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...

oh yeah crystall ball owner :) marking your words, yeah BD sales are finding true level, :) you make my day with HD DVD taking the leads overall again :)

It will be funny to read this thread in coming weeks...

Looks good...

you mean HD DVD with 3 new day and date titles and no one day and date title for Blu-ray ? even with that HD DVD was not able to sell more discs...

M.

Initial post updated.

BTW, in accordance to my proposal of a few days ago, if there are no objections I shall ask markrubin to close this thread at 0900 EDT (1300 UTC) and reopen it on Friday at the same time.

This chart seems to show very clearly what I have been saying since December.Actually rdjam what you said in early December was that the PS3 wouldn't have much of an effect on the format war. When that turned out to be wrong only than did you start saying that the PS3 effect would only be temporary.

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. That is indeed the more accurate term. My bad.

Actually rdjam what you said in early December was that the PS3 wouldn't have much of an effect on the format war. When that turned out to be wrong only than did you start saying that the PS3 effect would only be temporary.Here is something he said related to this subject on February 13th (the day that "The Departed" came out on both formats):

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9762306#post9762306
The Bluray camp seems to be getting more and more desperate these days.

The PS3 launch did not reverse the HD DVD sales advantage like they thought it would, and the PS3 sales have slowed down dramatically. Yet when there are releases to both formats, HD DVD sales continue to outpace BR sales.And some stuff from February 9th, right after a $5 off deal on Amazon that they revoked for some orders later (supporting that it was a loophole or mistake) resulted in HD DVD getting the lead for top 10 on Amazon back temporarily:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9731702&&#post9731702
What the Top 100 chart shows is simply that Bluray Player sales (including the PS3) outsold HD player sales recently (ie Christmas). What the "Top 10" chart shows, is that HD DVD owners are STILL a bigger buying force than Bluray owners.

If Ten new titles came out on each format tomorrow morning - the HD DVD versions would handily outsell the BR versions.

In this vein, the release of "The Departed" on HD and BR next week will be an acid test - I maintain that the HD DVD version WILL outsell the BD version.

P.S. - I'm sure many will remember the predictions that BD sales would also fall away after the initial curiosity of PS3 owners waned...If a person predicts that something will fall, odds are high that at some point they will be able to say, "I told you so". And I've even left out later predictions that didn't come true in the time claimed.

If you look at that post from February 9th, you will see that rdjam made some interesting claims about what being ahead in the top 10 meant. All because of the little blip for HD DVD (after the Amazon $5 deal that HD DVD owners seemed to try to take advantage of in greater quantities) that can be seen for February 9th in the attached image.

--Darin

This is getting rediculous. Some people are bragging about sales stats as if they have made a personal accomplishment.

Feel satisfied because YOU WIN!!!

Just for fun, let's try to guess the score for the week ending April 29:

Releases of the week:

HD DVD
Antarctica Dreaming
Digital Video Essentials (DVD International)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Universal)
Failure to Launch (Paramount)
The Nutty Professor (1996) (Universal)
Planet Earth: The Complete Series (BBC)

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

I say 62/38.

Just for fun, let's try to guess the score for the week ending April 29:

Releases of the week:

HD DVD
Antarctica Dreaming
Digital Video Essentials (DVD International)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Universal)
Failure to Launch (Paramount)
The Nutty Professor (1996) (Universal)
Planet Earth: The Complete Series (BBC)

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

I say 62/38.

I say 68/32, Night at the Museum will be big winner ..... with The Queen and Deja Vu close behind.....

M.

AVS received a suggestion that seems worth a try:

Considering sales information gets released in the weekend, we propose that the thread stay closed between Tuesday morning and Friday morning.
Once the new information has been posted and discussed, it's best to 'adjourn' the meeting.

The thread can easily be reopened: just PM me or hit report post: let's try this and see how it works.

Meeting adjourned

sticky

reopened ;)

Thanks, Mark. :)

It seems we get some early info this week!

From Reuters/ Hollywood Reporter (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070502/media_nm/dvd_dc_1):

"Museum" leads DVD charts in first week

[...]

High-definition disc sales for the week were 71% Blu-ray Disc and 29% HD DVD, with Blu-ray sales bolstered by the fact that "Museum" was available exclusively on that format.

So, 71:29, or 2.4:1.

Remarkably consistent.


I say 68/32, Night at the Museum will be big winner ..... with The Queen and Deja Vu close behind.....
Hmmm... Pretty good guess.

That is definitely interesting. With how strong Planet Earth has been on the Amazon sales charts, it still couldn't beat out NATM. Amazon continues to be the anomaly.

Hmmm... Pretty good guess.

Yes, much better than my own 62/38. I had underestimated Night at the Museum... and probably overestimated Smokin' Aces's legs.

We still don't know the new YTD and SI percentages, which will offer us an insight into actual volumes.

And what pecentage of sales are these Videoscan results based on? It would be nice if they included as many locations as possible. It's like the Neilson TV ratings. The real ratings are usually different than what they actually show since they can't get the actual numbers of people watching.

That is definitely interesting. With how strong Planet Earth has been on the Amazon sales charts, it still couldn't beat out NATM. Amazon continues to be the anomaly.

That's right.

http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/1442/pebdnatstl3.jpg

Planet Earth (Blu-ray) has consistently and substantially ranked above Night at the Museum (Blu-ray) at amazon (and it's been #100 or better for a month before release date). But at the end of the day (or the week), Night at the Museum was #1.

Yes, much better than my own 62/38. I had underestimated Night at the Museum... and probably overestimated Smokin' Aces's legs.

We still don't know the new YTD and SI percentages, which will offer us an insight into actual volumes.

I figured Museum was going to rule the roost, it's a big CGI effects romp with Stiller, Wilson, and Williams. It's also been advertised almost as much as the theatrical release.

It's also an all-ages thing.

Looking back...

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

Some scenarios:

HD DVD 20,000 - BD 49,000
HD DVD 25,000 - BD 61,000
HD DVD 30,000 - BD 73,500
HD DVD 30,000 - BD 85,700

That's right.

http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/1442/pebdnatstl3.jpg

Planet Earth (Blu-ray) has consistently and substantially ranked above Night at the Museum (Blu-ray) at amazon (and it's been #100 or better for a month before release date). But at the end of the day (or the week), Night at the Museum was #1.
Unless I missed something (entirely possible), I didn't see it stated that NatM on BR beat out PE on HD-DVD. I just see overall sales up 71:29 in favor of BR for the week.

BTW, thank you for making this thread a sticky and leaving it open... there's some very good (and interesting) discussion in this thread. :)

Unless I missed something (entirely possible), I didn't see it stated that NatM on BR beat out PE on HD-DVD. I just see overall sales up 71:29 in favor of BR for the week.

No, I'm positing that NatM on BD beat out PE on BD (it does not say it explicitly on the news post but reading between the lines, that's what I concluded - though I might be wrong).

My bad, I didn't notice you were comparing both on BR.

Yeah, I thought NATM would do OK, simply because there wasn't much else (besides PE) out there. However, I thought PE would do better on Blu-ray than it appears to have done, but it didn't. Perhaps it is the demographic of the group (PS3 owners) as others have suggested.

NATM is not a movie I'd personally buy myself. I got dragged to see it by my GF, and it met my low expectations. However, YMMV. :p

Also, given the Amazon stats, it'd be interesting to how Planet Earth HD DVD did against Night at the Museum on BD.

So, 71:29, or 2.4:1.
Unfortunately, we only have 71:29 for the week, but nothing on YTD or SI. I still have to wait for HMM to estimate the unit volumes for the week.

I am hoping that the volumes for them both combined to go up over last week.

NatM is a family movie that people should be interested in gauging how well it does since it could (possibly?) accelerate or slow down family movies in the pipeline.

Also, given the Amazon stats, it'd be interesting to how Planet Earth HD DVD did against Night at the Museum on BD.

That's difficult to know because we aren't given a two-format best-selling table where we know the relative sales of each title.

But I have read that last week Night at the Museum SD DVD had worse amazon rankings than Planet Earth (both SD DVD and HD DVD).

That's difficult to know because we aren't given a two-format best-selling table where we know the relative sales of each title.

But I have read that last week Night at the Museum SD DVD had worse amazon rankings than Planet Earth (both SD DVD and HD DVD).
It's not the first time that amazon rankings don't match any of the mainstream rankings for DVDs or HDMs. It should be clear by now that the people buying from amazon are very different from the general owners of movies SD or HDM.

That is definitely interesting. With how strong Planet Earth has been on the Amazon sales charts, it still couldn't beat out NATM. Amazon continues to be the anomaly.

That it is. I expect most of planet earth sales to have been at cheaper places like Amazon. I don't think places like BB sell much of titles like planet eatch.

BTW, nataraj (and Icemage if he reads this):

Would it be possible to chart/graph the 4-week sales? It's very difficult to see any trend with such volatility.

Not surprising leaked or early released data favoring Blu-ray gets shopped out early. ;)

waaah, I know sour grapes. :p

Much stronger, first alert number wise for Blu-ray that I expected. I wonder if the final numbers close the gap somewhat. But will we ever know, since we don't get those final numbers right?

It will be interesting next week if the gap closes again. If it does then this may be a reporting anamoly.

Very good showing for Blu-ray and for NATM title's showing.

When we get the HMM numbers, and YTD and SI numbers, we can calculate out the volumes right?

Is it possible that since Amazon sold out of Planet Earth, (IIRC for both formats) that those numbers were not reflected in these Nielson/Videoscan stats and will show up in next weeks rankings?

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://img251.imageshack.us/img251/2608/ratiogp6.gif

Actually, 71% is the third largest share of the year, surpassed only by the two Casino Royale weeks.

With the Warner reshuffle, there is now another dead week for HD DVD on May 8th. The numbers from that week should look very similar to this week, if not worse.

Blu-ray New Releases:
* Catch & Release (Sony)
* Dirty Dancing (Lionsgate)
* Donnie Brasco (Sony)
* Revenge (Sony)

HD DVD New Releases:
* None

Grubert,

Don't know if you would know this.

Other than waiting for the online version of HMM to come out, are there earlier releases sent out? Is there a subscription? :D

Thanks, Mark. :)

It seems we get some early info this week!

From Reuters/ Hollywood Reporter (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070502/media_nm/dvd_dc_1):

Lets keep that number climbing and get rid of one of these formats - and so far BD has the quicker path to achieve that....lets get that puppy to be 80/20 on a weekly basis and put one of these out to pasture.

With the Warner reshuffle, there is now another dead week for HD DVD on May 8th. The numbers from that week should look very similar to this week, if not worse.

Blu-ray New Releases:
* Catch & Release (Sony)
* Dirty Dancing (Lionsgate)
* Donnie Brasco (Sony)
* Revenge (Sony)

HD DVD New Releases:
* None

And if you count new, day and date releases only, there are going to be a lot of dead weeks for HD DVD.

It appears this weeks figures again show the power of day and date releases (Museum, Deja, etc) over catalog titles.

Lets keep that number climbing and get rid of one of these formats - and so far BD has the quicker path to achieve that....lets get that puppy to be 80/20 on a weekly basis and put one of these out to pasture.
That was Sony's gameplan, but obviously it hasn't worked.

Anyways, the big battle will be in Q4 and beyond IMO. The numbers right now are too low.

For the week before last, Reuters reported 60% BD, 40% HD DVD, while the HMM numbers were 52% BD, 48% HD DVD:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10394953&&#post10394953

For last week, Reuters is reporting (in Grubert's link) 71% BD, 29% HD DVD, and by tomorrow evening the HMM numbers will be leaked.

We can also assume that the 3 weeks ago, the Reuters numbers were 69% BD, 31% HD DVD (since HD DVD gained 9 points the week after to 40 percent)

So basically:

Reuters numbers:

Last week: 71% BD, 29% HD DVD
Week before that: 60% BD, 40% HD DVD
Week before that: 69% BD, 31% HD DVD

For the week before last, Reuters reported 60% BD, 40% HD DVD, while the HMM numbers were 52% BD, 48% HD DVD:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10394953&&#post10394953

For last week, Reuters is reporting (in Grubert's link) 71% BD, 29% HD DVD, and by tomorrow evening the HMM numbers will be leaked.

We can also assume that the 3 weeks ago, the Reuters numbers were 69% BD, 31% HD DVD (since HD DVD gained 9 points the week after to 40 percent)

So basically:

Reuters numbers:

Last week: 71% BD, 29% HD DVD
Week before that: 60% BD, 40% HD DVD
Week before that: 69% BD, 31% HD DVD

Reuters numbers? That's a good one. Reuters are a news agency. They do not gather and distribute market data.


It will be interesting to see what Nielsen put out on Friday. I think it will indeed be 71:29. However, it's probably best to get confirmation before putting charts together.

i dont know if its been said or not, but im pretty sure that the amazon rankings take into account the value of the product. seeing as Planet Earth is $70, it takes far fewer sales to push it up over the $15-$30 products.

For the week before last, Reuters reported 60% BD, 40% HD DVD, while the HMM numbers were 52% BD, 48% HD DVD:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10394953&&#post10394953


The Reuters article was actually a Hollywood Reporter article, which was also written by Tom Arnold - no, not Roseanne's ex, but the HMM editor.

And it was a little confusing. It got much clearer when posted on HMM (http://www.homemediamagazine.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10579):


On the high-def front for the week ended April 15, Blu-ray Disc titles accounted for 60% of sales while HD DVD took 40%, nine points more than the previous week.



As fozziwig said, Reuters reports on Nielsen data.

Ah ok, that makes sense now.

