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If DVD Is Dead, What's Next?
uglysad writes "The Age has a piece discussing the fact that, from the home entertainment industry's standpoint, the DVD is dead. So what is next? From the article 'It will come as a shock to film fans who have spent their Christmases stocking up on their movie collections, but the technology industry is in agreement: the DVD is dead. Consumer electronics companies have begun to show off what they believe will be the next generation of home video technologies. But despite the common belief that the DVD is history, the industry is split over what the next step should be.'"
Seems a little hasty to make such a claim. VHS isnt dead yet. The only media I can think of that is dead is the 8-Track and 70 RPM.
DVD is dead just like we're being forced into HDTV in... oh wait, it's smoke. How many people do you know that just got a DVD player? It's hardly dead.
If HD-DVD 'wins' the battle then current DVD isn't at all dead... HD-DVD is backwards compatible thus allowing companies to continue to produce old style DVDs on the cheap while also supplying higher quality content or longer (in video length) disks.
Your options are
- Blu-Ray
- HD-DVD
Nobody wants a format war.There are 11 types of people. Those who understand binary, those who don't and those who are sick of this lame joke.
Though you can still buy players and people have a ton of tapes. I see this more as wishful thinking on the part of consumer electronics mfgs (who'd love for you to have to buy yet another player format) more than anything else
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
The industry wants to kill DVDs since it is so easy for people to rent and copy them now days. Maybe they think they'll make more money with (Uncrackable)DRM'd replacements.
if the entertainment industry says DVD is dead I won't buy any more.
what? you don't have the replacement out yet? well, you guys just fucked yourselves then didn't you.
The issue that is far, far bigger than HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray and yet the industry doesn't seem to understand is that a standard DVD is more than good enough for most people. As with the CD before it, the DVD hits a sweet spot where aficionados might want improvements but the average user just doesn't care enough (if he is even able to discern them). The industry is being lulled into a false sense that the masses want HD DVDs because of the success of HDTVs, but I believe that has more to do with people wanting larger screens that take up less real estate (LCD, Plasma), than it really does with the higher resolution (for the masses, not for everyone). Also, people expect to buy new TVs on a cyclical basis and it is much easier to get them to run through one purchase upgrade than to upgrade their entire old media collection.
Someday HD DVDs (of one format or the other) will be the norm, but I'm quite sure this is going to be a much slower process (far slower than VHS->DVD IMO) than the studios seem to realize and will be driven more via a trickle of sales as people replace old TVs and DVDs with new models (which support old and new formats). In the meantime, they better keep cranking out those Plain Old DVDs.
Exaggerating death throes isn't meant to end sales, gods no. If that suddenly happened Bush would probably have to slash taxes and then tell everyone to take that $300 out and buy a stack of DVDs (except anything he finds morally repugnant, such as gay cowboys). The MPAA would have to suddenly circle the wagons, up-end the Bucket 'O Lawyers and proclaim the fall-off is the result of rampant piracy.
Nope, nothing like that.
What they mean to do is push the new HD-DVD or Blu Ray technology, even if it's not on the store shelves just yet. What's desired is to whip up a frenzy -- to make it a self fulfilling prophecy.
Anyone remember (the late) Richard Pryor as the Wiz, changing the colours? Red is dead, wouldn't be seen in green, etc.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
They only want us to think it's dead for two reasons, first, content cannot be securely protected (like they hoped). Second, you can now get a player for twenty bucks (same as in town), so there's little profit left.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
I'm in the technology industry, and I don't think the DVD is dead. Hell, we just got a new DVD player with our surround sound kit. Does anyone see Blockbuster renting out something more than DVD?
This guy is making stupid generalizations to draw attention.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
When people stop buying DVDs in signficant numbers, then and only then will DVD be dead.
Just because they want us to buy more, newer, less reliable, more expensive shit doesn't mean we will.
Question everything
I think for purposes of this argument, we can fairly say that if it's not given at least an aisle at Best Buy, it's dead. LP's are dead as a doornail. VHS tapes will be soon. But I can't imagine the DVD section at Best Buy going away within the next three years. Keep in mind it's in the interests of the electronics industry to have DVD die off as soon as possible. And despite the fact that the MPEG-2 encryption was a rush job and has long since been blown away by newer codecs, DVD's remain an outstanding technology.
Whatever the next standard is, it won't have the clear advantages over DVD that DVD had over VHS. The several hundred million consumers who already own DVD players and stacks of DVDs have no urgent reason to jump to the next standard -- not until most of these people own high-def Televisions. DVD will be with us for some time.
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
The technology industry agrees that DVD is dead? Alrighty then...
