"Club Penton" - Ask questions to Hollywood insider "Penton-Man"

[SkullPhyre]

It was nice.

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by sharkshark

To be honest, for a while both formats had elements that sucked, and those of us format neutral could see the advantages/disadvantages of each without becoming zelous or feeling that the only way to enjoy this hobby would be to treat it like some sort of sycophantic team sport.

My pick for the format to beat, was Blu-ray (due to Bill Hunt's pre-launch posts about the two formats, and of course, the forward thinking specs of Blu-ray compared to HD DVD).

That being said, I was convinced by "people", that HD DVD was the format that was going to win (for multiple reasons), and I enjoyed my HD-A2 while I had it, and argued with many "fans" (some of whom post here) about the superiority of HD DVD over Blu-ray, and it's eventual success.

Eventually, I found out that the things that were supposed to happen FOR HD DVD was not happening, and Blu-ray was starting to mop up the floor with HD DVD (something which I repeatedly read was not going to happen), and so I saw the writing on the wall, and purchased the PS3 in May of 2007 (yikes, that long!), and found that I enjoyed Blu-ray better than I did HD DVD.

For a while, I didn't care who won, but eventually, my preference for Blu-ray made me pick a side. Yes, the BDA came off "smug" at first, but eventually, I found myself very glad that I preferred Blu-ray due to the actions of some "people"/"groups", and I found the BDA to lose some of their smugness.

Originally Posted by sharkshark

I felt, as someone who felt there were advantages and disadvantages of -both- formats, that after Harry's "review" of the format that the Bits' response was needlessly reactionary, and seemed (to a third party interest) to overlook many of the issues and concerns that even strident fans of BD were suffering with, from loading times, profile confusion, lack of lossless audio support, etc., etc.

Originally Posted by Bill Hunt via The Digital Bits

I'm somewhat surprised to find myself saying this, but HD-DVD is quietly making Blu-ray Disc look pretty silly. Motivated as I've been by a desire to see this format war end quickly, I was quick to sing the potential praises of Blu-ray Disc early on, simply because it seemed to have the clear advantages of better technology and much broader studio support, plus the potential market-share dominance of the forthcoming PS3 game system. And to be honest, my very early experiences with HD-DVD were disappointing. Since that time, however, an interesting this has happened... the early Blu-ray experience has turned out to be pretty lackluster too. Discs have looked bad, the Samsung player is a disaster and Sony's over-priced the PS3 right out of the market (you'll be able to buy both an Xbox 360 AND a Nintendo Wii for the price of a PS3). Sony and their BD camp allies are just not delivering on the promise of their format - period. Meanwhile, HD-DVD software and Toshiba's hardware (via these firmware updates) just keeps getting better and better. And get this: Sony STILL can't get their 50GB dual-layered Blu-ray Discs to work right on the existing and prototype players. The current Samsung player, as shipped, will not play them. How do you like them apples? Ouch.

If the BD camp doesn't do something dramatic and fast... they will have lost the hearts and minds of the early adopters to HD-DVD. To my thinking at least, HD-DVD is looking better and better all the time... and it seems to me it's now the format to beat.

The Digital Bits - 8/26/2006

I also want to point out that while stand-alone players were suffering with slow loading times, my PS3 is faster than my HD-A2 ever was. The Blu-ray players might have had an issue with "lossless audio support", but the Blu-ray studios (Lionsgate and neutral studios not included) at least supported it across the board. Also, I still say the profile issues aren't much different than DVD players back in the early days, the only difference was that it focused on features instead of "profiles".

Originally Posted by sharkshark

The best thing for the Bits, IMHO, was the end of the war, getting back to doing what you guys do best.

As someone who has been reading The Bits since the DVD/DiVx war, I didn't have an issue with them reporting on the war... in fact, I found it helpful.