We can also assume that the 3 weeks ago, the Reuters numbers were 69% BD, 31% HD DVD (since HD DVD gained 9 points the week after to 40 percent)It wouldn't surprise me at all if the reporter messed up and compared the weekly numbers for April 15th of 60/40 to the YTD number for April 8th (69.4/30.6).

--Darin

Grubert,

Don't know if you would know this.

Other than waiting for the online version of HMM to come out, are there earlier releases sent out? Is there a subscription? :D

Yes, there is a subscription, but they email you the link to the magazine on Monday so it's not much of an advantage. :)

It appears this weeks figures again show the power of day and date releases (Museum, Deja, etc) over catalog titles.
This really does seem to be true.

It looks like maybe the large PS3 base (who aren't necessarily regular movie purchasers) are buying the BD version of some new releases but skipping over less compelling titles or titles they already have on DVD. As opposed to HD-DVD owners or standalone BD owners who are more likely to buy more movies and even buy those that they already have on DVD.

This really does seem to be true.

It looks like maybe the large PS3 base (who aren't necessarily regular movie purchasers) are buying the BD version of some new releases but skipping over less compelling titles or titles they already have on DVD. As opposed to HD-DVD owners or standalone BD owners who are more likely to buy more movies and even buy those that they already have on DVD.
The HD DVD older catalog releases are not selling as well as the new releases either. The best selling HD DVDs are new releases. The only chance a catalog has is if it is new. Personally, I think the studios are as much to blame for milking their catalog gems too much. After you get the regular release, the EE, the special box set, the extra special box set with figurines and playing cards, it's going to be tough to get the same number of fans to continue to buy yet another version.

The record that catalogs don't do well is the same for both formats [the longer you go back, the less it will sell] (just look at Casablanca, one of the best movies ever made, and it barely sold 2000 disks)

Yes, there is a subscription, but they email you the link to the magazine on Monday so it's not much of an advantage. :)
That's unfortunate. I guess it's back to waiting for that link to HMM for 050507 to become active.

Casablanca was only 2000 disks sold? That's unfortunate. I saw it for the first time on HD and was overjoyed with it. It is now one of my favourite releases, on any format.

This really does seem to be true.

It looks like maybe the large PS3 base (who aren't necessarily regular movie purchasers) are buying the BD version of some new releases but skipping over less compelling titles or titles they already have on DVD. As opposed to HD-DVD owners or standalone BD owners who are more likely to buy more movies and even buy those that they already have on DVD.

I'm one of those. At 35+ BR titles and not a single re-buy. Not planning to either. (Except maybe the re-release of TFE. :)) I am buying classics too though, that's not in my current collection.

i dont know if its been said or not, but im pretty sure that the amazon rankings take into account the value of the product. seeing as Planet Earth is $70, it takes far fewer sales to push it up over the $15-$30 products.

Not true. If you follow the in stock numbers it's pretty evident that price has no influnce on rank.

Casablanca was only 2000 disks sold? That's unfortunate. I saw it for the first time on HD and was overjoyed with it. It is now one of my favourite releases, on any format.While it was very low up to the March 18th report, that title is included in the list of 5 free discs that people can send in for. So, it is hard to know how many got it from there. Still seems kind of sad that sales are as low as they are after the job Warner did on it and for such a classic. I still have a feeling that "The Wizard of Oz" would sell pretty well, although not like some of the day-and-date stuff.

--Darin

I'm one of those. At 35+ BR titles and not a single re-buy. Not planning to either. (Except maybe the re-release of TFE. :)) I am buying classics too though, that's not in my current collection.

The only DVD's I've redipped on in Blu-ray are Black Hawk Down and Pearl Harbor and I'm not sorry about them in the slightest. I stopped buying DVD well over a year ago and have mostly bought day/date new releases. The latest batch of my Blu-rays were ones I was even skipping in the theater (when I might normally have seen them there) like Casino Royale, Rocky Balboa, Night at the Museum. Only have to wait 2-3 months it seems and I can avoid the crowds and sticky floors, people on their cell phones, etc...

The HD DVD older catalog releases are not selling as well as the new releases either. The best selling HD DVDs are new releases. The only chance a catalog has is if it is new. Personally, I think the studios are as much to blame for milking their catalog gems too much. After you get the regular release, the EE, the special box set, the extra special box set with figurines and playing cards, it's going to be tough to get the same number of fans to continue to buy yet another version..

IMO people have become terribly myopic in taste. If something doesn't have some direct correlation to the decades of entertainment that they can easily relate to they give crap, and they aren't adventurous enough to experiment.

When I was a little kid not everyone even had color TV yet, cable was really rare and they would reach back a lot further for movies to broadcast. Combine that with a relative handful of channels and it just meant you got acclimated to films produced as far back as forty years rather than the fifteen-twenty maximum most will reach for now.

Lets keep that number climbing and get rid of HD DVD - so far BD has the quicker path to achieve that....lets get that puppy to be 80/20 on a weekly basis and put HD DVD out to pasture.

Here, if took the liberty of amending your post so that you would have to feign even a hint of neutrally by referring to HD DVD as "one of these formats. ;)

IMO people have become terribly myopic in taste.

Or perhaps the 2,000 people willing to buy Casablanca on HDDVD are terribly myopic in theirs? :shrug:



If something doesn't have some direct correlation to the decades of entertainment that they can easily relate to they give crap, and they aren't adventurous enough to experiment.


It sounds more like people don't expect a 60 year old movie to be visually attractive to market against newer fare... if not the fact that they already own it three times and even if they acknolwedge a slight superiority over their older (say DVD) print, they don't think it's an improvement enough to justify a double dip. I'd say the latter is far more reasonable than the former. Such thoughts have made me very picky over choosing catalog titles to buy on either Blu-ray or HDDVD that I already own on DVD.

The YTD (& SI) percentages given in HMM being rounded to nearest integer makes it difficult to estimate actual numbers. If I assume that last week YTD was really 68.0000:32.0000, then here's the weekly (BD:HD) numbers based on various changes.

68.0:32.0 - (0:0)
68.1:31.9 - (34,660:14,157) - bad
68.2:31.8 - (71,796:29,325) - ok
68.3:31.7 - (111,683:45,616) - unlikely
68.4:31.6 - (154,638:63,162) - yeah, right,
68.5:31.5 - (201,029:82,110) - :eek:
---

Assuming the YTD/SI numbers are based off the same numbers HMM gave for up till Mar31, I think the YTD ratio is going to be reported on HMM as 68:32 there is no way to cross 68.5:31.5 without "violation of physical laws". ;)

Unless of course the previous week's 68:32 YTD was closer 68.4:31.6 - which would screw up all the calculations, but could allow the YTD ratio to move up to 69:31 without too large a weekly unit sales.

(I'm assuming that weekly ratio is 71.0000:29.0000, but the numbers are close for changes in weekly --- it's the YTD that is difficult to move by 1%.)

That integer ratio for YTD is not enough to get actual sales numbers. If only they were kind enough to give two more decimals...

Or perhaps the 2,000 people willing to buy Casablanca on HDDVD are terribly myopic in theirs? :shrug:

Perhaps myopic isn't the best choice of words, I think people tend to gravitate toward the familiar, films with a different palette, pacing, acting and writing styles require an extension from the viewer.

A more extreme example would be getting used to the language of a Shakespeare play. It usually takes ten-fifteen minutes, then ya click in, but you have to meet it half way.

I have several movies from every era, they are all visually striking in their way, so I would never draw any "good enough for DVD" line in the sand. It would be based more on if I actually enjoy the film enough to watch it more than once or twice.

However, I'd never kid myself that Vertigo, The Third Man, or Once Upon A Time In The West will outsell A Night At The Museum :(

The YTD (& SI) percentages given in HMM being rounded to nearest integer makes it difficult to estimate actual numbers. If I assume that last week YTD was really 68.0000:32.0000, then here's the weekly (BD:HD) numbers based on various changes

.....

That integer ratio for YTD is not enough to get actual sales numbers. If only they were kind enough to give two more decimals...

Exactly what I've been saying. Infact we could have two weeks with exact same YTD/SI ratios. We will have to start assuming some decimal places soon ...

Here, if took the liberty of amending your post so that you would have to feign even a hint of neutrally by referring to HD DVD as "one of these formats. ;)

Your edit, not mine.

If HD DVD were up and had the quicker path, i would be all in for them...but they are not.

This war is to the point now where prices have come down enough to be more accessible, so the quicker we get to one format, the better IMHO. ;)

Perhaps myopic isn't the best choice of words, I think people tend to gravitate toward the familiar, films with a different palette, pacing, acting and writing styles require an extension from the viewer.

A more extreme example would be getting used to the language of a Shakespeare play. It usually takes ten-fifteen minutes, then ya click in, but you have to meet it half way.

I have several movies from every era, they are all visually striking in their way, so I would never draw any "good enough for DVD" line in the sand. It would be based more on if I actually enjoy the film enough to watch it more than once or twice.

However, I'd never kid myself that Vertigo, The Third Man, or Once Upon A Time In The West will outsell A Night At The Museum :(
The correct term is Presbyopic :D

More seriously though. Besides the largely symbollic tag of movie made "last century", some incredible movies are from the last century, if we think about it, it's human nature to not pay money to watch a movie made before they're born, even less people will want to watch something made before their parents were born :eek:

Exactly what I've been saying. Infact we could have two weeks with exact same YTD/SI ratios. We will have to start assuming some decimal places soon ...
If YTD ratio changes though, we will know at least that previous week's ratio was closer to 68.4:31.6 assuming 68.5 becomes 69:31.

Eventually, if the weekly ratio mostly go higher than YTD, eventually the fractions will add up and move it up, though we won't be able to get good estimates for the actual unit sales without knowing more decimals in YTD or SI ratios.

If YTD ratio changes though, we will know at least that previous week's ratio was closer to 68.4:31.6 assuming 68.5 becomes 69:31.

Eventually, if the weekly ratio mostly go higher than YTD, eventually the fractions will add up and move it up, though we won't be able to get good estimates for the actual unit sales without knowing more decimals in YTD or SI ratios.

What I mean is - we could get a week where YTD and SI ratios don't change - so we won't be able to calculate the numbers at all just based on weekly ratios ...

if we think about it, it's human nature to not pay money to watch a movie made before they're born, even less people will want to watch something made before their parents were born :eek:

Well, thats the nail on the head, and with the extreme proliferation of "specialized" content channels, you need never see something made less than ten years ago. Look how many truly rotten TV shows do a great biz on DVD, just because that's what is familiar.

When I was 9 nine you could see 40-year-old Laurel & Hardy shorts followed by 8 year old Brady Bunch episodes. You don't really get those kind of splits on one unified source now.

TOP HD DVD TITLES FOR WEEK ENDED 4/29/2007

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 PLANET EARTH: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION (BBC/WB, $99.98)
2 SMOKIN' ACES (UNI, $39.98)
3 CHILDREN OF MEN (UNI, $39.98)
4 HAPPY FEET (WB, $39.99)
5 ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (UNI, $29.98)
6 SUPERMAN RETURNS (WB, $39.99)
7 PAYBACK: DIRECTOR'S CUT (PAR, $29.99)
8 THE DEPARTED (WB, $39.99)
9 THE MUMMY RETURNS (UNI, $29.98)
10 THE GOOD SHEPHERD (UNI, $39.98)


TOP Blu-Ray TITLES FOR WEEK ENDED 4/29/2007

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM (FOX, $39.98)
2 PLANET EARTH: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION (BBC/WB, $99.98)
3 DEJA VU (BV, $34.99)
4 CASINO ROYALE (MGM/SONY, $38.96)
5 THE QUEEN (BV, $34.99)
6 THE DEPARTED (WB, $34.99)
7 HAPPY FEET (WB, $34.99)
8 THE PRESTIGE (BV, $34.99)
9 A SCANNER DARKLY (WB, $28.99)
10 BLACK HAWK DOWN (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.

New HD DVD entries: Planet Earth (1), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (5).
HD DVD releases that didn't make the top 10: Antarctica Dreaming, Digital Video Essentials, Failure to Launch, Nutty Professor.

New Blu-ray entries: Night at the Museum (1), Planet Earth (2), Deja Vu (3), The Queen (5).
Blu-ray releases that didn't make the top 10: Failure to Launch, Secret Window, Ultimate Avengers Collection.

Exactly what I've been saying. Infact we could have two weeks with exact same YTD/SI ratios. We will have to start assuming some decimal places soon ...

Actually that would have already happened. Just look at these two weeks:


02/25 68.5/31.5 67.4/32.6 51.5/48.5
03/04 65.7/34.3 67.2/32.8 52.2/47.8


which would round up to


02/25 69/31 67/33 52/48
03/04 66/34 67/33 52/48


:eek:

Neo are you a magician :)

i just checked the reuters report today

and guess what. it said 71% bluray and 29% HD-DVD.

http://www.reuters.com/article/industryNews/idUSN0242084220070503

High-definition disc sales for the week were 71% Blu-ray Disc and 29% HD DVD, with Blu-ray sales bolstered by the fact that "Museum" was available exclusively on that format.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

Originally Posted by Neo1965

if we think about it, it's human nature to not pay money to watch a movie made before they're born, even less people will want to watch something made before their parents were born

Well, thats the nail on the head, and with the extreme proliferation of "specialized" content channels, you need never see something made less than ten years ago. Look how many truly rotten TV shows do a great biz on DVD, just because that's what is familiar.

When I was 9 nine you could see 40-year-old Laurel & Hardy shorts followed by 8 year old Brady Bunch episodes. You don't really get those kind of splits on one unified source now.

