Bashing Blu-ray hurts more than just Blu-ray.

[tron3]

It's one thing when the red fan boys are preaching the demise of blu-ray, while still sucking at the dried up teets of Toshiba. It is another when Toshiba takes parting shots and continues to try to undermine the success of blu-ray. "Super up conversion, flashram, and digital downloads will make you obsolete." Etc.

HDTV has been with us about a decade and is already becoming an old hat trick. Blu-ray is the most exciting thing to happen to home entertainment since HDTV and is a much needed enconomic stimulus. Intentionally trying to undermine the adoption of blu-ray hurts the economy. "But it is only a segment of the economy." is no excuse. Gas prices are only a segment of the economy, and look how fuel costs have changed the price of EVERYTHING.

With Circuit City failing, and jobs being lost, mass adoption of blu-ray could stimulate and secure more positions in that job market. Every little bit helps. Suppose Radio Shack closed their doors forever and no one took them over? Do we blow it off and say, "But they are only small stores with a few employee's. No big deal." Radio Shack has over 6000 stores in the nation. That is probably more than the other electronic retailers combined! If the average store employed 6 people that is 36,000 people out of jobs. That doesn't even take into account the local district offices and home office. Thousands more without out jobs.

I'm not trying to say blu-ray will save the day, but it will save some jobs, and create new ones. Business is always looking to cut costs. Unfortunately when money is tight the employee goes from asset to liability in the blink of an eye.

The entire format war caused a massive slow down in the acceptance of either format. Plus all this mud slinging has shaken consumer confidence. The format war should not have happened. On the other hand, it shows the victor was indeed the superior technology. In this case, blu-ray.

Paramount / Dream Works, and Universal need to start showing support for blu-ray. Right now they look like they decided to abstain altogether. Again, not a good impression for consumers.

To all you red campers, digital campers, and general anti-blu campers, it is time you stop the antics. The next job which is lost may be yours.

[rubberghost]

that was pretty heavy. right on.

[scweb13]

Originally Posted by tron3

Paramount / Dream Works, and Universal need to start showing support for blu-ray. Right now they look like they decided to abstain altogether. Again, not a good impression for consumers.

With the exception of DreamWorks, how are they not showing Blu-Ray support. Didn't Paramount just re-release all their prior BD's? Hasn't Uni and Paramount released specs for upcoming BD's?

[tron3]

Originally Posted by scweb13

With the exception of DreamWorks, how are they not showing Blu-Ray support. Didn't Paramount just re-release all their prior BD's? Hasn't Uni and Paramount released specs for upcoming BD's?

News to me. Pulling your old stock pile of BD's from storage is just clearing inventory. Where is Transformers? Or any of the countless titles people on this site want? Part of me almost believes we will see Iron Man on DVD before we see it on blu-ray.

A few select people plan on boycotting Paramount and Universal for that HD DVD exclusive stunt, even upon return to BD. But as I have said before, not purchasing my favorite Paramount or Universal movie on blu-ray doesn't punish them - it punishes me! But now it seems they are punishing us for not giving the public what we want most. The new stuff!

[scweb13]

Give them some time to get things together. Cloverfield and There Will be Blood will be released in 2 weeks, if not sooner. Spiderwick Cronicles in June.
Uni will take a little longer because they've never done Blu before. They have some titles (The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, The Scorpion King, Doomsday) coming out in July.

[fatediesel]

You also need to realize the Catch 22 in releasing the biggest hits (like Transformers) on blu-ray right now. Since the format hasn't gained mass adoption, sales won't be as high for movies like LOTR, Star Wars, etc. However, mass adoption might not happen until these movies are released. Also, I have no idea what the Radio Shack example is trying to prove. Does Radio Shack even carry blu-ray? Also, not buying a Paramount/Dreamworks/Universal movie does hurt the company, as it lowers sales. I'm in the minority in that I believe the HD-DVD payout was great for Paramount's bottom line, as they made a lot more money in that time from the payout than they would have through blu-ray sales. As for fuel prices, of course most items have gone up in price due to rising gas prices, because those items have to be shipped to stores. If it used to cost $500 to transport a batch of goods and now it costs $800 then they are going to pass the increase off to the consumer.

[MasterXeus]

Originally Posted by tron3

Paramount / Dream Works, and Universal need to start showing support for blu-ray. Right now they look like they decided to abstain altogether. Again, not a good impression for consumers.

Overall I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think Paramount / Dream Works, and Universal decided to abstain, they’re working on releasing movies and they want to do it right. How long before we started seeing all these great titles from Sony, Fox, etc.. when they first started selling Blu-ray? How long did it take them to start up their line up? Universal is playing catch up and Paramount already had some movies in the warehouse, but they still need to catch up too.