Originally Posted by sharkshark

All I heard for years about BD.com was that if you'd show up here and say the least bit critical thing about BluRay that you'd be attacked and/or banned for having a disenting opinion. This, of course, is rediculous, an exagurated attack upon a community of like minded users. At the same time, AVS certainly has had more than its fair share of draconian members and policies. Still, it's comments like those above that really get on my nerves, exposing how even a slight disenting comment (like, "maybe Amir's not such a prick and just had a view that disagreed with yours?") gets met with anger, ridcule, and often downright hostility.

I don't know Amir well enough (thankfully) to call him a name, but he did have issues above and beyond disagreeing with my opinion.... and some of us can remember some of these "aspects" of his personality.

I'm dealing with my old knee injury acting up, so I haven't been posting much lately, but I just HAD to reply to this.

~Alan

[Jeff Kleist]

I was asked by a filmmaker (who many here are familiar with) awhile back to go on film (actually 4k RAW) to express my knowledge of the whole affair and I balked at the idea.
I don’t know if that project is still in a planning phase or if it has been shelved permanently.

I have a standard response to the whole documentary/book thing

"Yes, we'd make a million bucks, the problem is the legal bills would be at least TWO million. Even if we did it legality free, nothing was on the record, and just like in science, what you KNOW and what you can PROVE are two different things. We KNOW that Paramount was paid off $150 million, but we couldn't PROVE it until it showed up on their balance sheet. 98% of the really good dirt from the format war will never have something like that to back it up, and exist soley in a lot of phone calls, IMs, emails and other non-admissable forms"

I'd love to see a tell-all film or book made, but by the time the lawyers won't care anymore, neither will anyone else.

More than one Senior V.P. at WB bought an HD DVD player over Christmas because they were clueless or shall we say *insulated* as to the announcement of Blu-ray exclusivity prior to CES.

Warner Canada was hosting events with Toshiba as much as a week prior, and all the people I talked to there was sure this was they were going red. Don't forget that WB was still crawling with red ants, and they didn't want anything leaking out when it shouldn't.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by sharkshark

All I heard for years about BD.com was that if you'd show up here and say the least bit critical thing about BluRay that you'd be attacked and/or banned for having a disenting opinion. This, of course, is rediculous, an exagurated attack upon a community of like minded users. At the same time, AVS certainly has had more than its fair share of draconian members and policies.....

Shark, I think some people are still fighting the “war” over at AVS.
They are just using different weapons.

I’m speaking about those that see dnr and/or ee or some other perceived imperfection involving 95% of Blu-ray movies and blow it way, WAY out of proportion on a daily basis.

For example, I’m told the *scientists* just bumped the old SALO thread to the top of their bi*chfest again for no other reason than to belittle one of our reviewers here who explained himself long ago and deferred final judgment to RAH and Torsten.

There is really no call for that………and if you check the past posting history of many of these *nitpickers* they were avid red ants in the past but, were blind to similar perceived deficiencies involving HD DVD.

There are still format war games being played out by unscrupulous *scientific* individuals to this day.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Bill Hunt

BTW, guys... I'll try to answer a few questions over on my regular thread. And you can thank Penton for pulling me in here. He called me was I was making my morning coffee this morning and asked me to check in.

lol

I love how a plan comes together.
I doubt that the NASA engineers would have pulled it off more synchronously.
Note the times………

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=7924

then, within the same minute……..
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=7925

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Bill Hunt

SOMEDAY... someone is going to have to reveal the REAL story and industry maneuverings behind Warner's final decision to go Blu-only. Related to which is, the real story behind all those rumors that Fox was THIS >< close to going HD-DVD only. (Hint: They weren't.) But that's a story for another day... probably many years from now! It's a dandy though.

Ill chime in with this and this actually came from someone well connected to the HD camp. Those of you that know me can probably guess who it is.

ANyway, it was believed that Fox deliberately delayed their titles so they could create the illusion that they were frustrated with the BDA and make it seem to Toshiba that they could be bought out and switch to the red camp and that this illusion was what Toshiba also used to try and permanently sway Warner to the side of the red camp. However, Fox and Warner made the deal that if Toshiba was unable to persuade Fox to go red that Warner would have to exclusively endorse blu, which is what happened.