Also, what is becoming clear is that even we HD-DVD enthusiasts are less inclined to replace large collections of older DVDs, partly because of the superlative upscaling ability of the Toshiba players, and also because the older movies were simply not produced so as to benefit as much from reissuing on HD as opposed to new movies conceived with HD in mind.

This is why the enthusiasm on the HD side for the "Walmart effect" must be tempered with the realization that without additional studio support, HD-DVD still occupies tenuous ground.

The real unanswered question is just what will it take to compel neutrality from even one studio. Will the BD/HD sales ratio really matter, or will the absolute sales dollar numbers for HD become the "carrot". Those that think the latter probably make a good point; just how big does that number have to be?

The real unanswered question is just what will it take to compel neutrality from even one studio. Will the BD/HD sales ratio really matter, or will the absolute sales dollar numbers for HD become the "carrot".

Fox just sold 6 million copies of Night at the Museum on SD in one week. The entire catalog of Blu-ray and HD DVD has sold maybe 2.5 million copies in one year. Weekly hidef sales are consistently well under 100,000.

Some carrot.

Financially, what studios should do is go neutral by not release anything at all in any of the hidef formats. Hey, come to think of it, that's more or less what Fox is doing... :D

Fox just sold 6 million copies of Night at the Museum on SD in one week. The entire catalog of Blu-ray and HD DVD has sold maybe 2.5 million copies in one year. Weekly hidef sales are consistently well under 100,000.

Some carrot.

Financially, what studios should do is go neutral by not release anything at all in any of the hidef formats. Hey, come to think of it, that's more or less what Fox is doing... :D

Maybe Fox makes more money NOT releasing titles. lol. The price they charge for catalog 25gb Mpeg2 discs is borderline robbery, hence the lower sales.

Fox just sold 6 million copies of Night at the Museum on SD in one week. The entire catalog of Blu-ray and HD DVD has sold maybe 2.5 million copies in one year. Weekly hidef sales are consistently well under 100,000.

Some carrot.

Financially, what studios should do is go neutral by not release anything at all in any of the hidef formats. Hey, come to think of it, that's more or less what Fox is doing... :D

Indirectly, that's my point. The number of players, hence high def purchasing, is so small, that these ratios don't seem very relevant, except as reasons for the studios to do nothing. How many millions of installed players on one side will it take for the numbers to become compelling?

Indirectly, that's my point. The number of players, hence high def purchasing, is so small, that these ratios don't seem very relevant, except as reasons for the studios to do nothing. How many millions of installed players on one side will it take for the numbers to become compelling?
1 million standalones (which for Blu-ray means something like 4.5 million PS3s IMO).

Neo are you a magician :)

i just checked the reuters report today

and guess what. it said 71% bluray and 29% HD-DVD.

http://www.reuters.com/article/industryNews/idUSN0242084220070503

High-definition disc sales for the week were 71% Blu-ray Disc and 29% HD DVD, with Blu-ray sales bolstered by the fact that "Museum" was available exclusively on that format.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
That's where I read the 71:29 ratio. But without more decimals in YTD/SI, the ratios in HMM are actually not that useful anymore to estimate movement of total sales that week. If it says 68:32 for YTD, it means last week was below 68.3:31.7, and this week is still below 68.5:31.5. If it becomes 69:31, all it means is that last weak is probably above 68.3:31.7 and this week crossed 68.5:31.5 --- assuming they round properly around 1/2 and that the BD weekly units don't cross 100K - still unlikely given how they've moved so far.

This makes the HMM numbers useful only at the weekly ratio. (the 71:29 is still to be confirmed in a few hours, it could still be a mistake).

Sorry to belabor this, but what makes a movie simply not produced so as to benefit as much from reissuing on HD They were not photographed with any less care, and in many cases the original negs, interpositives, and Technicolor separations can still be worked with. Even the first films from the early 1900's were filmed by professional photographers who knew there stuff and achieved amazing clarity and detail.

I think too many years of indifferently produced TV prints and videos have given the inaccurate perception that this is "just how these films look"; not true.

Also video is a generation away from film, and another medium with it's own characteristics. There is no film which can't be improved with higher resolution. It would be like saying that Casablanca would look just as good on 16mm as it does on 35mm.

If HDM becomes the "Day and Date" medium only, it will continue to get a dozen yearly purchases from collectors such as me rather than the well over a hundred I buy in SD.

Sorry to belabor this, but what makes a movie .

Timothy,

I enjoy discussing old films, but other than the sales effects of "old" vs. "new", this is fairly off topic. May I suggest you open a thread on the benefits of HD transfers of old (and I don't mean the 60's!) titles. I'd love to join you there!

Ken

Fox just sold 6 million copies of Night at the Museum on SD in one week. The entire catalog of Blu-ray and HD DVD has sold maybe 2.5 million copies in one year. Weekly hidef sales are consistently well under 100,000.

Some carrot.

Financially, what studios should do is go neutral by not release anything at all in any of the hidef formats. Hey, come to think of it, that's more or less what Fox is doing... :D


I wonder if studios just kind of know this is how it's going to be at these price tiers and level of HDTV ownership?

Maybe the initial pipe-dream of deep PS3 penetration and a swift victory had some thinking otherwise, but by now reality must have set in.

Is the current level of HDTV ownership high enough that we should realistically expected much higher numbers that these? Nobody really thought the cart was going to pull the horse in that people would buy an HDTV because of HDM rather than the reverse did they? That would be a pretty major output of cash for the luxury of paying an extra $10-$15 for your movies.

Sorry to belabor this, but what makes a movie They were not photographed with any less care, and in many cases the original negs, interpositives, and Technicolor separations can still be worked with. Even the first films from the early 1900's were filmed by professional photographers who knew there stuff and achieved amazing clarity and detail.

I think too many years of indifferently produced TV prints and videos have given the inaccurate perception that this is "just how these films look"; not true.

Also video is a generation away from film, and another medium with it's own characteristics. There is no film which can't be improved with higher resolution. It would be like saying that Casablanca would look just as good on 16mm as it does on 35mm.

If HDM becomes the "Day and Date" medium only, it will continue to get a dozen yearly purchases from collectors such as me rather than the well over a hundred I buy in SD.

Since that was me you took issue with, I'll just say- chill out. Maybe you are willing to replace "over 100 SDs a year" but I assure you that most people will not, as has been pointed out many times on these forums. Most people, even enthusiasts, will replace select favorites. Older movies simply will not be the driving force in this movement. Sorry if that upsets you, but that's the way I see it. :)

Since that was me you took issue with, I'll just say- chill out. Maybe you are willing to replace "over 100 SDs a year" but I assure you that most people will not, as has been pointed out many times on these forums. Most people, even enthusiasts, will replace select favorites. Older movies simply will not be the driving force in this movement. Sorry if that upsets you, but that's the way I see it. :)
Completely agree with you on this. I am only replacing select DVDs in my collection. Catalog releases are too expensive for both titles, and both my HD DVD and BR player upscale just nicely :)

The majority of people are not going to replace their DVD collection with the HD movie. Day and date releases titles are where it is at, and there is no way to spin this in HD DVD's favor. I purchased an HD DVD player in January, and then bought a BR player because of my frustration with the release schedule for HD DVD and because I quickly realized how many movies I wanted to see were coming to BR...

Swanni Sez Blu-ray software is trouncing HD DVD

http://www.tvpredictions.com/blusales050307.htm

Yet, if sales information at Amazon is indicative, HD DVD players are outselling Blu-Ray machines.

Why aren't HD DVD owners buying disks to watch with their players?

--- CHAS

I would really like to get ongoing hardware sales information.

Swanni Sez Blu-ray software is trouncing HD DVD


What has this thread come to ? We need figure out whats happening using someon'e reporting of Reuters reports ....

BTW, what did Swanni say last week when it was 52:48 ? :p

Since that was me you took issue with, I'll just say- chill out. Maybe you are willing to replace "over 100 SDs a year" but I assure you that most people will not, as has been pointed out many times on these forums. Most people, even enthusiasts, will replace select favorites. Older movies simply will not be the driving force in this movement. Sorry if that upsets you, but that's the way I see it. :)
I'm not hot under the collar about this, but I think there is a difference between what will look better and what will sell better. I don't humor myself that a sterling HDM release of Citizen Kane will outsell even an OK presentation of Night At The Museum.

There may be no accounting for taste in the movie market place, I just wish to dispel the perception that an older film is somehow technically less able to be substantially improved on HDM.

Mine is the extreme minority opinion, but I'd rather see a 60-year-old film get restored and released high-def, because I'll never see it in a theater, but can project it at home, Night In The Museum I could have seen four months ago in a theater had I wanted to.

I think it is obvious that attach rates asside, millions of PS3's can still sell more disks than a couple hundred thousand HD-DVD players.

The question is, what happens when that gap starts narrowing. That is when the attach rate will start to have an effect.

BR still leading should not be a surprise to anyone. BR leading through the rest of the year shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. BR, slowely losing that lead into the end of this year and throughout 2008, that will surprise a lot of people, but really shouldn't.

Cheers,

Richard

I think it is obvious that attach rates asside, millions of PS3's can still sell more disks than a couple hundred thousand HD-DVD players.

The question is, what happens when that gap starts narrowing. That is when the attach rate will start to have an effect.

BR still leading should not be a surprise to anyone. BR leading through the rest of the year shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. BR, slowely losing that lead into the end of this year and throughout 2008, that will surprise a lot of people, but really shouldn't.

Cheers,

Richard

Food for thought. Even if the gap narrows between BD and HD DVD pricing, I could imagine lower BD standalone sales because it's possible that some early BD adopters own their standalone in the form of the PS3 already.

Yet, if sales information at Amazon is indicative, HD DVD players are outselling Blu-Ray machines.

We obvously know that Amazon is anything indicative of the larger reality. Remember that it was common wisdom that HDDVD standalones dominated last year with a $500 / 50% savings and we found out in Febuary that it was a whopping 52-48% lead.


BTW, what did Swanni say last week when it was 52:48 ? :p

HDDVD standalone sales STILL haven't pulled away from that? :p

Mine is the extreme minority opinion, but I'd rather see a 60-year-old film get restored and released high-def, because I'll never see it in a theater, but can project it at home, Night In The Museum I could have seen four months ago in a theater had I wanted to.

I think you're centering on a qualitative argument versus an experience one. I bought Night at the Museum and avoided going to the movies because I despise going to the theater these days, unless it's high brow and high dollar (something like the Arclight), with the appropriate... etiquette... achieved by that premium. I have been buying Blu-ray movies more in replacement of the cinema release than replacement of my old DVDs. Blu-ray exclusives also have a definitive lead in this area and probably will for the near, if not intermediate future.

I would definitely agree with on you on the desire for some of the great films re-done. I'd love to see Spartacus in it's Critereon treatment on HDDVD, for example (but even moreso in Blu-ray. :D ). Same with Ben-Hur, The Seven Samurai, Ghandi, etc.

BR still leading should not be a surprise to anyone. BR leading through the rest of the year shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. BR, slowely losing that lead into the end of this year and throughout 2008, that will surprise a lot of people, but really shouldn't.

You don't think the 2nd generation of Blu-ray standalones will maintain the parity in sales the 1st gen saw (52-48 is anything but a dominating performance)?

Food for thought. Even if the gap narrows between BD and HD DVD pricing, I could imagine lower BD standalone sales because it's possible that some early BD adopters own their standalone in the form of the PS3 already.

In fairness if a PS3 is in fact anyones purchase choice to be used as a stand alone BR player then the attach rates for that player are a wash and should resemble any stand alone HD-DVD players attach rates.

It is more the longer term comparison of those who have a PS3 gaming platform who buy the occasional movie versus stand alone HD-DVD players that will have "total" sales shift in HD-DVD's favor as the install base narrows in total numbers.

Cheers,

Richard

UxiSXRD,

Not sure exaclty what your asking, but I will say this.

I think that the coming and continued price reduction on the HD-DVD hardware side will hit a point of no return whereby currently announced BR pricing cannot compete and they will start to lose market share faster and faster.

Furthermore I cannot figure out a scenario whereby the Sony or the BDA can launch a price competitive (Say within $100 of the expected $199 HD-DVD price my Christmas) and not have the entire BDA blow appart at the seams. At least from the CE perspective.

If anyone has figured that out I would love to hear it. Neither format will ever die, but I think that Sony will have to abandon the business plan of trying to maintain a primium on BR pricing if it wants to stay in the game. If they do that and BDA CE's be darned then depending on how close they can keep the pricing this effect will be correspondingly less and will take longer to really be felt.

Nothing is to say that HD-DVD doesn't have corresponding drops or subsidies in reaction to any BDA moves either.

In any case, the next 6-18 months should be very interesting as the media vs price battle shifts and players adjust their game plans. I think in the end the entire War will be a marketing and business plan white paper (hmm, maybe case study is more accurate) for the ages.

Cheers,

Richard

In fairness if a PS3 is in fact anyones purchase choice to be used as a stand alone BR player then the attach rates for that player are a wash and should resemble any stand alone HD-DVD players attach rates.


That would be if we had more than a generalized picture of the PS3 attach rate. You could have every owner buying 2 movies, or two out of ten buying 10 movies and the other eight buying none. When you have a multi-purpose machine, it's hard to determine motivation.

Agreed at best we have educated guesses and estimates for both formats.

I think both look low. I can't imagine that the PS3 attach rate is less than 1. Come on, that hardly seems realistic.

That said, I think that the estimates for HD-DVD are low as well. Heck I own over 80 and while I am sure that folks here are not the norm, I have a hard time picturing less than an attach rate of 1 per month of ownership on average. I have 6-7 per month of ownership others have less than 1, but it all evens out.

