On Nov. 13th
If there is one sector that is sure to ride out the economic downturn in some comfort it has to be business punditry. Today's instalment in Things That Will Be Either Better Or Worse In The Next Financial Cycle comes from the HD3 Conference in LA, where a panel of entertainment execs discussed how the Blu-Ray format might suffer as the credit crunch begins to bite.
Sony may have won the format wars - seeing HD-DVD driven before them and hearing the lamentation of its early adopters - but longer term the discs may go the way of the Betamax and it's all that pesky economy's fault.
"The economy is the biggest challenge, because there are just so many pieces to the Blu-ray puzzle that consumers face," said Disney's Lori MacPherson, "You need the high-definition television set, you need the player, you need the cables, you need the software . . ."
And films. You definitely need films. The price of which compared to DVD, streaming and downloads might also be a factor.
"We're all constantly looking at (disc) pricing," said Rich Marty from Sony, "What it amounts to is that we'll wait until after the fourth quarter and see how it goes."
On Nov. 16th
On Tuesday, the economy was gonna kill Blu-Ray. As of Friday, Blu-Ray might save Christmas. Right now, the only difference between our economy and a back-alley crapshoot is the informed punditry of the former. But anyway, a bunch of studio executives met on Friday to say, more or less, if Blu-Ray can roll that hardway four we're totally gonna make the car payment and get out of this.
Seriously though, the Digital Entertainment Group, a consortium of studios and other Blu-Ray backers, forecast that by the end of the year, 10.5 million households will be capable of playing Blu-Ray videos — with 8 million of them on the PlayStation 3. That's well less than the 14.4 million figure an analyst tossed out mid-year, and for it to happen, 2.3 million more PS3s need to be sold, in addition to a million stand-alone players. Still, "We remain pretty confident that we'll meet our targets for the fiscal year," says SCEA spokeswoman Julie Han. The PS3's U.S. installation base is 5.7 million; Sony expects to sell 4 million to 5 million more by March.
Having listened to some of the BMO Capital Markets conference, in which nearly everyone expressed some form of qualified optimism for the coming year, studio executives are not delusional nor howling in the dark on this. It absolutely doesn't help that you're asking people, many of whom are in mortal fear for their jobs, to lay out lots of money on a player and a quality television just to enjoy the experience of a new DVD format. But even as the economic picture worsened in October, Blu-Ray sales quadrupled. Price drops in standalone players and, of course, the value-add you have with a machine like the PS3 that can do more, has enough hopeful for the time being.
"The only dark cloud is the economy," said David Bishop, the president of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. Yeah, no kidding. Come on, baby needs a new pair of shoes!
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3.3 million players (2.3 PS3 /1 million stand alone) need to sell for the analyst to be on target.. (Sony predicts 4-5 Million PS3's to be sold by March)
Like the article skims, the economy is not at it's best. WW we are very close to the 1930's depression, so much in fact that they are finally starting to admit recession and hinting toward depression.
We have heard/read it over and over that PS3 needed a price cut... but Sony can't, most due to share holders and the rest due to the fact of cost to make the system or to make up for lost cost before the cheaper parts.
Instead BR players are becoming cheaper, but not cheap enough for this holiday season.
Nobody can predict what this holiday will be like.. because well... it hasn't been this bad for many, many, many, years. (yes I have said this statement in 5/10 posts but it's true)
There is one important thing going against BR at this point in time and thats HD Downloads.
It's not an MS thing as some people keep trying to point out, but DirecTV, Pay Per View, Dish Network, Comcast, Apple, MS, to name a few... all back HD Downloads as the way of the future, and those are some nice hefty corporate trades.
Not to mention coming out on the 360 on Nov. 19th is Netflix, it will have a bigger hand in many people's pockets just based on install base... Yes Netflix can already be streamed to your PC now (not many familyis all sit togeather in front of their PC with popcorn), and there are ways to stream it to your TV, but 99% of the people do not know how to do it, and having a 360 already connected to your TV makes it simple.
Now some might say BS, but think about it... You turn on your system and there is a 1month FREE access to download some Movies (Netflix on 360 comes with a Free Month), and not everyone will get hooked but some will if not most, and that some/most can very easily turn the heads from Blu-ray to Downloads.
Now people can predict allot of whats going to happen, but the way the WW economy is at this point in time, many people (including analysts) weren't even born and can't really pinpoint what this holiday will bring. I'm not an analyst, I just pointing out my view on the matter... ok wait.... I guess I'm an amateur analyst...lol
In the end more people are going to be worried about their homes, and jobs, rather then when a new item they need in their home this holiday and that can be a huge impact on sales for anyone... No matter what company you are and what you are selling.
PS4 Preordered - 06/11/2013 @09:30am
XBox One Preordered - 06/19/2013 @07:57pm
"I don't trust #XboxOne & #Kinect 2.0, it's always connected" as you tweet from your smartphone - irony 0_o
