How about this article from Grubert's favorite pundit: ;)

from a pro- HD DVD leading pundit but has some new points

http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback184.html

Wal-Mart Names HD DVD the Winner
By: Rob Enderle :DIs this the guy who thought that Microsoft would sell 2 million XBOX360 add-ons by the end of 2006, using 20% of 10 million? If so, then I think that showed he really didn't have much grasp of reality and had a real lack of knowledge in this area.

--Darin

This title is a MONSTER on all fronts and I can't wait till we get some hard sales figures.Given the difference in player prices, I would expect this title to sell more HD DVD players than Blu-ray players (including the PS3). Basically, those who really want to get into it for just this title are probably more likely to buy an HD DVD for that. That becomes even more true if they can get an HD DVD player for $199 near the end of the year and Blu-ray players are all at least twice that. Which is why I think the Blu-ray camp better not sit back and just assume they'll keep all their exclusive studios and win this thing without at least getting close to whatever HD DVD players will be going for at the end of the year.
He's not afraid to go out on a limb and some of his more famous pronouncements obviously fell flat. But to be fair, he's been accurate a lot too in quite a few things. he been pro Microsoft an pro HD DVD in the past so obviously Blu-ray guys don't like him.I don't trust people who show themselves to have a lack of intelligence on a subject. That goes for whichever side they support.

Here is an article of his from August a little over a year and half ago:

Blu-Ray Wins or Nothing Does (http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback67.html)

--Darin

Is this the guy who thought that Microsoft would sell 2 million XBOX360 add-ons by the end of 2006, using 20% of 10 million? If so, then I think that showed he really didn't have much grasp of reality and had a real lack of knowledge in this area.

--Darin

What a difference 4 months makes.

http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback158.html

What a difference 4 months makes.

http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback158.htmlWhat an irony that the article carries a Blu-ray ad.

What a difference 4 months makes.

http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback158.htmlI think it was 16 months between those. This was just December and I thought this was interesting from him:
Add to this that the Xbox 360 HD DVD drive is for movies only, so each one counts for movie viewing while PS3s may not be used to watch movies and you have a situation where the active movie player advantage by year-end should be between 4x and 6x better for HD DVD over Blu-Ray.I think we pretty much all knew that not every PS3 would be used for movie viewing even a year ago (although some now seem to want to make it seem like this is new information in order to push the attach rate issue, even though it didn't save CED in its war with VHS), but that thing where he thought that HD DVD should have between 4x and 6x the active movie players pretty much indicated his knowledge level IMO. Interesting how Blu-ray was outselling HD DVD for software right at the end of the year, when he thought the active player advantage should have been the other way 4-6:1. And that was less than 4 weeks before the end of the year, so not like it was a long term prediction (with more excuse for being so wrong).

--Darin

Source? Rest of the article this was on? :eek:

linky?

When I don't give a link - that means a link can't be given ! In this case its from a respected daily industry publication.

I don't trust people who show themselves to have a lack of intelligence on a subject. That goes for whichever side they support.

Very true. Does this guy have any major predictions that have come true (of course if he made 100 predictions and only 5 came true - nothing great there).

In general tech predictions are difficult. But volume estimates (like the add-on numbers) ought to be easier.

Interesting how Blu-ray was outselling HD DVD for software right at the end of the year, when he thought the active player advantage should have been the other way 4-6:1. And that was less than 4 weeks before the end of the year, so not like it was a long term prediction (with more excuse for being so wrong).

Yup. Out of ironic amusment I might have tried to see what other tripe that blow hard was spouting, but that site is slower than molasses.


When I don't give a link - that means a link can't be given ! In this case its from a respected daily industry publication.

You can certainly understand some... skepticism...over a quote that can't be corroborated? Certainly for context, if not veracity.

Here is an interesting quote from WB - PS3 owners aren't buying the bulk of movies.

Assuming this means Blu-ray movies then the obvious question is:

OK then, who is buying the bulk of Blu-ray movies?

nataraj: Here is an interesting quote from WB - PS3 owners aren't buying the bulk of movies.

fozziwig: Assuming this means Blu-ray movies then the obvious question is:
OK then, who is buying the bulk of Blu-ray movies?

I was hoping someone would raise this, because I have a question. If BD standalones account for more than 1/2 the sales, and they number in the order of 100,000, then the percentage of the 2,000,000 PS3's buying movies is less than 5%. Someone update me.

... then the percentage of the 2,000,000 PS3's buying movies is less than 5%.I'm not sure why people are using 2 million for the number of PS3s. Are people counting those sold in Japan, even though the software figures we've seen from Nielsen are for the US, counting units shipped, but not sold to consumers, ...? I believe that the NPD numbers come out to about 1.3 million through the end of March, but I keep seeing people using 2 million.

I also wonder how much Warner really knows about what players the discs are being sold for.

--Darin

Is this the guy who thought that Microsoft would sell 2 million XBOX360 add-ons by the end of 2006, using 20% of 10 million? If so, then I think that showed he really didn't have much grasp of reality and had a real lack of knowledge in this area.

--Darin What about his comments on the Wal-Mart HD DVD players do you disagree with?

AFAIK, Xbox 360 HD DVD drives continue to sell. As HD DVD movies become more plentiful and those Xbox 360 drives drop below $149 or less in price by the 4th quarter, then it may very well achieve 20% penetration into the Xbox 360 fan base.

Pull the article up, I don't think he predicted 2M sales by the end of 2006. But a lot of them will probably be sold by the end of the year.

He may have been wrong about the magnitude or the timing , but possibly not on the eventual affect.

Do you agree or disagree that the Xbox 360 add on HD DVD drive is a very positive factor for HD DVD that can only become more effective as HD DVD gains further mass market penetration?

And he's not as wrong as the Sony PS3 spin masters or Fox propagandists who predicted millions more PS3 sales and orders of magnitude higher HD sales by this time period.

What a difference 4 months makes. http://news.digitaltrends.com/talkback158.html
Is this the guy who thought that Microsoft would sell 2 million XBOX360 add-ons by the end of 2006, using 20% of 10 million? Where in the article did he say 20% by end of 2006?

The Xbox 360 HD DVD drives may very well sell more units as HD DVD availability goes up and HD DVD movies become more commonplace (see Wal-Mart discussion above).

Why don't you read the article again, take out your arbitrary time periods and see what advantage the Xbox 360 HD DVD drive can have over this year to the HD DVD player installed base.

Anyone no about how many 360 add on drives have been sold?

Where in the article did he say 20% by end of 2006?I don't see it in that article, so it could be elsewhere or it could be that my memory was off some. In there he says 4-6x for HD DVD by the end of 2006.
... take out your arbitrary time periods ...It isn't my arbitrary time period. He is the one who said, "... by year-end should be ...". And the time period is part of making predictions.
What about his comments on the Wal-Mart HD DVD players do you disagree with?I would have to look at it again, but I think his title is BS right there and with what I've read from him in the past, don't trust him to really have all that much of a grasp of reality. Do you believe that title is the truth?
AFAIK, Xbox 360 HD DVD drives continue to sell.Of course it continues to sell.
As HD DVD movies become more plentiful and those Xbox 360 drives drop below $149 or less in price by the 4th quarter, then it may very well achieve 20% penetration into the Xbox 360 fan base.And it wouldn't make his 4-6x by the end of 2006 any more intelligent than it was when he made it. Lots of things will happen someday.
He may have been wrong about the magnitude or the timing , but possibly not on the eventual affect.Wow. I think I need you to defend any predictions I make. :) I won't even have to worry about how ridiculous they are.
Do you agree or disagree that the Xbox 360 add on HD DVD drive is a very positive factor for HD DVD that can only become more effective as HD DVD gains further mass market penetration?Not sure why you are going there as it makes absolutely no difference as to how dumb his prediction was and seems like a way to take away from that. If it doesn't drop in price, I think it could become less important with standalone player drops. If they would fix some of the problems and push it more, then it could become more significant.

--Darin

Anyone no about how many 360 add on drives have been sold?

No.

Anyone no about how many 360 add on drives have been sold?

I don't have a link but I remember just a week after Toshiba hit 100K on standalone players that they said something about over 200K HD DVD players.

So I figured low 200s = 220K - 100K standalones = 120K HD Addons + Computers + PC Drives.
I would figure the majority of those are HD Addons.
Maybe 90K-100K?

To my knowledge Microsoft has never given an exact count.

Maybe 90K-100K?


During CES we were told 92K. So, you will have to guess what happened this year ...

I don't have a link but I remember just a week after Toshiba hit 100K on standalone players that they said something about over 200K HD DVD players.I believe the info about the 200k came first and wasn't clear about whether it was standalones or counting the add-ons. Kosty has some insider contacts and reported that one of them told him the 200k was just for Toshiba and didn't count add-ons. Then the release came out that they had surpassed 100k standalones. I haven't seen any explanation of this discrepancy and makes me wonder about that contact.
During CES we were told 92K. So, you will have to guess what happened this year ...I'm pretty sure the kjack posted that the NPD number for the end of January was 112k (after the 92k for end of December). I haven't seen any reports since then, that I recall.

--Darin

I was hoping someone would raise this, because I have a question. If BD standalones account for more than 1/2 the sales, and they number in the order of 100,000, then the percentage of the 2,000,000 PS3's buying movies is less than 5%. Someone update me.

As Darin noted, the NPD number for NA is 1.3 million shipped.

As of 2/1, HDDVD standalones were up 52-48% according to NPD. Let's go with namechamp's 220k HDDVD players (both standalone and add-on/PC drives). Toshiba supposedly said 100k players.

This would mean BD had ~92k standalones comparitively as of the same time (2/1/07), roughly 8k less than Toshiba's 100k. According to Videogamecharts.com (http://videogamecharts.com/page3.html) showed there were 931,700 PS3's sold through it's 3rd month (Febuary). Nielson/HMM numbers were 100/92.53 SI at the time

To summarize with the Nielsen/Videoscan/HMM numbers:

~2/1-2/4

HD DVD
Standalones (Toshiba and clones): 100,000
360 add-on: 92,000
PC drives: ~28,000
Total: ~220,000 "players"
Disc sales: 114,688 YTD; 477,250 SI, 20,533 weekly


Blu-ray
Standalones (Sammy, Sony, Panny, Pio, Philips): 92,000
PS3: 931,700
PC Drives: ?
Total: 1,023,700 "players"
Disc sales: 237,071 YTD; 534,112 SI; 45,719 weekly

I'm pretty sure the kjack posted that the NPD number for the end of January was 112k (after the 92k for end of December). I haven't seen any reports since then, that I recall.

Then we can assume something like 150K till now ...

I can't wait for the some actual numbers, i feel it might be kind of interesting to see how many players there actually are. Anyway thanks guys.

It seems Toshiba are happy to stick to bragging about hardware sales.

Cause that's all they have to "brag" about, and it ain't doing anything to winning the important portion of the war - title sales.

By the time Hd-DVD players hit $199, Blu-ray players will be close to that as well, so I really cannot understand why they are pinning their hopes on "hardware" other than that they have nothing to pin it on besides that.

asj,

By the time Hd-DVD players hit $199, Blu-ray players will be close to that as well,

I sincerely doubt that. Besides, who is going to make it? Not Sony, as it would eat into their PS3 sales which have been pretty lackluster according to the NPD numbers. I doubt any of the other major CE manufacterers want to enter that market, so I just wonder who would make the cheap BD player.

Today's the big day! :)

We'll get some heads up on the REAL Videoscan numbers today - not the "first alert".

Should be pretty interesting...

Today's the big day! :)

We'll get some heads up on the REAL Videoscan numbers today - not the "first alert".

Should be pretty interesting...


wha?

Cause that's all they have to "brag" about, and it ain't doing anything to winning the important portion of the war - title sales.

By the time Hd-DVD players hit $199, Blu-ray players will be close to that as well, so I really cannot understand why they are pinning their hopes on "hardware" other than that they have nothing to pin it on besides that. That's kinda fanciful thinking.

HD DVD pricing has been steady in its MSRP price and street pricing reductions from $499 to $399 and now street pricing at $299. A $199 MSRP player is only just $100 below what a HD A2 is priced at now. The most expensive component, the drive unit is being used in a case with a USB connection as the HD DVD add on for the Xbox 360 that has a MSRP of $199 with a remote and a HD DVD movie as a bundle, street pricing of $149.

At this moment what is the lowest MSRP for a Blu-ray player? The $599 PS3? What's the lowest MSRP announced? Is it still the $499 Sony that isn't available yet? What are the MSRP prices on available Blu-ray players now? $799 $999 and above?

HD DVD units is selling for hundreds of dollars less. What makes it probable that those CE manufacturers are suddenly going to sell Blu-ray units for $300 less than the lowest announced player by the end of the year?

Your wishful thinking?

They will have to be within $100 if sales of HD DVD players go up significantly. They will do what they can to make Blu-ray win. (Lets say software sales in this quarter Blu-ray only outsells HD DVD 60/40 with sales of HD DVD staying the same as last quarter that would put them at 720,000 for the year and Blu-ray at 1,330,000) The BDA will use YTD numbers. If these new lower price HD DVD players come out in Summer the BDA will have a quarter ,maybe 2, to lower their player prices before HD DVD starts selling more discs YTD. Which would mean 6-9 months from now to get less than $300 players. The new Sony cut the price in half of their first one after what will be around 6 months I dont see why they wont be able to cut it in half 6 months later around Christmas with production costs coming down.

We may see older Blu Ray models at $300 by Christmas. One that is compliant with the Oct 31st BD-J spec for $300? I can't see it happening by Christmas.
Unless PS3s cost $300 by then. Sony will really have to do an embarrasing trouser-drop for that to happen though.

HD DVD units is selling for hundreds of dollars less.

That strategy has worked wonderful up to now! :o

That strategy has worked wonderful up to now!

Actually yes. What chances would HD DVD had if the players sold for $1K ?

Probably not much better. ;)

The story for BD so far is (with apologies to Churchill) - never has so much hardware and so much money been spent to sell so few software. Yup. BD is ahead, but the ROI sucks - and Neilson numbers pretty much sum it up every week ;)

We may see older Blu Ray models at $300 by Christmas. One that is compliant with the Oct 31st BD-J spec for $300? I can't see it happening by Christmas.
Unless PS3s cost $300 by then. Sony will really have to do an embarrasing trouser-drop for that to happen though.

MS sold more than 10mil xbox 360 and we have not heard them announcing to the world that they are now making money out of each console sold. PS3 just shipped <>3mil consoles. By the rate they are going, i doubt they can achieve XBox 360's 10mil figure by year end. They were #3 in australia during their launch week and could not even sell out their launch units in UK !! :p

and days go by, blu-ray is looking more and more like an expensive version of UMD. How many PSP sold? more than 10mil? Did that make UMD mainstream? There werent even a competing format :p

The story for BD so far is (with apologies to Churchill) - never has so much hardware and so much money been spent to sell so few software. Yup. BD is ahead, but the ROI sucks - and Neilson numbers pretty much sum it up every week ;)

Yep. By my count:

232,000 HD DVD players generate ~22,000 disc sales per week (Nielsen avg)
1,268,700 Blu-ray players generate ~50,000 disc sales per week (Nielsen avg)

So if Blu-ray, on the back of the PS3 can hit 3.5 million by years end, that will be 138k discs per week. If the Wal-Mart news holds true, by the end of the year, there could be 1.5 million HD DVD players, with disc sales of 142k discs per week. This assumes a similar ratio of current hardware/software sales.

So BD may possiblly take the SI even at December, but at the end of the year, HD DVD will be closing the gap (ahead in weekly sales) and rapidly growing (much like BD did this year). So I don't think 2007 will decide the format war either. So on we go to 2008...

I believe the info about the 200k came first and wasn't clear about whether it was standalones or counting the add-ons. Kosty has some insider contacts and reported that one of them told him the 200k was just for Toshiba and didn't count add-ons. Then the release came out that they had surpassed 100k standalones. I haven't seen any explanation of this discrepancy and makes me wonder about that contact.
I'm pretty sure the kjack posted that the NPD number for the end of January was 112k (after the 92k for end of December). I haven't seen any reports since then, that I recall.

--Darin

NPD has not publicly released a number after the 92k 2006 year ending number.

