Desperate moves like this are not new to Sony and the other companies invested in Blu-Ray. This is to be expected and explains quite clearly the recent resurgance in Blu-Ray exclusivity. Either way, more money in the hole, wonder if Sony and their constituants will ever see a profit.

@Onimusha12

Desperate? I hardly call it desperate, sony just wanted to end the war for good.

Oh my god..STOP pissing and moaning you hd-dvd fanboys. There was NO payoff....a "trusted source"...that doesn't exist. Some RANDOM BLOGGER on some stupid hd fansite claiming he has a "trusted source"...you're all stupid for believing him lol. Sorry guys if you don't know how the practice of "False Rumors" work in the industry, ya'll need to brush up on lingo..instead of wasting time with this garbage bs.

YOU seriously believe in your demented heads that FOX and WARNERS were going ....hd-dvd exclusive, WHY! LOL...WHY the hell would they do that, so their sales could PLUMMET and make ther companies the laughing stock of the industry.

Guys, get with it..there's no payoff, they switched because they see the BLURAY sales, they see BLURAY player sales..they see the future, and the future is BLU.

ONCE AGAIN, RIP HDVD...stop crying its all over.

It's reasonable to say that Warner's statements that the consumer choose BD had nothing to do with their ultimate decision. No one had really chosen anything with less than 1% of all home video sales being HD sales in 2007.

Paramount said that HD-DVD had a better and more finalized spec, and they thought HD-DVD was superior (mandatory picture in picture, ethernet port, etc -- only BD advantage was space). Warner said that BD was chosen by the consumer. They're both BS to one extent or another. They're just PR reasons the companies listed for making the switch. Do you think "we were paid a lot of money to move over" would go over as well?

Warner was in a good spot, but if I were them I wouldn't have sold to either format for $500 million. I'd have insisted that all of my releases would be royalty free for the life of the format in addition to a cash payout. This would be worth billions for a studio as large as Warner. And, who knows, maybe that did happen.

I wonder how much of this money came from Toshiba indirectly when they purchased Sony's Cell fab plant.

Of course there was a payoff! Do you really believe Warner would hold the promise of tipping the format war and give it away for free? Do you really believe that the HD-DVD consortium wouldn't offer Warner hundreds of millions to make their format the next HD format? Warner kept itself in an awesome position by staying platform agnostic, and because it was the final studio and the only way to end the format war within the next couple of years, it had a very valuable position.

If Warner didn't leverage that position for a lot of money they'd be more than foolish. There's nothing wrong with the payout, in my eyes, but it would be naive to say you didn't believe there had been one.

We don't know the full terms, but I wouldn't consider it desperate.  I'd consider it an expensive up-front investment on something that possibly holds the potential to multiply that investment by a factor of 100.  Let's say Sony sits back and doesn't offer Warner and Fox enough to be BD exclusive: Toshiba would have offered them a similar figure and HD-DVD would have won the format war probably late this year or next.  The wildcard is what the potential windfall might be.

If BD can oust DVD quickly, Sony would be in a position to make many billions over the life of BD.  If BD takes years to oust DVD, it would be in a much weaker position.  The biggest issues here are:

(1) Consumers don't know why they need to upgrade to BD.  They assume DVD is high def.  They connect their fancy HD TV sets with composite and stretch aspect ratios.

(2) The cost of BD, by design, will be significantly higher than DVD.  This will stop a lot of people from adopting it, especially the unwashed masses that don't know the difference. 

(3) BD doesn't have nearly as many advantages over DVD as DVD had over VHS.  DVD promised surround sound, vastly superior images and colors (debatable for DVD vs BD), a fancy new disc-based format, and logevity without quality degredation.  BD promises better surround sound -- if you have the equipment.  Better images and colors, but not to the extent that DVD had over VHS, and higher costs.  

People won't adopt any HD format en masse anytime soon.  I've been saying this before the BD trump card, and I will continue to say it for the next couple of years.  When BD players are cheap -- and more importantly -- BD disc prices approach DVD prices, we'll have the potential for serious adoption.

Someone should start a thread to bet on when the bitter tears will stop.
Seriously, it's hilarious, but the site will overload with so much thread about this.
I've rarely seen such a meltdown, and it's a gaming site.
Shows how much some people were involved in this.
Going until believing a blog is falling really low though.

