Is the importance of Blu-Ray overstated?

[MikeB]

@ bdbdbd

When we put it into perspective with number of people who have high-speed internet access (by 2012), meaning the number of people having access to DLC, and the amount of money spent around the world, BD adoption seems to be a bit small to compete DD.

Broadband internet usage growth has seen a significant slowdown. Downloads will increase, but this does not mean the average consumer will suddenly prefer pay to download their high quality movies instead of buying movies on disc for reasons mentioned earlier.

Broadband internet usage does compete with DVD sales and Cinema visits, but not so much with regard to Digital Distribution sales at this point and probably for a very, very long time to come. Free (usually low quality) illegal downloads of pirated movies is the main concern.

Still I think many prefer to own or rent to watch the full HDTV quality experience, coming in nice box with lots of extras. You could easily copy VCR tapes and illegal copies were floating around en masse as well, likewise with regard to on CD (DivX) and DVD (usually downloaded over the internet, so this is where DD and disc media meet).