When enthusiast sites fail to show any enthusiasm...

[Neo65]

Originally Posted by Sir Terrence

I think you are looking at this one deminsionally and from a one sided perspective. I was a insider on AVS, and I will tell you, they tried to bridle me everytime I went over there to snuff out some lie that Disney was going red. Everytime things didn't go quite right with HD DVD, Amir would say "keep your chin up, just did a presentation for Disney, and they were really impressed. We wowed them". This is a chum throwing tactic that is not only deceiving, it was damn right dishonest. There was never a presentation, and Disney was never considering going red or neutral at ANY time. When I tried to point this out, my threads were deleted, and his were allowed to remain. I finally boycotted AVS, had my insider status removed, and stop going there. I was not rude, nobody thought I was rude, nobody complained that I was rude, I just brought truth to counter a lie.

I do have to agree that there was that large pre CES-2007 BIG-LIE that every red supporter was doing the wink-wink-Disney-going-red bit. I was neutral at that point and was surprised but thought there was something going on, but I suspect also that a great big many people got suckered into buying more red movies thinking that with Disney on board, that dual formats was a reality. Disney's statements during CES-07 was a surprise --- particularly the strength of their blu-support.

It was a major milestone --- I decided then that I will scale back red disk purchase to exclusives that I really really really want to watch.

At around October to December '06, the Disney rumor did make me buy a few more red catalog disks than I would have as it painted a much stronger red position than reality.

In hindsight, I should have stuck with my earlier assessment on the stronger BD position and avoided the red catalogs that I now will have to rebuy in blue. There were a lot more of the "jump in, the water's fine" from the red supporters trying to get more people to commit to the red format. I can't say that a comparable number of blu supporters did the same. The most rational voices were the ones who asked people to wait it out. There were a lot of deeply commited blu-ray supporters who said "wait it out if you're not an early adopter" --- that there is also an acknowledgement that there were a lot more adults in the blue side of the fence than the red.

And yes, I bought into both formats very early. By June, I was somewhat taken aback at what was going on in the insider's forums at some other sites, that's why I came to this site.