For the record, this is not anything I heard from Bill, Jeff or Penton. Its just my way of putting together the pieces based on what I was told in confidence by several HD-DVD insiders (NONE of which EVER told me that Warner was going red just that there were HEAVY discussions and that a decision was imminent (end of Dec 2007)) and your public comments. Feel totally free to rebuff this post.

[Jeff Kleist]

ANyway, it was believed that Fox deliberately delayed their titles so they could create the illusion that they were frustrated with the BDA and make it seem to Toshiba that they could be bought out and switch to the red camp and that this illusion was what Toshiba also used to try and permanently sway Warner to the side of the red camp. However, Fox and Warner made the deal that if Toshiba was unable to persuade Fox to go red that Warner would have to exclusively endorse blu, which is what happened.

Fox's vacation was solely tied to the cracking of AACS, but certainly before spreading those kinds of stories someone should have thought that "Gee, maybe the company who refused to release Blu titles for 6 months because of AACS being cracked might not want to devote themselves to a system without copy protection"

[Esox50]

Format war, schmormat war. Who cares. We won. The better product won. A major victory for home theater buffs and film aficionados. End of story.

I would much rather see and talk about concrete release dates for stuff like Braveheart, LOA, Jurassic Park, Indy Jones, etc, etc.

[Anthony P]

Fox's vacation was solely tied to the cracking of AACS, but certainly before spreading those kinds of stories someone should have thought that "Gee, maybe the company who refused to release Blu titles for 6 months because of AACS being cracked might not want to devote themselves to a system without copy protection"

yup, and why do HD DVD fan boys like to push the notion that Fox's brake was the showing of defection but miss that a few months earlier Universal did the same thing (since the AACS crack was seen on HD DVD first)


yup, and why do HD DVD fan boys like to push the notion that Fox's brake was the showing of defection but miss that a few months earlier Universal did the same thing (since HD DVD was cracked first)

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Fox's vacation was solely tied to the cracking of AACS, but certainly before spreading those kinds of stories someone should have thought that "Gee, maybe the company who refused to release Blu titles for 6 months because of AACS being cracked might not want to devote themselves to a system without copy protection"

I was talking about several of their titles such as Independence Day, I'Robot and Master and Commander, which was back when they were in the game.

[Jeff Kleist]

sorry, confused 2 unfounded Fox rumors, my mistake

[Living Near Shamu]

I still remember when Toshiba dropped the price of the HD DVD players to $99. $99! Didn't Penton said that the studios were also kinda angry that Tosh was already degrading the new technology? I mean where was the money to make if the new media was dropping that fast?

[horseflesh]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Top of the Morning to all my Irish friends today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhuDkhvOpBc

Thanks!!

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Shark, I think some people are still fighting the “war” over at AVS.
They are just using different weapons.

fair enough... but there's no need, in my opinion, to dehumanize them with jargon... It wasn't 'till this thread that I saw the "red ant" epithet, but there was enough M$/HD-DUD crap (along with LOADS of anti SONY stupidity) to go around.

YES, there are those on AVS that go completely out of line, that are still trying to fight old battles, that blow things out of proportion. Please agree that there are equally those HERE that come off as smug, that are more eager to see conspiricy as the obvious motivation, and that the "blu side" did nothing bad, and the "red side" did nothing right. Maybe not in the same numbers, but don't you ever feel that even if you agree with the sentiments of some members of this forum that they come across as dogmatic and needlessly antagonistic? Can't someone be satistfied with being right without also being arogant and derisive of their opposition?