In any case it all depends on whether these cheap chinese players on the way (Wal-Mart related or not) can be marketed to JQP. If he starts buying them at a rate of say 2x - 5x that of BR stand alone players eventually the media sales will start to shift.

There are a lot of ifs for sure, but this seems rather likely in that I cannot figure out a BR counter move in line with thier stated business model.

Cheers,

Richard

PS. Sorry, I think I may be getting rather off topic. I just tend to respond regardless of the thread I am in ;-)

I would really like to get ongoing hardware sales information.
I'll second that.

I think both look low. I can't imagine that the PS3 attach rate is less than 1. Come on, that hardly seems realistic.

Well, attach rate without a timeframe doesn't mean much. Over the life time I do expect an attach rate of 1 - but how about in the 3 months of average ownership we have had ?

If we assume 1.3 M PS3s are there and about that many movies have been sold, the attach rate is definitely below one, considering all the CE settop players that have been sold (some 85K if some reports are to be trusted).

There is a lot of talking points on this.

Are the sales numbers coming directly from the studios or from Neilsons, Sony, BDA, HD-DVD group of a combination of all of them?

My sense, and I have no idea to what degree admitedly, is that there is a lot going on that we have no visibility to or reporting on (At least accurate).

Amazon sales numbers are harder to figure out against sales rank than waiter math at its best for example.

Cheers,

Richard

Question: Are the Amazon sales #s quoted worldwide or just North America?

If they're worldwide, then that could help explain the HD-DVD bias in Amazon's software sales #s (or alternatively, the Blu-Ray bias in the Nielson #s). Since the main Blu-ray engine is the PS3, that only came out in Europe/Australia on March 27, but we've had PS3s penetrating the NA market since November.

What do you think the PS3 sales will top out at - 20M? Then what will standalone players top out at - 200M? If HD-DVD captures the low-end market it will crush BD, no matter the PS3 attach rate. :)

I think it is obvious that attach rates asside, millions of PS3's can still sell more disks than a couple hundred thousand HD-DVD players.

Richard

I like that answer to my question.

Do the HD DVD's that were 'given' away in the promotion count in the sold column? Probably not but I don't know for sure. Thinking about it, why would anyone buy disks while they were being 'given' away?

--- CHAS

What do you think the PS3 sales will top out at - 20M? Then what will standalone players top out at - 200M? If HD-DVD captures the low-end market it will crush BD, no matter the PS3 attach rate. :)

Analysts who think the PS3 will do badly think sales will top out at 65 million.

Let be know how that crushing works out for you :rolleyes:

Analysts who think the PS3 will do badly think sales will top out at 65 million.

Let be know how that crushing works out for you :rolleyes:
Let me restate player numbers: 650M *crush*

http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom050607/

Week Ended 4/29: 71% BD, 29% HDDVD
YTD: 68% BD, 32% HDDVD
SI: 58% BD, 42% HDDVD

Top 5 BD
1. Night at the Museum 100.00
2. Deja Vu 75.04
3. Planet Earth 24.14
4. The Queen 17.29
5. Casino Royale 14.33

Top 5 HD-DVD
1. Planet Earth 100.00
2. Smokin' Aces 52.60
3. Digital Video Essentials 16.47
4. Batman Begins 13.98
5. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 13.00

YTD: 68% BD, 32% HDDVD


Same as last week, as I was fearing.

But a big jump in SI.

Hooray! Combined hidef charts!

HIGH-DEF SELLERS

1. Night at the Museum BD 100.00
2. Deja Vu BD 75.04
3. Planet Earth HD DVD 32.78
4. Planet Earth BD 24.14
5. The Queen BD 17.29
6. Smokin' Aces HD DVD 17.24
7. Casino Royale BD 14.33
8. Happy Feet BD 7.19
9. Black Hawk Down BD 7.05
10. The Departed BD 5.82

TOP 10 Hi Def Optical Media
1. Night at the Museum BD 100.00
2. Deja Vu BD 75.04
3. Planet Earth HD-DVD 32.78
4. Planet Earth BD 24.14
5. The Queen BD 17.29
6. Smokin' Aces HD-DVD 17.24
7. Casino Royal BD 14.33
8. Happy Feet BD 7.19
9. Black Hawk Down BD 7.05
10. The Departed BD 5.82

Are the - Week Ended 4/29: 71% BD, 29% HDDVD - numbers disc sales or dollar amount sales?

The reason I ask is because neither the Reuters article nor the HMM magazine indicate what the percentages mean for that week. Also because of the discrepency between:

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM (FOX, $39.98)
2 PLANET EARTH: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION (BBC/WB, $99.98)
3 DEJA VU (BV, $34.99)

and

1 Night at the Museum - 100 Index
2 Deja Vu - 75.04 Index
3 Planet Earth - 24.14 Index

from the HMM magazine

VideoScan definitely covers unit sales, both B&M and online.

Rentrak covers B&M, and I don't know if it's unit sales or dollar amount.

Are the - Week Ended 4/29: 71% BD, 29% HDDVD - numbers disc sales or dollar amount sales?

The reason I ask is because neither the Reuters article nor the HMM magazine indicate what the percentages mean for that week. Also because of the discrepency between:

RANK TITLE (LABEL/DISTRIBUTOR, SRP)
1 NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM (FOX, $39.98)
2 PLANET EARTH: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION (BBC/WB, $99.98)
3 DEJA VU (BV, $34.99)

and

1 Night at the Museum - 100 Index
2 Deja Vu - 75.04 Index
3 Planet Earth - 24.14 Index

from the HMM magazine

Nielsen VideoScan report the market share ratio based on UNIT SALES only. They don't tell us volumes (we have to guess those or wait for some nice studio to leak figures).

If we have two charts then the one reported by Nielsen VideoScan is accurate - or at least considerably closer to the true market situation.

If you've been seduced by the Amazon top 10 for the past week then at least now you know what it translates to in reality - a hill of beans. :)

Nielsen VideoScan report the market share ratio based on UNIT SALES only. They don't tell us volumes (we have to guess those or wait for some nice studio to leak figures).

If we have two charts then the one reported by Nielsen VideoScan is accurate - or at least considerably closer to the true market situation.

If you've been seduced by the Amazon top 10 for the past week then at least now you know what it translates to in reality - a hill of beans. :)

In parts of Columbia, a hill of beans is huge and pretty valuable. :D

Same as last week, as I was fearing.

But a big jump in SI.
The 1% move up in SI is probably because last week's 57:43 was really 57.4:42.6 and this week the 57.4 became > 57.5 which became 58 when rounded to nearest integer. YTD last week was probably between 67.5 and 68.3, assuming BD sales did not cross 100K for this current nielsen week.

Assuming 68.2:31.8 I get 57K and 23K for BD and HD. If these are correct, for the first time we see a week where BD sales went up and HD went down.

Percentage of Top 10 Sales:

Night At The Museum 33.23%
Deja Vu 24.94%
Planet Earth HD 10.89%
Planet Earth BD 8.02%

Blu-Ray 83.38%
HD-DVD 16.62%

The 1% move up in SI is probably because last weeks 57:43 was really 57.4:42.6 and this week the 57.4 became > 57.5 which became 58 when rounded to nearest integer.

On 4/15 we got (IIRC) 56.56 for BD. For last week since the weekly ratio was 52:48, that SI ratio would have had to reduce for BD (I assumed 56.5). So it couldn't have been 57.4 last week.

Percentage of Top 10 Sales:

Night At The Museum 33.23%
Deja Vu 24.94%
Planet Earth HD 10.89%
Planet Earth BD 8.02%

Blu-Ray 83.38%
HD-DVD 16.62%

It appears that HD-DVD would have a majority of titles in the 11-20 places to move the top 10 numbers from 83/17 to the weekly 79/21.

Assuming 68.2:31.8 I get 57K and 23K for BD and HD. If these are correct, for the first time we see a week where BD sales went up and HD went down.

I think it is pretty difficult to say either way these days, YTD could be 67.6:32.4 all the way to 68.4:31.6.

Also where did your assumption of 68.2:31.8 come from (not being rude, just inquisitive)?

Hooray! Combined hidef charts!

HIGH-DEF SELLERS



Interesting. So HD Planet Earth did outsell BD - just like in Amazon.

BTW, can you ask HMM to give us either
- more accurate YTD ratios or
- % increase/decrease in BD/HD numbers from previous week

We can figure out the numbers to a good extent if we can get either of these ...

On 4/15 we got (IIRC) 56.56 for BD. Since the weekly ratio was 52:48, that SI ratio would have had to reduce for BD (I assumed 56.5). So it couldn't have been 57.4 last week.

I don't remember what they were, my calculated was 56.51. Hmm, I wonder if we can use all these earlier data to calculate ranges. I doubt it as YTD and SI all include too many weeks of cumulative data that one week of sales cannot change unless the sales are much higher.

Btw, assuming 'perfectly .0000 for YTD ratio for previous weeks" , this is my calculated (BD: HD) numbers just for fun.

68.2:31.8 - (71,796:29,325)

Probably not that useful, since the assumption of perfect .0000% for previous weeks are not likely correct. However, if I plug in the following YTD ratio of (68.33:31.67), I get the corresponding SI going to (57.509:42.491)!!!
(68.33:31.67) - (124,231:50,704) --- not very likely, but numbers would have increased for both.

If somebody is requesting something, how about somebody request estimated weekly sales volume, and have them spit out the number that we're all actually interested in.

(68.33:31.67) - (124,231:50,704) --- not very likely, but numbers would have increased for both.

Right. I think to get both figures to move in the same direction we need to fiddle a lot of numbers.

Since there was no reason why the HD & BD numbers should move in the same direction in the first place, I'm inclined to leave the old ratios as they are and use 68.16 for this week's YTD. This will get us 45K for BD (up from 34K) and 18K for HD (down from 32K). I can live with these figures.

http://img518.imageshack.us/img518/3914/nielsenanalysishn3.gif (http://imageshack.us)

Night at the Museum sold 3x Planet Earth HD and 4x Planet Earth BD.

Can we bin amazon rankings now?

It appears that HD-DVD would have a majority of titles in the 11-20 places to move the top 10 numbers from 83/17 to the weekly 79/21.
All HD DVD needed was to keep the ratio closer than 79:21 in the 11-20 placings to move to 79/21. All that has to happen is for the ratios from #11 onwards to be slightly less than 83:17. One possible scenario is that #11-#20 are filled with BD with an average of 3.0 followed by #21-#30 with HD DVD with an avg of 2.5 and we'll end up with 79:21 counting only the first 30 titles.

Night at the Museum sold 3x Planet Earth HD and 4x Planet Earth BD.

Can we bin amazon rankings now?
Not only are amazon rankings not materially useful, they move very low numbers in total. Just look at how the individual title stock numbers change day to day. If a title is in the top 100 and you see the stock number decrease by ____ (fill in the blanks), what does this say about the top 100 rankings? :D

What do you think the PS3 sales will top out at - 20M? Then what will standalone players top out at - 200M? If HD-DVD captures the low-end market it will crush BD, no matter the PS3 attach rate. :)


20 million is unbelievably low. Especially when prices drop, games improve and some of the 200 million ps2 owners start looking for an upgrade.

You're also assuming there won't be cheap Blu-Ray players (Chinese or otherwise). I think your scenario is *highly* unrealistic. But I can't blame a guy for dreaming.

So, 71:29, or 2.4:1.

Remarkably consistent.



Hmmm... Pretty good guess.

Thanx ;)
I was few hours out, and seems like few pages to read :)

Marek

Thanx ;)
I was few hours out, and seems like few pages to read :)

Marek
That really was good, Marek. So what's going to happen next week???

That really was good, Marek. So what's going to happen next week???

with no HD DVD date and day release, it could be same or even more in favor for BD :) I will try to put some number this weekend, before thread will close :)

Marek

BTW, can you ask HMM to give us either
- more accurate YTD ratios or
- % increase/decrease in BD/HD numbers from previous week

We can figure out the numbers to a good extent if we can get either of these ...My guess is that some people around here were too smart for them and the move to less accuracy got them what they wanted. We can't calculate the weekly numbers with any real accuracy anymore. I would love it if we could get these numbers, but think that the move to 2 digits was to keep us from calculating things out week to week.

--Darin

My guess is that some people around here were too smart for them and the move to less accuracy got them what they wanted. We can't calculate the weekly numbers with any real accuracy anymore. I would love it if we could get these numbers, but think that the move to 2 digits was to keep us from calculating things out week to week.

While that is possible, I hope thats not the case.

As a matter of fact, I think they (videoscan) should just publish the total numbers ... its not like anyone will stop subscribing to Videoscan if they can get just these two total numbers for free. Compared to the numbers available from NPD for free, this would be insignificant.

Top 5 BD
1. Night at the Museum 100.00
2. Deja Vu 75.04
3. Planet Earth 24.14
4. The Queen 17.29
5. Casino Royale 14.33

Top 5 HD-DVD
1. Planet Earth 100.00
2. Smokin' Aces 52.60
3. Digital Video Essentials 16.47
4. Batman Begins 13.98
5. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 13.00
Hooray! Combined hidef charts!

