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Disney - Blu-ray's Fair Weather Friend

Posted by Zonk on from the pick-a-side dept.

An anonymous reader writes "One day they're out, the next day they're in. Back in March, Disney CEO Bob Iger seemed to indicate that his company (which has exclusively backed Blu-ray since the start of the high-def format war) was on the verge of supporting *both* high-def formats. What a difference a couple of months of good press for Blu-ray makes: this week, the CEO reversed his earlier position, saying 'the single greatest thing we can do right now is to not waffle, but to be very, very blunt about it, (and) to continue our support of Blu-ray because we sense a real advantage.'"

4 of 138 comments (clear)

  1. Blu Ray could be improved... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    By requiring the player to phone home before playing the content. This would give customers better products and shareholder more confidence when trading technology and entertainment stocks. One can only hope.

  2. Doesn't mention the little problem of broken DRM by Whuffo · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Seems strange that this announcement comes so shortly after an AACS key was spread all over the internet; it seems that HD-DVD's protection is pretty well beyond defending now. It's not totally broken yet, but the writing is on the wall.

    Blu-Ray has additional copy protection in addition to AACS, so any media mogul who is depending on DRM to protect his profits would naturally be waving the Blu-Ray banner at this point.

    Of course, Blu-Ray will have all of its protections defeated too - it's just a matter of time.

  3. Re:HD-DVD's are better for consumers by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 5, Informative

    HD-DVD initially was not going to support anything above 480p through component video which would have forced everyone with a non-HDMI HDTV to "upgrade" to a newer HDTV. They relented "after" Sony came out and said they would not enforce content protection for the first couple of years and allow 1080i through component. Sony said no such thing. The Image Constraint Token (ICT) is an anti-feature of AACS, the copy-prevention system for BOTH HD-DVD and BLU-RAY. It wasn't Sony that said ICT would not be enabled, it was HOLLYWOOD as the MPAA that said they would not set the ICT bit on any AACS releases for either format. It had nothing to do with competition between BLU-RAY and HD-DVD and everything to do with not pissing off the early adopters who are the target market for any HD products.

    There are numerous Blu-ray burners/drives for PCs and macs out right now. Where are the HD-DVD burners for macs? Where are the consumer level HD-DVD burners for PCs? Considering that you can't buy one for much under $500 and the blank media is at least $15 a disc, the question is moot, even for most of the early adopters.

    I'm not into anime or that sick tentacle porn so I could care less about movies from other regions. Are you fucking kidding me? Do you really believe that the rest of the world has no cinema of note beyond anime and hentai?

    Anyone holding such a ridiculous opinion has no business discussing any aspect of cinema, you are just too ignorant to have any insight whatsoever. Which is probably why your claim about the ICT was total bunk too.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  4. Re:Disney's largest shareholder.... by Threni · · Score: 5, Informative

    All this stuff is about money, not principles. You shouldn't expect the suits to understand how stuff works (encryption, laser frequency etc) - just about whether or not this will make more money than that. If Disney turns something down, and later a better offer is made, there's no concept of loss of face, just the possibility of reduced profits.