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Consumer Problems with Blu-ray and HD-DVD 403

Posted by Zonk from the have-to-buy-fifth-element-again dept.
bart_scriv writes "Business Week looks at the upcoming Blu-ray and HD-DVD product launches and predicts problems and confusion for consumers. In addition to anticipated difficulties in distinguishing between the two formats, some studios will be using copy protection that will intentionally down grade the picture. When combined with Sony's plans to upconvert based on hardware configuration and the fact that most HD TVs aren't capable of displaying either format at full resolution, early adopters may be getting a lot less than they bargained for. As the article suggests, it may be that 'the best bet for either format to gain acceptance now lies with next-generation game consoles.'"
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Consumer Problems with Blu-ray and HD-DVD More

Consumer Problems with Blu-ray and HD-DVD

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  • The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @04:58PM (#15005743)
    Which DRM is easier to crack?

    Simple as that.

    • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Informative)

      by Keeper ( 56691 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:04PM (#15005805)
      The content protection scheme used for both HD-DVD and BluRay is the same (ie: neither is easier to crack than the other).

      • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Jah-Wren Ryel ( 80510 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:06PM (#15005837)
        The content protection scheme used for both HD-DVD and BluRay is the same (ie: neither is easier to crack than the other).

        However, implementations will differ from manufacturer to manufacturer and maybe even from model to model of player. So we may find that a certain player has an exploitable weakness that others do not.

    • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Insightful)

      by minus_273 ( 174041 ) <aaaaaNO@SPAMSPAM.yahoo.com> on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:38PM (#15006154) Journal
      i dont think anyone outside of the geek communit cares about DRM. Most people dont mind. Most people dont even encounter the DVD DRM and dont even know about it.

      • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Interesting)

        by DingerX ( 847589 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:52PM (#15006289) Journal
        That's the way DRM is supposed to be. HD-DVD and Blu-Ray DRM are going to make people care. The current path for HD player acceptance runs through the folks at the upper-end of the market who watch really big Bruckheimer explosions on their monster televisions.

        The HD players coming out want to repeat the DVD player success story: the fastest adaptation of a new media technology ever. I mean, in the space of a few years, DVD video achieved something like 80 percent market penetration. Now here comes HD-DVD; only problem is HD televisions don't have that high market penetration numbers. But at the very least, someone who spent $3000 on a television will probably want to spent $500 on a player to watch something other than sports and CSI in hi-def.

        Yet enter DRM: Sony and pals are so scared of nerds ripping off their signal and trading it peer-to-peer they're going to screw those who spent $3000 on TVs and who can afford and do purchase large amounts of DVDs.

        So they're so afraid of the nerds in the basement and their 19" LCD screens, that they'll stop taking the money from those fat cats in their Bucky Balls wanting to watch Brucky Bombs go off.

        Geeks don't particularly care about DRM ruining their access to stuff: it's a challenge that historically has been met every time. What bothers them more is the notion that DRM ruins cool technology by making it less attractive in the marketplace.

        • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Tim C ( 15259 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:51PM (#15006801)
          Yet enter DRM: Sony and pals are so scared of nerds ripping off their signal and trading it peer-to-peer they're going to screw those who spent $3000 on TVs and who can afford and do purchase large amounts of DVDs.

          That's the funniest part actually - they're worried about a bunch of nerds ripping off high definition content and then either downsampling the shit out of it, or trying to p2p/ftp/irc around 40GB files. The former isn't worth it (might as well do the DVD, it'll be quicker), the latter really isn't practical even now. The only really practical way to shift that much data currently is on disc (or tape), which seriously limits distribution.

          • Limits, but doesn't eliminate. There's a decent market for burned copies of rips on the sidewalks here in NYC. Heck, even if you did downsample (plenty of the latest releases are cruddy camcorder bootlegs), people would still buy them up now and again - and for many people (dare I say most), DVD resolution is plenty.

            I'm sure it pales next to online distribution, but it's there enough that stodgy MPAA execs would want to stamp down on it, I'm sure.

        • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:5, Insightful)

          by cgenman ( 325138 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @11:12PM (#15008262) Homepage
          So they're so afraid of the nerds in the basement and their 19" LCD screens, that they'll stop taking the money from those fat cats in their Bucky Balls wanting to watch Brucky Bombs go off.

          Ironically those nerds with their LCD screens can't give the MPAA their money if they wanted too: HD-DVD won't play back on any of the existing computer monitors at above DVD resolution.