How many companies have stopped producing DVD players?
How many stores have stopped selling DVDs?
How many DVD pressing factories have shut down?
Where can I buy a next-gen media player (HD-DVD, Blu-Ray, whatever)?
WTF do they mean when they say DVD is dead?
Despite what the industry says, I'm betting on at least 4 years before I really have to worry about my precious DVD's being truly obsolete.
Don't think: Bones with a tricorder in hand saying "he's dead, Jim". Do think: Al Capone gritting his teeth and snarling "That no-good punk is dead. Dead, ya hear me?".
The movie industry hates DVD for the same reason it hates unadulterated CD: the pirates have cracked it so thoroughly that the studios might as well post the disk images on mininova themselves.
DVD is only dead to the greedy who aren't happy with the deflation in profit margins, due to the huge array of competition from everywhere, including scads of historical movies and TV programs and imported foreign content. They prefer to think it's not due to the competition but to piracy, but they're wrong. When you consider the time required to copy DVDs, its probably actually cheaper to just by a legit copy. Sure, there may be some bootleggers out there who are showing up with counterfits at flea markets, and a few downloaders who will D/L a movie to watch just because they can, not because it's convenient. But not enough to explain the hit big media is taking in the pocketbook, despite their claims.
Big media figures if they start up something newer and better they can get us all to transition to it and spend more $$$. However, while I think it could mean a short term windfall, I'm not convinced that HD gives you enough additional value to make it worth the transition-- most of what I like to watch already exists and isn't in HD format, I have no interest in spending extra $$$ just to see the modern crap that's mostly written by ad executives.
The DVD is not just going to go away, there's a huge amount of content out there that, even if the disks and the players start dying out, we'll be able to back them up on new storage mediums and still preserve them. And, much of the content remains worth watching, in fact, mostly more so than what's targeted for HD.
But let them pull out all the stops. And maybe there'll be suckers who will buy into it, but if I ever do I'll be about the last to do so, after the cost has dropped to about what DVDs are going for now...
They only wish it was dead because while it's alive it's a low-cost content rich alternative to the high-cost content poor HD market...
They should pick a format that can last centuries. This may sound ridiculous at first, but consider what the ideal shape is regardless of technology. It would be something like a thin pen-drive. If you only store something small or compression improves, then it can be a short pen. If you want to store 50 movies, then it may be a longer pen.
If it is like a pen-drive, then the technology inside does not matter such that it can change. Only the interface has to stay the same.
A disk, especially a 5 inch disk is too bulky. Plus, it is too easy to scratch the surface and the technology determines the interface. You cannot increase the number of groves (or whatever they call them now) without needing a new interface. A pen-drive-like interface does not care how many groves or how much RAM is inside. Only the "plug" and outer body has to remain the same. Inside it can use bacteria, pizza, or gerbal poop to store info. It ain't matter.
However, I must say that USB is a little awkward to insert. But, I have not seen something significantly better to replace it as an interface. So a pen-drive shape it is in the right direction.
Table-ized A.I.
I think DVD is alive and well, and will continue to be for a few more years at least.
Even with HD-DVD or Blu-ray looming around the corner, the bottom line is that DVD media will be supported on these newer devices.
If your talking about the end of using physical media for distributing movies, then I think your are a long way off. Hollywood is not really embracing online digital media, whether its for music or movies. Too many competing standards are vying to be the dominant online media format, Apple's quicktime, Microsoft's WMV, DIVX, XVID, etc, etc, etc. None of these players are going to want to give up their proprietary format to create a single industry standard, at least not with regards to Microsoft and Apple. Having too many file formats being distributed over the net will just be annoying. Having to buy or install multiple products to get a chance to watch a Hollywood movie will cause consumers to protest.
Also, I have yet to see a truely decent mergin of the PC in the living room. Most are still klunky hacks that try and force a PC into a home theater component, complete with boxy case, noisy fans, and cumbersome operation. DVD's are popular because of the easy of use, slip a disk in a try and hit play. Until computers match that in terms of simplicity, using a PC to playback movies won't become popular.
So what are these people talking about, other then making some grandiose statement to attract attention? Physical distribution of movies may change, but its still digital media, whether its in the form of a DVD, or someone comes up with a square holographic cube, any new digital player will support the previous generation of media, there is no reason for DVD to die to become obsolete.
DVD will be dead when Hollywood stops fighting online distribution of copyrighted content, Apple and Microsoft embrace the same file format, and someone finds a way of turning the computer into a dirt simple consumer electronics component. As you can see, it ain't going to happen anytime soon.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
Yes it's dead because the DRM has been cracked. If it weren't for DeCSS, there would not be so strong a push to get everyone switched over to Blu-ray or HD-DVD (which both are so far uncracked).
