreakabale" DRM and they drop the prices to current DVD levels. I have plenty of unread ebooks waiting for me to catch up; I can and will out-wait the studios.
3-If I don't have it on DVD and its (like most hollywood movies) not really HD-worthy, I'll wait for the bargain bin or just rent it off XBOX.
In other words: I'm buying N-O-T-H-I-N-G when it comes to movies.
The studios made their bed so I'll let them lie in it; they chose the more expensive HD delivery format because of consumer-hostile DRM and the promise that we, like good lil suckers, would over-pay 100% for bad MPEG2 transfers on BluRay.
Well, now they know better.
I'm not dropping any money on movies on disk (BD or DVD) until they come down to baseline DVD price levels ($15-20) on the HD stuff. Or until they realize the only way to force the market to BD is to discontinue new DVD releases. (2011, would be my guess). And if they do, I'll probably wait them out a bit longer and make do with rentals and downloads.
Now, TV shows are different; the few shows I'm collecting on DVD I'll keep on getting on DVD until the show ends. But otherwise, my moratorium is absolute. I don't pretend they'll even notice my strike but since they *are* noticing an effect it is clear I'm not the only one who refuses to be fleeced.
That's one bit of good news, I guess.
The key thing is that the studios don't really understand *why* people buy movies on DVD (again, TV shows are different). Except for the upper 2% of movie "connosieurs" in the golden eyeball crowd, most people buy movies for *access* to the movie. Good transfer, bad transfer, extras, none of it matters as much as being able to watch the movie when you feel like it. Which, for most buyers, is really on the order of two or three times over a space of years.
With rentals running at 20-30% of the purchase price, buying made sense, if only for the convenience and timeliness.
Now, add in online movie rental services and the jacked-up prices we've seen of late on *both* BD and new DVD releases (I'm not the only one to notice that the standard dual-DVD "special edition" movie releases are priced at US$20-22 rather than the $18-20 they used to command, right?) and the equation changes.
1- As pointed out, few movies are truly HD worthy to start with.
2- A typical online SD rental at $3-4 works out to 15-20% of the purchase price
3- Add in their infamous RedBox vending machines with their $1-a-night rentals.
Clearly the "lease vs buy" equation is skewing towards lease.
My guess is the movie sales slowdown is only *beginning*.
Studios have but two choices:
1- Drop BD prices as fast as possible to DVD levels, keeping both formats at the same price for a short period while making it clear they *will* phase out DVD
2- Renegotiate the deals in place with the online and rental outfits to force higher rental prices
Of course, any attempt to force higher costs on consumers will simply make piracy more attractive and nowadays anybody inclined in that direction can do web searches to learn and find the necessary tools. And with the "unlicensed" content readily playable on PS3s and 360s...
The studios thought they were herding us to a fleecing and instead they followed Sony and Disney off a cliff.
BD is really only superior on things like concerts, much like HD itself. I really have to be sure the BD purchase is going to be worth it before I shell out. Regular DVD is usually fine for the average movie.
Okay, I agree with you guys but there is still the issue of price. There is no way I'm spending $40 on a Blu-ray movie. I have the money but that's extravagant. People see the price of Blu-ray movies and I think take that as an indication that it's an overpriced concept. And DVD quality is "good enough".
Players are dropping in price (I paid a reasonable $140 for a Sony player) and using Netflix I don't spend much more ($2 a month additional membership fee). But I'm not the average consumer.
Players are dropping in price (I paid a reasonable $140 for a Sony player) and using Netflix I don't spend much more ($2 a month additional membership fee). But I'm not the average consumer.
Don't be so sure.
Netflix just added a million more customers over the holidays.
Microsoft seems to be doing quite well with their online rentals, Amazon has been expanding their reach, and the rumor is Apple is looking to release a fully-baked Apple TV followup to get in the game for real.
*Somebody* has to be keeping those services in business and growing.
Word gets around especially when it comes to saving money.
Buying movies has never been the only movie-watching game in town, regardless of what the BD "geniuses" might've thought.
Price of disks and I don't want to buy disks that won't work on all but one of the laptops in the house - my wife is the only one with a BD player and playback is rubbish.
Having said that, I may buy a BD player after pay day for upscaling to my HDTV and only buy blu-ray disks when worthwhile content appears.
Oh, and I still want to be able to rip it and watch it on my non-BD laptops.
Why Are Blu-ray Sales Suffering?
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