Wow at people actually saying that Sony wouldn't let MS use Blu-Ray for their format if MS chose to. I mean, that's why all Sony VAIO's don't have Windows, right?!?! You people stating this must have not even a slighty clue of how the business world works!

Vgchartz actually tracks the market in a representative fashion. That was not representative of the market it was simply FUD.

Im not assuming everyone wants DD, im assuming that most people will pick the convenient solution. Currently physical media is more convenient. The reason for physical media is convenience even if a few people like to collect things. I know someone who collects games, and he gets very upset at the thought of losing his collection and they are all pirated downloads. When downloads become the convenient solution then a majority of people will use that source for their media.

Physical media doesn't exist to cater to the collector mentality that exists in certain gamers. It exists as an inexpensive and convenient means to distribute content.

As far as DD goes, it is a more convenient means of distributing and purchasing content. There's a reason why iTunes replaced CDs as the most relevant means of distributing music, and it's not because it offers a better quality format (it's unarguably worse). Same applies for movies (worse quality due to lower bit rate), but not for games.

The main detractors of DD would be those who do collect, and those who deal in the secondary (used) market, which are often the same group.

Not everybody collects, and this comes from a consumer who is unquestionably a media hoarder to the point where it has been an inconvenience to move and store collections.

If I could have access to every piece of distributed media I ever bought through any remote connection (even if it were a personal sever that housed all files), I'd give up the vast majority of my collection.

Most of my PC games collection is on Steam. I'd transfer the rest of my games to Steam if it were possible and ditch the media. Having access to one's collection through any computer is better than trying to take it all with you if you're mobile.

For the unbillionteenth time, yes.
The next Xbox will have a Blu-Ray drive and it will be able to play Blu-Ray movies. It will not be DD only as they would lose millions upon million of revenue from the people who do not have a fast internet connection.
Blu-Ray is the current growing standard for high density optical media and will stay that way well into the next Xbox's life span.
So stop making this thread over and over again. No matter how many times this same thread is made, it will always be the same answer.

wait a min..FUD...Home Media magazine also tracks the market in a representative fashion just  like VGchartz do though they do it for Mainly Movies instead of Video Game's. Home Media magazine  is quite respected. do not try to pull out that card of it was not representative of the market. that's like saying NPD is not. they are all tracking services.

as for Convenient being the main drive..once again collecting is. and Digital Downloads require a high bandwidth , which is being capped.

So I don't see how that's going to be anymore Convenient as for getting physical Media at the brick an mortar store's as you can do right now.

when the ISP's keep capping the speed for internet.

www.newamerica.net/.../Bandwidth%20Caps%20for%20High-Speed%20Internet%20in%20the%20U.S.%20and%20Japan.pdf

I still disagree with that.. the Collecting of movies is just like collecting game's, there are people that collect them just like anything.Else

it's human nature to do so. the point is why is the media distributed the content?

if it's not for collector's than what is it for?

the simple:

 A collection is a group of things gathered or collected. A person is a collector when they brings items together into a group. People collect different things. People collect things for lots of reasons - - including that it is fun! Harder - Collecting is a great hobby because it can be different, unique for everyone. Each found item has its own 'story.' In the process of collecting, you continue to learn. As you build any collection, you apply skills in identifying, selecting, discriminating, evaluating, classifying, and arranging items.

Those who view collecting as trivial or a waste of time, miss the connections that it has to life skills and occupations. Scientists also collect things; they gather information, data, and samples. Museums and libraries are collections. Many people make their livelihoods by collecting and disposing items. In fact, all of us go through our lives collecting and discarding things around us.

http://42explore.com/collect.htm

Yeah I know all about bandwidth caps etc. NPD tracks about 95% of the U.S. game market and for what it doesn't directly track it has excellent estimates. On demand means -> Streaming, direct download, cable companies on demand, satelite on demand, kiosks.

Of those you have

• Major cable companies
• Porn companies
• Kiosk based distribution which is growing quite fast with Redbox etc and they are likely thinking of creating proprietary media for direct download.
• Major internet services like Netflix, iTunes
• Consoles

if you consider cable companies alone that probably already blows through the $200m estimated download revenue. Netflix alone would take up almost half of it if you consider at most 1M people whom mainly use it for their online service.

This to me, is what CBHD represents...

M$ might needs a media format with more disc space for larger games, and CBHD offers this, while being able to fully play regular DVDs.  The cost for such a choice are drastically reduced, and you can still upscale movies to 1080-quality.  Not only that, but production cost for these disc would be a fraction of the cost to go with brd on both the manufacturing cost, and the long term licensing fees.  Seems to me that M$ is going to look very hard to go in another direction, unless they can get a serious sweetheart deal on brd fees, imho.

If it represents a $10-15 saving on the drive and another $9.50 on Blu Ray playback its quite a bit of savings to consider relative to what 95% of games will require (im going off the $23 of royalties justification for CBHD vs DVD). Even limiting themselves to single layer 15GB discs would be good enough for at least 97% of games in the next generation. This will be especially important when next generation consoles probably won't cost more than $299 at launch.

Yeah, nobody in the west has done a hard srcub of CBHD for public consumption, since it launched, but evidently, ALOT of companies have looked into it, based on how many of them are supporting it in China.  I think M$ is going to look at the decision very hard to decide what format to use...but I DO think we will a physical media formt for the next console, because DD just isn't there yet, as Joeorc pointed out.