Look, you're making this a lot more complicated than it is. Companies are in the business of making money.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
The automakers had no choice, it's keep going, try to adjust and hope there is a light at the end of the tunnel. But still, that's not the way to think about it. It's a matter of whether the profit margins are good enough to continue vs. putting that money and resources to other uses. I imagine that the margins on Blu-Ray are higher than DVD, even considering the lower economies of scale, so production it will continue until the profit margin sinks too much.
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In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
I think the point is that the drives are replaced every several years and all the media gets migrated when the drive is upgraded. I hope a person that buys digital files does that does backups though, can you imagine decades of media just disappearing because the heads decided to start rowcropping on the platter? Sure, flash should be more stable, but 1.5TB of flash costs a lot more than two platter drives and two enclosures. Besides, a backup should be there in case there is a computer corruption or some other issue.
I haven't had a big problem with pressed media going bad, maybe one disc started delaminating out of I have no idea how many. A hundred? A thousand? I've had more problems with hard drives going bad, one in ten drives die on me before it's replaced. I think that follows Google's rate when they made a paper about it.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
Trust me you have much more of an attarchment to Blu-ray than studio heads do. Studios want Blu-ray to succeed because they can charge a premium for them. If people don't buy BR disks the studios will drop them.
While I don't think this will happen anytime soon. If some other form of distribution proves more popular and financially successful, studios will drop BR.
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In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
Just to bring some clarity back into the discussion the reason I brought up hard drives is because the primary point of this discussion is about Apple supporting Blu-ray. Storage would be one of the main reasons for Apple to support Blu-ray. Not simply storage of movies, but storage of any digital data.
Yes optical media does have the advantages you've listed. As time goes on those advantages are of less importance. This isn't my opinion you can see it reflected in sales.
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Also, let's be clear on one thiing. If what you're talking about is sub-standard video, you don't need Blu-Ray or any other new technology. DVD is a mature, cheap technology that you can certainly use if quality is not a consideration. But that's not relevant to this discussion.
What are you defining as substandard video? Today most people are still watching standard def video. Bringing up the quality of video most people accept, again goes to the necessity of Apple supporting Blu-ray.
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In regards to one format replacing another, right from the start it was intended for DVD to replace VHS. It was not an accident. First there was VHS which had its day and years later along came DVD. In time the superior format took over.
Yes DVD was designed to replace VHS, but that does not mean this plan will automatically work. There were competing video formats that were also designed to replace VHS, but lost and DVD won.
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Strangely you think there is no way that different technologies can co-exist. Yet we have seen such co-existence in the entertainment field for many years. Movies have been with us for years, as have radio, television, and more recently the Internet.
It depends on what those different technologies have to offer. If two technologies perform the same exact function, then more than likely one is going to be picked over the other. That happens all the time. Blu-ray and HD-DVD were not able to coexist.
Radio, televison, and film all perform entirely different functions.
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Certainly that means some canibalizing. But this isn't DVD replacing VHS all over again. That was a transition by design. Quite a different thing.
DVD had to fight for the consumer market the way all formats have to fight, it's victory was not guaranteed. I do agree with you on one respect Blu-ray will not have the success DVD had over VHS.
Just to bring some clarity back into the discussion the reason I brought up hard drives is because the primary point of this discussion is about Apple supporting Blu-ray. Storage would be one of the main reasons for Apple to support Blu-ray. Not simply storage of movies, but storage of any digital data.
Yes optical media does have the advantages you've listed. As time goes on those advantages are of less importance. This isn't my opinion you can see it reflected in sales.
What are you defining as substandard video? Today most people are still watching standard def video. Bringing up the quality of video most people accept, again goes to the necessity of Apple supporting Blu-ray.
Yes DVD was designed to replace VHS, but that does not mean this plan will automatically work. There were competing video formats that were also designed to replace VHS, but lost and DVD won.
It depends on what those different technologies have to offer. If two technologies perform the same exact function, then more than likely one is going to be picked over the other. That happens all the time. Blu-ray and HD-DVD were not able to coexist.
Radio, televison, and film all perform entirely different functions.
DVD had to fight for the consumer market the way all formats have to fight, it's victory was not guaranteed. I do agree with you on one respect Blu-ray will not have the success DVD had over VHS.
Television, radio and film overlap on many levels and there are also situations in which one format is better at something than the others. So it is with optical media compared to other means of storing digital data.
Look, clearly DVD and Blu-Ray occupy the exact same space and eventually DVD will be replaced by Blu-Ray. All that has happened is that the extra profit studios were hoping to make in the early going hasn't materialized. That's their problem and really not relevant to this discusion. Blu-Ray isn't DOA. There is a point to optical media in the overall scheme of things and for the forseeable future, Blu-Ray is the media format that we'll be working with. What is going to happen now is that cost will come down to better align with market realities but Blu-Ray will emerge as a viable technology.
