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Why Has Blu-ray Failed To Catch Hold?
Velcroman1 writes "My VCR is stashed in a closet, right next to a couple of CD-ROM players, a laser disc player, and other forgotten electronics. Is my Blu-ray player about to join them? Blu-ray really hasn't caught on — and probably never will. 'I'm surprised DVDs have continued to hang on,' said King, referring to the fact that player sales of over 20 million units in the US last year were pretty much evenly split between DVD and Blu-ray models. Blu-ray discs and players are clearly superior to DVDs, offering more features and a better picture overall. So why haven't shoppers been impressed?"
I suspect most people aren't that bothered by picture quality.
DVDs are handier than tapes, you don't need to rewind.
DVDs still work just fine.
Because "regular price" for many blu-ray movie is $29.99 compaired to $17.99 for a DVD. The only times I buy blu-ray over DVD are for action movies that I really enjoyed (and that the improved picture quality is actually noticeable) or deep discount sales when I can get them for under $15.
Netflix
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Blu-ray players connected to the Web can offer games, extra movie features, and additional bonus materials online that DVD players generally can't. And the latest Blu-ray players can handle 3D discs, something no DVD player can do.
I don't want any of that shit, especially if I have to pay extra for it. I just want to watch a movie.
DVDs don't crash because some jag-off decided to run Java code between frames of my movie. DVDs don't make me worry about version numbers, patching my player, or any of that jazz. And that's just technical.
I have a DVD player in every computer, and connected to each TV - meaning portability. All my friends have DVD players. It's easier to find movies on DVD.
DVDs are cheaper.
I have a huge collection of DVD's. I'm not going to repurchase everything.
Next will be going back to solid state non-spinning media. People don't change formats for picture quality (see: Betamax). They change for convenience/durability.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Honestly, the quality is too good - You can see the wizard behind the curtain. Real life example: My geeks friends and I were all standing around watching Iron man 2 on a super huge LCD screen at best buy. It was the scene where Tony escapes his captors in the clunky MKI armor. We all noted that the suit looked like plastic, not metal. That you could see where the joints didn't quite connect. In short, the illusion was shattered. I haven't bought a blue ray video since. (I have a PS3, I own a few blueray films that I got for the extra features - But I prefer to watch plain old DVDs.)
Plain and simple. Most people aren't looking to play in high definition on Frank's 2000 inch TV.
And for screens 60" and smaller high def, while noticeable just isn't enough of an improvement to merit the switchover.
That and the huge install base of DVD players and drives out there is just an 800 lb gorilla that Blu-Ray has to struggle to overcome.
And the capper.
If there had NOT been a credible format war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, we'd probably have seen better adoption by now. The format war completely crippled uptake of the format for YEARS. As such, neither HD platform gained the critical early traction necessary to overtake DVD. Now, this late in the game, since it has to now compete with streaming/downloadable content as well, it's going to continue to stumble.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Or just read the article summary, where it says 50% of new player sales were Blu-Ray. That seems fairly mainstream.
The headline-grabbing premise of the article claims "Blu-Ray is failing", but the actual argument being made to convince us of that is "Blu-Ray has not entirely replaced DVD in the first few years", which most people would not consider to be the same. There's absolutely no argument stated that even tried to convince us that Blu-Ray sales are on the decline or that Blu-Rays won't continue to grow and eventually supplant DVDs just like most incremental, backward-compatible upgrades.
The lack of Blu-ray support from Apple is entirely an Apple thing. They want people to support iTunes, not Blu-ray. The tiny bit of money they would have made on video professional who want Blu-ray support (which they can actually get, after-market, on the Mac ... Adobe tools support it) pales in comparison to the cash they're pulling in on iOS devices and products. In fact, just the iPad itself brought in as much revenue as the Mac last year... and it wasn't even launched until April.
Sony won specifically because Blu-ray wasn't proprietary. Toshiba and Microsoft ran HD-DVD like a gaming console -- Toshiba sold every player at a loss, which they could, because they got a per-disc royalty. Blu-ray was rapidly licensed... other than the PS3, Sony wasn't even out with a BD player early on (they had to devote their supply of lasers to the PS3).
Blu-ray in PCs wasn't a critical thing, just as DVD in PCs wasn't when DVD was new. PCs only adopt the new consumer formats once the drives hit a comfortable price point. Which is about where Blu-ray drives are these days.
And this is the same evolution as other devices. The pundits do expect Blu-ray player sales to exceed DVD this year, for the simple reason that the CE industry has counted on new DVD features of some kind every year to drive new player sales. Particularly today, your best chance at a new sale is to someone who's already a DVD users. The premium player market was long ago established at around US$100. When 480p players hit the market, they were more expensive, but settled into the $100 niche. Then upscaling players took over that $100 slot. Now it's Blu-ray players... they are, after all, still fully functional DVD players. By Christmas, BD players will hit the $50 mark on sales, then pretty regularly into 2012 -- just as BD players first hit the $100 mark last Christmas, and now are readily available at around $100.
Media sales are another thing... many discs are sold to people with multiple players. You may have that BD player in the livingroom, but DVD players in the car, the kids room, the portable player or PC for vacation use. This has many new BDs bundled with a DVD as well... they'll spend the extra $0.05 to make the BD sales. Disc sales were around 20% last year, depending on the film (films with geek appeal do a significantly higher share of BD sales than, say, chick flicks or kiddie films). This is expected to increase this year.
That's not the whole story, though, because it's also keyed by retailer. Wal-Mart sells the most DVDs in the country, and they're still highly DVD oriented. Best Buy, on the other hand, went over 50% Blu-ray last year, and they continue to grow. DVD sales are skewing toward highly discounted older releases already, and probably keep moving that way. That's one big reason the studios are all about the Blu-ray, even though it hasn't dominated yet. Don't forget, it took quite some time for DVD to replace VHS, and that was without the backward compatibility.
Another related factor: just try to find a standard definition television or camcorder any more. They essentially don't exist. Consumers are moving rapidly toward HD in all things, which starts to make DVD unacceptable, at least for certain films. Same reason I could imagine watching a small cast drama in SD, but wouldn't even bother to watch any pro sport in SD... just doesn't work anymore.
-Dave Haynie