Universal is far from abstaining.
The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, & The Scorpion King on July 22
Doomsday - July 29
Heroes: Season 1 & 2 on Aug 26
Among other titles announce

The same goes for Paramount
Face/Off- May 20 or June 03
Next – May 20
Cloverfield – June 03
The Spiderwick Chronicles – June 24
Drillbit Taylor – July 29

Just because these may not be the main movies people want doesn’t mean these companies are abstaining. So Transformer hasn’t been announcing yet, so what?

If your argument is they’re not releasing countless titles people on this site want, then that argument could be for any studio here.
Where’s The Matrix, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Godfather, X-Men 1 & 2, Bad Boys, etc...


As far as people boycotting Paramount/Universal releases, most of them are just talk and the few that are serious will have little to no real affect on the market.

[silversnake]

i think people need to be patient. It's like , blu ray just won and everyone expects that ALL MOVIES be out already. I can understand you guys are frustrated because some of the movies out are some we could clearly wait for while the blockbusters aren't out yet.

give them time to actually come out and make them. I'm on the same wavelength for video games. People are always complaining that there are delays, or it's taking too long. I want these blu ray titles just as much as anyone else, but relax, enjoy the ones you have now. Be patient, they will come soon, and when they do , it will be awesome

[camper]

See...after reading the thread title, I thought the following line was going to be "It also hurts my heart."

Seriously, good points. Don't agree with all of it, but I agree with the spirirt in which it was written.

~Camper

[Horhay]

That was a good argument, I agree with some of you points, but I think some folks just need be patient finally we are seeing Uni and Para contribute to the cause.

[tron3]

Ok, I read the replies. I see Universal is releasing The Mummy series, and such. Sometimes we see blu-ray from our own fishbowl. There could 2000 titles to choose from, but if few of those movies are the ones we desire, then "they don't have anything".

HD DVD may be dead, but apparently isn't completely buried yet. The impact being certain titles could already be in our hot little hands.

So yeah, I'm pissed because I don't have Transformers on blu-ray. When I see the title releases announced for the year so far, I also do not see Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, the Shrek series, nor Toy Story.

But let's return to what matters here. The anti-blu klan needs to stop bad mouthing blu to hinder sales. I'm looking in your direction Toshiba. Be professional and grown up about it. We won, and even extended the olive branch to you guys. But nooooo, Toshiba has to be North Korea of high definition media.

[CassilineKnight]

Are you serious?

Now Bluray is the savior of the economy?

Seriously this is kinda ridiculous. The economy isn't failing cuz of HD DVD or Toshiba. Nor is anything they say or do going to impact it one way or the other.

The bottom line is that Bluray is a very expensive format/hobby. Not everyone can afford it and until that changes Bluray will continue to advance slowly. Yes the format war didn't help things but it happened. Deal with it.

Toshiba is allowed to do what they want to do. If Bluray is so good and clearly the next "DVD" then it should be just fine regardless of what others say or believe.

[scweb13]

Originally Posted by tron3

But let's return to what matters here. The anti-blu klan needs to stop bad mouthing blu to hinder sales. I'm looking in your direction Toshiba. Be professional and grown up about it. We won, and even extended the olive branch to you guys. But nooooo, Toshiba has to be North Korea of high definition media.

If you own a PS3, I don't understand the Toshiba hate. You do realize that they manufacture and co-developed the cell processor, right?

[tron3]

Originally Posted by scweb13

If you own a PS3, I don't understand the Toshiba hate. You do realize that they manufacture and co-developed the cell processor, right?

I know that, but I do not own a PS3. I have much respect for Toshiba. When I worked IT at a lawfirm we had a couple of these Toshiba laser office printers. Big suckers which printed 12 pages a minute. That was blazing fast back in the day of dot matrix and daisy printers. A home laser printer was 4 pages a minute at the time. We had those things for years and years before we retired them. Give them toner, and clean the corona wire from time to time and they ran.

The newer faster printers were a NIGHTMARE. The extended tray feeder was a third party unit and was always jamming. They were the bane of my existence for 5-7 years before we got rid of them. Things got a little better when they finally updated the firmware. I told them that was the problem over and over for months. But no one listened. After all, how could I possibly make that assessment? One day they update the firmware.

I once touched a brand new NIC I had to install in a computer and just knew it was bad. Jerry, our contracted guy and I became friends, but he told me to stop fooling around and install it. Well, 45 minutes later this thing would not work! This was the Win98 days so that should tell you something. We had a bunch of computers to do because we were upgrading the system. Time was short so he asked me to move and worked on the card himself while I was successory continuing the install process on other machines. He finally concluded the NIC was bad.