Kjack's 112k was just an estimate, and not an NPD number.

Everything after 92k is just a guess. Since traditionally sold 5X better in November and December, than in the slow months following, I would say the volume dropped to 8-10k a month, with a little ramp up starting to occur in March and carrying through August.

Both the Xbox 360 HD DVD drives and the Toshiba 2nd gen sales probably are going way up in April as the second qtr CE buying season starts and the new releases start flowing yada yada yada.

More discs available should substantially increase sales of the Xbox 360 drives throughout the year.

So if Blu-ray, on the back of the PS3 can hit 3.5 million by years end, that will be 138k discs per week. If the Wal-Mart news holds true, by the end of the year, there could be 1.5 million HD DVD players, with disc sales of 142k discs per week. This assumes a similar ratio of current hardware/software sales.


Hmmmm.... I find it highly unlikely that the Wal-Mart crowd would sustain the sales ratios of current HD DVD owners, which are largely AV enthusiasts.

Hmmmm.... I find it highly unlikely that the Wal-Mart crowd would sustain the sales ratios of current HD DVD owners, which are largely AV enthusiasts.

+1

Attach rate will go down when a mass market influx hits. I imagine these theoretical HD DVD players would have attach rates more akin to the PS3. Higher than the PS3 to be sure, but nowhere near the current attach rate.

wha?
Today is the day that Videoscan make their sales numbers available to subscribers for the week starting April 15th. It was available to subscribers from this morning.

Again, these are the real numbers, not the "first alert" numbers.

So, folks out there now know how the two formats compared for that week. If the BD folks don't rush out another press release stating their huge sales lead for the week, I think it's safe to say they were pretty even :)

you mean pretty even from hd dvd preorders ? :)

Today is the day that Videoscan make their sales numbers available to subscribers for the week starting April 15th. It was available to subscribers from this morning.


But we never get that. At Kosty's request, I asked HMM if that was possible, but didn't get a reply.

Probably not much better. ;)

Thats because you don't know how it was after Warner announced they were going nuetral and a majority of AVS people voted that HD DVD was "dead in the water" :)

Yep. By my count:

232,000 HD DVD players generate ~22,000 disc sales per week (Nielsen avg)
1,268,700 Blu-ray players generate ~50,000 disc sales per week (Nielsen avg)

So if Blu-ray, on the back of the PS3 can hit 3.5 million by years end, that will be 138k discs per week. If the Wal-Mart news holds true, by the end of the year, there could be 1.5 million HD DVD players, with disc sales of 142k discs per week. This assumes a similar ratio of current hardware/software sales.

So BD may possiblly take the SI even at December, but at the end of the year, HD DVD will be closing the gap (ahead in weekly sales) and rapidly growing (much like BD did this year). So I don't think 2007 will decide the format war either. So on we go to 2008...

Your assuming a Walmart consumer will buy as many titles as a HD-DVD early adopter, assuming cheaper Blu-ray standalones won't hit the market and sell better than last years expensive models, assuming PS3 owners will not increasingly buy Blu-rays rather than DVD's, in the face of huge movies like Spiderman 3, wall to wall advertising, and a general shift away from SD to HD movies/TV/gaming.

Your optimistic, I'll give you that!

Jag,

Your assuming a Walmart consumer will buy as many titles as a HD-DVD early adopter,

No, it is the same logic as applies to the PS3. More players = more disc sales, unless YOU want to assume that someone who purchases a HDM player of either sort buys 0 movies.


assuming cheaper Blu-ray standalones won't hit the market and sell better than last years expensive models,

Who is going to make them? That really is the question. What BD company is going to sell a $299 BD player? Not Sony, as it would hurt PS3 sales, which arent going all that well anyway. So you think Pioneer or Panasonic are going to make one?


assuming PS3 owners will not increasingly buy Blu-rays rather than DVD's, in the face of huge movies like Spiderman 3,

They may buy a big movie like Spidey 3 in BD, but they may not buy other catalog titles on BD, especially if there is a price premium.

Today is the day that Videoscan make their sales numbers available to subscribers for the week starting April 15th. It was available to subscribers from this morning.

That is, of course, not possible.

Nielsen report up to and including the Sunday of each week. The next set of figures we see will be for week ending Sunday April 22nd (that is April 16 - 22 inclusive).

The difference between 1st alert & final data in terms of volume sold might (or might not) be significant but in terms of % market share there will be practically no difference. This is because the 1st alert sample size is massive. The final data will be massive sample size + a little bit more.

The weekly share on 1st alert was 61% BD & 39% HD. On final data the share will remain the same.

A quick aside from the specific discussion going on here:

In terms of general high-def disc sales numbers , I put together this list:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10392288#post10392288

It breaks it down by format, title, and studio. There a few missing slots that need to be filled in: any help would be appreciated. The list is purely for informational purposes: I think it's of general interest, no matter your particular format leanings.

Blu-ray doesn't need a player to match the price of the cheapest HD-DVD player, they need to continue lowering hardware prices to keep any prce difference within reason.

It appears to have worked upto now, without any aggressive hardware pricing moves from the Blu-ray camp.

Chinese HD-DVD players aren't a secret, they've been on the agenda for many months and still haven't hit the market, let alone in significant numbers.

There will be signifcant announcement with regards to Blu-ray hardware, that's only logical, to assume HD-DVD is the only format that can make aggresive price cuts ignores past experiences with new formats.

Content is still the driving force, especially with new formats, selling to consumers who have already splashed out on expensive HDTV's.

If a PS3 owner is so inclined to buy a movie like Spiderman 3, surely they'll buy other major releases, and as they become acustomed to HD, increasingly buy catalouge titles.

Blu-ray has big blockbuster movies in abundance, they'll drive sales with PS3 owners and mass market consumers alike, who will be attracted by day and date releases, as seen with Casino Royale.

On the one hand you assume the mass market/PS3 generation will only buy big name blockbusters, which Blu-ray will provide, on the other you expect Walmart HD-DVD players to fly off the shelves, despite lacking big Disney, Fox and Sony releases, particularly recent boxoffice succeses that are still fresh in peoples minds, and no doubt heavily advertised as being BLu-ray exclusives.

Wouldn't you think twice if you were a Walmart customer?

If price AND content are equally important you'd stick with regular DVD for the time being.

Jag,

On the one hand you assume the mass market/PS3 generation will only buy big name blockbusters,

That has been the party line according to a wide variety of BD supporters. They assert that the only titles that really matter are recent blockbusters (this is why many BD supporters claim the Matrix wont sell well), and day and date releases.


on the other you expect Walmart HD-DVD players to fly off the shelves, despite lacking big Disney, Fox and Sony releases, particularly recent boxoffice succeses that are still fresh in peoples minds, and no doubt heavily advertised as being BLu-ray exclusives.

Actually if you read my posts, I make no such assumption. I have said the apparent importance is that Wal-mart made an investment in the format. Thus, Wal-mart is apparently (if the stories are true) putting its money behind HD DVD. Therefore, the potential is there for Wal-mart to demand that current BD exclusive studios start releasing on HD DVD or lose Walmart. Then there will be some interesting discussions at the studios.

Blu-ray doesn't need a player to match the price of the cheapest HD-DVD player, they need to continue lowering hardware prices to keep any prce difference within reason.

It appears to have worked upto now, without any aggressive hardware pricing moves from the Blu-ray camp.

Chinese HD-DVD players aren't a secret, they've been on the agenda for many months and still haven't hit the market, let alone in significant numbers.

There will be signifcant announcement with regards to Blu-ray hardware, that's only logical, to assume HD-DVD is the only format that can make aggresive price cuts ignores past experiences with new formats.

Content is still the driving force, especially with new formats, selling to consumers who have already splashed out on expensive HDTV's.

If a PS3 owner is so inclined to buy a movie like Spiderman 3, surely they'll buy other major releases, and as they become acustomed to HD, increasingly buy catalouge titles.

Blu-ray has big blockbuster movies in abundance, they'll drive sales with PS3 owners and mass market consumers alike, who will be attracted by day and date releases, as seen with Casino Royale.

On the one hand you assume the mass market/PS3 generation will only buy big name blockbusters, which Blu-ray will provide, on the other you expect Walmart HD-DVD players to fly off the shelves, despite lacking big Disney, Fox and Sony releases, particularly recent boxoffice succeses that are still fresh in peoples minds, and no doubt heavily advertised as being BLu-ray exclusives.

Wouldn't you think twice if you were a Walmart customer?

If price AND content are equally important you'd stick with regular DVD for the time being.


Just because you make a bunch of crazy assumptions doesn't mean others are. I have bad news BTW, the average consumer already has the Disney movies an won't be replacing them anytime soon. Like you said, price and content. Also Casino Royale hasn't done but a little over average, and it should have kicked as.

It is impossible now to tell what thread I'm reading - the same things are discussed in every thread ... :(

Jag,



That has been the party line according to a wide variety of BD supporters. They assert that the only titles that really matter are recent blockbusters (this is why many BD supporters claim the Matrix wont sell well), and day and date releases.




Actually if you read my posts, I make no such assumption. I have said the apparent importance is that Wal-mart made an investment in the format. Thus, Wal-mart is apparently (if the stories are true) putting its money behind HD DVD. Therefore, the potential is there for Wal-mart to demand that current BD exclusive studios start releasing on HD DVD or lose Walmart. Then there will be some interesting discussions at the studios.


My predictions are 'crazy' yet you already have Walmart 100% behind HD-DVD, ready to turf Blu-ray out of the door.

This despite it's sales advantage, studio/CE support, and the implications in ditching Blu-ray and p****** their large investments up the wall, WORLDWIDE, all for one retailer, no matter how important.

Just because you make a bunch of crazy assumptions doesn't mean others are. I have bad news BTW, the average consumer already has the Disney movies an won't be replacing them anytime soon. Like you said, price and content. Also Casino Royale hasn't done but a little over average, and it should have kicked as.

I guess there'll be no interest in POTC 3 this Christmas, and coutless other Disney releases.

I'll leave the HD-DVD heavyweights to talk amongst themselves, my 'crazy' assumptions that consumers are heavily influenced by the content available is obviously too much for some.

jag,

My predictions are 'crazy' yet you already have Walmart 100% behind HD-DVD,

read what I just wrote - you will see the term "apparently" and the phrase "if the stories are true". I dont have them 100% behind Walmart.



ready to turf Blu-ray out of the door, despite it's sales advantage,

The sales advantage is not that great. Grubert posted a link that said that total HDM sales this quarter amounted to $30 million dollars. In the grand scheme of things, that is chump change.


studio

Studio support is fluid. Look at DIVX, and like I said, Wal-mart has 40% of the DVD market, and if they told the studios go neutral or else, I think there would be some interesting disucssions in the studio board rooms.


/CE support,

That seems to be eroding a bit lately, what with LG releasing a 2nd generation universal player and Samsung releasing one this summer.


and the implications for these studios and maufactuers in ditching Blu-ray p****** their investments up the wall, WORLDWIDE, all for one retailer, no matter how important.

I dont see how the studios or CE companies would lose anything. They could continue to make BD discs and players. No one would stop them.

Blu-ray doesn't need a player to match the price of the cheapest HD-DVD player, they need to continue lowering hardware prices to keep any prce difference within reason.

It appears to have worked upto now, without any aggressive hardware pricing moves from the Blu-ray camp.

Chinese HD-DVD players aren't a secret, they've been on the agenda for many months and still haven't hit the market, let alone in significant numbers.

There will be signifcant announcement with regards to Blu-ray hardware, that's only logical, to assume HD-DVD is the only format that can make aggresive price cuts ignores past experiences with new formats.

Content is still the driving force, especially with new formats, selling to consumers who have already splashed out on expensive HDTV's.

If a PS3 owner is so inclined to buy a movie like Spiderman 3, surely they'll buy other major releases, and as they become acustomed to HD, increasingly buy catalouge titles.

Blu-ray has big blockbuster movies in abundance, they'll drive sales with PS3 owners and mass market consumers alike, who will be attracted by day and date releases, as seen with Casino Royale.

On the one hand you assume the mass market/PS3 generation will only buy big name blockbusters, which Blu-ray will provide, on the other you expect Walmart HD-DVD players to fly off the shelves, despite lacking big Disney, Fox and Sony releases, particularly recent boxoffice succeses that are still fresh in peoples minds, and no doubt heavily advertised as being BLu-ray exclusives.

Wouldn't you think twice if you were a Walmart customer?

If price AND content are equally important you'd stick with regular DVD for the time being.

Your assuming that you won't be able to buy those Fox and Disney movies on HD DVD buy the time Wal-Mart puts their players in the store.

My predictions are 'crazy' yet you already have Walmart 100% behind HD-DVD, ready to turf Blu-ray out of the door.

This despite it's sales advantage, studio/CE support, and the implications in ditching Blu-ray and p****** their large investments up the wall, WORLDWIDE, all for one retailer, no matter how important.

Jag, I know the spector of Walmart hanging over BR like a dark cloud over a picnic is hard to swallow. But at least you have plenty of time to get use to it. ;)

Your assuming that you won't be able to buy those Fox and Disney movies on HD DVD buy the time Wal-Mart puts their players in the store.

He's also assuming that there's going to be a significant amount of Fox/Disney on BD. So far, with a few notable exceptions like Pirates, that certainly doesn't seem to be the case.

He's also assuming that there's going to be a significant amount of Fox/Disney on BD. So far, with a few notable exceptions like Pirates, that certainly doesn't seem to be the case.

To be fair, if X-men (Fox) and the Prestige (Disney) were HD DVD titles and sold the same numbers they did as Blu-ray titles, they would be the fourth and fifth best-selling HD DVD titles of all time. So Fox and Disney aren't exactly insignificant in terms of popularity... more popular than Universal, apparently.

^

I'm not saying that they're unpopular studios. Just that they haven't exactly opened up their vaults onto BD. And cancellations haven't been unusual.

Tell the average person that Disney is on BD and they get excited. Then show them the titles that are available... and you'll get a different/confused reaction.


It's one thing to say that Fox and Disney is on one format and not the other. But when you actually list the titles currently available, the reaction is more of a "big deal" type of thing. Maybe things like Alien, Die Hard, Pixar, etc. will be out by the holidays to make this more appealing. But we're not there yet.

It is impossible now to tell what thread I'm reading - the same things are discussed in every thread ... :(

Unavoidable, I suspect, given finite news and infinite posts. Still, it would be great if we could somehow limit this thread to the topics. Perhaps the mods could help?

^

I'm not saying that they're unpopular studios. Just that they haven't exactly opened up their vaults onto BD. And cancellations haven't been unusual.

Tell the average person that Disney is on BD and they get excited. Then show them the titles that are available... and you'll get a different/confused reaction.


It's one thing to say that Fox and Disney is on one format and not the other. But when you actually list the titles currently available, the reaction is more of a "big deal" type of thing. Maybe things like Alien, Die Hard, Pixar, etc. will be out by the holidays to make this more appealing. But we're not there yet.

I agree that their support hasn't been as strong as the other studios (save for paramount...), but this seems to be a temporary thing. POTC and Cars are pretty much the biggest guns Disney has in terms of recent releases, and all three of them will hit within 6 weeks. Sure, Disney hasn't opened their animation vault up fully, but if Universal's tepid sales have shown anything, it's that catalog titles will only sell to a small fraction of the installed base. I'd argue that Universal is being just as timid as Disney in that they both refuse to release their catalog crown jewels at this time. Universal has been better with "average" catalog releases, but they are sorely lacking in the hits dept. Even a relatively minor Disney release (Prestige) managed to outsell all Universal releases. Universal definitely has quantity going for them, but none of their releases manage to get anybody all that excited.

As for Fox, who knows what that hiccup was all about. They did make sure to get Night at the Museum out, which was probably much more important than most of the delayed titles (from a sales standpoint).

To be fair, if X-men (Fox) and the Prestige (Disney) were HD DVD titles and sold the same numbers they did as Blu-ray titles, they would be the fourth and fifth best-selling HD DVD titles of all time. So Fox and Disney aren't exactly insignificant in terms of popularity... more popular than Universal, apparently.

And how many BR players did it take to make that happen? You know install base numbers if you will?

And how many BR players did it take to make that happen? You know install base numbers if you will?