          I watch all videos on my computer monitor (don't have a TV), and was excited by the prospect of getting some real high-quality video for these high quality monitors. Yet I could blow a few hundred bucks for an HD-DVD / Blu-Ray player, but only get video output equivalent to that of a 20$ DVD drive. I might as well keep pirating, because there is no reason to fork over the money for a new standard that I can't support. What is the incentive for upgrading?

          Don't forget the sampling problem of many HDTV sets... if you try to play a low-rez movie at high rez, you will incurr the wrath of the "upsampler," which has the nasty habit of getting video and audio out-of-sync on many displays. So now the problem may be that your 8,000 dollar plasma-screen TV shipped before the MPAA's chosen video interface standard, but all you will know is that people's voices are coming out a bit before they open their mouths and the picture seems blurrier than when using your Xbox.

          Bad MPAA. No doughnut.
      • i dont think anyone outside of the geek communit cares about DRM. Most people dont mind. Most people dont even encounter the DVD DRM and dont even know about it.

        That's the whole point. With the new protections in place, many people who have not had a problem up until now, will now have issues. Suddenly "average Joe" who bought an HDTV last year will realize that his 'hot new HD-DVD movies' don't look as good on his HDTV as they do on his buddy's [Rich John] HDTV even though average Joe's HDTV has no problem

      • Re:The key to acceptance: (Score:4, Informative)

        by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:16PM (#15006508) Homepage
        Well, if you haven't found any non-skippable sections on your DVDs, you're lucky... but you're right, you don't really meet the DVDs DRM until you want to use a HTPC/Media Center. It's like CD players before iPod etc., you didn't really notice until you want to format-shift it. Of course, that doesn't include people like me that have DVDs from three regions (would be 4 if not the jap stuff was region 2&4, guess the HiDef stuff will add another twist since Japan is now lumped in with US). Most people get stuff with the DRM already broken though. In a recent survey here (Norway), 25% of males age 15-24 download TV shows. That tells me there's a huge demand (if not great willingness to pay) for seeing videos coming from a computer. That's quite a few people that "would care" whether or not ACSS is broken or not.
      • People don't care about DRM now because it's easy to circumvent. They use their DVD-ripping software, not knowing (or caring) what hassles the one cracking the DVD "encryption" had to go through. All they know is that there's some software they can use to copy their DVDs and that they can play their copies.

        The onset of market penetration of DVDs matches the moment the copy protection was ripped and region codes fell. Before that, the penetration was rather low. People prefered to stay with DivX and other CD

  • Surprising? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Firehed ( 942385 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:01PM (#15005770) Homepage
    Could this be any less surprising? I've been following it closely and I have a hard time keeping everything straight. As I work at a video store, I can safely say that average consumers are nothing less than completely screwed.
    • My hope is that people are going to be SO confused that they won't buy at all. Especially after the first complaints are in that the quality sucks 'cause the system refuses to give you best quality because you don't have the "right" kind of display, cable or whatnot.

      If they can't get this sorted out, customers will be pissed off, and both formats will bomb so hard that it measures on the Richter scale.
      • It hasn't hurt HDTV sales. Salesmen push whatever is best for THEM, not the consumer. Do you think your 60+ year old grandmother is going to know the difference? She just want one of those "nice" TVs. Whether she can actually view any HD content once she leaves the store is a whole other issue that does not effect the salesman commish on the TV.

        Sure, the original poster will say he does the custome right, but 99% of the time, the salesman just screws his customers. Knowledge is power, and most folks
        • Oh sure, nobody cares. NOW. People buy new TVs on the promise that they'll be able to watch the high rez content.

          Imagine how they're going to be pissed off when they find out their new 2000+ bucks TV ain't gonna work with HDTV.
  • My prediction is that consumer will largely (ps3 being the notable exception) ignore both blu-ray & hd-dvd until dual players arrive.

    Shouldn't take too long...

  • No more HDDVD Blu Ray Stories Please (Score:5, Insightful)

    by abscissa ( 136568 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:04PM (#15005808)
    Neither of these formats will be accepted as easily as, historically, other formats have.

    1. Cassetes --> CDs: CDs are thinner and higher quality that does not degrade. Even still, it took *almost* 10 years before cassetes were completely and fully replaced. Even to this day, unless you count, say, iTunes, CDs reign supreme and music on DVD is still a joke.

    2. ?? --> Beta/VHS: No fromat existed for viewing movies at home... except maybe an 8mm projector!! But I can't remember video stores that had 8mm rentals... is it just me?

    3. VHS --> DVD: DVD is smaller, thinner, and holds more at a better quality. Plus, like every previous post has pointed out, many people have invested in buying DVDs and, like me, see no reason to "upgrade" the quality of their movies... for... $30+??

