Blu-ray's Biggest Battle this Holiday: Journalism

[FinalEvangelion]

Neither the economy or digital downloads are the biggest barrier to Blu-ray success. For all that know the facts, digital downloads is something easier said than done at this point in time. I'm not against digital distribution, but for the next several years it will work better as a rental service than a purchase service. Even with DVRs and VOD services, video rentals are still very strong. As for the economic issues going on, Home Entertainment tends to survive the best as it provides a good time/value for people.

So who supports the success of Blu-ray right now? Well, the Hollywood studios, big retailers, most of the tech industry, and well all the people that matter. Just recently, at DEG (Digital Entertainment Group), the studios seemed optimistic about the format.

Which leads me to the next thing. After the report about studios' optimism, we had the journalists come and not even do any clever spinning - but outright lie about what was said. Right now, the journalists have their last chance to steer people away before the big holiday push of BD and big titles like Dark Knight. They know that anti-PS3 fanboys are their best channel of information delivery and will try to spread the news really fast.

Despite this, BD definitely has enough energy to pull through. The vendors and marketers really need to make it clear to the consumers that their DVD collections can be played on all BD players. It always works with my skeptical friends. Once they know that fact, then the convincing can commence. While many argue the perception of quality difference is less of a jump from VHS to DVD, there is still a noticeable difference to even most J6P type of people with the upgrade from DVD to BD. BD is hitting human sensory limits, as probably from now on, new formats will be introduced for convenience rather than for an upgrade in quality. The diminishing returns factor will come into play big time with upgrades in quality beyond Blu-ray.

It would be nice if we saw articles like "BD owning consumers are very satisfied with the upgrade in PQ and AQ that is offered. Now is the time to buy." However, that's not the case as journalists are squarely against the success of the format.