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He has no empirical points, but I'll address them if it will make you happy

Posted by Jazz Inmate (A) on January 15, 2008 at 13:59:02

In Reply to: I'm not going to argue with you Oscar. Just address the author's empirical points if you disagree. (nt) posted by Audiophilander on January 15, 2008 at 13:28:41:

>> 1) Region free. <<

HD DVD would have to offer a spec for region coding if it expected to be a serious contender to replace DVD. Studios would not offer their entire output on a format that was completely region free. They need to protect their distribution privileges and would do so, by law. The fact that HD DVD managed to fumble through its first couple years without providing region encoding seems doesn't mean it would do so much longer.

>> 2) Less draconian copy protection. <<

The flip side of that is: imminently pirate-able. Studios don't like that. They do like copy protection.

>> 3) Finalised specification. <<

Yeah, but not enough open spec or capacity to realistically compete with Blu-ray.

>> 4) Cost. <<

It's just as expensive as Blu-ray. Toshiba decided to drastically reduce the price of its hardware to single-handedly try to resuscitate the format. They are failing. How you HD DVD dudes took this as an indication that HD DVD is actually cheaper than blu-ray moving forward is anybody's guess.

>> There's also the whole sensible and descriptive name, better picture quality and questionable reliability with Blu-ray, and the fact Blu-ray was a format created to divide the industry, but those are all secondary to the above in my opinion. <<

You call this empirical? We have film directors like Bay and Spielberg who have evaluated their material on both formats and claim Blu-ray to be superior. As for the name, that's an opinion, not empirical evidence.

>> If Blu-ray wins, what happens?
1) Bob Public buys a film on holiday, brings it home and find it doesn't work. <<

My PS3 has played every Blu-ray I've thrown at it--dozens of titles. I understand some have had problems, but they're in the minority.

>> 2) Joe Public buys a film, expects to be able to legally copy it to his hard disk based portable player, only to find it doesn't work being informed he needs to buy the film again in an online store to download it to his player. <<

You couldn't do that with DVD either, when it came out. As we speak, better BD drives are reaching the market. It's just a matter of time before you're able to do it. Again, Mr. Smith and you are stuck in the present when you should be thinking about the future.

>> 3) John Public buys a first, second, heck even third generation Blu-ray player, only to find it won't play any new Blu-ray films any more because the specifications have changed. <<

Again, this is misinformation. I bought an early model PS3 and it has played everything. Now, a new company, BluFocus, has formed to assist movie studios with quality control checks on their Blu-ray releases. This will help ensure that each title plays on each model of player going forward. But the few problems in the road are really minor.

>> In short, we get screwed, being stuck with an inferior format. <<

You and Mr. Smith are certainly welcome to avoid Blu-ray and keep buying HD DVD, but don't tell me that decision is based on empirical evidence. AFAIC, it's based on complete lunacy on both your parts.

>> Some film companies of course love this. Disney love the copy protection, <<

All companies selling digital content--including your beloved microsoft--love copy protection. It's not just Disney fer chrissake. And if you think Universal and Paramount don't care about copy protection, you've been sniffing too much liquid paper.

>> Fox loves the region locking <<

Again, all movie distribution companies like region coding because it gives them some modicum of control over their releases.

>> and Sony love releasing products whose specifications aren't finalised, <<

We live in a digital age where the power of processing and the size of hard drives improves by a factor of two about every 17 months. In this environment of change, you can't build a static technology without cheating consumers out of future benefits that may be just around the corner. The fact is that Sony has done a pretty good job of straddling that fence with the PS3 and Blu-ray. Much better than MS and Toshiba, which want to lock us in to a format that already is outdated and lacks the capacity of its competition.

>> so you can buy a new product to do the exact same job a few years down the line. <<

I bet the PS3 and most Blu-ray players will be the shiznit for the next decade.

>> They work in their best interests (or at least what they think are their best interests), which obviously are not the same as ours which is not to be unexpected, that's capitalism for you. <<

Oh boy, there's some "empirical" evidence, eh auph? A socialist buddy for ya. This is really funny.

>> However not everybody looks at the format war rationally and thinks, which format would better serve us? <<

Uh, how 'bout the one with 20 gigs greater capacity? Where is homey factoring that in to his analysis?

>> Some go on their brand loyalties, the Blu-boys are largely made up of PlayStation fanboys, and people who hate Microsoft (ignoring the point that Microsoft technology is in both formats), and then yes there are people who for some strange reason are actually a fanboy of an optical disc format, of how a 12cm piece of plastic is put together. <<

Well, we all have our biases, but homey is not acknowledging his own. He's an MS fanboy to the bone. And in that last sentence, he indicates that optical formats are not important at all, which is exactly the wrong attitude for those of us who do want an HD film library on optical disc.

>> By fanboy I mean a person who scourers the internet looking for anybody of a descenting opinion and showers them in abuse, or posts comments on however their little pet technology is awesome and everything else is "teh sux". <<

Spacecadet, heal thyself.

>> There's something these people need to remember, they're partly responsible for why Bob Public wasted his hard earned money only to find his film won't play on his player, or why Joe Public can't rip the film to his portable player, why John Public's Blu-ray player doesn't work with new discs and of course why all of them and Bill Public ends up paying far more money to either work around these problems, or pay for the additional costs of Blu-ray. <<

Someone needs to remind Mr. Smith that Blu-ray has achieved very small market penetration. Joe Public, for whom homey is so quick to speak, hasn't even dipped his toe into this format war. And won't, precisely because there is no clear upgrade path yet.
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"I have found that if you love life, life will love you back." -Arthur Rubinstein (1887-1982)

Edits: 01/15/08 01/15/08 01/15/08

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