I don't know, but it doesn't matter. Why are player sales needed to discuss disc sales? To answer your question, I suppose we'd have to know how many PS3 owners have actually purchased a Blu-ray disc (to thus count the PS3 as a Blu-ray player... people don't by HD DVD players and then not buy at least one disc). I don't think anybody knows this number. Whatever the breakdown, total disc sales are total disc sales.

Attach rate is meaningless.

I'd argue that Universal is being just as timid as Disney in that they both refuse to release their catalog crown jewels at this time.

Other than the Spielberg stuff (which likely has its own set of issues), what is Universal being timid about?

http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2518265320070426

On the high-def front, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales, while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week. Observers attributed the lift to the strength of "Aces," the week's top HD DVD seller, which was not available on Blu-ray. The film's distributor, Universal Pictures, is the leading supporter of the No. 2 format. The top-selling Blu-ray title for the week was "Casino Royale."

looks like sales are starting to even out, though the strength of Casino Royale seems to have given Blu-ray a longing surge that's probably gonna take a while to overcome...

http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2518265320070426

On the high-def front, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales, while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week.

looks like sales are starting to even out, though the strength of Casino Royale seems to have given Blu-ray a longing surge that's probably gonna take a while to overcome...

Is he talking about YTD or Weekly ratio ? Because last week the ratios were

YTD : 69/31
Weekly : 61:39.

If it is YTD, that would be an improbably huge jump. If it is weekly, it would be a 1 % change, not 9 :confused:

Other than the Spielberg stuff (which likely has its own set of issues), what is Universal being timid about?

Well, I was specifically referring to the Spielberg stuff. However, you are right in that this probably has more to do with Speilberg than it does Universal. My point was that having Universal without Speilberg movies is somewhat akin to having Disney without classic 2D animated movies: a somewhat hollow victory. However, Disney does have the Pixar stuff *actually coming out*, which is arguably even more important than the 2D animated stuff at this point, while Universal doesn't seem to have Speilberg 2.0 let alone actual Speilberg movies set for release anytime soon.

I don't know, but it doesn't matter. Why are player sales needed to discuss disc sales? To answer your question, I suppose we'd have to know how many PS3 owners have actually purchased a Blu-ray disc (to thus count the PS3 as a Blu-ray player... people don't by HD DVD players and then not buy at least one disc). I don't think anybody knows this number. Whatever the breakdown, total disc sales are total disc sales.

Attach rate is meaningless.

Sure attach rate is meaningless to you because it exposes the purchases as a relative mirage given the high install base. And HD DVD supporters haven't even touched on how BR was all but giving away BD thru the Amazon 50% off deal, I'm sure that's meaningless also as it has no bearing on disc sold in your mind.

Sure attach rate is meaningless to you because it exposes the purchases as a relative mirage given the high install base. And HD DVD supporters haven't even touched on how BR was all but giving away BD thru the Amazon 50% off deal, I'm sure that's meaningless also as it has no bearing on disc sold in your mind.

Take your pick Reginald, either every PS3 counts as a Blu-ray player, in which case Blu-ray attach rate is low but Blu-ray is absolutely destroying HD DVD in terms of players sold

OR

PS3 doesn't count as a Blu-ray player at all, in which case Blu-ray's attach rate is destroying HD DVD's, but HD DVD has higher player sales.

You keep trying to have your cake and eat it too... Blu-ray is dominating in either player sales or attach rate. Obviously, the answer is that the PS3 counts as some fraction of a standalone and attach rates and player sales aren't all that different.

As for total disc sales vs. attach rate:

Does a studios profits increase if attach rate goes up? No. How about when disc sales go up? Yes. Therefore, total disc sales are all that matter. Attach rates merely tell you demographic information at this point in the game.

Take your pick Reginald, either every PS3 counts as a Blu-ray player, in which case Blu-ray attach rate is low but Blu-ray is absolutely destroying HD DVD in terms of players sold

OR

PS3 doesn't count as a Blu-ray player at all, in which case Blu-ray's attach rate is destroying HD DVD's, but HD DVD has higher player sales.

You keep trying to have your cake and eat it too... Blu-ray is dominating in either player sales or attach rate. Obviously, the answer is that the PS3 counts as some fraction of a standalone and attach rates and player sales aren't all that different.

As for total disc sales vs. attach rate:

Does a studios profits increase if attach rate goes up? No. How about when disc sales go up? Yes. Therefore, total disc sales are all that matter. Attach rates merely tell you demographic information at this point in the game.


Seems to me that anyone with ab ounce of brains would prefer the format with the smaller amount of players but with almost the same amount of disc bought. The only thing left to do is get more of the players (HD DVD) into the hands of customers.

Anyone know or care to guesstimate how many HD DVD disc would be sold if HD DVD had the same number of players as BR?

However, Disney does have the Pixar stuff *actually coming out*, which is arguably even more important than the 2D animated stuff at this point

We'll see... that June 5 date is coming up pretty quick and no one seems to have Cars as a preorder. I have a feeling this one will be pushed back.

But your point about lack of Spielberg vs. lack of Disney animation is definitely valid. Getting a little Jurrasic Park on HD and a little Lion King on BD would true-up the studio alliances a bit closer to what people would actually expect.

Seems to me that anyone with ab ounce of brains would prefer the format with the smaller amount of players but with almost the same amount of disc bought. The only thing left to do is get more of the players (HD DVD) into the hands of customers.

But to sell more players, you need to sell more to the average consumer. When you sell to the average consumer, your attach rate goes down. You can't assume HD DVDs attach rate magically stays as high as it is when they start selling $300 players to the Wal-Mart crowd.

This is why all that matters is that your combination of attach rate and player sales result in higher total disc sales. Whether you do that by selling 10000 discs to each of your very few owners or by selling 1 disc to millions of owners does not matter.

Anyone know or care to guesstimate how many HD DVD disc would be sold if HD DVD had the same number of players as BR?

If the primary player sold was a videogame console, like BR? I'd say slightly less or about the same. Standalone attach rates will not be the same as Videogame attach rates which will not be the same as discount Wal-Mart player attach rates. Stop assuming a static attach rate when you create these hypothetical scenarios.

We'll see... that June 5 date is coming up pretty quick and no one seems to have Cars as a preorder. I have a feeling this one will be pushed back.

But your point about lack of Spielberg vs. lack of Disney animation is definitely valid. Getting a little Jurrasic Park on HD and a little Lion King on BD would true-up the studio alliances a bit closer to what people would actually expect.

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised to see Cars pushed back, if for no other reason than Disney seems to be releasing an onslaught of big-name titles within a 3 week span (Both Pirates movies, a bunch of relatively big name action stuff like Con-Air, The Rock, and Crimson Tide, Apocalypto, as well as Cars) and something just has to give. But so far there's no indication either way.

Regarding studio support: I totally agree.

I haven't been keeping up with this thread...

What is everyone's take on IGN's news that HD DVD only lags BD disc sales by 2000 discs and that hardware sales are 4:1?

I haven't been keeping up with this thread...

What is everyone's take on IGN's news that HD DVD only lags BD disc sales by 2000 discs and that hardware sales are 4:1?

Well, the claim comes from a HD DVD PR firm, and they don't state how they got their numbers.

Sony's "million sold" claim comes from Home Media research. I don't know how impartial they are.

So my take on those numbers is skeptical as of now. Given that most derived estimates put Blu-ray ahead by 250,000, I just don't see how the gap got narrowed to 2000 all the while Blu-ray has been leading in all sales reports every week. HD DVD would have had to outsell Blu-ray for multiple weeks to close the gap like that. It just doesn't add up.

ok i know 4 people who bought a PS3 but do NOT own a HDTV, now why in the world would they buy a PS3 if they do not have a HDTV?

well i figure they want the newest games?

they just bought it because they are a playstation fanatic?

they will get a HDTV at some point, but can afford the PS3 now so why not?

now why would any of them buy a Blue-ray movie? so they can sit on a shelf till they get a HDTV? or are they just putting off buying the dvd and just renting till they take the HD plunge?

One of them is a real PS fanatic and waited on line, but he has no HDTV ! weird :confused:

The second is waiting till a certain brand of 46 lcd comes out before he jumps on board.

The third did not even know he had to have a HDTV :eek: he just thought the games were supposed to look better.

The last was a 15 year old on my block got one for Xmas and is playing it on his old 27 inch tv in his room. His parents have no clue and far to much money !!!

Well, the claim comes from a HD DVD PR firm, and they don't state how they got their numbers.

Sony's "million sold" claim comes from Home Media research. I don't know how impartial they are.

So my take on those numbers is skeptical as of now. Given that most derived estimates put Blu-ray ahead by 250,000, I just don't see how the gap got narrowed to 2000 all the while Blu-ray has been leading in all sales reports every week. HD DVD would have had to outsell Blu-ray for multiple weeks to close the gap like that. It just doesn't add up.


I wonder if this is a possibility...

The article didn't specify US sales did it? What if BD has sold very few copies outside of the US (100-200k), and a million in the US. While HD DVD has sold fewer in the US and more outside the US. But when comparing the global number, both formats are about equal.

Of course, I have no idea how they would arrive at global sales, unless the had global sales data for both formats (maybe they do, I don't know).

http://gear.ign.com/articles/783/783545p1.html

IGN article with HD DVD provided stats, maybe from the April 15th final numbers?

HD-DVD Movie Sales Only 2k Behind Blu-ray
Most recent sales data shows formats almost neck and neck.


April 25, 2007 - The recent pres-release-bickering between the HD-DVD and Blu-ray camps isn't terribly new, though most previous spats have gone down in the midst of large trade shows. The most recent squabbling began when HD-DVD celebrated the format's birthday by announcing that 100,000 dedicated players had been sold, preserving the format's hardware lead, not counting the PlayStation 3 (story). Blu-ray fired back, announcing that Blu-ray movie sales had reached the 1,000,000-sold milestone, and added a little salt to the wound with the data that 70-percent of Q1 HD-movie sales were thanks to Blu-ray (story).

Today, HD-DVD's representatives from Webersh & Wick public relations wrote to IGN Gear directly with updated HD-DVD news.

According to their figures, HD-DVD movie sales lag only 2,000 units behind Blu-ray with 998,059 units sold.

The firm points out that pre-orders of Planet Earth and The Matrix Trilogy will propel HD-DVD over the million-mark quite shortly. Representatives also stated that hardware sales have continued with strength in April, maintaining a 4 to 1 margin over Blu-ray. ..... Things that make you go hmmm...


I didn't see this posted in this thread before...

Things that make you go hmmm...
I didn't see this posted in this thread before...

Uh, maybe because it's not Nielsen sales data? :rolleyes:

That 4:1 ratio of Hd-DVD (what i take to be xbox add-on+standalone) versus standalone blu-ray (i'd wager adding the pS3 would crimp this ratio pretty hard) is interesting though....not sure where they got that....in the end, it's a marketing blurb because what's basically happening is that the PS3 is pulling away sales of standalone blu-ray players.

That is, of course, not possible.

Nielsen report up to and including the Sunday of each week. The next set of figures we see will be for week ending Sunday April 22nd (that is April 16 - 22 inclusive).

The difference between 1st alert & final data in terms of volume sold might (or might not) be significant but in terms of % market share there will be practically no difference. This is because the 1st alert sample size is massive. The final data will be massive sample size + a little bit more.

The weekly share on 1st alert was 61% BD & 39% HD. On final data the share will remain the same. None of these sales figures are massive at this stage. It terms of a mass marketed consumer product the volumes are still tiny in the captured statistics. Any quirk is magnified.

There is a possibility of more than a few points of shift from first alert to final numbers. Also first alert digital numbers are larger retailers, at this stage its possible that the sample survey retailers may have a different trend. Also if any first alert vendors miss their submission, they roll up into the final numbers.

To assume without merit smacks of bias.

I haven't been keeping up with this thread...

What is everyone's take on IGN's news that HD DVD only lags BD disc sales by 2000 discs and that hardware sales are 4:1?I got the HD press report type email earlier today and I don't read it as they are really within 2k, but that they are within 2k of what the Blu-ray group reported.

Here is the relevant part of the email:
But in the wake of Blu-ray’s Monday announcement of hitting 1 million units sold, we had to point out some of our own interesting observations from the latest Nielsen stats and from point-of-sales data compiled by Universal, Warner and Toshiba.

First is that HD DVD titles are now at 998,059 units sold – a mere 2,000 units shy of Blu-ray’s announcement from Monday.As people can see, they used point-of-sales data from 3 companies besides the Nielsen stats for the HD DVD number, and just the announcement for the Blu-ray number. They don't even claim that they are within 2k of the real numbers, just 2k of the announcement. Somebody else may go make assumptions and come up with 2k, but I don't think that makes sense in this case. Especially when Nielsen numbers say that SI was 56.4/43.6 through April 8th. Going out and adding sales for one side from other sources while not adding them for the other side would of course result in misleading values. I don't blame the email as it spells out what they did, but others can jump to false conclusions from that.

--Darin

NPD has not publicly released a number after the 92k 2006 year ending number.

Kjack's 112k was just an estimate, and not an NPD number.Why do you claim that? Kjack is an insider, and one who doesn't seem to go around deceiving people, from what I've observed.

--Darin

http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2518265320070426

On the high-def front, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales, while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week.

Observers attributed the lift to the strength of "Aces," the week's top HD DVD seller, which was not available on Blu-ray. The film's distributor, Universal Pictures, is the leading supporter of the No. 2 format. The top-selling Blu-ray title for the week was "Casino Royale." Does this imply the final N/V numbers were 60/40 compared to the first alert numbers of 61/39 for the week ending April 15th?

thats a 2% swing (+1 -1)

Or is it talking about April 22 numbers or April 8th numbers?

That article implies recent final weekly numbers were

69% 31% one week
60% 40% the next week

Is there any recent weeks this matches in the Nielson/Videoscan stats?

Seems to me that anyone with ab ounce of brains would prefer the format with the smaller amount of players but with almost the same amount of disc bought. The only thing left to do is get more of the players (HD DVD) into the hands of customers.Can you please tell us why you think RCA dropped the CED format (it lost to VHS) when it reportedly was selling more discs per player than they expected? Those with an ounce of brains look at how long players have been in the market (it doesn't seem real smart to count HD DVD sales that happened before the PS3 even went up for sale as evidence against the PS3 as a player) and many other factors. The current rate of sales is much more likely to sway a studio now than what sales were last summer. The smart ones will of course look at what players are likely to sell, etc., but don't make the mistake of thinking that the format with the higher attach rate must be doing better.

I thought people here knew a year ago that HD DVD was likely to have the higher attach rate just because of the different approaches and now it seems like this is news to people. HD DVD better have a better attach rate than the PS3, or they are doing something wrong. Although a high attach rate that is the result of mostly only appealing to a core of enthusiasts is bad news generally, not good news.

Are you one of the people who is glad that Microsoft didn't decide to include an HD DVD in all XBOX360s recently, since that would have likely hurt the attach rate?

--Darin

As people can see, they used point-of-sales data from 3 companies besides the Nielsen stats for the HD DVD number, and just the announcement for the Blu-ray number. They don't even claim that they are within 2k of the real numbers, just 2k of the announcement. Somebody else may go make assumptions and come up with 2k, but I don't think that makes sense in this case. Especially when Nielsen numbers say that SI was 56.4/43.6 through April 8th. Going out and adding sales for one side from other sources while not adding them for the other side would of course result in misleading values. I don't blame the email as it spells out what they did, but others can jump to false conclusions from that. This makes sense. Until HD DVD leads in sales one week, I think Blu-ray will maintain its SI lead.

I thought people here knew a year ago that HD DVD was likely to have the higher attach rate just because of the different approaches and now it seems like this is news to people. HD DVD better have a better attach rate than the PS3, or they are doing something wrong. Although a high attach rate that is the result of mostly only appealing to a core of enthusiasts is bad news generally, not good news.


Do any BD stalwarts really believe Sony represented sales projections at anything remotely close to the current, relatively modest SI disparity when they pitched their strategy to the studios? C'mon.:rolleyes:

http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2518265320070426

Does this imply the final N/V numbers were 60/40 compared to the first alert numbers of 61/39 for the week ending April 15th?

thats a 2% swing (+1 -1)

Or is it talking about April 22 numbers or April 8th numbers?

