The biggest dvd producer in the world just picked HD DVD.




http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070112-8602.html

Quote :

" Adult film industry embracing HD DVD 1/12/2007 8:54:38 AM, by Eric Bangeman Like consumers, the adult film industry has a choice to make when it comes to HD DVD and Blu-ray, the two formats vying to be the successor to DVD. A couple of stories on the subject have surfaced recently; the first claims that Blu-ray disc manufacturers don't want the porn industry releasing content on Blu-ray, while a second story says that adult filmmakers have decided to cast their lot with HD DVD. Adult film producer There Joone told Heise Online that his company, Digital Playground, would be going with HD DVD for future HD releases. Joone reportedly said that none of the Blu-ray manufacturing facilities would press discs for his company, saying that Sony had threatened to pull their licenses if they produced adult content. Ars contacted the Blu-ray Disc Association for comment on Joone's allegations. "There is not a prohibition against adult content," said Marty Gordon, vicechair of the BDA US Promotions Committee and vice president of the Philips Electronics Hollywood Office. "The BDA welcomes the participation of all companies interested in using and supporting the format, particularly those from the content industry. We look forward to working with any content providers interested in providing their audience with [the] best possible high definition home entertainment experience." Officially, the BDA is welcoming adult filmmakers with open arms. But they may not be interested. In September 2005, Ars ran an opinion piece looking at the economics of the next-gen optical formats. One argument by the guest op-ed writer was that Blu-ray was a considerably more expensive format. In March of 2006, Image Entertainment said it was concerned about the costs associated with Blu-ray. Those concerns are being echoed by the porn industry, less than a year after it had apparently decided to go with Blu-ray. A spokesperson for one adult studio told TG Daily that HD DVD is easier and cheaper to produce and that it was the industry's belief "there are more HD DVD players in homes than there are Blu-ray players, for example in the Xbox 360." Other adult studios agree. Another industry source told TG Daily, "Only bigger studios can afford Blu-ray, and even then it's not economical." Could the adult industry's apparent decision to back HD DVD mark a decisive shift in the format wars? Much has been written about the war waged between VHS and Betamax beginning in the mid-70s. A number of factors played into the eventual triumph of VHS: Sony's refusal to license the format during Betamax's first few years, legal battles with the movie industry, the greater recording capacity of VHS (eight hours vs. five), and, perhaps most relevant to this discussion, the adult industry's embrace of VHS. The landscape is different this time around. Both next-gen formats offer the porn industry something it thinks it needs: better copy protection via AACS. Blu-ray has a number of big studios and major hardware manufacturers backing it while HD DVD has only Universal, Paramount, and Warner from the movie studios (and the latter two are also releasing Blu-ray titles). Also, as the Blu-ray manufacturing process matures, prices will drop. But porn is big business, with Forbes estimating $14 billion in annual sales as of 2001, and if adult filmmakers throw their weight behind HD DVD and largely ignore Blu-ray, it will boost the fortunes of HD DVD. It's not going to be enough to tip the battle decisively one way or another, but it will mean a longer, more protracted battle between the two camps."

And why is Sony so stupid? They refused to allow Adult film companies to press on Blu-Ray? What a smart business model to prevent a billion dollar industry to use your format....

1/12/2007 11:35:00 AM

if you need HD porn I feel intensely sorry for you

1/12/2007 11:36:30 AM

Who wouldn't want 1080p porn?

1/12/2007 11:37:58 AM

with that level of clarity, the porn sluts look nastier.

You kinda need that suboptimal quality to cover up some of that shit.


But porn aside, Blu-Ray will end up just like betamax.

1/12/2007 11:41:23 AM

Quote :

"if you need HD porn I feel intensely sorry for you "

its not the need for HD porn, its just the fact that the adult film industry was the reason the VHS won out over beta-max, so its very likely the same scenario could happen again.

[Edited on January 12, 2007 at 11:43 AM. Reason : d]

1/12/2007 11:43:14 AM

Well, they had porn AND Disney.