After getting screwed over because the industry decided they would not trust anyone with analog composite inputs, I'm not about to fork over more cash for new hardware just because my "HD Ready" TV was obsolete after less than one year when the industry decided they wanted to encrypt the signal to the TV.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
The other thing DVD has going for it is that it's actually a standard. The next generation still hasn't sorted itself out between Bluray and HD-DVD. I know that I held off on buying a DVD burner because of the standards battle between DVD+R and DVD-R, until the hardware manufacturers got fed up and built drives that could burn in any format. I expect the same thing will happen here. Buying one or the other at this point is a gamble, and you might get stuck with the next Betamax. Not to mention that Holographic Video Discs are in development which hold a terabyte of data, making both of the "next generation" standards seem like a mere footnote before the real next generation arrives.
Bite the hand.
More like 3X, really.
But also people didn't have to buy a new TV to see the difference. They bought a DVD player - it looked better on their normal NTSC/PAL TV.
If they buy an HD-DVD or BluRay player, it's not really going to look any better unless they buy a new HD TV. And they're still pretty expensive. (Mind you, the player manufacturers seem to be solving this problem by making the players prohibitively expensive anyway.)
For me, a big difference with DVDs was the sound, too. Perhaps more so than the improved video. VHS sound is crap (inc. 'VHS HiFi') - I have pre-recorded VHS movies where I can barely make out the dialogue, and it's not like I've played those tapes to death. I'm talking about the first play through. DVD sound is great - and I have to ask, how much better can the sound actually get with HD-DVD? We're back into CD vs SACD territory there.
I think high definition DVDs will take over eventually, but not at the speed the industry thinks, especially while they're still dicking around with competing formats. Until one HD format is settled on, I think most people will steer clear (esp. when the people who actually bought 'HD Ready' TVs find out it won't work due to no HDMI connector, etc).
Ever seen the back of a receiver? Take a long look at those analog RCA jacks because that was the last time the industry ever got everyone on the same page at the same time. When was that? 1970 something. Since then, Sony and Toshiba fought it out over Toslink and SPDIF and the CD format. Dolby and DTS fought it over the new surround sound ... both of which were obsolete a few years later with 6.1 and 7.1 coming fast and furious. Component barely started to become a standard before it was supplanted by DVI, which lasted on a year or so before HDMI came along to replace it. Every day I deal with pissed off and frustrated consumers who can't get their DVDs, cable terminals, satellite receivers and TVs all working together because of incompatible technologies.
My computer is my entertainment center for a reason.
I'll tolerate anything except intolerance.
DVD is more than acceptable quality for 99.9999% of the population, and as a PC storage medium, it's fine.
For audio, it's fine.
The only problem I can see is that the built in copyprotection was cracked, and certain people aren't happy about that :)
Perhaps they mean that the dvd-player market is saturated, and they need something else to sell?
smash.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
I agree: DVD and VHS were very different "new" things, and DVD is hardly in need of replacement.
VHS wasn't commonly in homes until the mid 80s. Being tape, it required long winding time to find content, and had an inherently limited lifespan. Being analog, it could not be copied or duplicated more than a generation or two. Videotape in general was introduced with less than broadcast audio and video quality, and as better technology came out, VHS slowly progressed toward being near broadcast.
DVD was introduced with CD quality sound and digital video significantly better than standard broadcast. DVD's are more convenient, durable and smaller than VHS tapes. DVD also offers perfect copies across generations.
DVD was also quickly integrated into computers; playing DVD's from a PC or laptop using VGA or DVI to a computer display offers a very high quality video, competitive with HDTV. Since common DVDs are better than commonly broadcast video quality, and since little HD content available, and since HD displays are not commonplace, there's hardly demand for a new HD media.
Satellite providers have had the capacity to deliver HD for some time now, and have instead chosen to deliver more content at standard resolution. If, as that suggests, there is scant market for HD video, why do we need an HD media disc to suddenly replace DVDs?
The only real benefit HD-DVD and BlueRay offer over DVD is in data storage capacity and in DRM, and consumers don't look particularly needy for either. They already have hard drive storage in excess of HD-DVD's (recall than when CD-ROM arrived, it offered FAR more storage than hard disks of the day).
CD's certainly didn't disapear for SACD, and in fact most consumers have never seen or heard of SACD. And remember when Phillips (and others) were presenting the "future of audio cassette," which was suposed to replace audio tapes the way that CD had replaced records? Those products bombed.