    • Re:No more HDDVD Blu Ray Stories Please (Score:5, Insightful)

      by hudsonhawk ( 148194 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:09PM (#15005861)
      You forgot about Videodisc. It was probably the only home format with any kind of penetration before VHS / Beta. And it sucked. Badly.

      I don't think this analogy fits with those examples anyway. This is more akin to the following:

      Stereo LP -> Quadrophonic LP
      VHS -> Laserdisc
      Cassette -> DCC
      CD -> SACD / DVD-Audio

      In other words, I think this is a specialized path, which only appeals to the high end consumer and won't get any broad market penetration. Even if Blu-Ray "wins" by piggy-backing on the PS3's market penetration, I don't think it will ever get much in terms of consumer acceptance.

      DVD is here for at least a few more years.

      • Re:No more HDDVD Blu Ray Stories Please (Score:5, Insightful)

        by hackstraw ( 262471 ) * on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:33PM (#15006122)
        Stereo LP -> Quadrophonic LP
        VHS -> Laserdisc
        Cassette -> DCC
        CD -> SACD / DVD-Audio


        And the grandparent mentioned Beta, and I will add minidisc and DAT.

        Lets take a look at the history here:

        Beta -> killed, basically because of Sony
        minidisc -> killed, basically because of Sony
        SACD -> killed, basically because of Sony

        DAT -> killed, basically because of the recording industry and SCMS

        DCC -> not sure why that was killed. AFAIK, it did not have SCMS. I believe it was not that good of a format. Less than CD quality if I remember correctly

        DVD-Audio -> don't know what the problem here is. I would love to get DVD-A in my car. CD+ quality with hours of content? I would love that.

        Laserdisc -> killed because the discs were too big and scary looking, but good quality for the time.

        Quadrophonic probably never took off because electronics were already expensive back then, so it was probably hard to overcome that hurdle.

        • SACD -> killed, basically because of Sony

          DAT -> killed, basically because of the recording industry and SCMS

          DCC -> not sure why that was killed. AFAIK, it did not have SCMS. I believe it was not that good of a format. Less than CD quality if I remember correctly

          DVD-Audio -> don't know what the problem here is. I would love to get DVD-A in my car. CD+ quality with hours of content? I would love that.

          All four of the previous have one very important thing in common. You never saw any of them in wal
          • No, minidisc had a lot of potential. It was Sony, and nothing else that killed it. Ever tried using their shitastic software? That's what killed Minidisc, and that software was Sony's doing. Granted the lifespan would have been short with flash- and hard drive-based players coming out not long after, but I still can't understand how you could squeeze 50 hours of battery life from a single AA when no-moving-parts players can get maybe 15. That's the one thing I definately preferred about the MD players.
        • What car do you have with such good speakers that when driving you can tell the difference between CD quality and 256kbps VBR mp3? 99% of cars don't have that good fidelity. That's why DVD-A will never take off in cars. If you want hours of content, use mp3. If it's for audiobooks, you especially don't need CD+ quality.
          • What car do you have with such good speakers that when driving you can tell the difference between CD quality and 256kbps VBR mp3? 99% of cars don't have that good fidelity.

            Trust me. I have 5.25" drivers in my door with tweeters on the pillar, 8" drivers in the back dash, and a 10" sub in the trunk. 8 volt preamp outs from the head unit to the deck. The four in-cabin speakers are time aligned. The time alignment and parametric EQ on the deck is calibrated with a computer. Its cool stuff.

            I would bet my
            • What kind of amps are you running? I was looking at the McIntosh [mcintoshlabs.com] line of amps...

              Their home stuff (particularly the tube gear) is great...and I'd heard good things about their car audio amps....


              • Yeah. My next car stereo will probably be McIntosh, but its pricey. I like Mc stuff because its about audio quality and simplilicty. It doesn't have 50,000 features that half work. Just track skip, basic tone control, and volume. What more do you need?

                I have and Eclipse head unit and 5 channel amp, 4x50 watt with 150 for the sub. I honestly don't know how loud it gets before it starts to distort or I can't stand it any louder. I'm pretty happy with it. I have a compact car that with the stereo cost
      • You forget VCD which still has a large install base in many countries.

        The VCD to DVD upgrade seems silly as it forced consumers to use diffrent formats to burn their Video and Audio discs.

        How many of you have both blank CDs and DVDs for this reason.

        If the video disc market had upgraded their players to support Xvid or Divx or indeed any quality above mpg 1/2 (They did upgrade from mpg 1 eventually) no one would have upgraded to DVD.

