LOL @ This thread.

This is why Digital Downloads are a long ways away from becoming the mainstream.

Some people can not handle the truth. A five to eight gigabyte COMPRESSED video will look horrible compared to uncompressed. That's like comparing videos via youtube. It just looks horrible (because of the compression). But you guys don't want to hear that, and no one will pay attention to this post.

 My thoughts exactly.  Don't need to own it to support it.

This thread will need to exist a long time for downloads to be dominant!

Yup, BR will likley be worth a fair bit. I personally think that how aggressively the industry (i.e. Sony, Samsung, Warners, etc) will push a move away from DVD is being seriously underestimated.

It would be easy to start making BR more attractive while touting backwards compatibility and upscaling of existing DVDs - I think we'll see BR exlusive extras, etc. before too long.

I think many seem to think the industry will now wait and see if people prefer DVD or BR: that's not going to happen, a move will be encouraged nay pushed and DVD will be retired in favour of BR.

Downloads are attractive to me personally but are a long way of replacing physical media IMO so BR will likely have plenty of time to make hay.

As for bigger formats coming - maybe for storage but I doubt movie industry will be interested for a long time now and no matter how big a disk format some small company comes up with it ain't going anywhere without content holders and they are very unlikely to consider supporting anything other than BR for a long time.

All of the above is only IMHO of course...

Well IMO this site will probably long be gone before that will ever happne , so chances for this thread to survive alone are zero :P

O LAWD
topic backfired

I actually have a strong desire NOT to own physical media.

Anyway, digital downloads is not just about HD movie purchases. It's also about rentals of SD/HD movies, purchases/rentals of TV shows, concerts, music videos and more. People will get what's fitting for their situation and their wallet.

"Apple already sells movies, TV shows — and music, of course — on iTunes. The company has sold 7 million movies and 125 million TV shows on iTunes, Jobs said."

http://www.statesman.com/business/content/business/stories/technology/01/16/0116apple.html

Well if that's the case then Digital Distribution may indeed catch on. We all know that with it being incorporated with the iPod it's sure to take off. I expect MS to push digital Distribution even harder now that HD-DVD is out of here. 

I reckon there are plenty of people that are all up for bypassing Toshiba and Sony's expensive and unneccessary formats all together and going for downloads.

Movie Downloads might be fine but Blue-Ray will never lose to them.
1) Limited reach og Hi-Def movie downloads
2) High speed internet connection required
3) No instant gratification.
4) BlueRay rentals are cheaper are user friendly. the whole 3 day rental and auto deletion spooks me out.
5) limited extras in downloads, Blue Ray discs are full of interviews, easter eggs, commentaries etc ..
6) Easier to archive Blue Ray discs.

well i could go on , but some other time.

I believe that once blu-ray reaches a certain market penetration and once the players will be relatively cheap, dvd and its players will begin to be phased out. I believe this because the margins on newer formats are immense.

Also retailers will prefer selling a 200$ blu-ray player on which the consumer is more prone to take an extended warranty (huge profit) to a 69$ dvd player which is so cheap people don't bother taking out the warranty on.

If this happens, the royalties for the Blu-ray association will make any current loses worth it.