If anything, I think there is more growth potential in HardDrive based DVRs to replace and expand upon the functions of VCRs, a job that DVD isn't very well equiped to perform given its slow and finicky write technology.
New iterations of the iPod, as a DVR, have the potential to serve new markets better than bigger DVDs. And as broadband becomes more commonplace, and faster bandwidth arrives, larger discs may not be that necessary after all.
I can already:
-get iPod sized movies on demand (via iTMS)
-get DVD quality movies on demand (via NetFlix)
-get TV style episodes and shorts on demand (via Tivo)
I can see those services migrate toward HD slowly without any need for HD discs along the way. Think of NetFlix using downloads and hard disks instead of discs and postage, and its hard to imagine what problem a HD-DVD standard would solve.
...because that's the only way they can make their DRM a reality. The studios don't want you to own anything. They want you to license the rights to view a performance over and over again.
The problem is that DVD is a "good enough" technology that there's not a compelling reason (for most people) to want anything different. The same with CDs. They tried to kill the CD format by trying SACD and other variations, but they don't understand that to 99.9% of the listening public, the CD is a "good enough" format for their music. Sadly, MP3 is also a "good enough" format for a vast majority of people, even at a low bitrate with a crummy encoder. Let's face it, when I'm in my car, the noise floor is so loud that MP3 is just fine.
So, they're doing the best to stay "on message" and try to convince us that it's dead because that's the only way they're going to get any more money out of the people who already are happy with the status quo.
Wolfenstien 3D and Doom were technically compelling content to make a lot of people buy new computers. I've yet to see a movie that made me want to upgrade my home theater.
For my part, DVD is just fine to watch the mediocre movies that they put out. Especially on a TV set, or (gosh forbid) a portable media player.
I agree that Hollywood is losing money because what they create is junk, and that watching the old stuff will keep most of us happy for a long time to come. Besides, your comments are just a little off, Hollywood is not seing a decline in DVD sales, they are seing a decline in Box Office sales. DVD sales are more than twice that of the Box Office.
You seem to imply that they want to push HD so that we will stop copying DVDs and start buying their cr@p, that is just not the case. In fact, Hollywood has seriously mixed feelings about HD. Why? Because they are afraid that it will make you and I stop going to the theatres. It probably will, but I do not think it will have a hugely negative impact on Hollywoods bottom line, they will just have to do business slightly differently.
Which brings us to:
most of what I like to watch already exists and isn't in HD format
Most of what you watch already exists, and in formats that are vastly superior to HD. It has been downconverted to DVD, but DVD is a pretty cr@ppy format for viewing on a big screen, try a DVD on a 50" screen, it actually looks pretty bad. Compare that to HD.
As HD is adopted, all your old stuff will also be released in HD, and believe me, you are not going to want to own a cr@ppy DVD once the HD version is out if it has been down converted well. Why do you think Sony bought the movie studio with the largest video library in the US? So that they can release all that old stuff on HD.
HD is coming, and once your TV size goes to 42", you are going to want to have it.
Since when is the DVD dead? I can tell BY FAR its not dead. As mentioned above, not even VHS is dead... why the rush to kill it? More profiteering?
I think Sony and Toshiba are going to spend so much time fighting the battles that they will lose the war. People will refuse to move away from DVD to a multi-hundred dollar player while the battle rages. But they WILL be willing to download a piece of software that lets them buy movies online. I think Sony and Toshiba will postpone the next disk winner for so long that people will go strait to direct download, (which I see as being the eventual next step).
I do security
I agree that Hollywood is losing money because what they create is junk
Excuse me? Just because they call making less money than they though they would, and making less money than some other year "losing" money doesn't mean you have to help spread the lie.
HD is coming, and once your TV size goes to 42", you are going to want to have it.
My TV is going to grow? Amazing. Especially considering that it's just the right size for the spot it's in. I wonder how it will fit... Seriously though, we're a minimum of 5 years away from widespread HD adoption. It will probably be longer, since most people replace their TV after 10 years on average, but not everybody buying new TVs today are buying HD sets. Actually not even a majority are buying HD sets. 32" SD is the norm. The only reason the masses will buy HD media in that time frame is if it's the only media available. It won't be though, because all the HD players will be DVD compatable, and all the non-cartel members will keep publishing on DVD to maximize the potential market. The early push to HD media with extra DRM is going to open the door for "independant" creators and publishers, and the *IAA member companies are going to see their market share decrease more and more.
There is a niche for anything you can think of. From a mass-market perspective, they're dead.
whatever the next trend is they better be backward compatible with todays DVD's. If those mooks think I'm buying my whole video library again in a new format they've got another thing coming.