        Most movie encodes on the internet still adhere to the 700 meg (Cd s
        • Truthfully we're caught up in the upgrade cycle, for me it doesn't matter I like the 700 meg Xvid format and until I feel the need to upgrade to the next pirate/home movie standard (likely 4.7 gig Xvid or H.263/4) I won't... My players will support those discs as well.

          Well, the three supported codecs of all HD players are MPEG2, WMV and H.264. I think H.263 is a codec for voicechat or something, not suited for this. Since MPEG2 is spacious, I think it's down to the last two. In the last codec comparison by
    • Just want to say on the 'better quality' argument: in general I can't tell the difference between VHS and DVD quality. (Unless the VHS is very old, of course.) The advantages of DVD are smaller size and random access. (No rewinding, the ablity to jump anywhere in the movie, and no rewinding. Did I mention no rewinding?)

      I'm sure there are people who believe they can tell the difference. Most of them probably have their super-high quality flatscreens hooked up incorrectly so that they are are actually ge
      • Your TV must really suck.

        DVD is significantly higher quality than VHS. Across the board. VHS is crap even compared to standard broadcast video.
        • If I'm doing a direct comparison test, sure I can spot differences. No problem. That is: if I'm specifically looking for it I can see a quality difference.

          If I'm sitting down to watch a movie I'll never notice the difference. That's my point. Most of the time I don't even notice if I'm playing off my iPod onto the same TV. (Though there is just enough difference to actually be noticable then.)

          I don't think quality is the big selling point of DVD's, and I don't think 'quality' will sell the next generat
      • I think you're more or less right. I found that out when we were forced to rent LotR on VHS; in full motion, I wouldn't have noticed the difference on the 36" TV I had then.

        Pausing was a different matter of course, and it's not just random access to the movie, but making "bonus features" more accesible. That's what DVDs offered, with no similar upgrade for the nextgen, except what the studios decide to force. It's an uphill battle.

        I'm sure an A/B test could tell the difference between DVD and VHS (if not ne

      • Re:No more HDDVD Blu Ray Stories Please (Score:4, Informative)

        by xkenny13 ( 309849 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:49PM (#15006786) Homepage
        Just want to say on the 'better quality' argument: in general I can't tell the difference between VHS and DVD quality [...]

        I'm sure there are people who believe they can tell the difference. Most of them probably have their super-high quality flatscreens hooked up incorrectly so that they are are actually getting worse quality on it. But they still believe they can tell the difference. (I'm sure some actually can tell the difference.)

        I can easily tell the difference, though I am watching on a 73" rear projection TV. You did not mention what sort of equipment you are using?

        My TV will do HDTV (1080i, I believe), and it looks incredible. I would love to see High-Def DVD movies, and am quite happy to pay for them. I am effectively the market for this new technology.

        That said, my set does not include the HDMI connector, and it is only 2 years old. So if that is a limitation (however iffy), then I'll just stick with the current DVD format. In this case, I am the market that is being lost due to all this stupid DRM crap.
    • ^^ Poster took the words out of my mouth. We get it. They both suck. We aren't worthy for your precious formats now come abck in 8-10 years when regular people actually care about aliasing and mpeg artifacting. If you lookup something like 'mpeg quality loss', you'll notice very little or no reference to consumer based products, and all to to with mastering. The problem is that consumers just -don't- need that much quality in this day and age. Perdiod.

      Now please editors, we -know- it won't be adopted, we kn
    • I know that the library had reel-film (Super 8, probably) movies, although I think they were largely B&W shorts and many were probably silent since I think there were probably few people who had sync-sound Super 8 projectors.

      I think there were also a lot of rental options for 16mm prints of movies. Not down at the corner shop, but all those hollywood movies we watched in school and college came from someplace.

  • Translation: (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cryptochrome ( 303529 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:04PM (#15005810) Journal
    The Mass-Media-Powers-That-Be have succeeded in royally fucking themselves by taking a perfectly simple concept (watch videos at higher resolution) and turned it into a crippled, convoluted mess.

    Ball's in your court, online video distributors (namely Apple).

    • Re:Translation: (Score:4, Interesting)

      by MobyDisk ( 75490 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:45PM (#15006225) Homepage
      simple concept (watch videos at higher resolution)
      It's even simpler than that, because DVDs today can already do higher resolutions. There's nothing in the DVD spec that limits you to 480 lines.

      The only complexity is storage capacity. But with the improved compression of MPEG-4 over MPEG-2, you could probably fit 1280x720 (or maybe 1920x1080 in some cases) video onto the same DVD media we use today. Many DVD players today already can play MPEG-4 disks (WMV, AVI, MP4, etc.) so it won't be a big expense for the manufacturers.

