Archived: Insiders Thread

[moweeis]

I was wondering why several of the FOX releases won't be out in europe untill 2008 ? i mean its just subtitles seperating most of the titles...

[Damon Payne]

Penton: Silly speculation of course, but can you comment on the idea that now that Paramount is prolonging the format war, Universal will start releasing on BD? It seems incredibly far fetched to me.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Damon Payne

Penton: Silly speculation of course, but can you comment on the idea that now that Paramount is prolonging the format war, Universal will start releasing on BD? It seems incredibly far fetched to me.

I don’t want to raise false hopes. I'm not a FUD-meister or a Softspin-meister.

As of now, any favorable Blu announcement expected by Uni at or around the time of next year’s CES is pretty much analogous to the existence of a snow ball in hell.
Aint gonna happen, at least not then. Those Uni boys made their bed and now they’re going to sleep in it for awhile longer. The Paramount *deci$ion* is independently exclusive of what Uni will or won’t do in the foreseeable future.

[Icemage]

To the insiders:

I know it's still a bit early to ask, but will we be seeing low-end hardware show up for Blu-ray by 2007?

Some have mentioned "breaking the chessboard" in response to the recent move by Paramount. To me, this means yanking the carpet out from under HD DVD by bringing hardware price into parity on the standalone front.

Of the recently released and announced units by Panasonic, Samsung, and Sharp, all of the units are fairly feature-rich, with assumably corresponding MSRPs. Is there a movement in the Blu-ray camp to cater towards the lower end of the spectrum with respect to the lower price range by producing hardware which isn't quite as robust, as is the case with HD DVD?

I understand that this is probably trade secret sort of information, so I'm not asking for specifics; just a "Probably Yes" or "Probably No" or even "No comment" answer would do.

[Titan]

Penton-Man

Any truth to Bill Hunt saying that Microsoft is also trying to throw money Warner Brother's way today to get them to go HD-DVD exclusive. I understand if you cannot comment on this.

[Amon37]

Does any insider know if Fox is continuing to stick with DTS-MA on all it's releases as the only form of uncompressed audio?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Maxpower1987

What do you make of this P-Man?

It has truly been a madhouse in *the town* today.
Honestly, I didn’t expect such a backlash from all quarters imaginable regarding Paramount’s deci$ion.

I have the utmost respect for Directors like Michael Bay, Francis Ford Coppola and James Cameron.

Re. Michael Bay (as he specifically has been in the news today)
Apparently, Michael is just as “intense” on the internet as he is when directing a movie with knee pads on.

I like it.
Suffice to say, that when Steven S. pitches somebody to direct a movie for him, that somebody has garnered the utmost respect from his colleagues in the biz.

Interesting coincidence tidbit of the day, James Cameron spent some of his formative years living in a humble abode literally blocks away from where cjplay lives.

Later.

[Josh]

Penton,

Do all these outspoken directors and producers have any pull? Or is all the backlash going to be negated by a very large red suitcase with a very large sum of money inside?

[Proteus]

I am particularly concerned about comments Bill Hunt made concerning Warner being bribed today by Microsoft as well.

Do you guys know anything about this?

If this is the case, then forget writing letters to Paramount and the like... Write your congress representatives. This is blatant anti-trust violation and simply MS, through the laundering affect of the HDDVD Promotions group, opening it's way too fat wallet and simply buying out America to force an inferior format on the consumer so it's future digital download garbage looks better.

I really hope these people in Hollyweird can influence Paramount with this backlash. The fact that their stock keeps diving helps give me hope that Warner may see that and at the very least hang steadfast neutral.

[GaS]

Penton-man

Is there any more bad news coming in the next few days or weeks? Don't need specifics just a warning.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by GaS

Penton-man

Is there any more bad news coming in the next few days or weeks? Don't need specifics just a warning.

No, at least none that I'm aware of.
I'll update in my typical coded way , if I hear of anything in the meantime.

I feel kinda guilty for not giving you guys here a heads up to the Paramount deci$ion but, I was counseled (even implored) that there would be little upside to overtly revealing it and it would simply play into the hands of HD VD protagonists that would milk the *rumor* for days until it became official.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Josh

Penton,

Do all these outspoken directors and producers have any pull? Or is all the backlash going to be negated by a very large red suitcase with a very large sum of money inside?

Without the directors and producers, there would be no *studio* just like without literary authors to write books, there would be no publishing houses.

Even very large soft red suitcases do not compare to the budget granted or profit made on some major Hollywood productions.