HIGH-DEF SELLERS

1. Night at the Museum BD 100.00
2. Deja Vu BD 75.04
3. Planet Earth HD DVD 32.78
4. Planet Earth BD 24.14
5. The Queen BD 17.29
6. Smokin' Aces HD DVD 17.24
7. Casino Royale BD 14.33
8. Happy Feet BD 7.19
9. Black Hawk Down BD 7.05
10. The Departed BD 5.82There are positive things that both sides can point to here. Basically:

- Blu-ray outsold HD DVD about 2.4:1 overall
- For the biggest common title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1
- Black Hawk Down on Blu-ray outsold Batman Begins on HD DVD about 1.5:1
- Casino Royale on Blu-ray outsold Batman Begins on HD DVD about 3:1
- The Departed on Blu-ray continues to outsell The Departed on HD DVD
- Happy Feet on Blu-ray outsold Happy Feet on HD DVD
- Smokin' Aces on HD DVD sold almost as many in its 2nd week as The Queen on Blu-ray sold in its first week

And then just pure speculation. If Batman Begins sold about as many this week as last, then sales of Smokin' Aces on HD DVD only dropped about 45% week to week. But, if BB stayed constant, then Deja Vu in its first week outsold Smokin' Aces in its first week by about 2.4:1 (if my math is right).

I wonder how Batman Begins would sell on Blu-ray if Warner releases it (or when they release it).

--Darin

Great numbers for Blu-ray!!!!!!

Also some Amazon data:

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/5927/cachedimageserviceoj1.png (http://img180.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cachedimageserviceoj1.png)

Great numbers for Blu-ray!!!!!!

Also some Amazon data:

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/5927/cachedimageserviceoj1.png (http://img180.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cachedimageserviceoj1.png)
The main point we've been discussing is that the amazon numbers do not correlate to the nielsen numbers, and spending a few minutes everyday looking at eproductwars.com and following their in stock numbers should tell us amazon move very few disks.

Btw, even their normal DVD rankings don't match what normal people buy.

The main point we've been discussing is that the amazon numbers do not correlate to the nielsen numbers, and spending a few minutes everyday looking at eproductwars.com and following their in stock numbers should tell us amazon move very few disks.

Btw, even their normal DVD rankings don't match what normal people buy.


Well one thing that is consistent is that Blu-ray wins at Amazon and Blu-ray wins at Nielsen and Blu-ray wins everywhere else. So in that sense the Amazon numbers do correlate.

IS Amazon important in the grand scheme of sales though? Absolutely not!

Not only are amazon rankings not materially useful, they move very low numbers in total. Just look at how the individual title stock numbers change day to day. If a title is in the top 100 and you see the stock number decrease by ____ (fill in the blanks), what does this say about the top 100 rankings? :DFrom looking at how the stock numbers change with time, it wouldn't surprise me if Amazon has been selling "Planet Earth" on HD DVD at a rate of over 2k copies per week. Looks like they keep restocking, so it is hard to get an accurate number, but it looks like they could have hit 400 per day for some of the time it has been out.

--Darin

I'm not surprised Planet Earth on HD DVD outsold the Blu-ray version, but I am quite surprised by Night at the Museum outselling both of them handily. I think this is a good indicator of why Amazon sales numbers should be taken with a large grain of salt.

I'm not surprised Planet Earth on HD DVD outsold the Blu-ray version, but I am quite surprised by Night at the Museum outselling both of them handily. I think this is a good indicator of why Amazon sales numbers should be taken with a large grain of salt.

Who would have thought that? Interesting, and a matter of opinion I guess? :confused:

Who would have thought that? Interesting, and a matter of opinion I guess? :confused:

Could you please clarify what you mean by "A matter of opinion?" According to the just-released numbers, Night at the Museum outsold Planet Earth on each format.

When the Digital Video Essentials disc is your #3...that screams a lot of HD DVD guys just looking for something to buy!!

There are positive things that both sides can point to here. Basically:

- Blu-ray outsold HD DVD about 2.4:1 overall
- For the biggest title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

Planet Earth was not the biggest title - a curious thing to say.

Combined sales of PE were slightly better than half those of 'Night At The Museum' (comfortably the biggest title of the week), and approx. 75% of the volume that 'Deja Vu' shifted.

Planet Earth would still be seen as a HD success as I think being the 3rd best seller of the week probably exceeded expectations. Hopefully nobody on this thread was actually suckered by the Amazon 'fantasy' charts.

Even now PE on HD DVD sits proudly at #6 - yeah, right, whatever. :rolleyes:

Unless of course by 'biggest' you meant the most expensive?

Planet Earth was not the biggest title - a curious thing to say.

Combined sales of PE were slightly better than half those of 'Night At The Museum' (comfortably the biggest title of the week), and approx. 75% of the volume that 'Deja Vu' shifted.

Planet Earth would still be seen as a HD success as I think being the 3rd best seller of the week probably exceeded expectations. Hopefully nobody on this thread was actually suckered by the Amazon 'fantasy' charts.

Even now PE on HD DVD sits proudly at #6 - yeah, right, whatever. :rolleyes:

Unless of course by 'biggest' you meant the most expensive?

I'm actually surprised, and yes it did give me more of a disconnect from the Amazon fantasy world. What this says to me is that May 22nd is not going to be the big showdown some are expecting it to be. I wouldn't be surprised if the Matrix vastly under performs the two Pirates films. We all knew that being a high-priced boxed set would hurt it, and this new Planet Earth data speaks to that. I think it will have better name recognition than Planet Earth, but at the same time that is a two edged sword for this particular series of films.

Planet Earth was not the biggest title - a curious thing to say.Not sure exactly what my error was, but:

- For their biggest title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

or

- For the biggest common title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

would be more along the lines of what I was thinking. Might have just mistyped the "their" as I tend to make quite a few typing mistakes and only catch some of them. :) I'll reword the original to make that more clear.

--Darin

I'm actually surprised, and yes it did give me more of a disconnect from the Amazon fantasy world. What this says to me is that May 22nd is not going to be the big showdown some are expecting it to be. I wouldn't be surprised if the Matrix vastly under performs the two Pirates films. We all knew that being a high-priced boxed set would hurt it, and this new Planet Earth data speaks to that. I think it will have better name recognition than Planet Earth, but at the same time that is a two edged sword for this particular series of films.

More to the point, the Matrix box sets are TWO VERSIONS of the same set of movies. The strength of the sale will be split in half. I won't be surprising if one or both of the PotC movies will outsell both of the Matrix box sets combined.

- For the biggest common title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

That may be true now, but if my memory serves me right, BD usually outsells HD DVD on "like titles" in the long run. This is one thing that actually is supported by the amazon rankings. We usually see the HD DVD ranking slightly higher for a little while, then it drops off. While the BD version seems to have more staying power. I believe this happened with The Departed and Happy Feet. Or am I wrong?

So while Planet Earth may have sold more right now on HD DVD, I don't think this will be the case overall in the coming weeks.

Not sure exactly what my error was, but:

- For their biggest title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

or

- For the biggest common title HD DVD outsold Blu-ray about 1.36:1

would be more along the lines of what I was thinking. Might have just mistyped the "their" as I tend to make quite a few typing mistakes and only catch some of them. :) I'll reword the original to make that more clear.

--Darin

Ah, OK, no problem. :) We all make mistakes - as the Dalek said climbing off the dustbin (an old Jasper Carrot joke).

Could you please clarify what you mean by "A matter of opinion?" According to the just-released numbers, Night at the Museum outsold Planet Earth on each format.

In as much as I own both titles on BD, "I" think PE is by far a better title, Museum is just ok, as a remake of another title with a different name. BTW: that is opinion, right? :o

When the Digital Video Essentials disc is your #3...that screams a lot of HD DVD guys just looking for something to buy!!

That shows the market is now limited to videophiles and HT enthusiasts.

That shows the market is now limited to videophiles and HT enthusiasts.

That shows the HD DVD market is now limited to videophiles and HT enthusiasts.

Though it is true to some extent for both formats.

The Amazon tracking sites and metrics do seem to understate the sales on hot B&M title in the first week or so of sales. but it properly show the relationship between the HD DVD and Blu-ray versions of Planet Earth.

the March 18 N/V data set also showed the Amazon rankings were fairly accurate except for the top 5 titles and they only varied in the maagnitude of their leads in volume.

It also during the week ending April 29 show a resurgance of Blu-ray in its trendings.

That shows the HD DVD market is now limited to videophiles and HT enthusiasts.
Though it is true to some extent for both formats.

When you are quoting don't add/change/modify the quote. Pls edit your post.

When you are quoting don't add/change/modify the quote. Pls edit your post.

I'll change it, but I put it in bold for a reason. I think responding directly below you should be clear enough that I'm correcting and not trying to make you say something you didn't say.

That shows the market is now limited to videophiles and HT enthusiasts.
Most PS3 owners probably think Video Essentials is how to connect up their new HDTV :p

Is there any way to find out if Neilson breaks down numbers by reporting sources. That is the only way we can cross reference their numbers to see if they are indeed valid.

Does anyone know how numbers are reported to them from the sources? Does ANYONE in this forum work for a company that reports retail numbers to Videoscan? How do they compile the data? This is something I am dying to know :)

Don't you know that we have to accept Neilson without question, be they sales or viewer numbers? Whole industries turn on their word. They are a new religion.

Is there any way to find out if Neilson breaks down numbers by reporting sources. That is the only way we can cross reference their numbers to see if they are indeed valid.

Does anyone know how numbers are reported to them from the sources? Does ANYONE in this forum work for a company that reports retail numbers to Videoscan? How do they compile the data? This is something I am dying to know :)

What source would you cross reference the numbers with? What makes you think they are invalid?

What source would you cross reference the numbers with? What makes you think they are invalid?

Maybe he thinks Neilson is part of Phase Hydra.

Analysts who think the PS3 will do badly think sales will top out at 65 million.

Let be know how that crushing works out for you :rolleyes:

Sooo, with about 3.5 million sold to date, how long exactly is it gonna take to reach those 65+ million? Just curious ;)

Don't you know that we have to accept Neilson without question, be they sales or viewer numbers? Whole industries turn on their word. They are a new religion.

I take it from the sarcastic tone that you believe Nielsen are unreliable and the thousands of companies that spend millions of dollars buying and using their data are complete idiots.

You are, of course, entitled to put up alternative figures if you believe they are more reliable and then we can discuss them.

But the reality is that Nielsen VideoScan deliver us a very accurate view of the HD disc market (at least in terms of market share) and you would prefer it if they didn't. Incidentally, if you read the whole thread (a chore I know) you will see that Nielsen numbers are frequently questioned, but we also get reasonable anwers to those questions.

For statistics you might enjoy can I suggest the current Amazon (USA) 'chart'? The HD DVD edition of Planet Earth has actually moved back up to #5 whereas the Blu-ray title that actually outsold it (according to those crazy Nielsen people), with 4 times more copies, sits at a lowly #415. Sounds like your kinda town!

Nope. I think some would like a couple of check points to see how accurate their numbers are, and how they come about - a studio data point, a store confirmation, a clear identification of what's being counted (- returns, promos?), an idea of how and when it's reported. We know the strengths and weaknesses of their TV rating system (e.g. see Wiki Nielsen Ratings).

So we accept it in lieu of anything better. Is it indicative or definitive, and how are the apparent errors explained? Are the excluded sales more representative of one format than the other?

I suspect it's "good enough" for the studios who are not going to give out real sales data. BTW as long as your preferred format's in the lead I'm sure you don't question any facet.

Rewind 2½ months back:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9767608&&#post9767608

There is nothing better than Nielsen VideoScan.

After the HDDVD power buy, the HDDVD folks were claiming these numbers showed a real trend towards HDDVD. Today, they tell us Nielsen isn't accurate.

I'm getting whiplash!

Rewind 2½ months back:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9767608&&#post9767608

There is nothing better than Nielsen VideoScan.
Don't argue that. Just what are the possible sources of error and their magnitude. Do we have 90% confidence? Why?

BTW as long as your preferred format's in the lead I'm sure you don't question any facet.What was your opinion of Nielsen's numbers back when the HD DVD group was bragging out outselling all other HD formats 3:1? I don't remember you questioning the numbers then.

I think it is healthy to consider how accurate they are, but your above statement sure seems like it applies to you.

--Darin

Don't argue that. Just what are the possible sources of error and their magnitude. Do we have 90% confidence? Why?

We have confidence because all of the companies that PAY Nielsen for data have confidence. If they thought Nielsen numbers were garbage don't you think they would stop their service? Both formats know exactly how many disks they sell, and yet I don't hear Toshiba or Sony crying foul over the Nielsen data. I don't hear the studios letting out a peep. The big box retailers seem to be silent too. In fact, all of the people who have the most to lose by the data being inaccurate or incorrect seem quite satisfied. Why aren't you?

One of my posts missing here. I don't recall touting Nielson when HD-DVD was ahead, and I'm not dissing it when HD-DVD is behind.

If you look back, someone took a shot at me for questioning Neilson's accuracy on the basis I don't like the numbers, and I responded to that.

Au contraire, if BD supporters are so sensitive about this maybe there's fire where there's smoke.

All I am saying is does Neilson have a spreadsheet that says this is how sales breakdown by sources reporting to us. That would at least tell us what is being reported and by whom. The industry could well be trusting Neilson for HD numbers, but that leads me to wonder why no studio has really changed their position in the last year or so.

As far as questioning Neilson, the problem is who else is out there besides Neilson reporting on this type of sales data. People in general go with the flow when it comes to believing numbers.. The assumption is that sources reporting to Neilson have no interest in reporting falsely or have an agenda. For instance with DVD that is not a problem. Is there a penalty for lieing to Neilson? Has anyone ever? Just curious....:

To be the total sales of both HD DVD and BD seems to be lower than I would have expected given the number of hardware available and the stage in the adoption cycle. Enthusiasts should be buying more per player....JMHO.

Is there any way to find out if Neilson breaks down numbers by reporting sources. That is the only way we can cross reference their numbers to see if they are indeed valid.

Does anyone know how numbers are reported to them from the sources? Does ANYONE in this forum work for a company that reports retail numbers to Videoscan? How do they compile the data? This is something I am dying to know :)

I don't work for a videostore, but I work in retail where sales numbers are collected and charted in a similar way. I can not imagine it being done much differently.