      So someone should just take MPEG-4, spec-out some new resolutions, and call it DVD-Ultra or something cool sounding. This might even happen as a de-facto standard before Blu-Ray or HD-DVD come-out, because there's no new technology or additional expense required.

      • Re:Translation: (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Wesley Felter ( 138342 ) <wesley@felter.org> on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:22PM (#15006550) Homepage
        There's nothing in the DVD spec that limits you to 480 lines.

        The NTSC DVD Video spec is indeed limited to 480 lines. (PAL DVD is higher, of course.) You can put whatever you want on a data DVD, but if there are few or no players for it, people won't care.

        So someone should just take MPEG-4, spec-out some new resolutions, and call it DVD-Ultra or something cool sounding.

        It was called DivX HD, but very few players and no movies support it. It was also called WMV-HD, with a few movies and no players. AFAIK, Nero Digital HD has no movies and no players. There were several factors at work here IMO:
        It costs so much to establish a new media standard that you can only do it every 10 years or so. Since each standard needs to last for a decade, it needs to be a big improvement over the previous, not a small improvement.
        Putting HD MPEG-4 (or WMV or whatever) on a regular DVD is so easy that N different companies tried to do it in incompatible ways, and the format war killed all the formats before they even got started.

      • Re:Translation: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by evilviper ( 135110 )

        It's even simpler than that, because DVDs today can already do higher resolutions. There's nothing in the DVD spec that limits you to 480 lines.

        This is moronic. Any storage media, "can do higher resolutions", but there's no player for it, so you're talking about a computer-only solution, which wont fly in this decade...

        The only complexity is storage capacity.

        That's ALWAYS been the only problem. If you had unlimited storage, HD wouldn't be an issue at all.

        But with the improved compression of MPEG-4 over MP

  • Technies needed for adoption but not wanted (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Keeper ( 56691 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:07PM (#15005844)
    In order for a new format to be adopted, people need to buy it. Early adopters are typically technically minded people, and are generally "informed" about what it is they're purchasing.

    The content produces are doing everything in their power to make the format unattractive to technically minded people. Meaning they're scaring away all of the early adopters. Which means that the format will never be adopted.

    For me, degrading the signal over analog connections was the thing that pushed me over into the "not gonna buy it" category ...
    • For adoption, all you need is a decently priced HD-DVD/Blue-Ray player that can be sold in quantity in Best Buy. The sheeple will buy it as long as it is there and it's something new.

      • "decently priced" = real cheap for the masses. The first year or so won't see any of that. The issue is whether or not they can get there, and do so just as quickly, if the early adopters choose to not buy into this. All the wise ones with analog displays won't because they know they won't get HD video that way; so why buy something that won't do any more than what you have now. OTOH, those who buy all new displays with HDMI and HDCP are probably going to be able to see the HD resolution (though the com

    • Well SONY is saying that they are not going to signal degrade the first Blu-Ray movies out until market acceptance is in. Then they will lower the boom and turn it on consequently turning off HD on all the older HDTV sets.
    • I would say that I am an early adopter, bought one of the first plasma TV's to come out, usually buy the lastest and greatest computer's. I have given away over a dozen old ones to friends and family. Also the same with string of DVD players AMP's etc.. Am I in the market for one of these two media players? NO. Why not? It is a dead end technology. There is no point to it. By the time they finally settle on one format or the other the issue will be moot. People will be buying their HD movies off the net and

  • Two solutions to Blu-Ray and HDTV (Score:4, Insightful)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:16PM (#15005944) Homepage Journal
    Solution 1: Wait two years after product mass introduction to buy the same technology with all the bugs worked out, for one-third the price.

    Solution 2: Don't buy DRM and other invasive products.

    Either solution will work, the former assumes you're just a cog in the machine and you don't need this technology absolutely today but can wait until 50 percent of the population has switched over, the latter assumes you think a non-DRM OpenSource-friendly version will be adopted at some point.

    Choose your poison.

  • Why can't these people just go out of business? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by hackstraw ( 262471 ) * on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:21PM (#15005993)

    Because they suck at what they do.

    I mean, HDTV is what a late 90s thing? And we still don't have hidef content. They only hidef that I can get is from cable, satellite, or OTA TV. CDs are late 70s technology (maybe early 80s). The oldest digital recording I own is from 1978.

    Why can't these people flood us with content at a reasonable price that we simply do not have the time or need to pirate the stuff?