That article implies recent final weekly numbers were

69% 31% one week
60% 40% the next week

Is there any recent weeks this matches in the Nielson/Videoscan stats?
Yeehaw!

Very close to even for that week, as I predicted.

Next week is likely to be about 64/36 - and over the next few weeks HD DVD will draw closer still.

This is definitely not the scenario that the Bluray entities were counting on... ;)

Yeehaw!

Very close to even for that week, as I predicted.You consider 1.5:1 to be "very close to even?".
Next week is likely to be about 64/36 - and over the next few weeks HD DVD will draw closer still.Is this prediction for the week, for YTD, or SI? 64/36 for the week would be 1.78:1, which would be an improvement for Blu-ray over last week. I predict the week ending April 22nd will be the best week so far this year for HD DVD at about 1.3:1 to 1.4:1 give or take a little (with Blu-ray ahead). That would be an improvement for HD DVD from the previous week and then I expect Blu-ray to do better for the week ending the 29th than the week ending the 22nd.

--Darin

None of these sales figures are massive at this stage. It terms of a mass marketed consumer product the volumes are still tiny in the captured statistics. Any quirk is magnified.

There is a possibility of more than a few points of shift from first alert to final numbers. Also first alert digital numbers are larger retailers, at this stage its possible that the sample survey retailers may have a different trend. Also if any first alert vendors miss their submission, they roll up into the final numbers.

To assume without merit smacks of bias.

You mistook my my meaning. The sample size in terms of retailers reporting is massive (60-70% of the market). Volumes are not masssive, that is true. But I did not say they were.

The point of a massive number of retailers reporting HD disc sales is that the market shares will not budge if a few more report a few days later.

If a political pollster gets a sample of 2,000 people he knows there won't be much, if any, change in the outcome if he asks another 1,000. And thats with a tiny sample compared to the voting population.

See what I meant now? :rolleyes:

Something usefull may still come out of that...

998,059 units sold. According to Home Media research, they had sold 937,500 by 3/31. Which gives us an average of 30K/wk during the first half of April.

Oh and 250,000 Toshiba players sold globally as of end of March.

I'd be willing to wager that the proportion of discs sold through for both formats that are not represented by Nielsen is roughly equal.

If HD DVD total actual (not Nielsen) SI really is creeping up within inches of 1 M, then the ratios (assuming Blu-ray has a similar proportion of unrepresented sales) would put Blu-ray somewhere in the vicinity of 1.3 M discs sold through.

I'd be willing to wager that the proportion of discs sold through for both formats that are not represented by Nielsen is roughly equal.

If HD DVD total actual (not Nielsen) SI really is creeping up within inches of 1 M, then the ratios (assuming Blu-ray has a similar proportion of unrepresented sales) would put Blu-ray somewhere in the vicinity of 1.3 M discs sold through.

Statistically this makes no sense. you would lose the wager.

Let's stick to the ratios that Nielsen report. They presently report YTD of 69:31 for Blu-ray.

When you add in the missing part of the market not covered by Nielsen the ratio will be practically the same.

Let's not put too much weight on a HD DVD PR piece that gives no clue as to the source of the data and even implies its numbers are including pre-order data.

http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2518265320070426

Does this imply the final N/V numbers were 60/40 compared to the first alert numbers of 61/39 for the week ending April 15th?

thats a 2% swing (+1 -1)

Or is it talking about April 22 numbers or April 8th numbers?

That article implies recent final weekly numbers were

69% 31% one week
60% 40% the next week

Is there any recent weeks this matches in the Nielson/Videoscan stats?

I wouldn't put too much faith in one reporter getting it wrong. So he rounded 61:39 to 60:40. Big deal.

There have been no new numbers reported. There has been no 'swing'. There will be new numbers posted on Friday which won't be too spectacular given the release slate for both formats.

BD will continue to benefit from CR sales and the other big March releases. HD DVD have ongoing sales from CoM (although not at Amazon), Good Shepherd and their big release of 17th April - 'Smokin Aces'.

I don't expect to see a huge change in ratios. So we're likely to see SI move to 58:42; YTD at around 70:30 and Weeky around 60:40 again. The following week should be a big win for Blu-ray again with Night At The Museum, The Queen and Deja Vu all having their HD launches. I expect to see 75:25 for BD in that week - I thinkk BD will also win the battle of 'Planet Earth' by a comfortable margin.

Statistically this makes no sense. you would lose the wager.

Let's stick to the ratios that Nielsen report. They presently report YTD of 69:31 for Blu-ray.

When you add in the missing part of the market not covered by Nielsen the ratio will be practically the same.

Let's not put too much weight on a HD DVD PR piece that gives no clue as to the source of the data and even implies its numbers are including pre-order data.
Why would we use YTD in this case, though? The number posted from HD DVD PRG was SI (or at least I assume it was... if that number was YTD then Nielsen is missing a lot more of the market than we think).

I'm looking at the posted Nielsen data for 4/15 for Since Inception which indicates 57:43 in favor of Blu-ray (roughly 1.3 to 1). That's where I got my 1.3M Blu-ray projection from.

I got the HD press report type email earlier today and I don't read it as they are really within 2k, but that they are within 2k of what the Blu-ray group reported.

Here is the relevant part of the email:
As people can see, they used point-of-sales data from 3 companies besides the Nielsen stats for the HD DVD number, and just the announcement for the Blu-ray number. They don't even claim that they are within 2k of the real numbers, just 2k of the announcement. Somebody else may go make assumptions and come up with 2k, but I don't think that makes sense in this case. Especially when Nielsen numbers say that SI was 56.4/43.6 through April 8th. Going out and adding sales for one side from other sources while not adding them for the other side would of course result in misleading values. I don't blame the email as it spells out what they did, but others can jump to false conclusions from that.

--Darin

It just says the POS data was compiled by the three companies. It does not say the three companies collected the data. I don't think Toshiba, Universal, or any other studio/CE runs their own point of sale data collection system, unless it is just within their own company store.

At work, computers collect and generate the data. I compile it. Sony's report they issued was compiling the data. Nielsen data that Sony compiled. So I guess I don't read this the same way you do.

How many places are taking Matrix pre-orders. Also, how can one count pre orders as sales? These guys need to know how to write a press release without making a fool of themselves. If the 998K is got by counting pre-sales, then this is one of the most idiotic PR attempts I have seen. Ever. JMHO.

It is easy to verify that while BB will carry plenty of titles of new BD releases, they DO NOT carry most HD DVD releases until weeks after they are released. Often never. So forcing people to buy from online sources that may not be covered by Neilson. So, we cannot assume that non Neilson sources are equally represented.

Even my local CC does not carry Uni releases on HD DVD, except for Miami Vice. They said others were sold out and not re ordered!

On Tuesday I hit 3 BB and 2 CC looking for Nutty Professor - since I have many stores within a mile of where I work and live. When I am in town, I pretty much have the whole day off :)

How many places are taking Matrix pre-orders. Also, how can one count pre orders as sales? These guys need to know how to write a press release without making a fool of themselves. If the 998K is got by counting pre-sales, then this is one of the most idiotic PR attempts I have seen. Ever. JMHO.

Actually

"The firm points out that pre-orders of Planet Earth and The Matrix Trilogy will propel HD-DVD over the million-mark quite shortly. Representatives also stated that hardware sales have continued with strength in April, maintaining a 4 to 1 margin over Blu-ray. ..... "

They point that they have sold under a million, but when the preorders got delivered they will pass a million.

I cant read it in any other way.

http://gear.ign.com/articles/783/783545p1.html

IGN article with HD DVD provided stats, maybe from the April 15th final numbers?

Oh come on, Kosty, you know as well as I do that a million divided by a million plus two thousand is nowhere near 57:43. :D

As famously said by an early-20th-century matador, "What can't be, can't be; and also, it is impossible." ;)


Things that make you go hmmm...


What makes me go hmmm (well, actually it makes me go grrr) is the terrible misattribution in the article:

- HD-DVD announcing that 100,000 dedicated players had been sold. TRUE
- Blu-ray announcing that Blu-ray movie sales had reached the 1,000,000-sold milestone. TRUE

- Blu-ray releasing data that 70-percent of Q1 HD-movie sales were thanks to Blu-ray. FALSE - It was Home Media Magazine who did that, on an article summing up the first quarter of 2007 (as IGN itself reported here (http://gear.ign.com/articles/783/783113p1.html)).

How many places are taking Matrix pre-orders. Also, how can one count pre orders as sales? These guys need to know how to write a press release without making a fool of themselves. If the 998K is got by counting pre-sales, then this is one of the most idiotic PR attempts I have seen. Ever. JMHO.

They didn't say they counted pre-orders as sales. They said that they have strong pre-orders on Matrix and Planet Eart, and that these titles will propel them well over the million mark.

Oh come on, Kosty, you know as well as I do that a million divided by a million plus two thousand is nowhere near 57:43. :D

As famously said by an early-20th-century matador, "What can't be, can't be; and also, it is impossible." ;)




What makes me go hmmm (well, actually it makes me go grrr) is the terrible misattribution in the article:

- HD-DVD announcing that 100,000 dedicated players had been sold. TRUE
- Blu-ray announcing that Blu-ray movie sales had reached the 1,000,000-sold milestone. TRUE

- Blu-ray releasing data that 70-percent of Q1 HD-movie sales were thanks to Blu-ray. FALSE - It was Home Media Magazine who did that, on an article summing up the first quarter of 2007 (as IGN itself reported here (http://gear.ign.com/articles/783/783113p1.html)).

Actually Grubert, the BDA also quoted the 70% of Q1 sales figure in their 1,000,000 disc press release. They did attribute the statistic to HMM, but they also released it in their press release. So the BDA did report it.

It would be nice if you corrected your post. Posts like yours also make me go Grrr...

Basically the BDA is a mouth piece that will report any positive news about BD. And once they regurgitate what someone else says, it implies they are signing off on the validity of the number, and making it their own.

The HD DVD group was not "Faslely" reporting that the BDA provided this statistic. They did (and still do), but the statistic was provided to them by HMM.

It is easy to verify that while BB will carry plenty of titles of new BD releases, they DO NOT carry most HD DVD releases until weeks after they are released. Often never. So forcing people to buy from online sources that may not be covered by Neilson. So, we cannot assume that non Neilson sources are equally represented.

Even my local CC does not carry Uni releases on HD DVD, except for Miami Vice. They said others were sold out and not re ordered!

On Tuesday I hit 3 BB and 2 CC looking for Nutty Professor - since I have many stores within a mile of where I work and live. When I am in town, I pretty much have the whole day off :)

BB, CC and even Walmart have been in BR's pocket since day 1 this year. It's quasi-impossible to find any new HD DVD releases in any of them for weeks and for some titles, never. How can we consider the Nielsen data representative of true sales numbers when most HD DVD titles must be purchased online ? Even if Amazon represents let's say 33% of these online sales, how can we, as simple observers with no real numbers, come up with any kind of representative numbers ?

Actually Grubert, the BDA also quoted the 70% of Q1 sales figure in their 1,000,000 disc press release. They did attribute the statistic to HMM, but they also released it in their press release. So the BDA did report it.

It would be nice if you corrected your post. Posts like yours also make me go Grrr...

Let me recap. Here's what IGN says:

Blu-ray [...] added a little salt to the wound with the data that 70-percent of Q1 HD-movie sales were thanks to Blu-ray.

So they are saying that Sony came up with the data. Which is false. HMR came up with the Q1 data on April 22 (http://www.homemediamagazine.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10559) and Sony relayed it on April 23 (http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/index.jsp?epi-content=NEWS_VIEW_POPUP_TYPE&newsId=20070423005486&ndmHsc=v2*A1174734000000*B1177365452000*DgroupByDate*J2*L1*N 1000837*Zblu-ray&newsLang=en&beanID=202776713&viewID=news_view_popup).

So my point stands. What they say is false. (And what I say is correct and true.)

The HD DVD group was not "Faslely" reporting that the BDA provided this statistic. They did (and still do), but the statistic was provided to them by HMM.

You misread. I wasn't criticizing the HD DVD PRG (not this time anyway). I criticized the IGN article.

You mistook my my meaning. The sample size in terms of retailers reporting is massive (60-70% of the market). Volumes are not masssive, that is true. But I did not say they were.

The point of a massive number of retailers reporting HD disc sales is that the market shares will not budge if a few more report a few days later.

If a political pollster gets a sample of 2,000 people he knows there won't be much, if any, change in the outcome if he asks another 1,000. And thats with a tiny sample compared to the voting population.

See what I meant now? :rolleyes: This is different as it is not a random sample. It is very stratified and the various retailers large and small do not count the same.

Political polling or normal statistical numbers do not apply for a non-random sample.

Let me recap. Here's what IGN says:



So they are saying that Sony came up with the data. Which is false. HMR came up with the Q1 data on April 22 (http://www.homemediamagazine.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10559) and Sony relayed it on April 23 (http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/index.jsp?epi-content=NEWS_VIEW_POPUP_TYPE&newsId=20070423005486&ndmHsc=v2*A1174734000000*B1177365452000*DgroupByDate*J2*L1*N 1000837*Zblu-ray&newsLang=en&beanID=202776713&viewID=news_view_popup).

So my point stands. What they say is false. (And what I say is correct and true.)



You misread. I wasn't criticizing the HD DVD PRG (not this time anyway). I criticized the IGN article.

Well, I did think you were talking about the HD DVD PRG. However, I don't think IGN is saying anything false either. All they said was that the BDA said that BD had 70% of the market in Q1. This is true, the BDA did say that. They said it based off HMM research, but they did say it.

I would think it would be odd if every news piece had to follow the data trail back to where all statistics originated. George Bush said the Army needs $4 Billion more dollars. George got this number from his Chief of Staff, who got the number from a 4 star general at the Pentagon, who got the number from a Pentagon research team, who arrived at the number by calculating how many more soldiers and equipment were need in the next three months, and these used dollar amounts provided by the acocunting department.

News items would be tremendously longer and no one would read them. The BDA did say 1,000,000 discs sold and a 70% Q1 market share. Likely the 1,000,000 came from Nielsen. The data used to calculate the 70% market share also likely came from Nielsen. The BDA probably already arrived at the 70% number on their own (it isn't rocket science) and HMM may have reported it one day earlier. The BDA even acknowledged that they did so. However, the BDA did say 70%, so I don't agree with your claim the IGN mislead anyone either.

Why would we use YTD in this case, though? The number posted from HD DVD PRG was SI (or at least I assume it was... if that number was YTD then Nielsen is missing a lot more of the market than we think).

I'm looking at the posted Nielsen data for 4/15 for Since Inception which indicates 57:43 in favor of Blu-ray (roughly 1.3 to 1). That's where I got my 1.3M Blu-ray projection from.

Ah, OK, My apologies. I misunderstood you. I thought you were saying the missing bit of the market would split 50:50 for the 2 formats.

Of course, it shouldn't matter whether we use SI, YTD or weekly. The missing part of the market should conform to the ratios used by Nielsen over whatever period is selected - in my view anyway. I see that Kosty has a different view - ie: that the unreported market actually has a HD DVD bias. Possible, but unlikely. It's just as improbable that the unreported movie sales have a BD bias and Nielsen are being kind to HD DVD!

This is different as it is not a random sample. It is very stratified and the various retailers large and small do not count the same.

Political polling or normal statistical numbers do not apply for a non-random sample.

The Nielsen videoscan numbers in this case is no longer a statistical exercise with random sampling. If I understand their methodology, they have retailers responsible for 40% DVD sales participating, and their data is collected at the register as the sales are rung up. Barring any mechanical errors or failure to submit data, their sales numbers for participating retailers are complete. And this percentage of the retailer population that participates is high.

IE: unlike statistical sampling which deals with a small percentage of the population, what they have is complete for the participating group. This size is beyond any normal statistical sampling considerations, so it is not correct to consider this the same as other nielsen ratings for TV shows (which is really about tiny statistics sampling sizes with a low percentage of the population participating, and yet is trusted by practically anyone. Nielsen ratings to TV shows are used to decide which shows live or die and rates for commercials even when they are much less complete.

As has been pointed out various times by many individuals here, amazon participates in nielsen, which should make tomorrow's HMM release interesting as the April 15th group buy will be part of that. We should see how much the nielsen numbers can be skewed by the impressive amazon showing of the red crusaders.