In every store each sale is registered (identified by the barcode) into a file that each day is sent electronicly to (in this case) Nielsen. Nielsen can identify the individual files as coming from your store. That's the only way they can verify that

1. They actually get your numbers for each day.

2. That you haven't doctored the numbers somehow. For example. You might want to influence the numbers by selling 1.000 copies of something through your cashier for say 0.01 dollar each. Would only cost you 10 bucks. It would show up in your file to Nielsen and they wouldn't see that you sold them for nothing. However if you normally wouldn't sell more than say 10 copies of your top seller in a day you would probably get a phone call asking what happened. Now you might have had George Lucas do a signing in your store on the day a new Star Wars disk was released in which case your 1.000 copies would be accepted in the statistics. If you didn't have a good explanation your numbers for that day simply wouldn't be counted.

I assume they have some software that scans the numbers they get and look for anomalies.

There are ways to fool all systems and I'm sure many stores and studios have ways to cheat Nielsen but at least for regular DVDs I just don't think the actual numbers for separate titles matters enough for that to happen and the total numbers are just to big to influence easily.

Nielsen gathers all individual files into first alert data data based on the first couple of days and after seven days into that weeks numbers.

The paying customers will not get numbers that identifies individual stores/chains but they will get them by region and day. This is very helpful to identify the results of different ads and commercials. This is actually likely to be the main reason companies does pay for this kind of info.

For example you have two similar cities in the same region. In one of them you spend 50.000 on radio ads. In the other you spend 50.000 on magazine ads. After a few days you will know which worked better for this particular movie. You then adjust your advertising budgets across the country accordingly.

Of course the studios knows exactly what percentage of the market Nielsen covers. They can simply compare their own sales a certain period (which they'll have x weeks late) and compare it to what Nielsen reported. So they know the numbers represent 53 or 87 (or whatever) percent.

One more thing.

There is no direct incentive for a store to participate.

However, the studios will obviously be more helpful with promotional help if you do. Actual ads or t-shirts or posters or whatever for instore promotion will be less plentiful if you don't participate. Of course Walmart will get more support than anyone else either way which is why they can afford not to.

Generating and sending the file is also fully automatic and requires no additional work on the stores part so there is no real reason not to participate.

Because of this my estimate is that in the DVD business Nielsen covers around 90 percent of whatever Walmart doesn't have. It's possible to discuss (as has been) how different buying habits for HD might mean that it's covering less of the market for HD but to what effect we are all just guessing.

Edit: and no, you don't get the numbers for free just because your store participates. You might get a few regional listings for your region. Nothing complete.

I'm not a market analyst, but I work for a company that does market analysis of sales data. We pay millions of dollars to purchase data from a variety of sources and we sell analysis of the data for millions more. You can better believe that the data is fairly accurate. Our clients closely monitor what we're doing. (My company does not have any home audio/video clients or access to any of that data).

You'd be amazed at what we can show to our clients. In some cases, they can get sales data down to the store level. Clients can run advertisements for a few days and get good feedback on how well it worked. It's quite sophisticated.

Planet Earth was not the biggest title - a curious thing to say.

Combined sales of PE were slightly better than half those of 'Night At The Museum' (comfortably the biggest title of the week), and approx. 75% of the volume that 'Deja Vu' shifted.

Planet Earth would still be seen as a HD success as I think being the 3rd best seller of the week probably exceeded expectations. Hopefully nobody on this thread was actually suckered by the Amazon 'fantasy' charts.

Even now PE on HD DVD sits proudly at #6 - yeah, right, whatever. :rolleyes:


Yes, I can see how Planet Earth would be outselling Casino Royale (Blu-ray) based on Amazon.com when it can't even beat Night at the Museum in actual SALES :rolleyes:

TU jpb123

Yes, I can see how Planet Earth would be outselling Casino Royale (Blu-ray) based on Amazon.com when it can't even beat Night at the Museum in actual SALES :rolleyes:

Didn't Night at the Museum sell something like 6 million on SD DVD in the first week? For Planet Earth to sell half of what Night at the Museum sold on HD is actually pretty amazing. Or do you think Planet Earth sold 3 million in SD?

If you consider that Planet Earth had more than 3 times the retail price it actually made Warner more money from HD than Night at the Museum did from HD

Here is the top 20 DVD list.

http://img371.imageshack.us/img371/504/dvdbx4.gif (http://imageshack.us)

If Night at the Museum sold 6M, PE on DVD sold about 200K. Not bad.

Ofcourse it sold so much more on HD - instead of 3.3% of Night at the Museum, it sold nearly 56%.

I think it is obvious that attach rates asside, millions of PS3's can still sell more disks than a couple hundred thousand HD-DVD players.
The question is, what happens when that gap starts narrowing. That is when the attach rate will start to have an effect.


So, how exactly will Hd-DVD players "catch up" with PS3 sales? :rolleyes:

Or are we still presuming a $99 HD-DVD player sometime in the future, by which time there will probably also be a $99 Blu-ray player. :)

The pool of potential PS3 buyers is much smaller than that of both/either format. If HD takes off, PS3 will be a foonote.

The pool of potential PS3 buyers is much smaller than that of both/either format. If HD takes off, PS3 will be a foonote.



Wrong. To buy into HD movie players you need the following;

1. have bought an HDTV
2. be interested in movies (many buy the sets for sports)
3. have a set big enough that you think HD discs will look better than your DVD's upconverted.
4. have the resources (and a spouse willing to let you spend them) on better looking movies when the same film costs 1/2 - 1/3 as much on DVD.

The pool of PS3 buyers is anyone who is interested in new games (same as X360) when the PS2 begins to be phased out.

Based on the 100+ million PS2's being sold so far and the 150+ million DVD players sold worldwide so far, it is entirely possible that HD players may someday sell more units than PS3 (I doubt it personally) but sales of the PS3 will never be described as "much smaller" or a "footnote."

Wrong. To buy into HD movie players you need the following;

1. have bought an HDTV
2. be interested in movies (many buy the sets for sports)
3. have a set big enough that you think HD discs will look better than your DVD's upconverted.
4. have the resources (and a spouse willing to let you spend them) on better looking movies when the same film costs 1/2 - 1/3 as much on DVD.

The pool of PS3 buyers is anyone who is interested in new games (same as X360) when the PS2 begins to be phased out.

Based on the 100+ million PS2's being sold so far and the 150+ million DVD players sold worldwide so far, it is entirely possible that HD players may someday sell more units than PS3 (I doubt it personally) but sales of the PS3 will never be described as "much smaller" or a "footnote."
You're being EXTREMELY optimistic if you think PS3 sales will even come close to approaching PS2 sales.

P.S. Most of the new releases here on DVD cost about 2/3rds of what it costs on HD DVD. The el cheapo DVDs are the old 3rd tier releases in my experience.

Of course the studios knows exactly what percentage of the market Nielsen covers. They can simply compare their own sales a certain period (which they'll have x weeks late) and compare it to what Nielsen reported. So they know the numbers represent 53 or 87 (or whatever) percent.For their own numbers in this comparison, how do they know how many sold through and how many are still on the shelves? If they got that data I could see how they could figure out the percentage that Nielsen covers, but if they don't know how many are sitting on shelves (at least approximately) it seems like it would make it tough to figure out Nielsen's percentage.

--Darin

So, how exactly will Hd-DVD players "catch up" with PS3 sales? :rolleyes:

Or are we still presuming a $99 HD-DVD player sometime in the future, by which time there will probably also be a $99 Blu-ray player. :)

The PS3 thing is goofy to me, someone in our forum produced stats that DVD was well on it's way by the the time PS2 launched the DVD Trojan.

There are a lot of DVD buyers who don't game and won't consider a PS3, Xbox add-on, or computer drive for their movie delivery system. If PS3 with it's low attach rate and slow adoption remains the biggest thing in HDM, it's all going to go down the drain.

When I buy BD, it sure won't be in the form of PS3. How many people who buy DVD use the PS2 as their only DVD player, and have never owned a standalone? How will HDM most likely be presented to someone in a store buying a new HDTV?

There are a lot of DVD buyers who don't game and won't consider a PS3, Xbox add-on, or computer drive for their movie delivery system.

Good thing Sony is deliverying the BDP-S300 with the same MSRP, then. :) And you can bet that unlike the PS3, it will street for lower than MSRP.


If PS3 with it's low attach rate and slow adoption remains the biggest thing in HDM, it's all going to go down the drain.


Yeah to the tune of 2 to 4 times disc sales. :D


How many people who buy DVD use the PS2 as their only DVD player, and have never owned a standalone?

Apples and oranges for numerous reasons: 1) cheap commodity DVD players, 2) mediocre playback ability from PS2 while PS3 Blu-ray playback is excellent and still the fastest loading and startup player from either side, 3) This isn't the year 2000 anymore :D (when indeed many many people were using the PS2 as their first DVD player. Remember that DVD didn't pass VHS until 2003 IIRC). etc etc.


How will HDM most likely be presented to someone in a store buying a new HDTV?

Hopefully quite prominently. Every BDA CE should be offering instant rebates on combos and they would really be pushing units (and anywhere up to 50% of MSRP would go quite favorably... and the margins on big HDTVs are usually more than large enough to swallow that and still deliver healthy profit). Though I guess if Blu-ray was only down 4% points in standalones as of Feb 07, with 500$/50%MSRP differences, guess they don't need TOO much of an incentive... ;)

Here is the top 20 DVD list.

http://img371.imageshack.us/img371/504/dvdbx4.gif (http://imageshack.us)

If Night at the Museum sold 6M, PE on DVD sold about 200K. Not bad.

Ofcourse it sold so much more on HD - instead of 3.3% of Night at the Museum, it sold nearly 56%.

However, the top-selling hidef title sold maybe 15,000-20,000 copies (WAG). Which would make PE sales on HD DVD + BD about 8,000-11,000.

So Planet Earth sales on SD were still one order of magnitude above Planet Earth hidef sales.

For their own numbers in this comparison, how do they know how many sold through and how many are still on the shelves? If they got that data I could see how they could figure out the percentage that Nielsen covers, but if they don't know how many are sitting on shelves (at least approximately) it seems like it would make it tough to figure out Nielsen's percentage.

--Darin

After a certain time they will have pretty accurate numbers. For many titles the retailers only pay for sold copies. Or at the least there is a return system where they have the right to return x % of what they bought. In April 2007 they will know how big a share Nielsen had for 2006 I'm sure.

It can work something like this. A studio may have a system that gives the store/chain the right to return 10% of the total value they buy if returned within 3 months from purchase. This works well in that if one title sells real poorly you can return much a high percentage of that one as long as there are other titles that have sold better. The 10% and 3 months are estimates but the system exists.

Of course the studios can't get exact numbers for a short time period (like a week) but over time they will get a very good feel for what percentage Nielsen covers. Of course this changes with time and for individual titles might be very different from the overall percentage.

Each large studio probably also have some stores across the country that they get direct numbers from on a voluntarily system to check against. Or at the very least the sales reps keep some track of how their key stores are doing with big titles. Numbers from this can all be compared with Nielsen numbers and figure out different ratios etc.

However, the top-selling hidef title sold maybe 15,000-20,000 copies (WAG). Which would make PE sales on HD DVD + BD about 8,000-11,000.

So Planet Earth sales on SD were still one order of magnitude above Planet Earth hidef sales.

Obviously, but it still sold some 15-20 times better on HD than SD compared to Night at the Museum. 56% compared to 3.3%. That's gotta give the studios something to think about in regard to what kind of specials might be suitable for HD.

Again Warner/BBC made more revenue on Planet Earth in HD than Fox did with Night at the Museum. no getting around that. Might be small change in comparasion but still more is better.

For their own numbers in this comparison, how do they know how many sold through and how many are still on the shelves? If they got that data I could see how they could figure out the percentage that Nielsen covers, but if they don't know how many are sitting on shelves (at least approximately) it seems like it would make it tough to figure out Nielsen's percentage.Modern systems track sales from the manufacturer to the distributor, from the distributor to the store and sales and returns at the store level. All those folks along the supply chain make money by selling their data. It's a huge business. Part of what my company does is to make sure that data is clean by using a variety of statistical techniques.

In some markets, such as magazine distribution, more than 40% of the product is returned to the manufacturer. Companies can closely monitor these markets in an effort to reduce costs and to create effective advertisements.

Modern systems track sales from the manufacturer to the distributor, from the distributor to the store and sales and returns at the store level.

The problem is not all retail stores participate in these (for eg. Walmart doesn't !). Sell through calculation will always been rough ...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Timothy Ramzyk
There are a lot of DVD buyers who don't game and won't consider a PS3, Xbox add-on, or computer drive for their movie delivery system.


Good thing Sony is deliverying the BDP-S300 with the same MSRP, then. And you can bet that unlike the PS3, it will street for lower than MSRP.

That's still far from affordable to many.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Ramzyk
If PS3 with it's low attach rate and slow adoption remains the biggest thing in HDM, it's all going to go down the drain.


Yeah to the tune of 2 to 4 times disc sales.

Yes, do we really have to tread the waters of how insignificant overall HDM sales are, and how it's not enough to outsell HD DVD?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Ramzyk
How many people who buy DVD use the PS2 as their only DVD player, and have never owned a standalone?


Apples and oranges for numerous reasons: 1) cheap commodity DVD players, 2) mediocre playback ability from PS2 while PS3 Blu-ray playback is excellent and still the fastest loading and startup player from either side, 3) This isn't the year 2000 anymore (when indeed many many people were using the PS2 as their first DVD player. Remember that DVD didn't pass VHS until 2003 IIRC). etc etc.

