So how does Sony et al. ensure a successor to DVD?

[frank_t]

In spite of all this excellent news, the gamble here is that consumers will begin to take notice and be interested in moving on up. When I say consumers, I don't mean those of us who frequent [too much ] this forum, but the consumer who *is* interested in that $199 or $299 player and the $14.99 - $19.99 movie.

How does Sony convince that consumer to move to blu?

There's a lot of apathy out there if we're to believe all the recent polls. Overcoming that will be no easy task. In fact, I think it'll be the hardest fight and will have to be won in far less time than this silly war was.

Sony, the studios, and Toshiba squandered the last two years in a pissing content that ultimately hurt everyone. They now have a limited window to fix things.

Can they do it? How do they do it?

Some not well-thought-out ideas --

-- campaign to educate that upconvert players are NOT HD and never will be, regardless of what TV they are connected to.

-- release BD versions of movies 1-2 months before SD-DVD version

-- lower the price of BD to a more reasonable $19.99 (WTF FOX???). or even cap them at $24.99. people will pay a little more if they see quality.

-- tie in advertising with HDTV. it doesn't seem to be hard to convince a person to purchase an HDTV. Go the extra mile and help them understand that upconvert players will not provide HD content; only Blu will.

-- ensure they know their DVD collection will play on their new Blu player

-- distribute firmware update CDs or have a program for brick-n-mortar stores to provide update CDs to customers free of charge (or at maybe 0.99).

[Pellaeon]

To make this early main stream.

1) Big releases: Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Alien(s), etc

2) Players in a $179-$249 (they dont have to be as cheap as regular DVD players! These folks have alread bought HDTV's for goodness sakes)

3) Media prices must get in the $17.99-$24.99 (max)

4) A killer Blu Ray add educating the public on how big Blu is, most (journalists included) believe it is a Sony format. Of course it will be good to mention the exclusive support they have now.

5) Most important, educate B&M stores!

After reading the post above, YES another big one, FIRMWARE UPDATES AVAILABLE at B&M stores. Best done at the time of the sale if possible. THESE SHOULD BE FREE though.

[richard lichtenfelt]

^Nice lists.
Add continued use of BOGO sales, free movies with player purchases, and blu-ray players bundled with hdtv's to make the buy in and dvd replacement prices less daunting.

[frank_t]

Originally Posted by Pellaeon

To make this early main stream.

1) Big releases: Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Alien(s), etc

2) Players in a $179-$249 (they dont have to be as cheap as regular DVD players! These folks have alread bought HDTV's for goodness sakes)

3) Media prices must get in the $17.99-$24.99 (max)

4) A killer Blu Ray add educating the public on how big Blu is, most (journalists included) believe it is a Sony format. Of course it will be good to mention the exclusive support they have now.

5) Most important, educate B&M stores!

After reading the post above, YES another big one, FIRMWARE UPDATES AVAILABLE at B&M stores. Best done at the time of the sale if possible. THESE SHOULD BE FREE though.

Excellent point #4!!!

So many people still think of this as a Sony only format.

[Downhere]

High Def media will never be as big or overtake DVD. DVD is the CD of the movie world. It will last another decade just like CD has lasted 25+ years. What we should hope for is that Blu-ray gets enough market share that we start getting the big titles we've all been dreaming about. Both DVD and Blu-ray will coexist.

[Septimus Prime]

They could probably show an ad during a high-def NFL game and say something like, "Game looks good on your HDTV, huh? Your movies can look equally good with Blu-ray." I would imagine that that would excite at least a good amount of J6P.