I did it from VHS to DVD which was fairly understandable since most of my video tapes showed their age and DVD did bring a whole new experience with 5.1 sound, interactive content, etc. but I have a HD TV and while I welcome HD content it's not compelling enough for me to want to replace many of the DVD's I own now.
Hell, VHS still is not dead, so there is no way DVD is "dead." Even with the introduction of HD-DVD and BluRay, non-HD content will continue to be released on less expensive, more compatible, MPEG2 DVD discs. It would be folly for a company such as ADV, whose content base is almost exclusively standard definition Anime to start releasing HD-DVD or BluRay discs simply because DVD is no longer the latest and greatest. HD-DVD / BluRay will come at a premium initially (and honestly, that premium may eventually become the standard price point :-\); consumers will not pay that premium unless they have something tangible to show for their investment. Only movies and recent seasons of more popular television shows are available in HD. Granted, a season of the average NTSC television show rarely fits on one or two DVDs, but that is not reason enough to insist on moving to HD-DVD or BluRay. Most people who buy television shows on DVD are content to swap discs, and those that are not are always welcome to do as I have and buy a 400 DVD Mega changer. On a side note, It is frustrating when studios think they have a clever solution to the problem and release double-sided DVDs (i.e. Quantum Leap) - because even with a DVD changer, you have to flip the disc manually. :)
... about merging HD-DVD and BluRay, but the consumer is the one who ultimately pays when two very similar but very incompatible formats are allowed to linger.
I own two HDTV sets and I am not fanatical about the transition to HD-DVD / BluRay. It is going to happen eventually, but considering the crap that has graced the big screen in the past 5 years I would rather just wait until a movie is on Showtime HD, HBO HD, INHD, etc... than pay $5+ extra for a movie that was not even worth seeing in the theatre. Movie studios will not begin to reauthor the good, but older, movies until there is a sufficient player base and there will not be a sufficient player base until there is content worth investing in a new player / TV (for some) to watch.
That said, there are a couple of people who actually buy UMDs and actually I know one of them. Despite the lackluster demand, movie studios continue to publish UMD videos. Which leads me to believe that HD-DVD and BluRay will be a similar boat, it will take studios years to figure out which format the consumer actually prefers. In that time, I am sure we will see hybrid HD-DVD / BluRay players enter the market to fill the gap that SONY and Toshiba could have easily filled before costing the consumer. BluRay discs may be more expensive to produce for the publisher, which is partly why Toshiba was such a
Add to that the fact that consumers just don't care that much about quality. They want convinence. The MP3 boom shows that. At the same time the Media Barons are trying to convince us to buy SACDs, the people are ripping their CDs to the lower quality MP3. Why because people want convinence. This is what DRM takes away. Heck, I would go back to VHS quality video in a second if they could make it even more convenient than my ReplayTV.
Absolutely. I knew DVD was going to catch on as soon as all the movie companies got behind it. That was when I got a player. VHS was dead from that moment.
DVD won't die and be replaced by HD-DVD or Blu-Ray. They were predicting that CD would die and be replaced with SACD or DVD-Audio, and that didn't happen.
Even though my DVD player supports DVD-Audio, I don't have a single DVD-Audio disc. I don't even have the player hooked up to support it. Why not? Because the DRM is so cripplingly inconvenient, it's not worth it. With a CD I can listen on my iPod, stream over my home network and listen at any computer, listen on my PDA, play the CD in the car, make mix CDs for the car, and so on. With DVD-Audio, they won't even allow digital feed from the player to the amp, so I'd need to buy a set of extra analog cables, I'd get lower quality (my amp has much better D to A than my player), and I wouldn't be able to rip the audio conveniently. And though some 'goldenears' folks will disagree, CD is basically good enough.
Similarly, DVD is good enough for the vast majority of people. I actually have an HDTV, and with a well-encoded DVD and a player with a good upconverter, the limiting factor on the image quality is either the source material or my eyesight. When I can see the fingerprints on the glass pane used for the 'floating pen' effect in "2001"--and that's a famously poorly encoded DVD--I know that there's really no great need for finer resolution. I can see the film grain on "Lawrence of Arabia" already, I don't need to see it any better. I can read the paperwork on Sam Lowry's desk in "Brazil". The resolution is just fine. Now, let's have more good movies...
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
What happens when those hundreds or thousands or millions of ROM chips (and handy plastic packaging) become "last week's movie"? You would need a major recycling & remanufacturing operation to prevent landfill. We already have a plastic recycling industry, but can chips be ground up & recycled? There's a lot of energy and resources that go into distilling a bucket of sand down to an integrated circuit, and it would be a shame to not recover some of that....
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.