No it's not, were talking about perceptions here. PS3 is being sold as your total entertainment hub under one roof, but it's looking like that's a solution to a problem nobody knew they had given sales. Also it doesn't upconvert, and until the working firmware update to make it do so is announced, it's an empty promise. Sony invests far too much in telling people what they want and need an too little time asking IMO.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Ramzyk
How will HDM most likely be presented to someone in a store buying a new HDTV?


Hopefully quite prominently. Every BDA CE should be offering instant rebates on combos and they would really be pushing units (and anywhere up to 50% of MSRP would go quite favorably...

Ya well, until somebody gives you that job, it can't really have any impact on what is actually going down at the consumer level. When I go to any HDTV department, I don't see a PS3 playing a BD, I see a Sony BD standalone, or an HD DVD A2.

Hooray! Combined hidef charts!

HIGH-DEF SELLERS

1. Night at the Museum BD 100.00
2. Deja Vu BD 75.04
3. Planet Earth HD DVD 32.78
4. Planet Earth BD 24.14
5. The Queen BD 17.29
6. Smokin' Aces HD DVD 17.24
7. Casino Royale BD 14.33
8. Happy Feet BD 7.19
9. Black Hawk Down BD 7.05
10. The Departed BD 5.82

cool, is that from VS?

we can also use it to comapare all the way to the end of HD DVDs top 5.

i.e.

1. Planet Earth 100.00
2. Smokin' Aces 52.60
3. Digital Video Essentials 16.47
4. Batman Begins 13.98
5. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 13.00

on the HDOM chart the % would be

1. Planet Earth 32.78
2. Smokin' Aces 17.24228
3. Digital Video Essentials 5.398866
4. Batman Begins 4.582644
5. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 4.2614

Could you please clarify what you mean by "A matter of opinion?" According to the just-released numbers, Night at the Museum outsold Planet Earth on each format

it actually outsold both combined and by more then 75% more

All I am saying is does Neilson have a spreadsheet that says this is how sales breakdown by sources reporting to us. That would at least tell us what is being reported and by whom. The industry could well be trusting Neilson for HD numbers, but that leads me to wonder why no studio has really changed their position in the last year or so.

As far as questioning Neilson, the problem is who else is out there besides Neilson reporting on this type of sales data. People in general go with the flow when it comes to believing numbers.. The assumption is that sources reporting to Neilson have no interest in reporting falsely or have an agenda. For instance with DVD that is not a problem. Is there a penalty for lieing to Neilson? Has anyone ever? Just curious....:

To be the total sales of both HD DVD and BD seems to be lower than I would have expected given the number of hardware available and the stage in the adoption cycle. Enthusiasts should be buying more per player....JMHO.

plazman: my understanding is that they do. we might only be interested in disk sales, but they have store, title..... don't forget that Neilsen is collecting this for studios not us. WB does not care how Night at the Museum did (well maybe for comparison). They take this data to be able to decide where and what promotions to do. I am also guessing that where quantity is limited (like many HD titles) they also use it to decide what markets might be better (i.e. give 90% of what Amazon asked for, 70% of BB….)

PS there are others (like Rentrack, I also think NPD)

plazman:

one more thing, a bit under a year ago (videobuisness) used to have rankings/retailer (BB, Amazon...)

what I mean it had the global ranking and then a brake down by store, so you could see a title be #5 but #10 for Amazon, #2 for BB...

Obviously, but it still sold some 15-20 times better on HD than SD compared to Night at the Museum. 56% compared to 3.3%. That's gotta give the studios something to think about in regard to what kind of specials might be suitable for HD.

Give it up...all these rationalizations just make the HD-DVD side seem more desperate..the fact is Blu-ray is outselling Hd-DVD every single week and widening the sales gap continuously. One side has to win in order for the whole industry to benefit, and at this point it's pretty obvious to any neutral observer that if there has to be a winner it would be blu-ray. I'm sure the shaking up at Universal will herald some changes in the months to come...

Give it up...all these rationalizations just make the HD-DVD side seem more desperate..the fact is Blu-ray is outselling Hd-DVD every single week and widening the sales gap continuously. One side has to win in order for the whole industry to benefit, and at this point it's pretty obvious to any neutral observer that if there has to be a winner it would be blu-ray. I'm sure the shaking up at Universal will herald some changes in the months to come...


Please, you don't know whats going to go down in the coming months, nobody does. Not only are all HDM sales a joke at this point, the idea of the tide-turning on the two or three releases drizzling in per week is just nonsense.

When players are all between $200 or under, software has come down a 25-30%, and the number of households with HDTV at least doubles, then you can start saying what obvious trends are taking shape. Right now your just jockeying for your format of choice. :rolleyes:

cool, is that from VS?



Yes!

Note how poorly catalog titles do, even on their first week:

Failure to Launch (BD/HD DVD), The Nutty Professor (HD DVD), Secret Window (BD) and Ultimate Avengers Collection (BD) failed to enter the charts at all.

The only new catalog title to register was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (HD DVD), which sold 13 percent of the Planet Earth HD DVD sales, or as you say, 4.26 percent of NatM sales. So, if NatM sold 20,000 units (high WAG estimate), ESotSM sold 852!! :( (one of them to me BTW ;) ).

Yes!

Note how poorly catalog titles do, even on their first week:

Failure to Launch (BD/HD DVD), The Nutty Professor (HD DVD), Secret Window (BD) and Ultimate Avengers Collection (BD) failed to enter the charts at all.

The only new catalog title to register was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (HD DVD), which sold 13 percent of the Planet Earth HD DVD sales, or as you say, 4.26 percent of NatM sales. So, if NatM sold 20,000 units (high WAG estimate), ESotSM sold 852!! :( (one of them to me BTW ;) ).

Good choice, Grubert... ;)

Good choice, Grubert... ;)

Of course you'd say that. :) Thanks!

The new issue of HMM is officially up - initial posts updated.

edit: BTW, going on the Q1 report by HMM, it seems total sales during the 4 first weeks of Q1 were about 388,000 for BD and 215,000 for HD DVD.

Blu-ray widens the lead again last week.


http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/4838/newmktshxa8.jpg (http://img222.imageshack.us/my.php?image=newmktshxa8.jpg)



With Spider-man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean 3, New Die Hard, Fantastic Four 2, Ratatouille all coming to Blu-ray exclusively we can only hope the gap continues to grow larger.

With Spider-man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean 3, New Die Hard, Fantastic Four 2, Ratatouille all coming to Blu-ray exclusively we can only hope the gap continues to grow larger.

krinkle, this is an information and factual analysis thread, which we want to keep free from (a) partisan campaigning and cheerleading, and (b) discussing titles that haven't even been announced.

Thanks for your cooperation.

krinkle, this is an information and factual analysis thread, which we want to keep free from (a) partisan campaigning and cheerleading, and (b) discussing titles that haven't even been announced.

Thanks for your cooperation.

Which is why I posted the relevant graph here from the last officially released data, no one else had posted the official graph yet in this thread, or perhaps you would like to provide a link to it from this thread where the official graph had been posted before?

It is certainly not my fault if the Nielsen data heavily favors one format over the other.

Which is why I posted the relevant graph here from the last officially released data, no one else had posted the official graph yet in this thread, or perhaps you would like to provide a link to it from this thread where the official graph had been posted before?
Posting the graph here is perfectly fine. It's some other part of your post Grubert complained about. Wait, maybe he even quoted that part? ;)

Which is why I posted the relevant graph here from the last officially released data, no one else had posted the official graph yet in this thread, or perhaps you would like to provide a link to it from this thread where the official graph had been posted before?

It is certainly not my fault if the Nielsen data heavily favors one format over the other.

Firstly, I did not object to your graph. FWIW the 4/29 figures (represented on the graph) were first posted by forum member Dreessen last Friday (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10464224&&#post10464224). The actual pie charts hadn't been posted. IOW, we already had that information - but thanks for posting the graph.

Secondly, what I object to is the segue from the actual sales reported to the effect of potential sales of potential titles which will be potentially announced.

Future events will affect you in the future, yes. But discussing things that are probably going to happen in Q4 opens a whole can of worms:

"In Q4 BD will have Spidey 3!! And Die Hard 4!! And PotC 3!! BD sales will clobber HD sales!! "
"Not so!! HD will have Bourne!! and Evan Almighty!! And all the Harry Potters which won't be released on BD because of crippled BD-J! Plus sales will multiply by ten because of cheap Chinese players!! BD=dead!!!11"
"WTF, Chinese players are rumor anyway"
"Well, duh, so is Die Hard 4. Fox is delaying everything."
"Yeah, but they did release Night at the Museum and it crushed your dear little Planet Earth y'all bought on April 15."
"You're retarded dude, Planet Earth made more money than Night at the Museum. Plus I got an email from the HD group saying that only standalone players count."
"Yeah, because it's the only stat they don't suck at."
"What sucks is movie sales to PS3 owners. They are only buying movies because PS3 games suck so much."

continue ad libitum... :rolleyes:

^^^ :D .

So, if NatM sold 20,000 units (high WAG estimate), ESotSM sold 852!! :( (one of them to me BTW ;) ).

Last week's BD number was 32K. That was without any new releases. This week had three new releases and the total was some 54K (my estimate). So it would look like about 15K is a good wag for N@M. So ESotSM sold probably around 600.

I've to dig for it - but I've been saying day & date releases are what will drive sales from even before the formats launched.

The pool of potential PS3 buyers is much smaller than that of both/either format. If HD takes off, PS3 will be a foonote.

I doubt PS3 will ever be relegated to 'footnote' status - afterall, it's fairly clear that without it the war would essentially be over already in HD DVD's favor. Instead, it's now HD DVD that needs to make up the ground, and significantly cheaper standalone player prices haven't yet had a material effect in closing that gap. For all of the announcements about 100,000+ standalone HD DVD players being sold thus far, along with the additional 100,000+ HD DVD add-ons - both to be purchased exclusively for HD DVD viewing - in my mind it speaks volumes as to the effect of PS3 that still BD enjoys nearly a 3:1 sales lead every week.

I can't seem to find a definitive number, but it appears DVD player sales are in the order of 100M/yr. With time, that will convert to HDM-only, with DVD capability players. I don't know about you, but I've been through DVD 4-5 players, so there is a good replacement market, and with expanding markets in China, India and elsewhere, that number should continue or increase. So the PS3 will have an important footnote, but it will be miniscule in numbers compared to standalone HDM players. The big question is if the more expensive HD format can dominate. IMO unlikely

It's not a matter of a footnote earned due to absolute player sales/contribution 10 years out from now, it's a matter of earning that footnote due to its effect of single-handedly getting BD through the year 2007 (thus far at least) in a stronger position relative to HD DVD. I don't quite understand folk that say when it's all said and done, PS3 won't have played a big role; I think we can acknowledge that of all players released to date, no other player has had as profound an effect on its formats' fortunes as PS3 has had on Blu-ray's up until now.

...BD enjoys nearly a 3:1 sales lead every week.

Do you have to lie ?

Do you have to lie ?

2:1, sorry. I assure you my purpose wasn't to "lie." :rolleyes:

I take it you agree with the rest of what I wrote then.

I take it you agree with the rest of what I wrote then.

You won't get people to read the rest of your post, let alone agree with, when you lie misrepresent like you did. Even if you change 3:1 to 2:1, your original statement would still be wrong.

You won't get people to read the rest of your post, let alone agree with, when you lie misrepresent like you did. Even if you change 3:1 to 2:1, your original statement would still be wrong.

YTD says it's pretty accurate.

Give it up...all these rationalizations just make the HD-DVD side seem more desperate..the fact is Blu-ray is outselling Hd-DVD every single week and widening the sales gap continuously. One side has to win in order for the whole industry to benefit, and at this point it's pretty obvious to any neutral observer that if there has to be a winner it would be blu-ray. I'm sure the shaking up at Universal will herald some changes in the months to come...

What on earth is wrong with your reading skills? There is no mention in my post (#5925, that you quote) about either Blu Ray or HD DVD as formats. It's a comment about HD in general and how it does against SD. You are obviously so blinded by your crusade that you managed to ignore that and use any comment to bring out stuff you've already posted about a thousand times. How about giving that up.

YTD says it's pretty accurate.

Welcome to AVS. Can you tell us a little bit about you and your interest in hidef formats ?

If you go back and read - not re-interpret - you will see he talks about every week.

in my mind it speaks volumes as to the effect of PS3 that still BD enjoys nearly a 3:1 sales lead every week

Yeah, sometimes it's WAY higher than 2:1 per week. He should be emphasizing the week it passed 4.5:1. :D

I've to dig for it - but I've been saying day & date releases are what will drive sales from even before the formats launched.

Sounds like a reasonable assumption. How do you think HDDVD can combat this when the BDA exclusives have so many more big box office hits this year?

Sounds like a reasonable assumption. How do you think HDDVD can combat this when the BDA exclusives have so many more big box office hits this year?

Spiderman 3 is the highest grossing movie opening of all time now. That might turn a few heads!

How do you think HDDVD can combat this when the BDA exclusives have so many more big box office hits this year?

Pls take this kind of talk to the general discussion thread.

You won't get people to read the rest of your post, let alone agree with, when you lie misrepresent like you did. Even if you change 3:1 to 2:1, your original statement would still be wrong.

Whether people agree with me or not is not the point; so far no one, including yourself, disagrees with what I said. That you yourself have nothing to post regarding the matter save to point out an error of ratios on my part I think sums up pretty well the strength of your 'position' (or lack thereof).

Yes!

