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Format Wars - HD DVD vs. Blu Ray
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Interested in a shiny new High Def DVD player but don’t know what format to get? Confused about the quality of HD DVD versus Blu Ray DVD? Afraid to go into your local Best Buy and see what all the fuss is about and ask the twelve-year-old kid that works there a question? We don’t blame you at all. To get the scoop on at least one of the competing formats, HD DVD, you can check out the potentially more interesting and less frustrating HD Experience Tour when it comes to town November 15th.
Until then, here’s some more info to get you started. There are two formats competing for your High-Def DVD dollars. These formats are HD DVD and Blu Ray DVD. Both formats are considered High Definition because they deliver the requisite lines of resolution. They are just two different, non-compatible versions using different technology, of essentially the same thing. Some companies like Toshiba, Intel and Microsoft back HD DVD and some, like Pioneer, Samsung and Sony, back Blu Ray. Also, some movie studios are going to release movies for one format and some for the other.
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In reality, it probably won’t matter much what company supports what format. It will be the programming that determines where consumers spend their money. If you really want to watch a certain movie like "Mission Impossible III" or "Nacho Libre" and they are only available in HD DVD and not Blu Ray (which they are) then that's what you'll get. Although, there are many consumers (including this writer) who are waiting for the other shoe (or other bits) to drop before making a final decision on the format to adopt.
What is that shoe? The porn industry. No one can deny that porn is a big business. Huge, gigantic business. Whatever format the porn industry decides to adopt is probably a format that will survive in the long run. People need and want their porn and if it’s only going to be available on HD DVD and not Blu Ray, our money is on HD DVD being around a lot longer than Blu Ray. Sorry Sony.
However, the porn industry seems to be taking a wait-and-see approach and for all anyone knows, may never adopt either format. Opting instead to go for some other strategy such as hawking their wares at some sort of online portal like the iTunes store for porn. With Apple supposedly to begin selling movies online at iTunes any day now, can the porn industry be far behind? Or, maybe they already sell porn online? Of course, we wouldn't know anything about that.
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