[Penton-Man]

This is a pubic response for all to read so that hopefully I stop getting queried in PM’s from sincere folks always asking me questions like…………

“Penton, with all due respect, you have proven time and time again that you have amazingly broad insider knowledge, then how come you aren’t a “registered insider” on AVMS like you are here on the blu-ray forum?”

or “Penton, how come you don’t help out paidgeek more often on AVMS?”



I understand how some could indeed be perplexed, so this is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I feel the need to do this because these type of PM’s rapidly fill my inbox and I then get e-mails from the blu-ray server God saying that the box is almost filled so *do something*.

O.K., I guess about a year ago when markrubin was asking “insiders” to please submit their credentials to be considered for “insider status”, I did so at AVS.

Specifically, I gave him the e-mail and phone number of a Worldwide President from a major Hollywood studio who easily could be considered in the top ten most powerful/influential people in Hollywood. I encouraged markrubin to contact my advocate as to my “qualifications” but I made it unequivocally clear to him that if this solitary reference was not sufficient for “insider status”, he was not going to get a list of other contacts for further verification. I felt that doing so would needlessly expose other references to their *connection* to me.

So, next thing you know, I guess after a couple of days or so, I was granted “insider status” on AVS. Shortly thereafter, maybe the next day or two, the A-man in response to another poster replies, and in the reply, he makes one of his typical indirect sarcastic snipes, this time an insult that was specifically addressed to me and me only.

Well, I don’t take that sort of nonsense from the A-man, the B-man or any man so I responded in a measured fashion agreeing with him and at the same time offering a little advice as to his online posting presence esp. as a V.P. of a major corporation.

I guess probably sometime later the same day or the next I get *Rueben sandwiched* and I am informed by markrubin that my insider status on AVS has been “suspended.”

Fast forward about 8 months?.............. now, I occasionally test the waters over there (on their Insider thread) to see exactly how long this “suspension” is in effect but, my posts end up getting invariably deleted (if the old regime is reading), which I guess means it is still ongoing or, in essence, should just be considered an outright banishment from that thread.
Like I’m crying in my soup.

So it is what it is………..Insider qualified over at AVMS without *active* posting privileges.
I hope that answers all future questions in PM’s on this matter.

Keep the faith. The mods here are the bomb.

[GaS]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

No, at least none that I'm aware of.
I'll update in my typical coded way , if I hear of anything in the meantime.

I feel kinda guilty for not giving you guys here a heads up to the Paramount deci$ion but, I was counseled (even implored) that there would be little upside to overtly revealing it and it would simply play into the hands of HD VD protagonists that would milk the *rumor* for days until it became official.

Thank you sir.

[darinp2]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I guess probably sometime later the same day or the next I get *Rueben sandwiched* and I am informed by markrubin that my insider status on AVS has been “suspended.”

I thought it had something to do with providing a link to this:

http://hd-insider.com/2006/10/06/mic...sforumcom.aspx

which refers to where Amir offered somebody else a bet and I offered him one or more, which he responded to by turning it into an accept and concede (not even saying which bet). Although he said all I had to do was contact him to get $7500 and I would have definitely been willing to take his money in a real bet, I wasn't going to take it under conditions I would consider something else (you can guess what words I would use).

I had to laugh when I was sent that link a while ago (although I had to search on google just now to find it again).

--Darin

[Longshot]

I heart Penton-Man.

[Longshot]

I would love to here from kjack on the happenings in the last 24 hours. kjack where are you?

[Deciazulado]

Originally Posted by blitz6speed

The one thing im glad about is that this didnt reach the mainstream news like the Blockbuster announcement did. When the blockbuster announcement happened, it was on every news station possible and they had a debate on CNN about it. This paramount news didnt circulate out of the usual net blogs and of course the HD movie forums.

Actually.. it made the Tuesday edition of my local newspaper by way of Associated Press

[WriteSimply]

Basically for the bloggers out there who are documenting the Paramount shift, the important items to mention are that Paramount got paid off by MS to shift, and that Spielberg's films under Paramount are not HD-DVD exclusive. Then the news of the studio stalemate is off-set by these two items. That's how you send YOUR message across.

paidgeek or penton, I assume that since Paramount vacated their seat in the BDA, this also means that replication slots for BD50 had suddenly opened up, haven't they?

Also, some of the slated Fox releases are the ones they were supposed to release back in April. So for the upcoming releases, will they be using the ol' DLT master to press the discs or has there been some additional content added (essentially a new DLT)?


fuad

[HDJK]

Originally Posted by darinp2

I thought it had something to do with providing a link to this:

http://hd-insider.com/2006/10/06/mic...sforumcom.aspx

--Darin