1/12/2007 11:46:54 AM

hahah sony is stupid

soo proprietary they screw themselves over and over again.

1/12/2007 11:47:16 AM

you'd think they'd learn after making the same mistake several times...

1/12/2007 11:50:40 AM

there should be a running sony format failure thread

betamax
minidisk
etc.

1/12/2007 11:53:46 AM

^ PS3

1/12/2007 11:56:13 AM

^^ ATRAC

haha like that would overrule mp3

1/12/2007 12:01:36 PM

...
SACD
DAT
MicroMV
Memory Stick
UMD

[Edited on January 12, 2007 at 12:05 PM. Reason : some more just thought of]

1/12/2007 12:02:31 PM

I've had a feeling all along that Blu-Ray will go the way of the Betamax, time will tell....

[Edited on January 12, 2007 at 12:04 PM. Reason : ]

1/12/2007 12:03:56 PM

People buy porn?

1/12/2007 12:12:21 PM

Quote :

"And why is Sony so stupid?"

Message body cannot exceed 10,000 characters.

1/12/2007 12:16:23 PM

sacd isn't a failure. more and more releases are being made onto sacd, plenty of remastering going on with older albums also.

1/12/2007 12:21:14 PM

Quote :

"Well, they had porn AND Disney."

Quote of the day.

1/12/2007 12:43:33 PM

^^^ lol nice.

1/12/2007 12:44:39 PM

more like Beta-Ray.... right?

1/12/2007 12:48:38 PM

Poor Sony.

1/12/2007 12:52:53 PM

HD-DVD, just in terms of picture quality, is an inferior format.

And, seriously, who the fuck pays for porn?

1/12/2007 1:02:00 PM

The number of consumers who care about the difference in quality aren't enough to offset Sony's insistence on proprietary formats. betamax and minidisk were superior as well... but in terms of sales, they failed. This will too.

1/12/2007 1:09:06 PM

Quote :

"HD-DVD, just in terms of picture quality, is an inferior format."

correct me if i'm wrong (i may be, as i haven't seen either), but didn't blu-ray quality suck horribly when it first came out? ESPECIALLY compared to HD-DVD? it's my understanding that it got better, but is there really a noticeable difference between the two?

this has been mentioned time and again, but my understanding of why blu-ray was (is) destined to fail:

1.) consumers understand "HD"...blu-ray is just something that comes on a PS3
2.) blu-ray is much more expensive (it's proprietary while HD-DVD is not...right?)
3.) initial quality was absolutely awful
4.) come on, it's sony! they fuck up everything!

1/12/2007 1:16:36 PM

Fuck, there's hardly anything good available on Blu-Ray

1/12/2007 1:18:02 PM

yeah, since when does the general public actually buy the "best" product?

1/12/2007 1:21:19 PM

what makes blu-ray so expensive? does it have ANYTHING to do with the hardware? i, personally, couldn't care less about the picture quality on dvd's that are $35-50/each, but i AM interested in the raw data capacity...30gb vs 50gb is a huge difference, and might (for me) be worth the extra cost up front to be able to store 66% more on a disc

1/12/2007 1:23:21 PM

^^hell, the general public is still yet to significantly adopt HD...

^ royaties?

1/12/2007 1:23:27 PM

royalties are what i figured drove up the cost...and that's just sony screwing themselves over

"superior" technology is a combination of function and cost...if hd-dvd costs half of what blu-ray does, and does more than the difference, then hd-dvd is "superior" to me

1/12/2007 1:26:15 PM

Quote :

"correct me if i'm wrong (i may be, as i haven't seen either), but didn't blu-ray quality suck horribly when it first came out? ESPECIALLY compared to HD-DVD? it's my understanding that it got better, but is there really a noticeable difference between the two?"

There was some reviews on the first hardware that Blu Ray had image quality issues compared to HD-DVD, but I suspect the average consumer wouldn't notice the difference.

Quote :

"what makes blu-ray so expensive? does it have ANYTHING to do with the hardware?"