Note how poorly catalog titles do, even on their first week:

Failure to Launch (BD/HD DVD), The Nutty Professor (HD DVD), Secret Window (BD) and Ultimate Avengers Collection (BD) failed to enter the charts at all.

The only new catalog title to register was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (HD DVD), which sold 13 percent of the Planet Earth HD DVD sales, or as you say, 4.26 percent of NatM sales. So, if NatM sold 20,000 units (high WAG estimate), ESotSM sold 852!! :( (one of them to me BTW ;) ).

852! and it was one of the better titles. IMO :(

The PS3 has played and still plays a substantial role in hidef disc.

It may continue to do so in the future - or not.

Everybody in agreement? ;)

The PS3 has played and still plays a substantial role in hidef disc.

It may continue to do so in the future - or not.

Everybody in agreement? ;)

That's a pretty bold claim.

852! and it was one of the better titles. IMO :(


IMO they need to lower the prices of the catalog titles. While I'm willing to pay $20 - $25 for a new release, I'm not so willing to pay that much for a title 5 or more years old that's less than $10 on dvd.

That's a pretty bold claim.
What's bold about it??? Are you suggesting the PS3 hasn't played a substantial role in this war? If so, I'd strongly disagree with you.

His statement seems very accurate to me...

What's bold about it??? Are you suggesting the PS3 hasn't played a substantial role in this war? If so, I'd strongly disagree with you.

His statement seems very accurate to me...

I meant the part about the future.


:p

Blu-ray widens the lead again last week.


http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/4838/newmktshxa8.jpg (http://img222.imageshack.us/my.php?image=newmktshxa8.jpg)



With Spider-man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean 3, New Die Hard, Fantastic Four 2, Ratatouille all coming to Blu-ray exclusively we can only hope the gap continues to grow larger.
Still too busy to hang out with you guys. Just have enough time to respond to this post with...

:)

Oh... and... yeah...

shame on you, Krinkle for this partisanism! I'm appalled! ;)

Originally Posted by Grubert
Yes!

Note how poorly catalog titles do, even on their first week: Yep but 500 or more catalog titles, sold to new player owners week after week, may eventually add up to a lot more sales over time. When that becomes 1000's of titles and millions of players, those catalog titles which have been fallow as DVD sales may have new life. From the studio perspective, a ridiculously low volume for a national released title, may be profitable. Any titles released now can also continue to drip drip drip accumulate sales for years and years.

In any given week those catalog titles may completely pale to a blockbuster new release, but they may become evergreen in steady sales that will increase as the number of standalone players accumulate.

There's just a lot more catalog titles available than blockbuster new releases. As the formats mature, those titles are the studios chance to double dip HD revenues out of those titles.

Catalog titles and their continued availability may eventually accumulate into major sales volumes as the number of standalone players on both sides of the format war increase.

Wow, BD is selling copies by the THOUSANDS. Look out DVD.

With stand-alone players selling by the DOZENS, this war will soon be over.

Wow, BD is selling copies by the THOUSANDS. Look out DVD. .

DVD was also being vastly outsold by VHS at the beginning...the point is once the studios all get together and try to push a good and relatively inexpensive product, they'll probably be able to do so over time simply by starting to slowly drop support for the older product.

DVD was also being vastly outsold by VHS at the beginning...the point is once the studios all get together and try to push a good and relatively inexpensive product, they'll probably be able to do so over time simply by starting to slowly drop support for the older product.

With the sales figures so incredibly small on both sides, it is a waste of time for format supporters to be championing sales figures and trying to one-up each other. It will be a long while before the pie charts have any sort of significance. With such a low sales volume, there is no way to maintain a stable margin of success.

With the slow down of PS3 sales, I think BD will hit a plateau pretty soon. Until either format gets their rumored support from Wal-Mart, neither will make a notable impact in the mainstream market. People should just enjoy their movies because the ratios will change month-to-month.

Anyone have info on the number of movies sold on VHS v. DVD 9 months after DVD launched? To me the few thousand weekly gap between BD and HD DVD does not seem like a huge deal. Probably works out to around $500K in additional revenue for BD v. HD DVD. If you work in differences in replications costs, the money made from BD probably isn't greater than HD DVD at all. Can the BD spend more than they are to up their promotions etc to drive growth? Looks to me they are already spending much more than the HD DVD folks - and they have the 20K or so extra movies to show each week. Is that impressive? Not if we're not seeing any steady growth since Jan.....

The only new catalog title to register was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (HD DVD), which sold 13 percent of the Planet Earth HD DVD sales, or as you say, 4.26 percent of NatM sales. So, if NatM sold 20,000 units (high WAG estimate), ESotSM sold 852!! :( (one of them to me BTW ;) ).

Would have been at least 853 if it was out on Blu-ray. Love that movie.

Anyone want to predict what the ceiling will be for the 22nd? There has got to be a limit of funds for consumers - as we saw Casino Royale spill into 2 strong weeks of sales. How many weeks will May 22nd titles ride at the top?

To me the few thousand weekly gap between BD and HD DVD does not seem like a huge deal.

Not sure thats a good matric. Need to look at copies sold per title. From what we saw from Sony's report, the avg sold by fox & Disney were no better than Universal.

I can't seem to find a definitive number, but it appears DVD player sales are in the order of 100M/yr.

not sure what you mean. But http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/cemadvdsales.html
it is 20k/year.


it was also
315,136 the first year (2x what HD DVD did including the add-on)
1,089,261 (close to what the PS3 did in the first year that was <2 months and it is 1/2 thee this year)
4,019,389
8,498,545
12,706,584

the point is HD DVD won't sell anywhere near the same as the PS3 before the PS3 is replaced (let's take 5 years because that is what Sony did with the 1 and 2)

yes eventually stand alone players will surpass the PS3 but no time soon enough to matter

Would have been at least 853 if it was out on Blu-ray. Love that movie.

Anyone want to predict what the ceiling will be for the 22nd? There has got to be a limit of funds for consumers - as we saw Casino Royale spill into 2 strong weeks of sales. How many weeks will May 22nd titles ride at the top?

I think we will see first time a week with over 100.000 units for Blu-ray :) or maybe even more.....

Marek

Yep but 500 or more catalog titles, sold to new player owners week after week, may eventually add up to a lot more sales over time.

Exactly 26,000 sales a year. ;) But that's assuming that if a title sells 500 units first week, it will continue to sell at least 500 units per week for the rest of the product life. And not even that is guaranteed - look at the March big sales report.

How about a round of guessing the results for last week? ;)

1. Guess the BD/HD percentage for week ending May 6
2. Guess the 'podium' (first, second and third title) on the hidef sellers list



Releases of the Week
New releases on BD: Dreamgirls, Happily N'ever After.
New releases on HD DVD: Alpha Dog, Dreamgirls, The Hitcher.

Catalog releases on BD: none.
Catalog releases on HD DVD: none.

I would say 65:35 to Blu-ray

The consolidated top 10 will (possibly) be:

1) Dreamgirls (BD) 100.00
2) Dreamgirls (HD DVD) 70.00
3) Night At The Museum (BD) 65.00
4) Deja Vu (BD) 35.00
5) Happily N'ever After (BD) 25.00
6) Hitcher (HD DVD) 23.00
7) Planet Earth (HD DVD) 14.00
8) Alpha Dog (HD DVD) 13.50
9) Casino Royale (BD) 12.00
10) Planet Earth (BD) 10.00

According to Amazon it will be:

1) PE (HD DVD) 100.00 (#6)
2) PE (BD) 85.00 (#10)
3) Casino Royale (BD) 25.00 (#237)
4) Deja Vu (BD) 20.00 (#278)
5) Dreamgirls (BD) 15.00 (#407)
6) Night At The Museum (BD) 12.00 (#418)
7) Dreamgirls (HD DVD) 10.00 (#537)
8) Departed (BD) 7.00 (#577)
9) Happy Feet (BD) 5.00 (#624)
10) The Queen (BD) 3.50 (#716)

Amazon positions of other 'new releases':

The Hitcher (HD DVD) #2,228
Alpha Dog (HD DVD) #3,012
Happily N'Ever After (BD) #3,256

Here's my bet:

Week percentage: 64/36 to BD
Top three: 1- Night at the Museum BD / 2- Dreamgirls HD / 3- Dreamgirls BD

New releases on BD: Dreamgirls, Happily N'ever After.
New releases on HD DVD: Alpha Dog, Dreamgirls, The Hitcher.


Here are the BO receipts.

Dreamgirls : 103M
Happily N'ever After : 15M
Alpha Dog : 15M
The Hitcher : 16M

I expect dreamgirls to beat Night at the Museum.

not sure what you mean. But http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/cemadvdsales.html
it is 20k/year.
yes eventually stand alone players will surpass the PS3 but no time soon enough to matter
You mean 20M/yr and US only

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., April 3, 2006 - DVD player and recorder units will have a combined market of 176.6 million units sold worldwide in 2010, up from 140.8 million units in 2005 http://www.instat.com/press.asp?Sku=IN0603107ME&ID=1622

I suspect recorder sales were less than 40M

My bet:

Week: 66/34 BD
Top three:
1) Night at the Museum BD
2) Dreamgirls BD
3) Dreamgirls HDDVD

My picks:

Week: 57/43 BD
Top three:
1) Dreamgirls HDDVD
2) Night at the Museum BD
3) Dreamgirls BD

I frankly just don't think Dreamgirls is going to be a hit with the PS3 crowd.

Cheers,

Richard

PS. A general comment about numbers. It never fails to amaze me how each side can say with absolute conviction that any numbers painting their format in a good light are irrefutable fact and any supporting the others format is FUD or desperation hahaa

Night at the Museum did 250M at the US box office and Dreamgirls did 100M. Night at the Museum high def sales will be all Blu-ray while Dreamgirls will be split amongst the two formats. Fractional installed base aside, I don't see how anyone can reasonably expect HDDVD dreamgirls to top out Night at the Museum in sales.

68/32 :) BD

Marek

Night at the Museum did 250M at the US box office and Dreamgirls did 100M. Night at the Museum high def sales will be all Blu-ray while Dreamgirls will be split amongst the two formats. Fractional installed base aside, I don't see how anyone can reasonably expect HDDVD dreamgirls to top out Night at the Museum in sales.

I agree, Night at the Museum will clear the top spot again without any problem

M.

I frankly just don't think Dreamgirls is going to be a hit with the PS3 crowd.

Agreed. Although, I can't believe anyone would buy Dreamgirls... in any format!

Put me down for 66:34 BR.

59%/41%

Blu-ray over HD DVD once again, but the gap closes as HD DVD regains some market share back

64:36 Bd>hd-dvd

61/39

Bd > Hd

BD 65% HD DVD 35%.

1) Night at the Museum
2) Dreamgirls BD
3) Dreamgirls HD DVD

68:32

Agreed. Although, I can't believe anyone would buy Dreamgirls... in any format!

Put me down for 66:34 BR.


It did win two Oscars. Definitely worth the $25 to me. It's an excellent movie! Much better than Night at the Museum.

DreamGirls BD
DreamGirls HD DVD
Night at the Museum BD
The Hitcher HD DVD
Planet Earth HD DVD
Planet Earth BD
Alpha Dog HD DVD
Happily N'ever After BD

60-40 Blu-ray

Does anyone have an updated version of Icemage's spreadsheet?

So does anyone think that Amazon actually have 70000 BD in stock? That would be about 300 copies per titles on average. That's quite a bit considering the low number of disc sold. We're looking at over a week worth inventory?

Does anyone have an updated version of Icemage's spreadsheet?

No. Unfortunately my spreadsheet has too many things going on ...

Still too busy to hang out with you guys. Just have enough time to respond to this post with...

:)

Oh... and... yeah...

shame on you, Krinkle for this partisanism! I'm appalled! ;)


and yupe Matrix too !! :D

Wow, BD is selling copies by the THOUSANDS. Look out DVD.

With stand-alone players selling by the DOZENS, this war will soon be over.

yupe - Sony, FOX, Panasonic and Pioneer will personally carry DVD's coffin in 3 years time :D :D :D (oh the number of smiley - intentional)

Some interesting figures on amazon vs overall sales:


amazon North America segment sales, representing the Company's U.S. (.com) and Canadian (.ca) sites, were $1.62 billion during Q1 2007. Let us say it's 1.5 billion for the .com and 120 million for the .ca.

Two thirds of their sales were on media. That is $1 billion. That includes DVD, CD and books. Let's say that between half of that and two-thirds were for home video. That's $500-$660 million.

Meanwhile, total home video sales during the period in the US were $3.5 billion.

So amazon accounts for 14-19% of total home video sales.


http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/070424/20070424006365.html?.v=1
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6435138.html

So amazon accounts for 14-19% of total home video sales.


This gives a good idea about Amazon market share of retail in general.

http://www.longtail.com/the_long_tail/2005/11/questioning_the.html

Said to be 10-15%. There is an interesting discussion on the "Long Tail" in that article for books - in our lingo catalog sales. Amazon has a higher % in long tail sales - some 1/3rd. Infact Netflix apparently buys a high proprtion of long tail titles.

So does anyone think that Amazon actually have 70000 BD in stock? That would be about 300 copies per titles on average. That's quite a bit considering the low number of disc sold. We're looking at over a week worth inventory? Why not.

They have several warehouses.

Assume you have three locations with major stock. Thats 100 copies per location. Thats a small box only a couple cubic feet. 150 boxes on a shelf or a corner of a warehouse is 300 cubic feet. No big deal for storage. That one small warehouse storage shelfing unit.

The issue is the purchase cost, not the storage cost. If the Blu-ray studios gave them a deal for buying them or advanced them to them for free or with a strong buyback offer, or gave them on credit no big deal.

If the studios gave them a good enough deal. why not?