My take from the begining was that BD was going to win, but HD-DVD let me in a full YEAR before BD did... Like SACD/DVD-A, I fully expected either hybrid players or a life with two seperate playback systems (something that I've got 'till this day). It was Toshiba as a player manufacturer let me down far more thoroughly than the format ever did, but a world with non-Tosh players is as hypothetical as wondering where BD would be without Sony and their PS3. With Warner's switch, HD-DVD lost, BD didn't (yet) win the bigger battle with DVD. Problems continue to this day, problems that can't (anymore) be attributed to the old ways, though talk of bitrates and such still bring up the same rhetoric. Old talk of these payouts from Tosh/MS, without indicating that it's certainly never been publicly stated explicitly (AFAIK) that similar payouts/incentives were NOT given to Blu exclusive studios, in terms of promotional support or even replication costs, is disingenous.

I'm just beating an old, dead horse here, but it's just so mindblowing simplistic to me to see this as a "we're the good guys and they were all pricks". Yes, this is the =Blu-Ray= fan forum, I get it. That said, even the strongest Kool Aid should allow some of the more comitted to at least admit, perhaps in their weak moments, that not all was evil or nefarious on the red side, and not everything was sunshine as roses on the Blu.

In the end, I respect the members of this particular thread too much to see hints of what plagues other sections of this forum, where dissent is (seemingly) pounced upon, and kneejerk reactions rule any rational argument. I think, humbly, that we're better than that in this little corner of the forum...

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Alan Gordon

I also want to point out that while stand-alone players were suffering with slow loading times, my PS3 is faster than my HD-A2 ever was.

absolutely... own a BD player at that time that -wasn't- a PS3? Bought a BD10, and even it was miles faster than my A1. That said, it was (used) $1100CDN, and my A1 was $500. At the time, without lossless (or DVD-A support) the PS3 was a non starter for me. I bought HD-DVD player and every exclusive title I could want, and then a BD once there were finally titles that I simply couldn't wait to own. And so, for the year and a half of coexistence, I enjoyed the best of both worlds, always knowing that it'd crash in favour of the blu side sometime soon.

Also, I still say the profile issues aren't much different than DVD players back in the early days, the only difference was that it focused on features instead of "profiles".

Sure, but, again, every HD-DVD player did the same thing as every other one, with a more mature (some argued less powerful) set of specifications.

Now, please, I'm NOT refighting the format war. I'm just saying, even as someone who knew BD was going to win, who when given the choice by Warner between two equivalent titles always bought Blu (only Red when, say, Lossless audio was provided), I -still- was wide eyed about the real issues of a maturing product, the fact that the PS3 was clearly going to be the only viable full featured player for years, etc., etc.

I don't know Amir well enough (thankfully) to call him a name, but he did have issues above and beyond disagreeing with my opinion.... and some of us can remember some of these "aspects" of his personality.

I can't speak for how he treated you, but in the first Toronto meeting here, when he and Kevin flew up to show off their stuff, we had a candid conversation about the pros and cons of the format. I certainly took his pitch as an honest one (ie., not doing this for the sake of weaseling in downloading), but ALSO took it, rationally, with a grain of salt, contextualizing claims from the HD-DVD side as much as I did announcements from CES about the premature death of HD-DVD from the Blu camp.

OK, I could go on and on, and sorry, Penton, for taking up space on your thread... I hope, in part, people can see that one can be critical while being respectful, can view any announcement from a corporate spokesperson with the right amount of skepticism, and recognize that it's not just your "enemy" that has an agenda or a bias, while those that you agree with are somehow immune from such intellectual crutches.

[4K display]

Do the administrators here welcome and appreciate the people who ***** out this forum so they can access the insiders?

Or are they just, tolerated?

[Robert Siegel]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Doctorossi, I think the point that Jeff is making is that this forum and The Digital Bits had the cajones to take a stand on what they believed was a superior HD format from the get-go rather than like other sites hypocritically stating that their “official” stance was that of neutrality…..when in fact, their actions proved exactly the contrary.

Bill should be applauded (as well as membership here) for their early astuteness in regards to the technological superiority of the Blu-ray format but, I’ll let Bill speak for himself.

