Comments on The Collective Shelf: Home Media Part 1: Why we don’t care about Blu Ray...

sorry, but"its" is possessive.not it's.it's = it i...

2008-07-24T01:33:53.771-07:00

sorry, but
"its" is possessive.
not it's.
it's = it is.
---------

Not here in the UK it isn't and as we invented the language, you'd better get it right :)

Seriously, I think this is where a lot of the confusion about grammar and spelling on the net comes from. Most ex colonies except for the US, use the UK English standards. But the interwebs are dominated by America.

^^ To the above ''anonymous'' poster. Thanks for t...

2008-07-23T18:34:39.605-07:00

^^ To the above ''anonymous'' poster. Thanks for taking the time to post your comments. I'm not sure you got the point of what I was trying to say. Of course Blu-Ray is ''better'' quality wise than dvd. My point is that we should stick with DVD (as clearly pointed out in part two) but that progression is from DVD -> downloads and not DVD -> BR. Simply put because while BR offers higher quality; the added quality value is far down on the list of what a consumer wants. As shown by the bittorent, youtube etc. people are happy to exchange added video quality for higher convenience and more importantly price. By the time BR has caught up with DVD in terms of back catalogue, price and accessibility, downloads will have taken over the space having risen up to the picture quality of DVD and become the easiest and cheapest way to access media. I'm not saying we've got to stick with DVD, that would be naive and churlish, BR is just not the way we should or will be going.

Were you the one who wrote "Why do we need cellpho...

2008-07-23T16:28:29.367-07:00

Were you the one who wrote "Why do we need cellphones? Pagers and landlines rule!" Or were you the one who wrote that article on "Why CD's will bust in another 10 years because cassette tapes can be copied and sound good enough."? All I know about technology is, whether you love it or hate it, it soon becomes affordable. My mom spent $800 on a cellphone in 1988. CD players were $800. Cd's were ridiculously priced compared to cassettes. Cassettes sounded good enough right? What about the fan of eight tracks or the fan of vinyl who says vinyl sounds better than any CD? Why don't we all just take all the brunettes in the world and make them blonde? Point is, Different strokes for different folks. Just because you sunk a fortune into DVD's (let me guess you have a collection of about 200-300?) don't hate it's younger brother, Blu-Ray. So HD-DVD was the red-headed stepchild. Move on. I stopped buying DVD's two years ago because I knew technology would render my dvd's obselete in the next ten years. Why? Because technology will dictate that Blu_ray will be the same price of Dvd's and hold more storage with better quality and sound. I hope that after writing this article you don't have a cell-phone, cd player, or automobile as I think that horse drawn carraiges can still get you from point A to point B. Oh yeah, what about the computer you're on at the moment, typewriters were around for decades. The world is full of non-essentials. Some of it good, some of it bad. Stop being so emo about technology you can't afford. And stop making money off Blu-Ray with all your internet ads advertising Blu-Ray. I'll take my Blu-Ray without the whining thank you very much. I enjoy it and enjoy the haters as much as the lovers. It's the next gen of entertainment, so stfu and enjoy.
stillerwhistmanpryce@yahoo.com for all you emo's who are crying about the loss of value in your huge as worthless dvd collection. I have a whole garage load of VHS I would love to sell you.

Don't forget they crippled Blu-Ray & HD-DVD with D...

2008-07-23T13:59:04.066-07:00

Don't forget they crippled Blu-Ray & HD-DVD with DRM & incompatibility just like DVD-A & SACD. 2 other expensive major flops in the market.

@Anonymous July 23, 2008 12:05 PM:That is how capi...

2008-07-23T13:51:00.088-07:00

@Anonymous July 23, 2008 12:05 PM:

That is how capitalism works. Get used to it. They are not selling girl scout cookies.

And besides, Sony isn't even a majority owner of Blu-ray. Dozens of other media and electronic companies are involved. If my memory serves me correct, I think Sony owns less that 30% of Blu-ray.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blu-ray_Disc_Association

Prices are higher than DVDs, but they'll come down. We don't live in a Utopian socialist society. Profit is the motive for most innovations by companies. They are only doing what any other company in their position would too, which is to try and control the market and increase their profits.

Vote for your technology with your money. It is not worth your vitriol. If it really bothers you that much, unplug from the grid and become a Luddite. Your life is too short to hate this meaningless stuff.

Meanwhile, I'll enjoy my hi-def content at little to no extra cost compared to regular DVDs. Thanks Netflix.

BluRay sucks, Sony sucks and I will never buy into...