    My HD DVR has firewire output that I can copy the stuff to my computer. Supposedly some of the channels are encrypted, and it takes realtime to make a copy. But I never have made a copy, but I always have 80 gigs of fresh content on my DVR that I can watch anytime. I love it. Oh, and someone is getting the $70 a month or so that I pay for content, right? I mean, sometimes I even watch or listen to the commercials because I'm busy doing something else and don't feel like fiddling with the remote control.

    What I don't understand is that the content "providers" dabble in all aspects of the modern era, but they insist on putting stuff on plastic disks and sell them at a brick and mortar store. I mean, Sony makes electronics, but they are talking about making the PS3 so that it does not play Sony movies. Huh??? Time/Warner owns a cable TV outfit and internet, but won't let you download their movies or with little streaming capabilities.

    The movie industry lets TV channels broadcast their stuff. The music industry lets radio broadcast their stuff. When are they just going to get with the times and deliver modern day technology?

    Oh, the funny thing is that I would assume most people would prefer the lower quality DVDs via DRM. Look how popular iTunes and AACs and MP3s are. Can't figure that one out.

  • sony has already announced that for the first generation of players, they will not be implementing the flag that signals an output downgrade. each studio has their own liberty whether to implement the flag or not. so far only two of the nine or so studios supporting blu-ray will implement that feature.

    unfortunately, their stance is one where they are being lenient in regards to using the flag in order to woo new adopters of their product. they reserve the right to implement HDCP only full-HD output, as more

    • Re:erroneous (Score:4, Informative)

      by Silvers ( 196372 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:33PM (#15006117)
      I believe this is incorrect.

      For their first generation of media they will not be enabling the flag. Their hardware players will still support it.

      The flag is an optional feature which they will not use, initially.
      • sorry, youre absolutely right. i meant media, but wrote players.

        according to AACS the image constraint token flag is implemented in the media, not the hardware itself. if the player reads a disk that has the ICT flag set and no HDCP enabled hardware is present, it will down-convert to 960x540 [little better than DVD]. studios reserve the right to implement the flag, so far there are only two studios that intend to implement the flag. the rest are being lenient for now. sony says they are against it [they wa
    • sony has already announced that for the first generation of players, they will not be implementing the flag that signals an output downgrade. each studio has their own liberty whether to implement the flag or not. so far only two of the nine or so studios supporting blu-ray will implement that feature.

      I think the reason they are not implementing it is becuase of all the HDTV's that have already been sold that don't support HDCP. Don't what to tick off all the early adopters of HDTV's if they try to early-ad

  • The real key to acceptance: Adult Movies (Score:4, Insightful)

    by imgunby ( 705676 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:25PM (#15006037)
    I'm surprised it hasn't come up more, but "pornography" has driven adoption of virtually all modern forms of media. Tin-types, 8mm movie film, VHS, DVD, DSL... you name it, and naked people (or their images) has been behind it. I'm gonna go on a limb and say whatever format is generally adopted by the adult industry is what will win out. Sony and the rest will quickly fall in line. imgunby

    • Re:The real key to acceptance: Adult Movies (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Oh, please. Are you really gonna watch pr0n on a device that phones home and reports your viewing preferences?
    • I completely agree. Consumers have shown over and over that they will spend ridiculous amounts of money for porn (remember the cost of the first VHS porn tapes?)

      And the quality of porn on these high-def formats is going to be incredible! Once guys see their first HD porn they will go apeshit. Stores should advertise porn bundles ("Happy Deals?") consisting of an HD-DVD or Blu-Ray player, five or six porn titles, a lotion dispenser, and a rag.

      • Do you really think this is true? High definition is going to really show the skin imperfections of these porn stars. The scars from drug injections. The cellulite from alternating between meth addiction and cookie addiction. The c section scars.

        I dunno about you, but this is why I like to dim the lights a bit before I go at it... I'd rather have my perfect fantasy, than the less than perfect specimen I'm performing on.

        Men are idealists... there is a reason we don't paint pictures of less than attrac
      • This won't apply to Bluray/HD-DVDs.

        People were drawn to DVDs for porn not only because of the better picture but also because the instant seeking capabilities. The camera angles were another interesting thing but they turned out to be mostly nonexistent.

        Ontop of that, broadband has spread and people are now getting their porn from the internet (through paid sites and p2p). Empornium is huge for instance.

        The only thing HD discs have going for them now is the higher definition and that's definitely not enough
    • "you name it, and naked people (or their images) has been behind it. I'm gonna go on a limb "

      Sounds like Slashdot is getting its share of the pr0n right there... thanks for the mental images.