I haven't studied up in awhile, but I think I remember reading somewhere that some of the equipment used to make regular DVDs can be reused for HD-DVDs, where-as the Blu Ray stuff is going to need new equipment, which in the short term will get rolled into the price of the disc.

1/12/2007 1:36:18 PM

blu ray does sound cool though and i like the added capacity but it will die.

i guess sony makes money in the lots of money off of a few things. rather than a little money off of lots of things.

1/12/2007 1:36:53 PM

Sony across the board is actually doing pretty shitty at the moment. If Blu Ray flops, heads will roll, if not sooner.

1/12/2007 1:37:39 PM

you can see all kinds of things with HD porn, "labias and flabias"

1/12/2007 1:59:44 PM

Warner Bros is supporting both formats. From their press conference at CES:

[in 2007]
HD DVD will bring 2.5 Million devices to the market
Blu-ray 6.2 million devices to the market.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/09/live-coverage-from-the-warner-press-conference/


Also:

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Universal/CES/CES:_No_New_HD_DVD_Announcements_from_Universal/429
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/09/a-little-dirty-detail-about-lgs-combo-hd-dvd-blu-ray-player/

and finally:

http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/08/fox-home-entertainments-2007-blu-ray-details/


I could go on all day, but face it:
Sony may have actually done this one right.

1/12/2007 3:57:47 PM

i'll be glad if they did...

50 gigs will be awesome but the price point isn't going to happen.

1/12/2007 4:22:19 PM

Quote :

"with that level of clarity, the porn sluts look nastier."

1/12/2007 4:28:49 PM

How is HD DVD an inferior picture format?

1/12/2007 5:18:27 PM

who the hell still BUYS pRon????

1/12/2007 5:21:27 PM

pirated porn as a christmas gift is pretty unclassy.

gotta give the real deal.

1/12/2007 5:26:30 PM

Don't mind FanatiK. The only things he's good at are ignoring common sense, talking about how much money he makes, and being dumb.

I'd like to point out he especially excels at that last one.

1/12/2007 6:42:48 PM

I'm still waiting on the optical disc to disappear entirely and flash memory to largely take over.

And porn has often been one of the few industries willing to take risks with technologies that offer promising returns. Go look up some of the first VCR tapes ... they were porn. Go look up some of the first major commercial websites ... they were porn. Wait of some of the first good examples of HD-DVDs, they will be porn.

(Request: Choose your Own Adventure HD-DVDs).

1/12/2007 11:21:09 PM

People watch porn for more than 5 minutes?

1/13/2007 1:31:48 AM

porn drives consumer technology

vhs, internet, dvd, all these would be non existent if it were not for porn popularizig them

1/13/2007 1:39:29 AM

Quote :

"Who wouldn't want 1080p porn?"

1/13/2007 11:30:02 AM

Quote :

"there should be a running sony format failure thread betamax minidisk etc."

PSP

1/13/2007 5:08:56 PM

I read somewhere that LG is coming out with a Dual Format player within the next year. Plays both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. Very very smart idea. Atleast if one flops you'll still have the other capability.

1/13/2007 5:20:31 PM

yeah but it only half ass plays hd-dvd

read an article about it... it will play the movie but none of the bonus features/graphics/games.

1/13/2007 6:49:30 PM

nice

1/13/2007 7:57:39 PM

^^^ if you don't mind paying $texas, there's a solution to almost every problem

1/13/2007 9:21:18 PM

Quote :

"Quote : "there should be a running sony format failure thread betamax minidisk etc." PSP"

Does memory stick count? It was more a form factor...

1/14/2007 12:01:45 AM

I wouldn't really call the PSP a failure per se.

Pop Quiz:

Which company introduced the MiniDisc format, upped the storage capacity to 1GB, then completely invented a new MiniDisc format solely for one product when that specific product could actually have brought its previous 1GB MD format to the mainstream?

Answer: Sony

1/14/2007 1:42:36 AM