2008-07-23T12:05:29.383-07:00

BluRay sucks, Sony sucks and I will never buy into such a consumer unfriendly technology.

Sony could care less about quality or consumers - It is all about licensing, royalties and propriety for Sony. Betamax, Betacam, Minidisc, SDDS, Memory Stick, UMD, Hi-MD, and now bluray?

Bluray discs are too expensive for what they are. Sony gets kickbacks for every BR disc produced on top of the expense. BRD’s are not even cost effective to use for data backups. It is overpriced junk technology that could easily be made less costly and less proprietary.

I bought a blu ray player to go with my hi def tv....

2008-07-23T11:41:58.838-07:00

I bought a blu ray player to go with my hi def tv. i don't particularly care if it is 'standard' or not. it looks better than regular tv/dvd and that's all that really matters to me.

anon @ 7:44, Strunk & White? that guide is nearly ...

2008-07-23T11:03:49.846-07:00

anon @ 7:44, Strunk & White? that guide is nearly a century old. try suggesting something applicable next time you want to look important. i suggest mla, apa or ap style guides. language isn't static; the sentence wasn't unreadable. far be it from me to hijack this thread, but effing relax on the grammar.

I think people are missing a very important issue ...

2008-07-23T10:24:39.506-07:00

I think people are missing a very important issue to consider: if blue-ray were the standard, filesharing would be deeply impacted (I think this was partially behind the creation of blue-ray itself) b/c it's very difficult to compress a 25GB movie into a size that makes it easy to share. Current DVDs can be compressed to fit on a 700MB CD and be in very good quality, but a 25GB blue-ray would probably still be in the Gigabytes after compression.

maaaannn, we're going to be SOOO kicking ourselves...

2008-07-23T10:10:41.874-07:00

maaaannn, we're going to be SOOO kicking ourselves when we get genetically augmented hearing... =(

You're right, digital downloads are the future.But...

2008-07-23T09:52:51.437-07:00

You're right, digital downloads are the future.

But Blu-Ray is the present.

Actually, a lot of what I download from BitTorrent...

2008-07-23T09:25:10.831-07:00

Actually, a lot of what I download from BitTorrent *does* incur a substantial hit to quality because I often elect to take the smaller files. The point is I don't even care about that. The power of convenience in quickly downloading what I want, when I want it is the real value-added. Sony and the rest have utterly botched this. The only company who understood this is Apple, who started up the iTunes music store when the others continued to try and cling to physical media. And now everyone is playing catchup to Apple.

I'm a bit shocked to read some of the comments her...

2008-07-23T09:08:42.213-07:00

I'm a bit shocked to read some of the comments here. I agree with the poibnt of the article and I think digital downloads are the future. I think people will not switch to HD because its to much fuzz about nothing, you need the big as expensive TV and the player and now u have to pay even more for your TV siubscription. Normal people don't care about this stuff, only nurds like you guys.

Picture quality is a none issue for most people.

Given current and near-future bandwidth capabiliti...

2008-07-23T08:35:36.318-07:00

Given current and near-future bandwidth capabilities of broadband internet in the US (and world), I do not think we will be seeing true on-demand HD content at Blu-Ray resolution anytime in the near future.

I agree that the visual disparity between DVD and Blu-Ray is negligable on anything smaller than a 50" TV. But on large HDTV's and particularly projectors, on screen sizes of 120" or more, the visual difference is enormous.

There is a reason why Netflix has become so successful using snail-mail and DVD's as its delivery medium. Netflix and its competitors now offer Blu-Ray for exactly the same price.

I think Blu-Ray will be around for the next few years, at least until a newer HD format arrives.

It's the SOUND that has the biggest improvement ov...

2008-07-23T08:30:56.697-07:00

It's the SOUND that has the biggest improvement over a regular DVD. I personally love the heck outta Blu Ray and use Netflix to get around the cost.

The low sales numbers are due to the price point, period. Nobody is going to pay $35 for a Blu Ray when Blockbuster is selling DVDs for $5 each.

But don't rag on Blu Ray, it is simply superior technology, and it looks and sounds amazing. Just because you don't like investing in home theater equipment doesn't mean it's a "bad format." It is the best format, period, including direct downloads. I don't know how big a 1080p movie would be in terms of bandwidth, but regular DVDs are 7-8 gigs each, so I would have to imagine Blu Ray is a good amount over that.

The title of this article needs to be changed to, ...

2008-07-23T08:29:52.798-07:00

The title of this article needs to be changed to, "Why I don't care about Blu Ray" since we implies others agree with what the author is saying.