    • Re:The real key to acceptance: Adult Movies (Score:4, Funny)

      by netsavior ( 627338 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:25PM (#15006579)
      Ever watched a Pr0n DVD on a projector or decent resolution large screen? We did and it was not pretty... Nobody is beautiful naked at 7foot x 480i (extreme close up)

      I think I will stick to VHS on a 25 inch TV as far as porn is concerned.
  • If this is as stillborn as DIVX, then we'll get to keep using DVDs and ripping them to our hearts' content.

    What's the best way to put your Blu-Ray or HD-DVD movie on your iPod? Oh, yeah. Right. Eat a dick, MPAA.
  • The problem I have with this is the plain and simple fact that film lacks the quality and detail that actual high definition video captures. Simply, blowing a film picture up to 1920x1080, even from the original negatives, will not produce the same quality as HD video. The argument about enhanced definition (1280x720p) which most HDTV's can currently only do, vs. full HD (1080p) is a dead-end when talking about HD-DVD's. I for one am not waiting to see a film movie in full HD as the film grain and other art

    • Re:Early adopters and FULL HD resolution (Score:5, Informative)

      by paulzoop ( 701446 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:11PM (#15006452)
      i'm sorry, but your talking complete rubbish. i work in the film industry and 35mm film is usually scanned in at 2k which is HD. even sometimes at 4k! i've shot on 16m, 35mm, super 35mm and on hd. film is a very mature technology while HD is still very young. i spend all day examining and working with BG plates shot on both. just because HD is new and digital doesn't mean it's *currently* better than the technology it's replacing. you sound like the early audio companies that said that CD's sounded better than LP's. they didn't then and have only just arrived recently. (listen to a lynn lp12...) the funny thing is that the new cameras have special "film grain" modes...
    • Actually, 720p is HD. 480p is ED.
      Other than that, I agree fully with your comments.

  • No problems .... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by gstoddart ( 321705 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:31PM (#15006097) Homepage
    No problems at all ...

    Consumers hear the DVDs won't work with the HDTV they already have.

    Consumers don't buy new HD DVD formats.

    Media companies find themselves holding onto a billion dollar albatross they've made unpopular with people.

    No problem.
    • That's right, it's no problem for the media companies. They just up the cost of the CD and DVD media we have now to make up for their HDDVD/BluRay loss, and their budget problems are solved. Of course, we're screwed then.
    • Yes, exactly; they make the format unpopular, nobody buys it, but they interpret that as piracy losses.

      Then their lawyers add up the costs of everything, and determine that piracy has resulted in a $100 billion dollar loss of business, which makes the MPAA run out and sue grandmas who don't even have internet connections.

      Oh boy, I'm ready for that future.

      • Then their lawyers add up the costs of everything, and determine that piracy has resulted in a $100 billion dollar loss of business, which makes the MPAA run out and sue grandmas who don't even have internet connections.

        Well, then no matter what happens it's a lose-lose-lose proposition for consumers.

        Either the stuff they've already bought is obsolete and doesn't work with the new stuff but nobody upgrades and what you suggest happens; or they do buy the new stuff and get no benefit from it; or they buy the

  • The Media Associations (Score:3, Interesting)

    by eno2001 ( 527078 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:47PM (#15006242) Homepage Journal
    The criminals at the RIAA and MPAA must be removed at all costs before they completely decimate all consumer rights. When I buy a recording of a movie or an album, I expect to have reasonable rights to copy it for use on various devices that I own. If I'm not going out and selling these copies, then I am not depriving them of any profit that they are entitled to. This is simple common sense. Whatever happened to the day when I could easily tape a selection of songs from various albums and play those songs in my car, on a walkman or a boom box? If anything, today's digital media should make these activities easier. And you know what? They DO. It's not the technology getting in the way, it's the lawyers and the artificial restrictions being assigned to playback devices and recordings devices by organizations like the MPAA and the RIAA. Those organizations are holding the artists, the distributors and customers for ransom. And why? Simply to keep their old, failing business model alive. Truth be told, MOST people would do the "right thing" and buy a legit copy of a song if the songs were reasonably priced (a few cents per track) and non-DRM. As long as there is DRM and unreasonable pricing there will be, otherwise honest people, trying to find a way to get "free" or "cheap" music. But as soon as some company offers high quality, direct from the artist to your ears, along with value added media (like liner notes in PDF and album art in JPG) full movie and music packages that are universally playable on all platforms, the DRMed crap will dry up. Kill off the dinosaurs. Show the RIAA and the MPAA that they are largely irrelevant to digital media. If you are an artist, work together with the P2P geeks to find a better distribution method that presents one file for a complete album or a television program or movie that you produced. If you are a user, spend some time exploring the alternatives that exist to big media. The quality is improving daily. Screw the fossils that are trying to control music, movies and television. Rescue YOUR media. Do it NOW!

