That trend has been going on for a while, biggest shift is from rental and DVD sell through at rental places.
Movies being available first digitally is just another trick to get more money. It's even in the article you linked.

Still, strides in digital-movie sales are encouraging to studios. And a primary reason for the accelerating growth in online sales is the widespread adoption of a new release window marketed as "Digital HD." For one to four weeks before a movie becomes available on DVD or to rent online, studios make new movies available to purchase from digital stores like Apple Inc.

Although some people are now buying movies online who might otherwise have bought a DVD or Blu-ray disc, studio executives said the biggest change is people who would have rented a movie but now, unwilling to wait, are buying it instead.

They understand that people are unwilling to wait. Same reason why home movies don't release alongside cinema versions.

Blu-ray sales percentage is still climbing, although the physical pie is shrinking rather rapidly. And with tricks like timed releases studios are helping it along. And sure why not, $19.99 for a digital release instead of $14.98 for the Blu-ray. The digital release gives them a lot more profit.

No, I just think lists like that are missing that DVD is no longer fit for purpose.  It was succeeded by a technology fit for modern purpose 8 years ago.

Anyway, as was already mentioned I'm not sure why some people are interested in putting Blu-ray down.  I'm pretty pumped about digital too, but I don't feel the need to put Blu-ray down, it's still the best allround option right now.

Nielsen publishes weekly stats for US.  http://forum.digital-digest.com/f145/nielsen-videoscan-home-media-magazine-blu-ray-dvd-hd-dvd-stats-updated-weekly-86912-35.html

Blu-ray has increased in market share bit by bit, in some weeks e.g. March 22nd up to 42% of the market (over $101 million).  Blu-ray has a very good market share for new releases, compared to DVD that has a lot of ambient sales from the older, much larger catalog of movies and TV shows.

Why are some people in such a hurry to lose out on physical media? The quality is better and you aren't tied to any specific service (streaming etc.) and you own it for life and if you don't want it any more you can recoup a portion of the cost by reselling it.

Not to mention with the way Netflix is being shaken down by the ISPs the cost of streaming is just going to rise.

Physical media for movies and music doesn't need to exist anymore. I rather have them as digital files.

Games are another story, but emulation can solve that problem.

I concur. Physical media doesn't need to exist anymore, at-least in 1st world countries with decent broadband infrustructure.

However, here in Australia we don't really have any decent digital services to take advantage of, nothing to the extent of Netflix or Hulu that's for sure, so the only option that people *really* have is to pirate or spend $30-$40 on a Blu-ray release or stick with DVD which is usually $20-$30 a movie, which is hardly convenient.

I love my music library being digital and online, I love my video games being digital and online (via Steam) I wan't the same thing with movies and TV shows, cheaper pricing wouldn't go astray either.

Why? There is only 1 online service that provides exact blu-ray quality with all the extras, yet it's more expensive than physical disks and you're tied to their system. For example Gravity: $25.99 while the Blu-ray disk is $24.99 on Amazon or $18.99 if you shop around. (I wanted to take The wolf of wall street again as example, but they don't even have that available) Plus you don't need to spend $4000 on the Kaleidescope system to watch it.

Btw the download is 41.5GB, with my 80GB data cap I don't even have the spare bandwidth to download one movie. So tell me, how are physical disks not needed anymore?

Shadow1980, best post in the whole thread. Echoes perfectly what I feel, and this coming from someone who does NOT have an internet traffic cap - I've had months with over 1 Tb Upload / Download...for 10 Euro / Month -.
So, if you don't live in Romania, go ahead, pray for the death of the physical. Pray that your ISPs won't catch on to the fact that you don't have ANYWHERE else to turn for your entertainment in your "developed countries" and enjoy being skinned alive for the right to download 100 Gb per month. Because I'm sure they won't be stabbing one another in the back just to offer you the most traffic and the lowest prices.

Slippery slope is slippery.

I honestly don't know how someone can't tell the difference.  Sometimes the streaming is incredibly good (House of Cards on Netflix), but usually it just looks like a joke compared to BD or a downloaded HD video....

Great post.

I still buy CDs, although through Amazon nowadays since the shelf space in my local store only has the disposable pop new releases left. My wife's first iPod died, new one she always forgets to charge and at some point it screws it up and you have to redownload everything. Same with my parents in law, always have to come over to fix the damn mp3 player. I simply play my CDs which always work.

When my ps3 died, it took me a couple of months just to redownload all the psn stuff with my bandwidth cap.

And books, I thought about buying an e-reader at some point. Then I picked up my book again, browsed back and forth to the nicely detailed map while reading the final battle of the wheel of time. Feeling the texture of the paper between my fingers and see the sunlight bounce of the pages. Checking how far I am by the thickness of the book. I stare enough at screens all day, no e-reader for me.

The real story here isn't physical discs disappearing in favor of digital downloads.

The real story here is the fact that BluRay, in spite it technically having greater video quality and higher disc capacity, has never truly taken over DVDs in the home video market. In fact, while BluRay has become semi-prolific in American homes, I'd be willing to bet more people still own just a DVD player over either both, or only BluRay. DVD sales are still fairly healthy, and DVDs copies of just about every single home video release that comes out still exist. I think Sony was really expecting BR to take over DVDs the way DVDs took over VHS. The difference being, it's still pretty much the same medium, and unlike the tape to disc jump, the benefits of BR for most casual/regular owners, are basically just garnish.

So maybe they bet too heavily on the BR format. No surprise there, I seem to remember them betting pretty heavy on UMDs as well. DVDs still stick around, because for a lot of people, they're more than enough. *shrugs*