NJ5 said: MikeB said: NJ5 said: @MikeB: If I had enough patience, I'd dig all the surveys you were posting about last year, which were supposed to prove that the PS3 was going to outsell the 360 during Christmas in America. One would think that these surveys should mean something, but so far I haven't seen it in reality.   You better quote me then. I'll do it myself: MikeB at VGChartz wrote (15 November 2007): "an independent survey indicated the PS3 was higher on the wishlists of US residents for christmas than the XBox 360. So I still have hope for the PS3 to beat the XBox 360 this holiday season globally." And it did! Please provide credit when credit is due NJ5. The poll was for US, and the prediction for worldwide... Sorry but I can't give you much credit for that one, even though the conclusion is correct ;) If the same thing happens now, Blu-Ray won't take off in UK (where the poll was made), but worldwide it will? :P

The reason why I didn't state North America instead of globally was due to the fact the 360 is priced lower (people may have to settle for a cheaper christmas gift) combined Halo 3 and 360 media hype. I took multiple factors in account. In any case the PS3 outsold the 360 for January for North America, maybe some people dissapointed with their christmas gifts bought a PS3 for themselves.

So a quarter of A/V-attuned people taking this survey, most of whom don't own an HD set, say they might try at least one high-def disc in the next year? LETS BURN OUR DVDEES MUST HAVE GIFT

the problem ps3 will face is that blu-ray is only an option for the masses when players are

@ Fastrabbit09

Blu-Ray spec 2.0 requires the two secondary decoders, 1GB of local storage for updates and content and an Internet connection. The PS3 is the most future proof Blu-Ray player out there. With such specs we won't see sub $100 players soon.

Personally I think all the extras (Wi-Fi, Home, PlayTV, PS3 games, webbrowser, large harddrive, MP3/MPG4/DivX/etc media support, etc) will likely still allow the PS3 to have an edge for a long period of time with regard to educated consumers. A future $299 priced slimline PS3 will likely do wonders.

MikeB said: "The 2008 Digital Entertainment Survey said watching HD DVDs was expected to have the highest rate of growth in 2008 compared with any other form of entertainment." "Of the 1,600 consumers surveyed, 24 percent said they intended to watch next-generation movie disks in the next six months. Almost 40 percent of the sample have or have access to a high-definition-ready TV. "It's great news for Sony who can expect the PlayStation 3 (with its Blu-ray capability) to become the must-have gift this Christmas," said Charles Moore, TV and Film partner at media law firm Wiggin who produced the report with research experts Entertainment Media Research." http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssConsumerGoodsAndRetailNews/idUSL2950137120080303 Hopefully Sony's PlayTV for the PS3 catches on as well: http://www.startribune.com/entertainment/tv/16089942.html Combined with Home and an awesome games line-up this is set to become an amazing year for the PS3!

What other form of entertainment is going to have a higher rate of growth? HD-DVD ownership is so low it's percentage increases are going to be huge.

Newsflash. Xbox 360 is going to have a higher rate of growth in Japan then PS3 this year.

40% have access to a HDTV. Who doesn't know someone who owns an HDTV? If you were going to watch movies with friends wouldn't it likely be at said friends house? (Since he is going to likely have the best setup?)

Seems like a meaningless survey that anyone could of told you the results of.

Also, considering they usually focus in a different kind of consumer research i wouldn't even trust the numbers in the survey.  They keep around half a million respondants and handpick who should take surveys.  This doesn't work well for surveys like this.   

Surveys like this tend to be meaningless ...

There are enough people who are uninformed enough to believe that DVD is a HD-Movie format to dramatically impact the "24 percent said they intended to watch next-generation movie disks in the next six months." On top of that there is the "almost 40 percent of the sample have or have access to a high-definition-ready TV" begs the question of how random the sample was, and what their definition of "have access to a high-definition-ready TV" really means; my sister "has access to" my HD-TV, and will see another HD-Movie on it within the next 6 months, but her lowest priority right now would be buying a HDTV or a Blu-Ray player.

The only way to calculate the statistics people want to infer from this survey would be to ask "Do you currently own an HDTV? If not do you intend on buying a HDTV in the next 12 months? Do you currently own a HD-Movie player? If not do you intend on buying a HD-Movie player in the next 12 months?" Even with as blunt and straight forward of questions as this it is difficult to get accurate statistics about people's intentions; if I asked "Do you currently own a living unicorn? If not do you intend on buying a living unicorn in the next 12 months?" I would (likely) get a number which was noticeably higher than 0% even though Unicorns are mythical and no one owns one, nor can anyone buy one.

@ HappySqurriel

24 percent said they are going to watch HD movie discs within 6 months, I don't think this survey was done unprofessionally. Especially consindering the article even states:

"Over 60 percent of consumers said they had been put off buying a next-generation disk player due to the presence of two formats in the market"

So there seems no confusion between DVD and HD media with regard to this survey like you seem to want to believe.

MikeB said: @ HappySqurriel 24 percent said they are going to watch HD movie discs within 6 months, I don't think this survey was done unprofessionally. Especially consindering the article even states: "Over 60 percent of consumers said they had been put off buying a next-generation disk player due to the presence of two formats in the market" So there seems no confusion between DVD and HD media with regard to this survey like you seem to want to believe.

Did I say they were using unprofessional methods?

Even if you use the most professional methods the results can still be meaningless. Call up 100 people and ask "Do you have a couple of minutes to be part of our survey on High Definition electronics?" and see how many people are willing to be part of the study; in most cases you would find somewhere between 5% and 20% will be willing to take a survey and no matter how random you sellect the initial 100 people, the people who take part in your survey will not be a random sample. Talk to any professional statistician and they will agree with me.

On top of that, does 60% of people responding yes to "Did the existance of 2 High definition movie formats prevent you from choosing to buy a HD-Movie Player?" really imply that everyone who took part in the study was well informed? On top of that, if 25% of the people who answered no to that question thought DVD was a HD-Movie format it would have a huge impact on the results of the study.

isnt this the same country where a large number of people did not know who winston chuchhill was?

@ HappySquirriel

It's not really that hard to do a proper survey.

First question: "Do you know what Blu-Ray is?" Based on the response you can rule out a lot of things already.