  • Solomon's baby. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by merdaccia ( 695940 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @05:48PM (#15006247)

    This format war is turning into a twisted modern day version of the parable of King Solomon. In that parable, two women both claim that a baby is theirs. Solomon guilefully says the only way to resolve the issue is by cutting the baby in half and giving a half to each woman. The first woman agrees, but the second woman pleads with the King to spare the baby's life and let the other woman have the child. Solomon knew the second woman was the real mother.

    Today, that baby is high definition DVDs, and unfortunately for us, both women would rather see that baby slaughtered than give up potentially lucrative royalties from it. The HD-DVD and Blu-ray camps are trying to compete with each other for money, and their greed is about to kill what could be the successor of the DVD. So what happens now? Well, as other people have pointed out, most will wait for one format to beat out the other. Or wait for players that play both formats, assuming such a thing would be made. I don't see it happening. After this whole battle, why would you license a player if it will decode the competition?

    In a way, we are Solomon. I think the only smart thing to do is to keep the baby ourselves and leave them both empty handed, by not buying the players or the discs. If the two camps could just get past their greed and see that their actions mean both of them will lose revenue, they might rethink their strategies.

    • Nice idea.

      I think this is what Sony is afraid of (that people will wait). I think this is also why they decided that Blu-ray *must* be included in the PS3 (even to the point that waiting for the spec to finalize pushed the ship date).

      People may be willing to wait on the sidelines to watch who wins the HD format wars before committing, but quite a number of people will be interested in getting the PS3. They may not care about the Blu-Ray drive ... but they'll have it all the same, and if that happens to he
    • I agree... However:
       
        I think the only smart thing to do is to keep the baby ourselves and leave them both empty handed, by not buying the players or the discs. If the two camps could just get past their greed and see that their actions mean both of them will lose revenue, they might rethink their strategies.
       
        You do realize who you are talking about, right? They're not going to ever rethink their strategies... They'll just blame piracy.
  • HDTV is over 10 years behind where the "experts" claimed it would be. It has been extremely slow to go mainstream becuase the consumer did not care about it or want it. The only reason I have one is because of the other features that the digital TV had that were handy. I don't even watch HD.

    For movies, HD-DVD and BlueRay won't sell very fast becuase the studios have to still make the releases on standard DVD to make any money. The consumer won't care. Only the game machines will pick up the players
  • Early adoptors usually get screwed, how is this a suprise? This is the price you pay for being on the bleeding edge.

    The pissing contest continues as electronic/movie companies work together to attempt to get consumers to compare television sets through pixel counting with magnifying glasses and rambling technical specs. Meanwhile mythical consumers are chomping at the bit to be allowed to purchase DVDs for more than $20 a piece and most don't know if they have an HD TV or not, and if they do have an HD

  • Buy and return philosophy (Score:4, Insightful)

    by cmoney ( 216557 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @06:35PM (#15006659)
    As my relatively new 2 year old HDTV only has DVI and component and no HDMI I suppose I'll be in the "screwed early-adopter" category so I'll be buying a few HD-DVD units and returning them when, "Ooops, I just found out it doesn't actually do HD unless you have HDMI, oh well, can I return it? K Thx, bye!"

    I suggest others do the same so we can send a message and make sure the MPAA et al know there's a segment of the market who won't stand for degraded standards for committing the crime of purchasing an HDTV before THEY got THEIR act together.
  • Look, the whole DRM issue has been beaten to death on /. more than once, and the discussion almost always focuses on the negatives: downconverting from HD to SD resolution for non-HDMI-compliant devices, inability to make totally unencumbered copies, etc. All of these are at least somewhat valid complaints. I'm would be particularly irritated if I had purchased a non-HDMI big screen set or projector about a year ago only to find out I can't watch pre-recorded HD stuff on it. Good thing I don't have any

  • Word association (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Kev_Stewart ( 737140 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @07:26PM (#15007064)
    Whenever you use term "DRM" in a post, please put the words "infected with" before it. Stuff like that catches on you know. The RIAA and MPAA did it with the terms "p2p" and "thief". Why shouldn't we do it too? "Infected with DRM" sounds just as good as "stole material via p2p".

  • amazing rez (Score:4, Funny)

    by mgabrys_sf ( 951552 ) on Monday March 27, 2006 @08:45PM (#15007598) Journal
    The picture's so good you can see the DRM watermark!

    Now THAT'S progress people! Huzzah!

    I never recalled Indiana Jones being chased by a boulder with a giant DRM logo emblazoned on it - but the metaphor is so right ya know?

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