FinalEvangelion said:
They were saying similar things about HDTV (intro. 1998) until about 1-2 years ago. If people actually looked into how long it took for telephone, B&W TV, color TV, cell-phone, CD players, they would be in for a surprise. |
Your analogy breaks down fairly quickly. For a new consumer electronics technology to be successful, it needs to have at least one *compelling* advantage over the existing technology, without any significant drawbacks. And by compelling I mean something the masses will go for.
Let's look at each of the technologies you mentioned:
1. Telephone. Compelling advantage over the telegraph? Actual voice communication and no morse-code knowledge required (accessible to the masses).
2. B&W TV. Compelling advantage over radio? Video transmission. Duh!
3. Color TV. Obvious compelling advantage over B&W.
4. Cell-phone. Compelling advantage over radio phones? Able to switch cells so broad areas can be traversed during a call vs having to stay within range of a single tower. Lower power requirements.
5. CD players. Compelling advantage over cassette and reel-to-reel tape? Longevity, mass-production (stamping instead of recording onto each copy), reduced hiss, etc. I'm not even going to discuss 8-track tape as it was here and gone in a short period of time due to a lot of disadvantages.
A counter-example is Laserdisc. I have 90 Laserdisc movies, but it never caught on with the masses because its compelling advantages (better picture, random chapter access, longevity) were offset by too many disadvantages (large, hard-to-handle discs, having to manually flip discs except in higher-end players, expensive discs).
Now let's look at Blu-ray. Advantages over DVD? Fantastic, movie-theater like picture, and improved but not groundbreaking sound (DVDs have 5.1 surround which provides for a very good theater-sound experience). Greater storage so very long movies can fit on one disc. Nearly indestructable.
But notice that I didn't say *compelling* advantages over DVD. While Blu-ray raises the bar in certain areas, particularly for audio/video-philes like me, DVD already provides a good picture on standard TVs, good theater-like sound with the right audio setup, random chapter selection, longevity (unless someone is careless with them... I have dozens of DVDs and have never had a DVD fail on me over the years), etc. Blu-ray is essentially an improved DVD, not a big quantum leap like DVDs were over video tape, and a quantum leap is what the masses require to invest in new technology.
And Blu-ray has some disadvantages right now compared with DVD. Price of the movies and the players. HDTV required to experience the improved video quality. Disc incompatibility with DVD players (no watching the movies in the vehicle on a trip, or in the dormroom players, or in the bazillion computers already equipped with DVD drives).
Again, I really hope Blu-ray survives because I love the format, but I'm not going to start comparing it to the advent of TVs or the telephone. Give me a break.