--- IMO, this thread gets interesting only on Thursdays and Fridays, the other days, this could just become a chatline for lonely people. ;)

Random sample of 5% would be better than a convenience sample of 40%.

There are some interesting numbers in CED.

NPD says 125K HD DVD add-ons were sold thr' feb.

DVD had one of its best quarters since its laucnh 10 years ago. Both hardware sales and software saw the second best quarters. Over 400 Million DVDs were sold in the quarter. That makes HiDef DVD sales less than 1/3rd of 1%.

In the first year since launch DVD sold about 12M. So, HiDef DVD has sold about 1/6 th of that number since launch.

Have you all seen this Reuter's article (http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN2220834920070423)?

From January 1-March 31, consumers bought almost 1.2 million high-definition discs -- 832,530 Blu-ray units and 359,300 HD DVDs -- according to Home Media Magazine. In March, consumers bought 335,980 Blu-ray Discs and 119,570 HD DVDs.

Since the high-def format's inception -- HD DVD launched in April 2006, while Blu-ray got rolling two months later -- more than 2.14 million discs have been purchased by consumers: 1.2 million Blu-ray Discs and about 937,500 HD DVDs.
This says there were 1.2 Million BDs sold since inception. Could the BD group really have been that tardy with their 1 million PR release?

The Nielsen videoscan numbers in this case is no longer a statistical exercise with random sampling. If I understand their methodology, they have retailers responsible for 40% DVD sales participating, and their data is collected at the register as the sales are rung up. Barring any mechanical errors or failure to submit data, their sales numbers for participating retailers are complete. And this percentage of the retailer population that participates is high.

I think that point is that since it is non random even with a high % of store it "could" have a low confidence level. For example Walmart buyers tend to be lower income* than say a high end AV store. If there is a trend toward higher HD DVD among middle income brackets as opposed to higher income brackets then Wallmart could sell higher % HD DVD vs BD. Maybe they do maybe they don't. The point is there could be many factors that cause a non uniform distribution of purchases such as geography, income, etc. Even with 80% of reporting stores it could still have a lower confidence. Usually reporting models will do statistical analysis and compare geographic, income and other data vs reported data and provide a correction to compensate. This isn't happening here for 2 reasons. One data is too new so there are no accurate models yet. The second is that it is far too political. If Toshiba came out with a model that showed HD DVD gained 5% and BD lost 5% due to sampling compensation how many BD fanboys would go crazy and the reverse is also true.

* Before I get blasted about stereotyping I know some very rich people sharp at Wlamart. But if you took the median income of say Walmart shoppers and Sax Fith Avenue you would see Walmart is lower.

Random sample of 5% would be better than a convenience sample of 40%.

Exactly.
Someone else must have taken some statistics at one point.

Have you all seen this Reuter's article (http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN2220834920070423)

This was posted a few dozen pages ago ...

This was posted a few dozen pages ago ...
Thanks. I figured it must have been.

But I see folks talking about HD-DVD at almost 1 million and BD at just over a million (based on the BD's recent press release) but this makes it sound like they really aren't as close as that. Guess the numbers are just confusing to me.

The DVD empire final stats for week of April 17th are up.

Blu-ray regained a 66% share, up from 49% the week before:



65.98% Blu-ray to 34.02% HD DVD the week of April 17th

49.34% Blu-ray to 50.66% HD DVD the week of April 10th

55.30% Blu-ray to 44.70% HD DVD the week of April 3rd



http://www.dvdempire.com/Content/Features/hidef_wars.asp?view=1&userid=99365604128722

The DVD empire final stats for week of April 17th are up.

Blu-ray regained a 66% share, up from 49% the week before:



65.98% Blu-ray to 34.02% HD DVD the week of April 17th

49.34% Blu-ray to 50.66% HD DVD the week of April 10th

55.30% Blu-ray to 44.70% HD DVD the week of April 3rd



http://www.dvdempire.com/Content/Features/hidef_wars.asp?view=1&userid=99365604128722

Love those numbers :p

But I see folks talking about HD-DVD at almost 1 million and BD at just over a million (based on the BD's recent press release) but this makes it sound like they really aren't as close as that. Guess the numbers are just confusing to me.

There are three sets of numbers. Nielsen/Videoscan reported numbers and the extrapolated HMM numbers. HMM numbers are higher than videoscan by some 20%. It is not clear where the 1M number reported by HD DVD group comes from - it could be an extrapolation using videoscan numbers again.

There are different timelines involved too.

I'd just go by Nielsen numbers knowing that it represents probably 80% of the market and not worry about other numbers.

Love those numbers :p

Here's the DVD Empire monthly chart (to end of March) that shows how the market share has changed since the launch of HD DVD - just one retailer of course but it's interesting to note how closely DVD Empire reflects the Nielsen numbers.

http://75.126.103.40/images/guy05/dvdempiremar31.jpg

For April there will certainly be a correction towards HD DVD but will this be maintained?

It just says the POS data was compiled by the three companies. It does not say the three companies collected the data.We don't disagree about whether they have their own point-of-sale systems. The email makes it clear that they got the data from 3 companies that compiled it. I didn't say where it originated, but for this report at least some of the data for the report came from those 3 companies (according to the report). Sure, they compiled it and then it came from them for the report. I probably could have made that more clear though.

--Darin

I don't expect to see a huge change in ratios. So we're likely to see SI move to 58:42; YTD at around 70:30 and Weeky around 60:40 again. The following week should be a big win for Blu-ray again with Night At The Museum, The Queen and Deja Vu all having their HD launches. I expect to see 75:25 for BD in that week - I thinkk BD will also win the battle of 'Planet Earth' by a comfortable margin.I expect this next set of data to be around 57/43 for the week and then the next week moving more in BD's direction, but not as high as 75:25 (or 3:1). HD DVD had DVE, but I don't know how well that will sell outside the enthusiast market. For enthusiasts I think it is a bigger title than many movies.

--Darin

Here's the DVD Empire monthly chart (to end of March) that shows how the market share has changed since the launch of HD DVD - just one retailer of course but it's interesting to note how closely DVD Empire reflects the Nielsen numbers.

http://75.126.103.40/images/guy05/dvdempiremar31.jpg

For April there will certainly be a correction towards HD DVD but will this be maintained?


How about a weekly chart , to show the HD DVD weekly trend since March 18th and into April?

I didn't know whether this is the right spot, but this seems the most appropriate thread. Some European comparisons a month after the PS3 launch:

Axelmusic
1 year BD 34.3% HD DVD 65.7%
1 month BD 41.5% HD DVD 58.5%
1 week BD 48.3% HD DVD 51.7%

Amazon UK top 5 ranking
BD 510 HD DVD 786

Amazon Germany top 5 ranking
BD 310 HD DVD 867

Amazon France top 5 ranking
BD 831 HD DVD 1414

So there seems to be at least some PS3 effect in Europe. (The timetrend on Axelmusic and on eproductwars contradicts the notion that it would be caused by eg region coding).

Obviously, I left out any Japan numbers since it is more or less BD-only.

I didn't know whether this is the right spot, but this seems the most appropriate thread. Some European comparisons a month after the PS3 launch:

Axelmusic
1 year BD 34.3% HD DVD 65.7%
1 month BD 41.5% HD DVD 58.5%
1 week BD 48.3% HD DVD 51.7%

Amazon UK top 5 ranking
BD 510 HD DVD 786

Amazon Germany top 5 ranking
BD 310 HD DVD 867

Amazon France top 5 ranking
BD 831 HD DVD 1414

So there seems to be at least some PS3 effect in Europe. (The timetrend on Axelmusic and on eproductwars contradicts the notion that it would be caused by eg region coding).

Remember that Axel Music sell ZERO product for the local market. All of their HD discs (both formats) come from outside Europe. For me this makes them unreliable as a gauge of the European market. It would be like using a US based importer that sold no NA released discs as a gauge of the NA market.

However, Axel is an interesting guide to the market share of HD discs imported into Europe.

Amazon UK, DE & FR will sell HD product intended for the local market.

TOP HD DVD TITLES FOR WEEK ENDED 4/22/2007

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 * SMOKIN' ACES (UNI, $39.98)
2 THE GOOD SHEPHERD (UNI, $39.98)
3 CHILDREN OF MEN (UNI, $39.98)
4 * THE GAME (UNI, $29.98)
5 A SCANNER DARKLY (WB, $28.99)
6 THE DEPARTED (WB, $39.99)
7 * FEAST (WEINSTEIN/GENIUS, $29.95)
8 PAYBACK: DIRECTOR'S CUT (PAR, $29.99)
9 * SCHOOL FOR SCOUNDRELS (WEINSTEIN/GENIUS, $29.95)
10 HAPPY FEET (WB, $39.99)

TOP Blu-Ray TITLES FOR WEEK ENDED 4/15/2007

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 CASINO ROYALE (SONY, $38.96)
2 HAPPY FEET (WB, $34.99)
3 THE DEPARTED (WB, $34.99)
4 PAYBACK: DIRECTOR'S CUT (PAR, $29.99)
5 A SCANNER DARKLY (WB, $28.99)
6 KING ARTHUR (BV, $29.99)
7 THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS (SONY, $38.96)
8 ERAGON (FOX, $39.98)
9 THE PRESTIGE (BV, $34.99)
10 THE FIFTH ELEMENT (SONY, $28.95)


Source: Rentrak’s Retail Essentials ™.
Sales estimations are based on preliminary data provided through an exclusive arrangement with Rentrak Corp.’s Retail Essentials service. Point-of-Sale data is collected weekly and projected nationally for the U.S. bricks-and-mortar sales channel.

Four new entries for HD DVD and none for BD. I'm surprised to see The Game doing so good.

I predict this will be the strongest week for HD DVD this year. Maybe even over 50 percent for the week. ;)

TOP HD DVD TITLES FOR WEEK ENDED 4/22/2007

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 * SMOKIN' ACES (UNI, $39.98)
2 THE GOOD SHEPHERD (UNI, $39.98)
3 CHILDREN OF MEN (UNI, $39.98)
4 * THE GAME (UNI, $29.98)


Wow. Top four are for Universal ...

Here are the releases for last week.

04/17 Dirty Dozen W V DD EFS 28.95
Enter the Dragon W V DD EFS 28.95
Feast O A 29.95
Game, The U DL V DD+ ES 29.95
Jerk, The U V DD+ EF 29.95
School for Scoundrels O A 29.95
Smokin' Aces U CO V DD+ EF 39.98

Four new entries for HD DVD and none for BD. I'm surprised to see The Game doing so good.

I predict this will be the strongest week for HD DVD this year. Maybe even over 50 percent for the week. ;)


Actually preliminary figures are already out ...its only 40%:

On the high-def front, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales, while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week. Observers attribute to the lift to the strength of "Aces," the week's top HD DVD seller, which was not available on Blu-ray. The top-selling Blu-ray title for the week ending April 22 was Sony Pictures' "Casino Royale."


http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/home_entertainment/news/e3i125893bbe2b357e35a0d5ae9bfadc205

This is the best HD DVD can mustered and they only account for 40%. Remember, Blu-ray had no new releases except for two old catalog titles. Don't expect HD DVD to surpass Blu-ray anytime soon. :D

Actually preliminary figures are already out ...its only 40%:


On the high-def front, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales, while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week. Observers attribute to the lift to the strength of "Aces," the week's top HD DVD seller, which was not available on Blu-ray. The top-selling Blu-ray title for the week ending April 22 was Sony Pictures' "Casino Royale."

I would expect to see a 60:40 weekly ratio but what the reporter said is, of course, impossible as HD DVD was not at 31% on the previous weekly share. I think the reporter is mixing up his weekly and YTD data. Not a good sign of quality reporting. :rolleyes:

Nielsen data will be released on Friday as per usual. There has been nothing published in advance.

Reporters getting their facts jumbled up doesn't qualify as preliminary figures I'm afraid.

How about a weekly chart , to show the HD DVD weekly trend since March 18th and into April?

Has anyone factored in the Amazon 50% sale on bluray titles into these stats? Anyone care to guess how different the stats would be if Amazon ran the same 50% sale on HD DVD titles? This tactic in itself falsly inflated bluray numbers IMHO.

Has anyone factored in the Amazon 50% sale on bluray titles into these stats? Anyone care to guess how different the stats would be if Amazon ran the same 50% sale on HD DVD titles? This tactic in itself falsly inflated bluray numbers IMHO.
Yup

I would expect to see a 60:40 weekly ratio but what the reporter said is, of course, impossible as HD DVD was not at 31% on the previous weekly share. I think the reporter is mixing up his weekly and YTD data. Not a good sign of quality reporting. :rolleyes:

Yep.

Anyway, as I posted earlier, for the YTD to go to 60:40 - there would have to be an implausible upswing in hd dvd numbers.

Has anyone factored in the Amazon 50% sale on bluray titles into these stats? Anyone care to guess how different the stats would be if Amazon ran the same 50% sale on HD DVD titles? This tactic in itself falsly inflated bluray numbers IMHO.

Having a sale is a tactic, but it does not falsely inflate bluray sales. Does the ongoing practice of giving away free HD DVD's with Toshiba players falsely inflate Toshiba player sales numbers?

Hint: The answer is "No".

TIME OUT. There is way to much name calling and NOT CHALLANGING THE INFO NOT THE POSTER.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=836777

reopened but note kevinca1's warning above please

Thanks :)

Thanks.

Maybe this thread should only open during the weekends. :D

Thanks.

Maybe this thread should only open during the weekends. :D

I second this. Let the thread be open from Friday to Monday. And make it sticky.

And make it sticky.

I agree with that. Although it always seems to be near the top in any event, so perhaps sticky status is not necessary.

Week: Blu-ray 52 HD DVD 48
YTD 68/32
SI 57/43

Top 5 BD

1. Casino Royale 100.00
2. Happy Feet 50.60
3. The Departed 36.57
4. The Pursuit of Happyness 33.85
5. The Prestige 29.43

Top 5 HD DVD
1. Smokin' Aces 100.00
2. Batman Begins 14.79
3. The Good Shepherd 10.83
4. Children of Men 9.57
5. Happy Feet 9.34

Top 5 BD

1. Casino Royale 100.00
2. Happy Feet 50.60
3. The Departed 36.57
4. The Pursuit of Happyness 33.85
5. The Prestige 29.43

Top 5 HD DVD
1. Smokin' Aces 100.00
2. Batman Begins 14.79
3. The Good Shepherd 10.83
4. Children of Men 9.57
5. Happy Feet 9.34

Sorry for the dumb question, but I'm kindof new to the thread and don't want to look through 188 pages for the answer, but what do the numbers represent?

Sorry for the dumb question, but I'm kindof new to the thread and don't want to look through 188 pages for the answer, but what do the numbers represent?

Its basically a ratio relative to the top title of the week. For every 100 copies of Casino Royale sold, 50.60 copies of Happy Feet were sold.

Top 5 BD

1. Casino Royale 100.00
2. Happy Feet 50.60
3. The Departed 36.57
4. The Pursuit of Happyness 33.85
5. The Prestige 29.43

Top 5 HD DVD
1. Smokin' Aces 100.00
2. Batman Begins 14.79
3. The Good Shepherd 10.83
4. Children of Men 9.57
5. Happy Feet 9.34

No surprises ...Smokin Aces practically had no competition for the week. The other HD DVD titles were surprising weak compared to Smokin Aces. Or perhaps Smokin Aces were really strong? I wonder if thats an indication of market saturation for HD DVD?

Its basically a ratio relative to the top title of the week. For every 100 copies of Casino Royale sold, 50.60 copies of Happy Feet were sold.

Thankyamuch sir. I was racking my brain trying to figure it out.

