Well... as expected, I've received a flood of e-mails over the last day or so in response to my high-def format war comments of yesterday. And as expected, those who have firmly attached themselves to HD-DVD weren't terribly pleased with my arguments. The interesting thing, however, is that none of these people could logically refute my reasoning, and very few even attempted to do so. In fact, while some of the responses from HD-DVD supporters were polite and thoughtful, most were defensive, overly emotional or even downright hostile. A couple e-mails were so nasty that I can only wonder at the mental stability of their authors. All of this suggests to me that even these people are starting to suspect that the writing is on the wall for HD-DVD.
I was pleasantly surprised, however, at how many readers responded to say that they generally agreed with my assessment of the situation. And it wasn't just Blu-ray supporters who reacted positively. A surprising number of retailers and industry insiders expressed relief that we had finally said what they WANTED to say, but weren't in a position to do so. I was also struck by how many people that agreed with my comments said they hadn't yet adopted either format, instead having decided to remain neutral until a choice was more clear. But many of those folks told us that they were now close to jumping into the high-def arena, and Blu-ray was where they were headed. The responses as a whole were certainly fascinating, and they have done nothing but convince me further that this format war needs to end now, before the early adopter market gets even more fractious and divisive.
So what, or who, could end this format war? Simple: Universal. If Universal were to suddenly announce support for Blu-ray Disc in addition to HD-DVD, or if they were to adopt Warner's TotalHD combo disc, that would be the end of it. You would suddenly have every major studio in town releasing Blu-ray titles (except for DreamWorks, and our sources tell us that the studio is simply waiting for one of these formats to start selling serious numbers before getting involved). By the end of the year, cheaper second generation Blu-ray hardware will available, and that's the ballgame. That's not to say that Microsoft and Toshiba would stop pushing HD-DVD anytime soon. And I'm sure some of the HD-DVD supporting studios would continue releasing titles, at least for a while. But why would any average consumer want to buy an HD-DVD player, even a very cheap one, when you can't get Disney movies, you can't get Pixar films, you can't get the Bond films, you can't get the Spider-Man films, etc, etc, etc. Universal has the power to end this format war tomorrow. We certainly hope a lot of people, both inside the industry and film fans as a whole, are making efforts to POLITELY convince them to do so. Here's how:
Universal Studios Home Video
70 Universal City Plaza
Universal City, CA 91608
(818) 777-4400
Studio website - E-mail form on website
While we're on the subject, here's more evidence of Blu-ray's advantage: Blu-ray almost completely dominates the Japanese market now (click here for more on that), and has a clear edge in the Australian market as well (click here). In fact, one of Australia's leading consumer electronics retailers, JB Hi-Fi, has announced that they won't even carry HD-DVD in their stores (click here). Why? Because they, like many others, simply don't see how HD-DVD can overcome the overwhelming studio support behind Blu-ray Disc. JB's marketing director, Scott Browning, put his company's position this way: "We don't want to be selling $1000 clocks." Ouch. Any way you slice it, this whole format war situation is just getting silly.
By the way, for you HD-DVD fans out there who are running around online today claiming that I'm somehow getting paid to endorse Blu-ray (rather than coming to the rather obvious logical conclusion all on my own), I'll bet you this: If, in the next few months, the HD-DVD camp suddenly gets all those Blu-ray exclusive studios to start releasing titles on their format, and if all those electronics manufacturers who have released Blu-ray players start releasing HD-DVD or combo players too, I'll will happily and publicly revise my opinion. I'll even exclude Sony on both counts. But I'm betting it isn't going to happen.