Well, I wasn't going to get involved in this but as Bill says, I'll throw my two cents in here. I have always felt enormous respect for Bill BECAUSE of his stance on which format he felt was better. Many web sites did not have the guts to take a stand, and I applauded him all along on doing what he felt was best. If you look at The Digital Bits as a business, Bill risked losing alot of advertising from any company associated with hd-dvd, that's a big possible (and probable) loss of revenue for him. While other sites were remaining neutral even though we knew which format they preferred by their editorials, Bill came out and said which format he felt was best and which he felt would succeed. To me, that's what I want from a website, and what makes a GOOD website instead of the "politics" of staying neutral and trying to please everyone and get dollars from both sides. There's enough of that so it was with a welcome, I felt, that someone decided to say "this is how I feel and this is the format I think is best."

It was largely because of this that my only contact with any website to do my Golden Hollywood column (on the Bits now) was with Bill and Jeff. That's the kind of website I am proud to write for, and there aren't many of them.

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by 4K display

Do the administrators here welcome and appreciate the people who ***** out this forum so they can access the insiders?

Or are they just, tolerated?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IXmH...eature=related

[iceman]

Originally Posted by 4K display

Or are they just, tolerated?

This is Penton's thread, so I let him decide, but I'll just make a quick reply to sharkshark:

I do agree that there were fanboys in both camps behaving immaturely, that being said, I think the official blue side handled things incredibly much more professional, than the red side.

1: The red side paid many web sites and forums to write positively about HD DVD and negatively about BD and twisting facts to a point it became ridiculous.
2: The red side paid many different writers to write positively about HD DVD and negatively about BD and twisting facts to a point it became ridiculous.
3: The red side paid many spokespersons to talk positively about HD DVD and negatively about BD, to a point where they sounded like Baghdad-Bobs. BD-50 is science fiction, 45GB HD DVD will come any day now etc etc.

I would say the red side accounted for 99% of 1-3 and the blue side 1%, because the counterparts of 1-3 really can't be found in the official blue side, predicting the death of HD DVD a bit early doesn't really count in my book because the writing was all over the wall. (1-3 can be labeled as "FUD", which has existed for thousands of years, but it was MS who really perfected the modern version of FUD. I have been a computer user/"professional" for quite many years now and have listened to MS' lies about OS2, Netscape, Linux etc etc, to a point where I crosscheck anything that comes from MS).

Toshibas' largest reason for HD DVD, was not to advance/improve technology, it was to prolong the life of their cash cow DVD. Microsoft's largest reason for backing HD DVD was to ruin the HD media market as much as possible, to fasten up adoption of movie downloads, their possible future cash cow. If you ever thought that Toshiba or MS were your HD-movie-friends, please think again. Why is it that all movie directors and producers who made official statements during the format war, did so in favor of BD? Personally I think those people are really the movie lovers and want a healthy HD market for their movies/products, what do you think? Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't remember a single director/producer who took a stance for HD DVD.

You write that your HD DVD players were much cheaper than the BD counterparts, yes, that is true, however, they were heavily subsidized and when the format war was over, Toshiba had lost over $1B because of HD DVD. HD DVD was never a healthy business idea and was never intended as such. Please let this sink in and think about it for a while.

If this format war has tought me anything, it is to always listen to both sides in any matter, think about what their motives are, do your own research, and then try to make the best decision. Also remember that web sites, news papers, TV channels etc, are also companies whose goals are to make money. It's often very interesting to know who own a web site/company, that very often explain their actions/standings and should definitely be taken into account. For example, would you rather trust a web site owned by Microsoft reviewing Xbox, than a committee of 100 people each paid by an independent organization doing the same review?

In any case, all this feels very much like 2007 and we have already talked about this 1M times on this site and while some people at other sites still seem bitter, I don't think we have talked about this for a very long time here and I would like to keep it that way

I have also often credited Bill Hunt for taking an official side in the format war, instead of pretending to be neutral and deceiving people.

[PeterTHX]

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't remember a single director/producer who took a stance for HD DVD.

Well, you had that guy who blew s**t up in those HD DVD ads
(not a producer or director though)