Assumption (HMM's YTD):
YTD 03.31 BD 832530
YTD 03.31 HD 359300

calculated using YTD & Weekly:
04.08 BD 48137
04.08 HD 29006
04.15 BD 38704
04.15 HD 24745
04.22 BD 43304
04.22 HD 39973

YTD 04.08 BD 880667
YTD 04.08 HD 388306
YTD 04.15 BD 919371
YTD 04.15 HD 413051
YTD 04.22 BD 962674
YTD 04.22 HD 453023

Btw, if I also use the SI numbers in HMM of
SI 03.31 BD 1,210,000 (plug by adding 10,000 to 1.2M to fit the SI percentage)
SI 03.31 HD 937,500

we get :
SI 04.15 BD 1,296,841
SI 04.15 HD 991,251
SI 04.22 BD 1,340144,
SI 04.22 HD 1,031,223


---

Modified Assumptions :
1. There is the missing April 1st single day sales... Maybe 03.31 is actually 04.01.
2. I added 10K to the 1.2M given by HMM for BD SI Mar31 (1.2M is too neat a number and the SI rounded up don't match ). Since the weekly, YTD, SI all seem to match. I am inclined to believe that the above numbers probably are very very close as far as nielsen videoscan first alert is concerned using the 4.08 and 4.15 ratios.

Week: Blu-ray 52 HD DVD 48


Wow. Now that is getting close - 1.08:1. Ofcourse the best HD DVD has done - in terms of ratios - this year.

I don't have my spreadsheet - so can't get any numbers till evening.

No surprises ...Smokin Aces practically had no competition for the week. The other HD DVD titles were surprising weak compared to Smokin Aces. Or perhaps Smokin Aces were really strong? I wonder if thats an indication of market saturation for HD DVD?
Smokin aces is a movie that did much better on DVD than the cinema. It bombed in theatres but caught a good audience in DVD.

Were there any BD day date releases that week? If there were, then it seems unusual that they don't show up as the top title.

Also, I suspect folks are picking up catalog titles as the HD DVD freebie titles....

But it's a positive to see a new release dominate the week. That's what studios want. AFAIK.

Thanks.

Maybe this thread should only open during the weekends. :D
I think this is a great idea!!! Close it sunday night and reopen Thursday morning.

Were there any BD day date releases that week? If there were, then it seems unusual that they don't show up as the top title.

Also, I suspect folks are picking up catalog titles as the HD DVD freebie titles....

But it's a positive to see a new release dominate the week. That's what studios want. AFAIK.
There's been only catalog releases on BD for three weeks Apr 03,10,17. Volver came out in Apr 03, but is a spanish movie. I think Fox pulled all their April releases, causing a hole in the supply of blu movies.

Apr 24 has Night at the Museum, The Queen, Deja Vu.

And then, there's Planet Earth, which is perplexing to me since documentaries like this on DVDs have not sold well, but there seems to be a lot of interest for this on HDM.

Were there any BD day date releases that week? If there were, then it seems unusual that they don't show up as the top title.

Also, I suspect folks are picking up catalog titles as the HD DVD freebie titles....

But it's a positive to see a new release dominate the week. That's what studios want. AFAIK.

No new title except for two old catalogs: Dirty Dozen and Enter the Dragon.

Were there any BD day date releases that week? If there were, then it seems unusual that they don't show up as the top title.

Also, I suspect folks are picking up catalog titles as the HD DVD freebie titles....

But it's a positive to see a new release dominate the week. That's what studios want. AFAIK.

04/17 Dirty Dozen W V DD EFS 28.95
Enter the Dragon W V DD EFS 28.95
Feast O A 29.95
Game, The U DL V DD+ ES 29.95
Jerk, The U V DD+ EF 29.95
School for Scoundrels O A 29.95
Smokin' Aces U CO V DD+ EF 39.98

Wow. Now that is getting close - 1.08:1. Ofcourse the best HD DVD has done - in terms of ratios - this year.

I don't have my spreadsheet - so can't get any numbers till evening.

What do you expect? Smokin Aces + 4 titles VS 2 old catalog titles, and yet HD DVD still could not get the lead. Oh yeah ...also that April 15th massive buy too.

What do you expect? Smokin Aces + 4 titles VS 2 old catalog titles, and yet HD DVD still could not get the lead. Oh yeah ...also that April 15th massive buy too.

Pls stop the partisan bickering. Take that to the general thread.

Nothing wrong with the content of your post - it is the tone/intent that doesn't belong to this thread.

Pls stop the partisan bickering. Take that to the general thread.

Nothing wrong with the content of your post - it is the tone/intent that doesn't belong to this thread.

My tone is fine. I wasn't being personal and was factually correct ...you just didn't like what I wrote. :D

As for the buy on Apr 15th. I am not sure how high Smoking Aces made it on Amazon, the top 5 does not seem to match what was going on at Amazon.

What were the other 4 titles? Smoking Aces was also out of stock at every BB that was within driving distance of where I live.

So, when you say April 15th, perhaps, you also need to correlate with the rankings on Amazon with the top 5 here. I see poor correlation and hence the April 15th sales probably had minimal impact on the sales Neilson is reporting....IMO.

As for the buy on Apr 15th. I am not sure how high Smoking Aces made it on Amazon, the top 5 does not seem to match what was going on at Amazon.

What were the other 4 titles? Smoking Aces was also out of stock at every BB that was within driving distance of where I live.

So, when you say April 15th, perhaps, you also need to correlate with the rankings on Amazon with the top 5 here. I see poor correlation and hence the April 15th sales probably had minimal impact on the sales Neilson is reporting....IMO.
Smokin Aces was the highest released title (#2 on HD DVD?), everything else was preorder which would not show up on nielsen until they ship.

This is Smokin Aces historical sales rank on amazon. Try hdgamedb.com. Looks like Smokin Aces hit top 25 or so.

SyHD, you were factually wrong!

Try correlating the title rank on Amazon on Apr 16th onwards with the Neilson. That will be a starting point.....

04/17 Dirty Dozen W V DD EFS 28.95
Enter the Dragon W V DD EFS 28.95
Feast O A 29.95
Game, The U DL V DD+ ES 29.95
Jerk, The U V DD+ EF 29.95
School for Scoundrels O A 29.95
Smokin' Aces U CO V DD+ EF 39.98

Nataraj, using a red and blue font is very hard to read for those that use the "AVS Dark Theater" screen settings (the one with the black background).

My tone is fine. I wasn't being personal and was factually correct ...you just didn't like what I wrote. :D

I'm tending to agree with nataraj on this one... though he kinda invited it with the "Wow. Now that is getting close" bit.

Most of us were expecting this to spike and it does show they still have some life left. Though I'm expecting other spikes, I think this will be the apex of HDDVD's performance against Blu-ray for 2007.

As for the buy on Apr 15th. I am not sure how high Smoking Aces made it on Amazon, the top 5 does not seem to match what was going on at Amazon.

What were the other 4 titles? Smoking Aces was also out of stock at every BB that was within driving distance of where I live.

So, when you say April 15th, perhaps, you also need to correlate with the rankings on Amazon with the top 5 here. I see poor correlation and hence the April 15th sales probably had minimal impact on the sales Neilson is reporting....IMO.

You are probably correct with the Amazon data ...pre-orders ruled Amazon for that week ...at least on the HD DVD side. Nielsen does not count pre-orders and we don't even know if Nielsen surveys Amazon in their report.

Neo. You're right. Only few titles were impacted, Smoking Aces being one. Others were pre orders and will show up later.

Also, Amazon were sold out for a few days on the title...because I was trying to get it and it wasn't in stock.

My tone is fine. I wasn't being personal and was factually correct ...you just didn't like what I wrote. :D

I too thought there was nothing wrong with your tone, and I speak as someone who has grown very fond of the "report post" feature.

What do you expect? Smokin Aces + 4 titles VS 2 old catalog titles, and yet HD DVD still could not get the lead. Oh yeah ...also that April 15th massive buy too.

Funny how none of the BD supporters were saying the same thing about the first 3 months of the year, when BD releases were outgunning HD DVD releases in size and number. Then it was just 'BD is winning 2:1!... 4:1! etc...

I'm pretty sure the ratio will swing back highly in BD's favour next week with the big day and date releases unless Planet Earth pulls off a miracle but it's interesting to watch the figures after the post holidays retail lull.

Also, like i've said before, the Rentrak charts always seem to differ fairly widely to the Nielsen ones. I wonder where they're compiling their data from. The top 3 seem to match fairly well but i'm thinking that when you get to #4 and beyond, the weekly sales figures figures could be so low that slight differences in POS data could affect chart position quite highly.

Just shows how volatile the market is when you go from 4:1 to 1:1 in a matter of a month....I expect the band to be between 1:1 and the ratio of respective players for the rest of the year. I am assuming, BD will have the hardware edge.

The studio probably care more about market size than ratios in any case. My next weeks prediction is 1.6-2.0: 1 for BD.

Funny how none of the BD supporters were saying the same thing about the first 3 months of the year, when BD releases were outgunning HD DVD releases in size and number. Then it was just 'BD is winning 2:1!... 4:1! etc...

I'm pretty sure the ratio will swing back highly in BD's favour next week with the big day and date releases unless Planet Earth pulls off a miracle but it's interesting to watch the figures after the post holidays retail lull.

Also, like i've said before, the Rentrak charts always seem to differ fairly widely to the Nielsen ones. I wonder where they're compiling their data from. The top 3 seem to match fairly well but i'm thinking that when you get to #4 and beyond, the weekly sales figures figures could be so low that slight differences in POS data could affect chart position quite highly.

Us Blu-ray supporters always have acknowledged that its all about content. Number of releases each week matters ...especially day and date releases. We have constantly harassed you guys about studio support. How is this inconsistent in the tone I conveyed? Content is king and Blu-ray has the edge since the year started ...except for the week in question. It only proves our point the more.

Just shows how volatile the market is when you go from 4:1 to 1:1 in a matter of a month....I expect the band to be between 1:1 and the ratio of respective players for the rest of the year. I am assuming, BD will have the hardware edge.

The studio probably care more about market size than ratios in any case. My next weeks prediction is 1.6-2.0: 1 for BD.

I try not to post much in this thread because the bickering gives me a headache, but none of this surprises me. If I'm interpreting the numbers correctly, and I certainly may not be, we're only talking a difference of a couple thousand discs, so it'll vary. This is what I'm referring to:

SI 04.15 BD 1,296,841
SI 04.15 HD 991,251
SI 04.22 BD 1,340144,
SI 04.22 HD 1,031,223


If I'm understanding correctly (and again, maybe I'm not quite understanding the numbers, so correct me if I'm wrong), that means for the week ending 4/22, there were 43,303 BDs sold, and 39,972 HD DVDs sold. So BD outsold HD DVD by a whopping, astounding, mind-blowing, astronomical 3,331 units.

Wow, that's definitely something for either side to be worked up over.

Us Blu-ray supporters always have acknowledged that its all about content. Number of releases each week matters ...especially day and date releases. We have constantly harassed you guys about studio support. How is this inconsistent in the tone I conveyed? Content is king and Blu-ray has the edge since the year started ...except for the week in question. It only proves our point the more.

I agree with that, especially at this stage. It's something that HD DVD has to struggle against. I suppose my point is more along the lines of the 'BD has won' claims. Weeks like these to me show that, were all things equal content-wise, things would be a lot closer. How it moves from here though is anyone's guess. Casino Royale is still top of the BD chart so there is definite signs of consumer growth, likely coming from the PS3 and it's up to HD DVD to counteract the content attraction with player sales. The price drop and free disc deals were an aggressive move but whether that will be enough by the time Spider-man 3 and Pirates 3 come out, who knows...

52:48 weekly share for Blu-ray is a very good result for HD DVD.

I wonder how much of that is down to the HD DVD bithday bash on Amazon. Unless Amazon had anticipated the rush and stocked in advance then a large chunk of those orders would have been ordered in, processed and shipped to customers in the following week - the week that these numbers relate to.

I did read somewhere that there were 10,000 unit sales/orders on that day which, if true, would count for quite a large slice of normal HD DVD sales. I'll see if I can dig out the page where I read about that number. It sounded rather a lot to me at the time but who knows?

Once again we get rounded numbers so calculating volumes becomes a bit of a lottery. Might as well wait until someone releases the numbers (hopefully in May). I have a feeling this would be the first week where Blu-ray numbers went down and HD DVD went up! Not quite enough to outsell Blu-ray of course.

Given the Blu-ray release slate was quite strong for the past week I can only see the weekly ratio moving back above 60:40 on the next Nielsen report. 70:30 would be nice.

Week: Blu-ray 52 HD DVD 48
YTD 68/32
SI 57/43 Wow :eek:


1.08 : 1 ratio Blu-ray to HD DVD


Probably within the margin of error based on their probable capture rate of total market sales.

Nataraj, using a red and blue font is very hard to read for those that use the "AVS Dark Theater" screen settings (the one with the black background). Rich, just to help, if you select to copy the text and highlight it with your mouse the background changes enough to make it legible

I'm tending to agree with nataraj on this one... though he kinda invited it with the "Wow. Now that is getting close" bit.

Most of us were expecting this to spike and it does show they still have some life left. Though I'm expecting other spikes, I think this will be the apex of HDDVD's performance against Blu-ray for 2007. Still a verifiable performance like this on the Nielson/Videoscan numbers in addition to the Amazon numbers (which look a tad prescient as leading indicators BTW IMHO) really complicates the "the format war is over, Blu-ray won, HD DVD is dead" talking points that the BDA was trying to make of the first quarter numbers.

HD DVD being that close clearly shows those BDA pronouncements of the format war as over as being premature at best.

Wow :eek:


1.08 : 1 ratio Blu-ray to HD DVD


Probably within the margin of error based on their probable capture rate of total market sales.

Well it's funny because even if than week had nothing on Blu-Ray it still hold.. i would have expected at least 55:45 for HD DVD and more

But next week data will be reallly interesting.., Both had New release (Planet Earth on HD DVD that still #5 at Amazon). Of course BluRay had 4 new release

Blu-Ray Release :

Deja Vu (Buena Vista)
Failure to Launch (Paramount)
Night at the Museum (Fox)
Planet Earth: The Complete Collection (BBC)
The Queen (Buena Vista)
Secret Window (Sony)
Ultimate Avengers Collection (Lionsgate)

HD DVD

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Universal)
Failure to Launch (Paramount)
The Nutty Professor (1996) (Universal)
Planet Earth: The Complete Collection (BBC)

Funny how none of the BD supporters were saying the same thing about the first 3 months of the year, when BD releases were outgunning HD DVD releases in size and number. Then it was just 'BD is winning 2:1!... 4:1! etc...

I'm pretty sure the ratio will swing back highly in BD's favour next week with the big day and date releases unless Planet Earth pulls off a miracle but it's interesting to watch the figures after the post holidays retail lull.

Also, like i've said before, the Rentrak charts always seem to differ fairly widely to the Nielsen ones. I wonder where they're compiling their data from. The top 3 seem to match fairly well but i'm thinking that when you get to #4 and beyond, the weekly sales figures figures could be so low that slight differences in POS data could affect chart position quite highly. Planet Earth HD DVD is constantly a few spots above Blu-ray version and has been in the Amazon top 10 since before April 15th. At those levels a few spots mean a lot more sales.

Planet Earth will be a plus for HD DVD numbers and may actually put it over the top next week or at last will cushion its fall.

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?

Planet Earth HD DVD is constantly a few spots above Blu-ray version and has been in the Amazon top 10 since before April 15th. At those levels a few spots mean a lot more sales.

Planet Earth will be a plus for HD DVD numbers and may actually put it over the top next week or at last will cushion its fall.

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?

Come on ...you seriously think HD DVD will take the lead with the help of Planet Earth? Amazon rankings is NOT the end all as you made it out to be. Amazon caters to a different demographic than B&M stores and clearly, its only a tiny share of the overall market. Planet Earth is not the only day and date release for the week you know:

Blu-ray
Night at the Museum ($250 million blockbuster)
Deja Vu
The Queen
Planet Earth

HD DVD
Planet Earth

So you are telling me the day and date release of Planet Earth HD DVD will outsell ALL of the day and date releases of Blu-ray? Talking about wishful thinking. I am not even sure Planet Earth HD DVD could even outsell the Blu-ray version. Considering Planet Earth is in short supply due to overwhelming demand, it will not play a huge part as you think it would. They only pressed a limited amount of sets.

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?

2? :p After a spike of 4.5:1, I don't think many were predicting Blu-ray to go higher... at least not before it went lower. ;)

Beside which, given the way Amazon sales work, BD sales rank could be lower yet they could be selling 2-3 times as many units... This weeks numbers should be VERY interesting...

