I think the problem here is that some people think because Digital Downloads is good, that they will kill BD (or DVD for that matter). The fact of it all is Digital Downloads will only reach a small market. Even if it does provide a level of convenience, that does not mean it will impact optical media.

Both have good reasons why they will continue to succeed.

gebx said: What can you do in 15 minutes?? Well some have said you can make a sandwich, do a quick load of laundry, partially install DMC4 on your PS3, and now according to Virgin and MS, you'll be able to download HD movies. http://www.techradar.com/news/home-cinema/high-def-movie-downloads-in-15-mins-270136 "Xbox Live high definition movie downloads should take between 15 minutes and half an hour to download by the end of the year on some broadband services, according to Virgin Media and Microsoft today. A Virgin Media spokesperson informed us that the company's 50MB broadband service will be made available to over nine millions homes by the end of 2008 - over 70 per cent of Virgin Media's entire network." I think the big news here is that the "networks can't handle it" and "would take too long" arguments have now been voided in the U.K.. And its not a matter of "if" this will happen in other European countries and NA, but "when"? I don't see this killing the Blu Ray, but its just one more thing they'll need to compete against.

Well for one, that service is most likely going to cost $100 a month or more, add into that the cost of the movies on XBL and it'd be cheaper just to buy the blu-ray, you also must remember that the movie downloads are going to be compressed, and the quality much lower than an actual blu-ray movie. Add into that your XBL subscription cost and Blu-ray becomes more appealing. Add into that the special features and games that come on Blu-ray and it becomes MORE appealing, and add into that the limited harddrive space of most 360's and Blu-ray becomes even MORE appealing. I do not see this affecting Blu-ray sales at all.

So Blu-ray has the following advantages:
Cost
Quality
Features
Movie Games
Physical Media
Unlimited Space

Digital Downloads:
Digitally downloadable

And plus, everyone is always complaining no one has HD TV's, so why would 360ers use up their precious harddrive space for something they cannot enjoy?

 

smbu2000 said: ssj12 said: do you realize how much a 50mbps connection would cost? Also this wont effect sales of disc media at all. Look at the music industry there will still be another 10 years before itunes and the other download services take over the music market. My 100mbps connection costs just over $35 ;-p

Your thinking of your "Local Area Connection" which is your network speed not your internet speed.

 

gebx said: 1) Forget MS/Xbox Live.. replace with Apple TV and every Cable Provider who wants to cash in on Video on demand rentals 2) Blu Ray is not the dominant format yet, and while HD downloads may not kill it ( I pretty sure I wrote that in my OP), it will take market share away and stop it from being as dominant as the DVD. 3) Costs will be high at first, they always are 4) Wait waht??? @SSJ12?? Itunes alone accounted for 4 BILLION songs downloads as of Jan 2008!! and at least 2 MILLION movies!

I LOL at you. What the hell do songs have to do with it? And do you realize those movies were less than DVD quality, and only about 1GB in size? Like I said, the 360 doesn't have the harddrive space, and most PC's don't, it's still a long way off and the cost for the first few years will be immense! Who wants to pay $1200+ a year for internet, +$20 a HD movie download when you can pick up a $300 Blu-ray player and $25 a movie. And also as I said, that $25 movie comes with better quality, special features, and a most likely a game or two.

 

Oh yes of course I completely forgot about servers! Your 50mbps is no good if servers can't upload it to you that fast, the fastest you'll get back is probably around 5mbps for quite sometime, how is XBL going to handle this if it can barely handle the traffic on it right now?

ion-storm said: Deviation59 said: ion-storm said: Blu-ray. Is. Dead Yup. Sure it is. Dream on, fanboy.   What am I a fanboy for?

 

I don't know but your statement is pretty ignorant. HD DVD is dead, Betamax is dead, Blu Ray is alive and kicking and IMHO will be so for at least 5 years or so when maybe Full HD downloadable movies are available to the masses.

Username2324 said: gebx said: 1) Forget MS/Xbox Live.. replace with Apple TV and every Cable Provider who wants to cash in on Video on demand rentals 2) Blu Ray is not the dominant format yet, and while HD downloads may not kill it ( I pretty sure I wrote that in my OP), it will take market share away and stop it from being as dominant as the DVD. 3) Costs will be high at first, they always are 4) Wait waht??? @SSJ12?? Itunes alone accounted for 4 BILLION songs downloads as of Jan 2008!! and at least 2 MILLION movies! I LOL at you. What the hell do songs have to do with it? And do you realize those movies were less than DVD quality, and only about 1GB in size? Like I said, the 360 doesn't have the harddrive space, and most PC's don't, it's still a long way off and the cost for the first few years will be immense! Who wants to pay $1200+ a year for internet, +$20 a HD movie download when you can pick up a $300 Blu-ray player and $25 a movie. And also as I said, that $25 movie comes with better quality, special features, and a most likely a game or two.

Competely agree with the quality issue and also the fact that movie downloads are NOTHING like music downloads except from the way data is transported.

 Music downloads caught on because of portable, small devices that let you take your collection anywhere and with absolutely no regards to quality (the earphones of the ipod are crap but a v.v. small percentage of owners actually replace them). This means that medium bitrate MP3 is fine for 99% of ipod owners. Also porability and how small the device is actually an advantage in the music business.

The movie downloads are exactly the opposite. You need large hardware (large TVs) with loads of space (won't fit in something as portable as the ipod) and the movie distributors will not let you transfer the movies you bought anyway. Also, quality plays a much bigger role in the movie industry (i.e. streaming movies are not even as good as DVDs).

This is why it is not an advantage to download movies in compact packages as it is with music but is actually a discadvantage.

Wake me up when it happens in Australia lol. Large landmass + small population = crappy broadband.

Wake me up when september ends.

Then I will see what happens, besides its not 1080p is it.

The amusing thing here is that most are focusing on availability of bandwidth and costs of wide band speeds necessary for downloading double digit GB downloads in a practical amount of time and factoring that as the sole cost of viewing High Def movies while completely ignoring the cost of the media itself.

There are two subscription fees. Your ISP fee and either a monthly rental fee for media, or individual title purchase fee.

Since some insist on using the music industry model as a portent for the video/movie industry, I'm guessing the same people that only factor network fees into their entertainment fees aren't planning on actually paying for any of their media. Considering that the vast majority of all music that is downloaded is not legit/purchased, it's easy to see why some people would think this.

This is the reason why MS charges primarily for rentals with options to buy permanent viewer rights, but only tied to an individual machine. I don't know why Marketplace purchases aren't tied to user accounts instead, but this is similar (only much more limited) to the DRM system Apple initially used with music bought through iTunes.

The problem with DD files is that because they will always be more compressed in the interest of increasing transmission speeds on a per file basis, they will always be of lower quality than those published on hard media. It doesn't matter if you burn your illegal file to disc after downloading it. That makes no sense to me personally. And I don't consider a 5GB 720p movie file anywhere near on par with a 1080p HD DVD or BR D file.

Not too many people are willing to pay money for lower quality output, particularly when the sole purpose of HD formats are for increased quality output.

Now if you're simply bit torrenting all your movies (of ripped HD DVD files) illegally, sure; anything is good if you're not paying a cent for it. But does anyone actually believe the future of distributed media is based upon the free/stolen standard? There's no money in that for the studios that produce the content.

Musicians can adapt to this by taking in their percentages from tour receipts and merchandise, but the parallel to this in the film industry would be what? Find a way to make more money at the box offices?

Everyone knows the only reason why many studios stay profitable is through DVD sales after the ticket receipts are totaled up.