How many people commonly use SD slots? Annecdotally most people I see just plug the camera into the computer and never remove the SD card. If most people never remove the card, it's not so crucial to have the slot.
SD slots are ubiquitous. Cameras, phones, computers, ALL KINDS of devices use them. The fact that you can quickly swap out one card for another and keep going is their biggest plus. This means you do not have to tie up your initial device to download/upload from the card, you can keep using it.
Every device has a different type of cord. I've got seven different ones that each only work with the device they came with. Why would anyone in their right mind think that hunting for and connecting the right cord made any sense whatsoever? It's way easier to just pop the SD card into the universal slot. Also, many devices do not charge via USB, yet require the power to be turned on for the card to be read from them. So you are draining the battery just to use the card.
Card slots are a much better solution, and Apple is just really late to the party on this one. All Macs, iPods, and iPhones should have them. It's inexcusable that they don't yet.
Look, you're making this a lot more complicated than it is. Companies are in the business of making money.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
Also, let's be clear on one thiing. If what you're talking about is sub-standard video, you don't need Blu-Ray or any other new technology. DVD is a mature, cheap technology that you can certainly use if quality is not a consideration. But that's not relevant to this discussion.
In regards to one format replacing another, right from the start it was intended for DVD to replace VHS. It was not an accident. First there was VHS which had its day and years later along came DVD. In time the superior format took over. Both formats were designed to perform the same basic function but one was better than the other. If you have a hard drive in a computer it can store movies, just as they can be stored on a Blu-Ray disc, but they are intended to play a different role. It's not one or the other. Each is better suited to varied uses. Strangely you think there is no way that different technologies can co-exist. Yet we have seen such co-existence in the entertainment field for many years. Movies have been with us for years, as have radio, television, and more recently the Internet. The reason cinema and radio have survived the arrival of television is that each has a place in our lives. I see the same happening in regards to various forms of digital media. Will there be overlap? Absolutely. Certainly that means some canibalizing. But this isn't DVD replacing VHS all over again. That was a transition by design. Quite a different thing.
Comments
Look, you're making this a lot more complicated than it is. Companies are in the business of making money.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
The automakers had no choice, it's keep going, try to adjust and hope there is a light at the end of the tunnel. But still, that's not the way to think about it. It's a matter of whether the profit margins are good enough to continue vs. putting that money and resources to other uses. I imagine that the margins on Blu-Ray are higher than DVD, even considering the lower economies of scale, so production it will continue until the profit margin sinks too much.
In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
I think the point is that the drives are replaced every several years and all the media gets migrated when the drive is upgraded. I hope a person that buys digital files does that does backups though, can you imagine decades of media just disappearing because the heads decided to start rowcropping on the platter? Sure, flash should be more stable, but 1.5TB of flash costs a lot more than two platter drives and two enclosures. Besides, a backup should be there in case there is a computer corruption or some other issue.
I haven't had a big problem with pressed media going bad, maybe one disc started delaminating out of I have no idea how many. A hundred? A thousand? I've had more problems with hard drives going bad, one in ten drives die on me before it's replaced. I think that follows Google's rate when they made a paper about it.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
Trust me you have much more of an attarchment to Blu-ray than studio heads do. Studios want Blu-ray to succeed because they can charge a premium for them. If people don't buy BR disks the studios will drop them.
While I don't think this will happen anytime soon. If some other form of distribution proves more popular and financially successful, studios will drop BR.
In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
Just to bring some clarity back into the discussion the reason I brought up hard drives is because the primary point of this discussion is about Apple supporting Blu-ray. Storage would be one of the main reasons for Apple to support Blu-ray. Not simply storage of movies, but storage of any digital data.
Yes optical media does have the advantages you've listed. As time goes on those advantages are of less importance. This isn't my opinion you can see it reflected in sales.
Also, let's be clear on one thiing. If what you're talking about is sub-standard video, you don't need Blu-Ray or any other new technology. DVD is a mature, cheap technology that you can certainly use if quality is not a consideration. But that's not relevant to this discussion.
What are you defining as substandard video? Today most people are still watching standard def video. Bringing up the quality of video most people accept, again goes to the necessity of Apple supporting Blu-ray.
In regards to one format replacing another, right from the start it was intended for DVD to replace VHS. It was not an accident. First there was VHS which had its day and years later along came DVD. In time the superior format took over.
Yes DVD was designed to replace VHS, but that does not mean this plan will automatically work. There were competing video formats that were also designed to replace VHS, but lost and DVD won.
Strangely you think there is no way that different technologies can co-exist. Yet we have seen such co-existence in the entertainment field for many years. Movies have been with us for years, as have radio, television, and more recently the Internet.
It depends on what those different technologies have to offer. If two technologies perform the same exact function, then more than likely one is going to be picked over the other. That happens all the time. Blu-ray and HD-DVD were not able to coexist.