52:48 weekly share for Blu-ray is a very good result for HD DVD.

I wonder how much of that is down to the HD DVD bithday bash on Amazon. Unless Amazon had anticipated the rush and stocked in advance then a large chunk of those orders would have been ordered in, processed and shipped to customers in the following week - the week that these numbers relate to.

I did read somewhere that there were 10,000 unit sales/orders on that day which, if true, would count for quite a large slice of normal HD DVD sales. I'll see if I can dig out the page where I read about that number. It sounded rather a lot to me at the time but who knows?

Once again we get rounded numbers so calculating volumes becomes a bit of a lottery. Might as well wait until someone releases the numbers (hopefully in May). I have a feeling this would be the first week where Blu-ray numbers went down and HD DVD went up! Not quite enough to outsell Blu-ray of course.

Given the Blu-ray release slate was quite strong for the past week I can only see the weekly ratio moving back above 60:40 on the next Nielsen report. 70:30 would be nice. Some would say 51% 49% would be nice too. Or those numbers the other way. Depends on what side of the fence you are on. ;)

on the AVS April 15th Amazon numbers

This poll came out with 1535 HD DVDs bought by AVS members during the April 15th HD DVD Anniversary Amazon buy.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=834958

I remember another tally of 1450 or thereabouts. It was well under 2000 reported not 10,000 , so the AVS buy wasn't enough by itself.

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?

2? After a spike of 4.5:1, I don't think many were predicting Blu-ray to go higher... at least not before it went lower.

Beside which, given the way Amazon sales work, BD sales rank could be lower yet they could be selling 2-3 times as many units... This weeks numbers should be VERY interesting... Actually , I think HD DVD has regained market share for the last four straight weeks if we calculate out the weekly percentages.

This result may be a result of the free offers from Circuit City at the time of purchase of a Toshiba HD A2.

That could be early results that new HD DVD standalone player sales are finally starting to affect the Nielson/Videoscan movie sale stats.

If it is new player sales driving this, then that's very good news for HD DVD.

That is sad considering the lineup.

April 17 releases:

HD DVD
Feast (Weinstein)
The Game (Universal)
The Jerk (Universal)
School for Scoundrels (Genius)
Smokin' Aces

Blu-ray
Enter the Dragon
The Dirty Dozen

We have constantly harassed you guys about studio support. How is this inconsistent in the tone I conveyed?

It is not. And that is the problem. This thread is for analysing sales data - not for harassing each other.

That is sad considering the lineup.

April 17 releases:

HD DVD
Feast (Weinstein)
The Game (Universal)
The Jerk (Universal)
School for Scoundrels (Genius)
Smokin' Aces

Blu-ray
Enter the Dragon
The Dirty Dozen Kinda moving the goalposts a bit...are we?

Its still is the best showing for HD DVD all year in the history of both the Amazon tracking for that week, the DVDempire stats and now the Nielson/Videoscan numbers.

They all are consistently moving in the same direction with HD DVD gaining market share all the last four or five weeks since March 19th.

You got to admit the numbers are closing. ;)

That is sad considering the lineup.

April 17 releases:

HD DVD
Feast (Weinstein)
The Game (Universal)
The Jerk (Universal)
School for Scoundrels (Genius)
Smokin' Aces

Blu-ray
Enter the Dragon
The Dirty Dozen

From that list, Smokin Aces is only real significant title as a potential big seller it isn't that surprising to me. I guess had BB not pulled off their usual - we don't stock HD DVDs on release week stunt in many areas we would have probably seen higher HD DVD sales. I'd say it was another good week for HD DVD in reversing their Q1 set backs.

It is not. And that is the problem. This thread is for analysing sales data - not for harassing each other.

The post you originally complained about did not seem remotely like harassment to me. Focussing on the casual use of the word "harass" in the post you quote here seems unfair, to me.

That could be early results that new HD DVD standalone player sales are finally starting to affect the Nielson/Videoscan movie sale stats.

If it is new player sales driving this, then that's very good news for HD DVD.

Unless all the new player owners are all buying Smokin' Aces and nothing else, wouldn't the gap between the #1 and #2 selling HD-DVD be smaller for that to me true? To me, that suggests that this weeks results are strongly impacted by Smokin' Aces being head and shoulders above all the other releases of the week.

Maybe.

But we don't actually have the N/V stats for those titles and we don't know well the earlier releases like Batman Begins Superman Returns and Serenity are doing.

If SA is huge and the others are pygmies it may mean that the accumulating mass of HD DVD owners has awakened as is buying movies again.

Either way, its not bad for HD DVD.

That is sad considering the lineup.

April 17 releases:

HD DVD
Feast (Weinstein)
The Game (Universal)
The Jerk (Universal)
School for Scoundrels (Genius)
Smokin' Aces

Blu-ray
Enter the Dragon
The Dirty Dozen
I'd say it's sad that blu ray, with a ton of new releases ,in general, of huge movies and the ps3 userbase being enormous (when it comes to high-def movie players at least, is almost neck to neck with HDDVD.Blu ray should dominate (like it did when HDDVD had zero new releases and amazon was giving away BD titles) EVERY WEEK, when considering all factors.

I mean BD fanboys are referring to "Smockin Aces" as if it was a huge blockbuster or something.

I'd say it's sad that blu ray, with a ton of new releases ,in general, of huge movies and the ps3 userbase being enormous (when it comes to high-def movie players at least, is almost neck to neck with HDDVD.Blu ray should dominate (like it did when HDDVD had zero new releases and amazon was giving away BD titles) EVERY WEEK, when considering all factors.

I mean BD fanboys are referring to "Smockin Aces" as if it was a huge blockbuster or something.

Maybe not in the Casino Royale league but look how well it outsold all other HD DVD titles in that week.

Top 5 HD DVD
1. Smokin' Aces 100.00
2. Batman Begins 14.79
3. The Good Shepherd 10.83
4. Children of Men 9.57
5. Happy Feet 9.34

SA sold almost 7 times more than the 2nd placed title! It looks like it could have sold at least as well as The Departed on HD DVD, which sold around 14,000 in week 1.

I mean BD fanboys are referring to "Smockin Aces" as if it was a huge blockbuster or something.

Well, it did represent 69.2% of the volume of HD-DVD's top 5 sellers for the week:


Top 5 HD DVD
1. Smokin' Aces 100.00
2. Batman Begins 14.79
3. The Good Shepherd 10.83
4. Children of Men 9.57
5. Happy Feet 9.34

Either way, its not bad for HD DVD.

Certainly not. This should be the first week where SI numbers move in HD-DVD's favor so far this year. The weekly numbers are pretty close to the SI numbers though, so depending on rounding and volume it may or may not actually be noticable in the N/V numbers shown by HMM.

The post you originally complained about did not seem remotely like harassment to me. Focussing on the casual use of the word "harass" in the post you quote here seems unfair, to me.

The problem seems to be a mis-understanding on the part of the poster about this thread and the way to behave in AVS. If he thinks harassing people is OK - obviously he won't find the post I complained about inapproprate in this thread.

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5594/nielsenhidefxp5.gif (http://imageshack.us)

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?
2? :p After a spike of 4.5:1, I don't think many were predicting Blu-ray to go higher... at least not before it went lower. ;)

http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/2608/ratiogp6.gif (http://imageshack.us)

Looking at the releases list for BD for the last two weeks ...

04/10 Dog Day Afternoon W V DD EFS 28.95
Dragon's Lair O
Payback P 29.99
Scanner Darkly, A W V DD EFS 28.95
04/17 Dirty Dozen W V DD EFS 28.95
Enter the Dragon W V DD EFS 28.95


How come we got these sales numbers ? Shouldn't it have gone down ?

4/15/2007 31,034
4/22/2007 34,635

Originally Posted by UxiSXRD
Quote:
Originally Posted by kosty
HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?


2? After a spike of 4.5:1, I don't think many were predicting Blu-ray to go higher... at least not before it went lower.

Except that asj had a poll asking about predictions of the ratios, and most of the people picked 3:1 or higher. So, actually alot of BD supporters didnt think it would drop much at all.

HD DVD has now been regaining market share for how many straight weeks?

2? After a spike of 4.5:1, I don't think many were predicting Blu-ray to go higher... at least not before it went lower.
Except that asj had a poll asking about predictions of the ratios, and most of the people picked 3:1 or higher. So, actually alot of BD supporters didnt think it would drop much at all.

UxiSXRD picked 4-5:1 (though this was for Mar 31).

Sales ratio will be 4-5 to 1 for Blu-ray

AaronSCH, asj2006, benficadvd, Cryptopsy, DavidHir, dominica, Dralt, Earz, joshmanley, pcostabel, stand_1998, tindizzle, UxiSXRD, videopainter

14

8.43%

How come we got these sales numbers ? Shouldn't it have gone down ?

4/15/2007 31,034
4/22/2007 34,635I didn't follow the group buy day for Blu-ray (on the 21st I think) all that closely, but maybe it had some impact. If people were buying on Amazon then I wouldn't expect many of the discs to ship during that week, unless Amazon got some out on that Saturday.

--Darin

We knew Smokin' Aces had done exceptionally well on SD DVD:

Universal Studios Home Entertainment’s Smokin’ Aces burned up the national DVD sales and rental charts the week ended April 22, finishing first on both the Nielsen VideoScan First Alert sales chart and Home Media Magazine’s rental chart.

Studio sources peg first-week sales of the Ryan Reynolds/Jeremy Piven actioner at 1.5 million units, making it a decided overperformer given its $35.6 million theatrical gross. That translates to about $25 million in consumer spending, not counting an additional $6.7 million in rental revenue.

http://www.homemediamagazine.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10579

When was the Blu-ray coordinated buy? I don't think it'd have a huge impact, but its impact will be greater than zero.

I also wonder how much Planet Earth will skew the numbers.

I'll predict an overall advantage of ~1.4:1 for Blu-ray over HD DVD for the month of April.

EDIT: I see above that the Blu-ray buy was April 21. So, we may see most of its impact in the week ending April 29 (or later). That may balance out the Planet Earth HD DVD sales to a certain extent.

I guess had BB not pulled off their usual - we don't stock HD DVDs on release week stunt in many areas we would have probably seen higher HD DVD sales.
Is that really a problem for most people? I can only speak for my area but I don't usually have a problem finding new HD DVDs at BB the day of release. I know Smokin' Aces was available at all of the BBs in my area on the day of, several days after, and is still in stock now.

I think this week's ratio helps to prove the theory that newer movies are what will really drive sales. A lot of folks on the HD DVD side were saying to give them content
and we would see their sales rise. It looks like, on the surface, that this is what is going on. Next week, if we see the Blu-ray ratio pull farther away from HD DVD, that will be another point towards proving this theory.

I went to two Best Buys this week looking for the SPiderman 3 BD demo disc. Both of them had the new releases for HD DVD out. Actually the display is much better than the last time I looked at the BD/HD DVD section months ago. It is well organized now and they are in an aisle right across from each other. Both formats has a similar number of discs on display. I suppose the fact that they are enclosing all the BD/HD DVDs in anti theft cases that need to be removed at the checkout is the reason the section is so neat and organized now. But the section in both stores is marked and easy to find. Neither format was given prominence over the other.

In case anyone has been wondering about my relative silence since Friday's numbers release, I'm tinkering with yet (another!) version of my spreadsheet that will allow for reverse projections when weekly numbers are present. Stay tuned (might take a day or two).

Is that really a problem for most people? I can only speak for my area but I don't usually have a problem finding new HD DVDs at BB the day of release. I know Smokin' Aces was available at all of the BBs in my area on the day of, several days after, and is still in stock now.

I think this week's ratio helps to prove the theory that newer movies are what will really drive sales. A lot of folks on the HD DVD side were saying to give them content
and we would see their sales rise. It looks like, on the surface, that this is what is going on. Next week, if we see the Blu-ray ratio pull farther away from HD DVD, that will be another point towards proving this theory.

I guess it could be a regional thing then. Last year I was buying ALL my disks from BB, now I end up buying ALL at Amazon. I tried to get Smokin Aces at BB/CC since I hadn't ordered it....but the BB closest to me - has 2X the space for HD DVD v. BD, however, most of it is catalog titles. They do sell many A-2 players though and have the 4 free disk offer (last time I checked). This is one of the highest grossing BB nationwide (or so I am told :))

I have no problem finding HD DVDs and BDs at HMV, Best Buy, Wal-Mart, or Future Shop. (I'm in Toronto.) For the above stores, the space given is similar for HD DVD and Blu-ray. However, they're still usually cheaper in the US at Amazon.com with the 10% deal, even after shipping is added in, so I've gotten many from Amazon.com.

P.S. Pricing locally on combos is totally outrageous. Often over CAD$40 (US$36). I don't like paying the premium on combos at Amazon.com either. Thus, I rarely buy them. The only one I own is Fearless.

In case anyone has been wondering about my relative silence since Friday's numbers release, I'm tinkering with yet (another!) version of my spreadsheet that will allow for reverse projections when weekly numbers are present. Stay tuned (might take a day or two). Take the time and do it right.

You support and effort has been amazing.

Good work Ice. Thanks :)

I didn't follow the group buy day for Blu-ray (on the 21st I think) all that closely, but maybe it had some impact. If people were buying on Amazon then I wouldn't expect many of the discs to ship during that week, unless Amazon got some out on that Saturday.

I doubt the 21st group buy would have an impact on the week ending 22nd.

And in any case, even the bigger HD DVD group buy only did 2K or less titles. I expect BD group buy to have lesser impact (does anyone know the numbers ?).

This is something that we have commented on - but can't get an answer to. Every week numbers for BD & HD DVD go up and down in unison. Earlier we used to think it could be a problem with out estimates - but we see that Videoscan numbers do go up and down together. Even when though the releases are not always in unison.

I agree with that. Although it always seems to be near the top in any event, so perhaps sticky status is not necessary.

Patrick: I think the point is that if it is locked 3-4 days a week then it will be hard to find after the closed period. Obviously right now it is always near the top, but the discussion was about closing it for a few days


PS add my vote to the idea

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5594/nielsenhidefxp5.gif

So it was not the best week for HD DVD but one of the worst for BD (that kind of makes sense considering the releases)

So it was not the best week for HD DVD but the worst for BD (that kind of makes sense considering the releases)

Actually second worst for BD & the second best for HD in terms of actual numbers. In terms of ratio ofcourse the best for HD DVD.

thanks Nataraj, I corrected it.

my post was a bit of a response to Kosty that said HD DVD is doing well because it is narrowing the weekly market ration. In essence BD has had a bad month. That is why HD DVD has come close in numbers. In reality that is bad news for all of us. It is the third lowest disk sales with the previous week being the worst

PS can you add a total (HD disks)?

PS can you add a total (HD disks)?

Good idea. Will do.

Anybody notice that its bad for HD when BD sales fall, but good when it rises?

Anybody notice that its bad for HD when BD sales fall, but good when it rises?

Yep. Thats what I was talking about in my post above ...

Every week numbers for BD & HD DVD go up and down in unison

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5594/nielsenhidefxp5.gif

So it was not the best week for HD DVD but one of the worst for BD (that kind of makes sense considering the releases) It does show the volatility of the Blu-ray volumes. They do seem release related.

But what's real curious is that HD DVD seems to (since Jan at least) been not vary release related during the first ten weeks with a basic sales floor that has only been peaked above that baseline with the new releases.

That may very well be indicative of the big hit blockbuster versus big catalog titles strategies of the two camps and may show the bias and impact of the PS3 base that is the majority of current PS3 users.

Accumulating new standalone sales may steadily lift that HD DVD baseline floor over time while Blu-ray may always have an advantage in bigger peaks but suffer from bigger drops as their big hit sales attrit.

HD DVD 's hope is that increasing standalone sales volumes with higher associated attach rates raise that steady floor up and the occasional peaks pop up.

Perfectly consistent with both format's strategies.

That's kinda interesting to see.

It does show the volatility of the Blu-ray volumes.

don't forget BD has larger sales.

if you look at the high and lows

BD ~ 65 -30
HD DVD ~ 35 -12

HD DVD most likely has fluctuated more (It is hard to see on the graph), both were one week with 1/2 as many as an other

even though I agree that BD is a bit easier to understand (based on release schedule) I think the difference is in the user. I more or less buy every week, when there is nothing good I look a bit more in the older titles, in the end I want to rebuild a decent library so I buy what is important (when there is too much) and when there is nothing I look at titles that I left behind on the other weeks. If we assume ½ the BD support is like me (AV fan) and the rest are PS3 then a good title will draw out many more sales and what you most likely have for the rest is a small kernel of nuts.

