Blue-Ray won't become popular until it's commoditized, AKA 50$ players and 6$ movies.

People keep talking about the Internet when they talk about digital downloads. That's not likely the future for the masses... Satellite or some other wireless "entertainment" tech is more likely what the movie studios are thinking of. They're trying to model it after the theater experience, I.e- pay per view or pay for download and view until you get tired of it and delete it from your DVR.

I have dish network HD and the programming and ppvs are now full 1080p... They look like my hd-dvds.

I have an iPod touch so I can listen to my music while at work, etc., but I can't really watch movies while I'm at work... Too distracting. So having portable movies would be nice, but not as essential as portable music.

EDIT: corrected bizarre spelling errors.  I've got to stop posting from my iPod Touch.

Cost of downloads will likely soar as most providers are going to make you pay for the amount of bandwidth you need for digital.

Also, everything is going to suffer in a recession except certain entertainment areas. I'll wait and see TDK sales (given how well Iron Man sold) on BR, plus others over holidays. BR players are finally getting to the right price point too.

the studios would love for us to rent content... they have been pushing it forever, even those sevices like the relaunch of napster, where you can use almost any of it in the rental time.... these services have failed, and failed again. people have said they will either buy it  or steal it, mainly because people like to own things. this is why the rental compromise has not worked because there is no ownership.... studios can not grasp that. 

@crumas: That's one good possibility. I would say that digital distribution doesn't take just one route, but many. Internet, digital TV via terrestial, cable, satellite and mobile network, mobile internet etc. One thing which i can see in the near future is remote use of devices and services. You choose "PPV service" from your phones menu during your work hours, pay your purchase from your account/phonebill and your DVR/multimedia hub starts to download the content at your home, so that it's ready for watching when you come home.

Yeah I don't understand why anyone would want to pay to rent something if you can add like a dollar or so extra to own it.

Digital downloads threaten/compete with the DVD rental market, video on demand services, and pay per view movies. Downloads do not directly compete with Blu-ray.

How many articles would we be reading about digital downloads if HDDVD was still alive?

@dbot: Propably just as many as we currently are right now. Maybe even more.

Digital Downloads doesnt even compete with those. Its only controlling like 2% of the market as a whole. Bu-ray has like 8%, DVD retals like 14%. Forget the actual data, need to find it. My %s are close enough though.

Well I cannot say I am surprised. After all it was the movie houses who killed off the alternative which was most likely to produce real cost benefits early on.

Digital downloads? Well I do occasionally download one either on my Xbox or BT Vision (UK thing) which is OK but the whole problem with movies is you want it now not in 12 or 24 hours time.

If my broadband speed was to double I will still probably not be at the stage that I could get near instant access to HD content, and this is the barrier.

That said why waste marketing budgets on Blu Ray when you can spend that money on the infrastructure so you are ready when it does become possible. I suspect Blu Ray still have a number of years before it becomes the norm.

In the meantime the world moves on and further away from the fixed media. Does this mean Microsoft got it wrong and right at the same time?