Radio, televison, and film all perform entirely different functions.
Certainly that means some canibalizing. But this isn't DVD replacing VHS all over again. That was a transition by design. Quite a different thing.
DVD had to fight for the consumer market the way all formats have to fight, it's victory was not guaranteed. I do agree with you on one respect Blu-ray will not have the success DVD had over VHS.
Just to bring some clarity back into the discussion the reason I brought up hard drives is because the primary point of this discussion is about Apple supporting Blu-ray. Storage would be one of the main reasons for Apple to support Blu-ray. Not simply storage of movies, but storage of any digital data.
Yes optical media does have the advantages you've listed. As time goes on those advantages are of less importance. This isn't my opinion you can see it reflected in sales.
What are you defining as substandard video? Today most people are still watching standard def video. Bringing up the quality of video most people accept, again goes to the necessity of Apple supporting Blu-ray.
Yes DVD was designed to replace VHS, but that does not mean this plan will automatically work. There were competing video formats that were also designed to replace VHS, but lost and DVD won.
It depends on what those different technologies have to offer. If two technologies perform the same exact function, then more than likely one is going to be picked over the other. That happens all the time. Blu-ray and HD-DVD were not able to coexist.
Radio, televison, and film all perform entirely different functions.
DVD had to fight for the consumer market the way all formats have to fight, it's victory was not guaranteed. I do agree with you on one respect Blu-ray will not have the success DVD had over VHS.
Television, radio and film overlap on many levels and there are also situations in which one format is better at something than the others. So it is with optical media compared to other means of storing digital data.
Look, clearly DVD and Blu-Ray occupy the exact same space and eventually DVD will be replaced by Blu-Ray. All that has happened is that the extra profit studios were hoping to make in the early going hasn't materialized. That's their problem and really not relevant to this discusion. Blu-Ray isn't DOA. There is a point to optical media in the overall scheme of things and for the forseeable future, Blu-Ray is the media format that we'll be working with. What is going to happen now is that cost will come down to better align with market realities but Blu-Ray will emerge as a viable technology.
How many people commonly use SD slots? Annecdotally most people I see just plug the camera into the computer and never remove the SD card. If most people never remove the card, it's not so crucial to have the slot.
SD slots are ubiquitous. Cameras, phones, computers, ALL KINDS of devices use them. The fact that you can quickly swap out one card for another and keep going is their biggest plus. This means you do not have to tie up your initial device to download/upload from the card, you can keep using it.
Every device has a different type of cord. I've got seven different ones that each only work with the device they came with. Why would anyone in their right mind think that hunting for and connecting the right cord made any sense whatsoever? It's way easier to just pop the SD card into the universal slot. Also, many devices do not charge via USB, yet require the power to be turned on for the card to be read from them. So you are draining the battery just to use the card.
Card slots are a much better solution, and Apple is just really late to the party on this one. All Macs, iPods, and iPhones should have them. It's inexcusable that they don't yet.
Look, you're making this a lot more complicated than it is. Companies are in the business of making money.
If there is money in Blu-Ray, the studios will produce them. It's silly to suggest they'll stop producing Blu-Ray discs if the growth they'd hoped for fails to materialize. After all, the American carmakers, Ford included, didn't stop making cars even when their sales went into the toilet.
In regards to the role Blu-Ray can play, clearly it's because there are times when you want to use optical media and not a 500g hard drive that there is room for both and a few other formats besides. People who buy movies, be they DVD or Blu-Ray, want such items so that they can watch a film multiple times and they like to collect movies. Professional digital media is very stable. I have CDs purchased in the 1980s that work just fine to this day. How many hard drives around today are going to be still running flawlessly in 2029?
Also, let's be clear on one thiing. If what you're talking about is sub-standard video, you don't need Blu-Ray or any other new technology. DVD is a mature, cheap technology that you can certainly use if quality is not a consideration. But that's not relevant to this discussion.
In regards to one format replacing another, right from the start it was intended for DVD to replace VHS. It was not an accident. First there was VHS which had its day and years later along came DVD. In time the superior format took over. Both formats were designed to perform the same basic function but one was better than the other. If you have a hard drive in a computer it can store movies, just as they can be stored on a Blu-Ray disc, but they are intended to play a different role. It's not one or the other. Each is better suited to varied uses. Strangely you think there is no way that different technologies can co-exist. Yet we have seen such co-existence in the entertainment field for many years. Movies have been with us for years, as have radio, television, and more recently the Internet. The reason cinema and radio have survived the arrival of television is that each has a place in our lives. I see the same happening in regards to various forms of digital media. Will there be overlap? Absolutely. Certainly that means some canibalizing. But this isn't DVD replacing VHS all over again. That was a transition by design. Quite a different thing.
I still remember the days VCR was still around..