It does show the volatility of the Blu-ray volumes. They do seem release related.

But what's real curious is that HD DVD seems to (since Jan at least) been not vary release related during the first ten weeks with a basic sales floor that has only been peaked above that baseline with the new releases.

That may very well be indicative of the big hit blockbuster versus big catalog titles strategies of the two camps and may show the bias and impact of the PS3 base that is the majority of current PS3 users.

To me they seem very similar:
- both have a floor: HD DVD at about 12,000 and BD at about 30,000
- their variability on a relative (percentage) basis is very similar
In fact, the biggest percentage increase was for HD DVD and the biggest percentage decrease (of about 30%) was shared.

I do believe that HD DVD has more 'catalogue' customers (just looking at titles that sell) but the catalogue sales are so small that they don't really show up on this graph. Moreover, as HD DVD grows, that will change and they will become more similar. And I have the vague impression that catalogue titles are already becoming less important to HD DVD.

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5594/nielsenhidefxp5.gif

So it was not the best week for HD DVD but one of the worst for BD (that kind of makes sense considering the releases)


This pretty much shows that only big blockbuster releases will significantly increase sales volumes per week (which pretty much invalidates the "catalog titles" will sell tactic of Hd-DVD). Both camps over the last 4 months are relatively stable in terms of unit sales per week EXCEPT for those times when Blu-ray had big releases (like Casino Royale), with Blu-ray holding the edge every week by margins that fluctuate based on the release schedule (e.g. April was pretty lean for BD and it shows in the sales per week).

I do believe that HD DVD has more 'catalogue' customers (just looking at titles that sell) ....

I don't think that is really true - or rather I can't come to the conclusion looking at the detailed numbers we got from Videoscan (thr' sony) until 18th.

I'd like to see someone prove this using the data we have (the spreadsheet is attached a few dozen pages back - or I can attach it again).

This pretty much shows that only big blockbuster releases will significantly increase sales volumes per week (which pretty much invalidates the "catalog titles" will sell tactic of Hd-DVD). Both camps over the last 4 months are relatively stable in terms of unit sales per week EXCEPT for those times when Blu-ray had big releases (like Casino Royale), with Blu-ray holding the edge every week by margins that fluctuate based on the release schedule (e.g. April was pretty lean for BD and it shows in the sales per week).

One of the best selling HD DVDs is Apollo 13, so don't rule them out

February 13. The Departed released. HD DVD sales that week were over 30,000

March 6, 13 and 20 had no HD DVD releases. HD DVD sales that week were under 20,000.

March 27. Three new day-and-date theatrical releases: Children of Men, Happy Feet and March of the Penguins. Sales again over 30,000.

April 3. One new release (Good Shepherd). Sales drop, but still over 20,000.

April 10. No new releases, and three catalog releases. Sales drop further to just about 20,000.

April 17. Three new releases (Smokin' Aces, Feast and School for Schoundrels). Sales jump above 30,000.

One of the best selling HD DVDs is Apollo 13, so don't rule them out

Apollo 13 was released on April 25, 2006. Limited title choice at the time boosted sales of available titles beyond what they would usually get.

April 17. Three new releases (Smokin' Aces, Feast and School for Schoundrels). Sales jump above 30,000.

But, why did BD go up as well (though by a small amount) ?

But, why did BD go up as well (though by a small amount) ?

Maybe the counter-buy drive by BD fanboys on amazon? ;)

Apollo 13 was released on April 25, 2006. Limited title choice at the time boosted sales of available titles beyond what they would usually get.

I think all well doing catalog titles (Movie release more than 2 years back ?) were in the first wave. For both HD DVD (Serenity, POTO etc) and BD (5E).

Actually , I think HD DVD has regained market share for the last four straight weeks if we calculate out the weekly percentages.True, but if HD DVD drops next week in the Nielsen sales ratio would that mean that it lost market share? Also with the lack of new Fox titles (except one) over the past month, the increase in the number of new Universal titles, and the lowering of HD DVD player prices it isn't surprising that HD DVD has been doing better recently.

Also with the lack of new Fox titles (except one) over the past month, the increase in the number of new Universal titles, and the lowering of HD DVD player prices it isn't surprising that HD DVD has been doing better recently.

No, given those factors, it isn't surprising. I don't think anyone is saying that it is. It's just a fact.

True, but if HD DVD drops next week in the Nielsen sales ratio would that mean that it lost market share? Also with the lack of new Fox titles (except one) over the past month, the increase in the number of new Universal titles, and the lowering of HD DVD player prices it isn't surprising that HD DVD has been doing better recently. Yes it would mean a drop in market share for that week.

February 13. The Departed released. HD DVD sales that week were over 30,000

March 6, 13 and 20 had no HD DVD releases. HD DVD sales that week were under 20,000.

March 27. Three new day-and-date theatrical releases: Children of Men, Happy Feet and March of the Penguins. Sales again over 30,000.

April 3. One new release (Good Shepherd). Sales drop, but still over 20,000.

April 10. No new releases, and three catalog releases. Sales drop further to just about 20,000.

April 17. Three new releases (Smokin' Aces, Feast and School for Schoundrels). Sales jump above 30,000.This does support the proposition that those releases are raising HD DVD off a base floor of sales.

But HD DVD strategy is to sell a low more standalone players and steadily increase that base week after week and more and more disc sales from an expanding base of owners.

Over time, they expect to raise that sales floor or base market share so it surpasses Blu-ray sales over the long term.

I guess it could be a regional thing then. Last year I was buying ALL my disks from BB, now I end up buying ALL at Amazon. I tried to get Smokin Aces at BB/CC since I hadn't ordered it....but the BB closest to me - has 2X the space for HD DVD v. BD, however, most of it is catalog titles. They do sell many A-2 players though and have the 4 free disk offer (last time I checked). This is one of the highest grossing BB nationwide (or so I am told :))

I don't think it's regional at all but a concerted BB effort to not offer the new HD DVD releases on time and sometimes never (example : Dog Day Afternoon, Bullit, Getaway, NIN, a lot of recent releases never made it to my 2 local BB stores, CoM only made it 2 or 3 weeks later, etc). Either they didn't want people to get those during the "buy an A2, get 4 HD DVDs free" deal, to push people to dig into the old stock, or they have an ulterior motive.

April 29th - Home Media Magazine:

http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom042907/

not sure if anyone posted this but according to http://www.blurayfreak.com/ "Casino Royale" is the Blu-ray movies' leader with 59 000 copies sold

Saw an intersting tidbit while following your links, Anthony.

A articles talking about NPD numbers said the Xbox 360 add on was the best selling HD DVD player out here. So we know at least the Xbox 360 HD DVD drive has more numbers than the HD A2 or vice versa.

I don't think it's regional at all but a concerted BB effort to not offer the new HD DVD releases on time and sometimes never (example : Dog Day Afternoon, Bullit, Getaway, NIN, a lot of recent releases never made it to my 2 local BB stores, CoM only made it 2 or 3 weeks later, etc). Either they didn't want people to get those during the "buy an A2, get 4 HD DVDs free" deal, to push people to dig into the old stock, or they have an ulterior motive.
Some people don't understand why folks shop at Wal-Mart. I'm more confused why any one would shop at BB! :eek:

Saw an intersting tidbit while following your links, Anthony.

A articles talking about NPD numbers said the Xbox 360 add on was the best selling HD DVD player out here. So we know at least the Xbox 360 HD DVD drive has more numbers than the HD A2 or vice versa.

Kosty, that is interesting? I thought we all new it and took it for granted. Just for NA There were almost 100k add-ons last year and SI there are around 100k standalones. Obviously there are more add-ons then A2, even if no add-ons sold this year (that would be hard to beleive)

Well, I think by end of April, we will see numbers like 150,000 HD DVD standalones for NA. just saw a link of a report of 250,000 HD DVD standalone worldwide, not including Xbox 360 add on.

Me thinks the "more than "100,000 threshold announcement was a low understated volume for that press release, so they could have an excuse to send it out at the start of the 2nd quarter and say good momentum things about HD DVD.

There might be 100,000 HD A2s sold by end of April. Last reported number I saw for the Xbox 360 add on was 112,000, but thats probably up over 150,000 or more by now.

Betcha that was based on Feb 2007 NPD numbers, and that April and May NA NPD sales numbers will show 50-75,000 more units sold, for over 150,000 units. And NPD probably is a bit low as they have to estimate guys like VE so they might be only 80-90% of real sales.

IMHO obviously. I would like to see NPD numbers myself for Feb, Mar and April.

Here is a link from a post earlier in this [Wal-Mart- Fuh Yun] thread by Grubert

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/toshiba-plans-sell-3-million/story.aspx?guid=%7BC6B36082-CD9C-4501-894B-518D2F172C36%7D

Toshiba ... 250,000 units it sold during the just-ended business year (March 2007).

TOKYO (MarketWatch) -- Toshiba Corp. ...aims to sell about 3 million HD DVD players for this fiscal year ending March 2008, a 12-fold increase from the 250,000 units it sold during the just-ended business year. Note: Sold in that context may mean shipped out to retailers, not sold to consumers yet. But if orders are unfufilled they all are assumed to be sold and off Toshiba's books.

Come on ...you seriously think HD DVD will take the lead with the help of Planet Earth? Amazon rankings is NOT the end all as you made it out to be.

You do have somewhat of a point as I bought Planet Earth and Matrix direct from the Warner online store wonder which demographic they cater to and are Warners numbers reflected in the totals.

Any one else surprised on how well that Planet Earth has held up in the Amazon top 10 ratings for both formats, and what possible impact that will have or foreshadow in the Nielson/Videoscan numbers? (currently Blu-ray #8, HD DVD #5).

That a rank of #5 and #8 of all DVD's sold at Amazon. That has to be noticeable volume by itself in the Nielson/Videoscan numbers just by Amazon being a first alert vendor. But it may also may reflect Planet Earth's sales volume at other retailers.

And since PE probably has been seen by many on HD cable or sat, what does it day that a lot of people are willing to spend $70 or more for a box set of something they just saw on HDTV. Does that bode well for future current catalog releases in HD that are re-watchable? Isn't that why people buy DVD's instead of renting , in the first place, to re-watch them?

And since PE probably has been seen by many on HD cable or sat, what does it day that a lot of people are willing to spend $70 or more for a box set of something they just saw on HDTV. Does that bode well for future current catalog releases in HD that are re-watchable? Isn't that why people buy DVD's instead of renting , in the first place, to re-watch them?

Here is the perspective of someone who never buys / re-watches anything on "TV". I got one of the discs of planet earth on rental. I quickly figured out that it is not something that can be rented and watched ... too many episodes.

I think the same holds for any TV serial as well - either you buy them or watch them on TV (using DVR).

That's a great point.

Its not rental friendly.

Its also amazing demo material and if you have kids its like the best natural history program ever made.

The sales of this at this price have to be encouraging to the studios.

How's the Blu-ray and HD DVD sales compared to the standard DVD version?

Is it even available in standard DVD?

Is it even available in standard DVD?

It's been the #1 seller at Amazon for weeks... ;)

I quickly figured out that it is not something that can be rented and watched ... too many episodes.

I think the same holds for any TV serial as well - either you buy them or watch them on TV (using DVR).
I disagree completely. I love renting tv shows. The box sets are usually quite expensive and most I'll only watch once. It is a lot more discs to get through, but if you are on something like Netflix and BB All Access it isn't a big deal. I do own quite a few seasons of tv shows as well, but I would be indebt to my eyeballs if I owned all of them that I've watched on DVD.

I disagree completely. I love renting tv shows. The box sets are usually quite expensive and most I'll only watch once. It is a lot more discs to get through, but if you are on something like Netflix and BB All Access it isn't a big deal. I do own quite a few seasons of tv shows as well, but I would be indebt to my eyeballs if I owned all of them that I've watched on DVD.

I guess, it does not seem to work for me, then.

Essentially it is boring for me to watch the episodes one after the other - even once in a couple of days. That would mean, I'd be spending almost as much rental money if I watch all the episodes of all the discs as buying (or in other words I'd spend so much money renting that I'd rather pay a little more and buy) - may be BB works better - this is for netflix.

We can check this by comparing top rental and sell-through titles.

Yeah the only series I own are anime series. My SO likes to buy some of the old 80s sitcom series. I did buy Sledgehammer Season 1 since that always tickled my sense of humor. :D

I am most interested and will buy HD boxed sets of the HBO series. I'm most interested in Band of Brothers, Rome, and the earlier Sopranos seasons. Lots of rewatchability in those. ;)

I have a used DVD store that I buy some TV boxed sets from. But I tried renting some series from my local B&M store and from Netflix. Couldn't really make that work. Having the box set is much better.

I disagree completely. I love renting tv shows. The box sets are usually quite expensive and most I'll only watch once. It is a lot more discs to get through, but if you are on something like Netflix and BB All Access it isn't a big deal. I do own quite a few seasons of tv shows as well, but I would be indebt to my eyeballs if I owned all of them that I've watched on DVD.

I agree completely with you. My Netflix Queue is 90% TV shows and 10% Blu-ray movies. I quickly found that with the exception of a select few TV show seasons, they were not something I was interested in watching over and over. Netflix works perfectly for scratching the itch without burning the pocket.

I may try that again. I want to see a lot of old classic TV shows but I don't really want to buy most as once I watch them in sequence once I'll probably be done with them for a while.

That's a great point.

Its not rental friendly.

Its also amazing demo material and if you have kids its like the best natural history program ever made.

The sales of this at this price have to be encouraging to the studios.

How's the Blu-ray and HD DVD sales compared to the standard DVD version?

Is it even available in standard DVD?

That's what Netflix is for. You can keep the rental disc as long as you want.

This chart seems to show very clearly what I have been saying since December.

BD got a boost in software sales from the PS3 Christmas launch, but the "curiosity purchases" by PS3 owners has tailed off now and although the "50% sale" helped numbers temporarily, BD softare sales are now finding their true level.

Meanwhile, HD DVD player sales are outpacing BD player sales, and HD DVD software sales continue a gradual, overall, increase. HD DVD is certainly catching up quite quickly to BD and will pass BD sales again in the near future. They will swap around more frequently in the coming months, but HD DVD is taking the lead again overall.

Mark my words...

Next week's numbers will show BD taking a larger share again, of course, but not nearly as large as before, and it will continue to slide lower after every see-saw. What I am saying will almost certainly be shown to reflect what is happening here...

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5594/nielsenhidefxp5.gif

So it was not the best week for HD DVD but one of the worst for BD (that kind of makes sense considering the releases)

Looks good...

That chart is consistent with the new PS3 purchasers redeeming their 7 (IIRC) or so $10 off coupons in the month or so after their purchase. If they don't continue buying movies after those rebate coupons expire, we would see the rise in Blu-ray sales flatten and eventually fall. We may be even to start seeing that now.

Sustainment of Blu-ray disc purchases by those PS3 Blu-ray users over time without those incentives is a big question.

Ah thanks for reminding me. I haven't redeemed mine yet. Probably this month... have a couple more I can get from the list.

That chart is consistent with the new PS3 purchasers redeeming their 7 (IIRC) or so $10 off coupons in the month or so after their purchase.Might have had some effect, but you might want to look at whether the top titles for those other weeks were eligible for those rebates (I know some like to call them coupons even though the UPC had to be cut out for each movie and sent in) before concluding that this explains things there. Looks to me like it follows the quality and quantity of releases quite a bit. New owners in general may pick up more older releases in their first month or two owning a new player than later on, even without incentives. Here is the list of eligible movies for the $10 rebate for PS3 owners:

http://www.blu-raymovierebate.com/ps_movies.html

The last time that I see any of those movies in the top 4 was February 11th, when "Underworld: Evolution" was the 2nd best selling title for the week. After that "Superman Returns" made it to #5 for a couple of weeks.

I wouldn't call the things included with the PS3 "$10 off coupons". I think we've been over this before. They are $10 mail-in rebates.

--Darin