I certainly wouldn't consider myself mad rich, or even a visual-ophile nut, but I did take the plunge to buy an HDTV, and not because it has "a few more pixels," but because it has a hell of a lot more pixels. Five to seven times as many as standard definition and that makes a big difference unless you're blind.

I agree that Blu Ray players, media and HD subscriptions are overpriced, but the cost of upgrading to HD does not need to include any of this. I am getting plenty of HD with a $55 UHF antenna here in the states.

I suppose part of the reason Blu Ray isn't taking off is due to ignorant cheapskates who find standard definition to be good enough, but I think a bigger part of the reason is there is more HD material available from the Internet than there is from the overpriced Blu Ray market. That's right, the Internet isn't just good for obtaining lousy-quality media for blind and deaf people; there's good stuff out there too for the audio/visual-ophile nuts and the mad rich.

Anonymous @6:10 is correct. It should be "its" not...

2008-07-23T07:44:23.896-07:00

Anonymous @6:10 is correct.

It should be "its" not "it's."

Please get a copy of Strunk & White and read it to avoid further embarrassing yourself :-)

BluRay makes a HUGE difference on big screens >42 ...

2008-07-23T07:30:18.162-07:00

BluRay makes a HUGE difference on big screens >42 in and I can't go back to regular DVDs. This article seems very narrow-minded to me. Prices will eventually become affordable once the technology reaches its goal of demand.

With my new HDTV, I wanted to watch more high-def ...

2008-07-23T07:27:53.090-07:00

With my new HDTV, I wanted to watch more high-def programming. Upgraded my satellite programming to HD and enjoyed the better images when using by Xbox 360. When I started getting hardware failures, I got it replaced and immediately sold and it got a PS3 instead. I then altered my Netflix account to send me Bluray movies when they are available for the titles in my queue at no extra charge.

The reality is that for me, Bluray doesn't cost any extra. I watch movies only once. Only a few movies are worth rewatching in which case I can hold on to the movie for a few more days or put in back in my queue.

The lesson for everyone is that technology is a commodity. When it becomes accessible by price and convenience, people will turn to it if it has value to them.

Right now, the best option is Bluray for rentals. If you like to buy your content, then an upscaling DVD player is probably a better option.

Unlike music, HD content appeals to our most primary sense, our vision. We are much more discriminating for visual content over audio when it comes to technical quality. Doesn't really matter for content that is not cinematic in its portrayal or lacking in impressive special effects. But some movies are presented for their visual arts. In which case HD is the way to go.

I'm glad I have the option and am glad there will be better ones coming down the pipe. The bottom line is that none of this is important enough to hate Bluray, Sony, or any other technology.

Just buy or rent what works for you.

For those of you who forget or don't know, I can r...

2008-07-23T06:35:10.219-07:00

For those of you who forget or don't know, I can recall reading an article about dvds in 1997. The same year I believe the playstation 1 was released. Who knows if it was even for sale before then? But thats at least 11 years to progress to where it is today, and blu-ray has been out for how many years now?

I agree with Jake on this one I have a great deal ...

2008-07-23T06:34:46.448-07:00

I agree with Jake on this one I have a great deal of pride in ownership. Expanding my collection and owning the actual DvD and case is my favorite part.

sorry, but"its" is possessive.not it's.it's = it i...

2008-07-23T06:10:53.028-07:00

sorry, but
"its" is possessive.
not it's.
it's = it is.

"It's = it isPresumably you write for a living so ...

2008-07-23T05:35:15.734-07:00

"It's = it is

Presumably you write for a living so please learn to use the basics of your language."

This not strictly true, if you're going to be a punctuation Nazi, you really ought to get it right.

In addition to "it is", it's can also be used to denote belonging to. John's = belonging to John.

The sentence "but the biggest problem with Blu Ray is that it doesn’t fit it’s only market.'

Is correct, the "it's" denotes "belonging to" Blu Ray

Peace

you think cinema is not a visual art?are you insan...

2008-07-23T05:19:36.588-07:00

you think cinema is not a visual art?

are you insane?

You leave out a number of reasons. BluRay isn't pr...

2008-07-23T04:45:38.772-07:00

You leave out a number of reasons. BluRay isn't practical as a personal recording medium. The HD cameras are expensive, you don't have "set top" recorders that cost less than a used car, and, worst of all, many Blu-Ray players are region locked. Lots of people today have DVDs from more than one "region" and players capable of playing them back. Yet, if we jump on the Blu-Ray bandwagon, half of your catalog of old DVDs instantly goes up in smoke -- with no practical way to carry them forward.

As the technology is becoming more restrictive, the value of it decreases. Lower value at much higher cost means no sale.