Well when the PS3 showed little promise early last year, Blu-Ray became the new hope for many Sony supporters and thus it has become such an ingrained aspect of gaming discussion, especially on this forum.

You can call the woes of the HD-DVD supporters pathetic, but they're no more pathetic than the Blu-Ray supporters who insist that Blu-Ray won without any bribes or behind the scenes politics. Also it was largely the insesant harping of Sony supporters for Blu-Ray that drove many who wouldn't have cared one way or another to support HD-DVD.

The Blu-Ray fanboys created the HD-DVD fanboys with their need to force this issue as one of polarized loyalty and after this recent bout of news and all the proclamations of Blu-Ray's victory do any of you really think you have the right to audatiously tell people to stop complaining when the only issue here was made by yourselves?

Call my argument excusive if you must but when the PS3 showed a renewed support these holidays it was you fanboys who made thread after thread proclaiming Sony's domination in some of the most shameless and over-reactive manners ever seen only to then claim foul when others put you in your place with facts and issues that still faced the PS3 asking, "Can't you let us have our excitement for the console we support?" Now that Blu-Ray shows signs of winning the format war you return once more with over-zealous proclamations of victory only to claim foul once more when facts are brought to light that sully your victory.

WB had plenty to gain from this without a payoff. It's in the best interest of the studios to have one standard format, because they know that most consumers are holding off on buying in until that happens. WB's decision moves up the timetable on that immensely, and their profits along with it. Keep in mind that plenty of studios were exclusive to one format or another before this. They weren't all paid off -- they just saw advantages to the format of their choice.

And to reiterate, it would not only be unnecessary for them to cover up this payoff (who really gives a crap, other than message board fanboys?), it would be illegal. Remember when Paramount switched to HD-DVD exclusivity? The news came out immediately. The executives spoke to the press about it, because they were obligated to. Same thing with the Microsoft-Rockstar GTA4 content deal. These things aren't secrets.

And again, if there was a payoff, it sure as hell wasn't 500 million dollars. That's a ridiculous, unrecoverable sum, and the BluRay association had no reason to pay it when their victory was already pretty much secured.

This is a made-up story from some teenage HD-DVD fanbloggers. That's all.

@ Onimusha12

Stop trolling. First, this is a rumor, and easily could be false. Second, who says that sony is the only one paying, if it is true, there are others in the blu-ray camp after all. Your blatant attempts at trolling are getting really old. unless you have something to add to the discussion, not bashing companies that you don't like, you shouldn't post.

Also, why wouldn't warner go Blu-ray exclusive. Blu-ray has been winning every week last year, and why would it change into this year. HD-DVD has been dying slowly, as we can all see, and this is the nail in the coffin. I don't know how warner bros. changing sides means that they were paid off, it means they look at the lackluster sales, compared to bd, and made a conscious decision. Nintendo fanboys are mad because this is only more good news for those in the sony camp, so must excuse it by saying they were paid off, or say that this format doesn't matter anyway. So sad, when people cannot be happy for other people.

DMeisterJ said: @ Onimusha12 Stop trolling. First, this is a rumor, and easily could be false. Second, who says that sony is the only one paying, if it is true, there are others in the blu-ray camp after all. Your blatant attempts at trolling are getting really old. unless you have something to add to the discussion, not bashing companies that you don't like, you shouldn't post.

I'm perplexed as to why you call my posts trolling when they're far more constructive and relevant than most of yours. Unlike you I've also never been banned for my actions so I really don't see you in a position to lecture.

You're also the one exagerating, not I, I bashed no companies, merely pointed out their behaviors as being typical and responded to the winings of people in this thread which I see you made no attempt to address for the very reasons you allegedly chose to single out my posts. It would appear you've painted your own bias here.

You're a well known Sony troll, that's no secret. While this news may be questionable to some degree, its valid news and more than plausable with only benefit of the doubt to support your argument of its invalidity. Your trollish nature is further illustrated by the fact you've illustrated nothing specific in what I've done to criticize me for. You've simply just slapped the label of troll on my presence in this thread with no real argument or specifics to corroborate it. Could that be because you have no merit to my being a troll outside of the fact I say things you don't agree with?