Were the top titles posted???? I cant find them. :confused:

This week HMM only posted YTD numbers, so we don't have access to the weekly figures at this time unless someone has another source.

You can't ignore the fact that titles generally have their highest sales in the first week of release.

I never said you should.

But you also can't ignore that there's than a period of 4 weeks or so where the new title sells less well than week 1, but better than when it settles down to sell the same as all the other old titles.

And you can't ignore the fact that all these titles were back catalogue bar one, and that this one was on BD too - and was hardly a 'Night At The Museum' sized blockbuster.

Though some will try.

Some people are tring to talk about 1st week sales and would have us completely ignore the 'hangover' sales of, for example, the 2 'POTC' films.

Who thinks that, after only a few weeks, their sales will have settled down to the same levels as other titles.

Anyone?

Anyone?

No?

Well stop pretending that's not the case, then. Stop pretending we should expect a non-combo re-release of 'Army Of Darkness' to be selling more than 'Apocalypto' in its third week, and that anything other than that is some sort of victory for BD.

Steve W

I'm a little surprised that anyone would think this week's releases would bring a HD DVD lead.

Look at the Top 10 sellers for BD for this, or any week, and you'll see that big titles, whilst selling big quantities in Week 1, still carry on selling quite well for a number of weeks after that.

Would we have a 65:35 BD lead if it weren't for sales of recent (but not brand new) titles like 'Apocalypto', 'Ghost Rider', 'Bridge...' and ''POTC1&2'? Looking at those titles, clearly not.

If you only look at thie new releases, you're presuming these titles on sell in big quantities for 1 week, and that's very foolish thing to do indeed.

Any sort of HD DVd comeback (if it happens) will be at least a Summer-ling event. Meanwhile, if the lead can be cut on a weekly (or 'most weekly') basis, that'll be the best anyone should be looking for.

BD-supporting cries of "You should have won, look how many titles you had!" ignore the fact that one of the biggest selling 'new' titles was actually a re-release.

Steve W

Maybe the problem is that HD DVD isn't getting the big releases that keep sales up in comparison to the competition.

Universal seems to think that large numbers of catalog releases are enough and these figures continue to show that they are not.

This Spring when Universal wasn't releasing anything and sales were in BDs favor everyone said 'wait till they start releasing' well, now they are releasing, and this quarter they released more movies than anyone else. In the week with the most releases HD DVD managed to get 35% of HDM sales.

That is why this number and the fact that BD continuously outsells HD DVD matter, because if they aren't willing to release big titles to sell more movies then the numbers will never change and HD DVD will continue to fall behind.

I haven't seen the unit sales figures in awhile now...do we know how many disks are selling ?

I'll try to put together an update of the units per movie list in a few days. The YTD numbers for the tops sellers we got this week may actually help with that for at least the top titles. It's a pity we didn't get any percentages at all for this week since it will be hard to make any qualified estimates for this week. My estimate is that this weeks total was at the low end.

If Grubert actually manages to get weekly numbers out of HMM after the weekend we would be better of with that and the YTD so I'm hoping he's successful in doing that

Maybe the problem is that HD DVD isn't getting the big releases that keep sales up in comparison to the competition.

Universal seems to think that large numbers of catalog releases are enough and these figures continue to show that they are not.

This Spring when Universal wasn't releasing anything and sales were in BDs favor everyone said 'wait till they start releasing' well, now they are releasing, and this quarter they released more movies than anyone else. In the week with the most releases HD DVD managed to get 35% of HDM sales.

That is why this number and the fact that BD continuously outsells HD DVD matter, because if they aren't willing to release big titles to sell more movies then the numbers will never change and HD DVD will continue to fall behind.

Exactly.

Also, Dead Silence is a Universal new release.

And the fact that Universal doesn't have any titles that can sell like Apocalypto or Pirates is who's problem? The Fifth Element, a catalog title and box office bust, with it's crappy transfer and all, has been in the BD top ten for how many months?

The point is, BD had 3 whole months (Q1) where week after week they had more and better releases.

For April, May & June, the releases were pretty equal in number, but with BD having around 5 or 6 big blockbusters.

We now have 2 months where HD DVD appears to have better releases, and no BD-exclusive blockbusters.

And we have BD fans insisting that HD DVD's 'Summer push' has failed because it's been unable to overturn those blockbusters in just one week, with only 1 non-catalogue title, which wasn't HD DVD-exclusive anyway.

If the 2 months of Summer releases don't pull HD DVD way back up, fair enough. But after just one week? Give it a rest.

Steve W

The point is, BD had 3 whole months (Q1) where week after week they had more and better releases.

For April, May & June, the releases were pretty equal in number, but with BD having around 5 or 6 big blockbusters.

We now have 2 months where HD DVD appears to have better releases, and no BD-exclusive blockbusters.

And we have BD fans insisting that HD DVD's 'Summer push' has failed because it's been unable to overturn those blockbusters in just one week, with only 1 non-catalogue title, which wasn't HD DVD-exclusive anyway.

If the 2 months of Summer releases don't pull HD DVD way back up, fair enough. But after just one week? Give it a rest.

Steve W

It isn't one week, this quarter has been flooded with Universal releases. Why are you in a sales thread if all you want to do is ignore or minimize the importance of the data? If you want to keep your blinders on about the deficit you should probably just avoid this thread completely.

If the market continues to grow at a certain percentage rate, and if each format more or less maintains its current percentage of the pie for an extended period of time, doesn't that mean they are both succeeding?I don't believe so for the simple reason that I think the name of the game for both sides right now is to get a major studio to come their direction (Universal for Blu-ray and Disney or Fox, although Lionsgate would help, for HD DVD).
In that scenario, if there's a large enough active, installed user base, why would the percentages for each format matter? If the pie gets large enough, each format will have potential customers that the studios would likely not ignore.It is unlikely that more than one studio will move to neutrality on the same day (unless they make a pact). Therefore, as soon as one moves it changes the dynamics significantly and any studios on the other side can now think about whether they want to continue pushing their side to try to get one winner, or whether they want to keep the market split.

--Darin

That is why this number and the fact that BD continuously outsells HD DVD matter, because if they aren't willing to release big titles to sell more movies then the numbers will never change and HD DVD will continue to fall behind.

O.K. I'm not a numbers guy; I mostly lurk here. So I will say this quickly and then duck me head.

I can't help but think there is much to much micro analysis about the weekly numbers versus actual releases. The ratio of BD:HD capable machines still remains about 4:1, even after the Toshiba promotion, maybe still closer to 5:1. Larger numbers of players inevitably drive disc sales, regardless of the day/date or catalog mix. Everyone has different tastes.

If during Q4 HD can manage to close the gap of BD:HD players significantly, that will close the media spread too. If BD sales increase (that means totalling the PS3 and standalones) enough to maintain or increase the player ratio spread, then so goes the media spread.

I think the relative consistency of the media sales ratios for many weeks, and the insensitivity to changes by new/old releases from both sides shows that the public, across the board, yawns loudly each week, and the total sales are just muddling forward, pushed by the shear size ( or lack thereof) of the the player audience.

I really cannot believe that any of the studios are shocked by what these weekly stats show.

Thank you.
I hope I have resolved all issues here and there are no reasons for any further posts. :D

Amazon's rankings are based of price. HMM is based on unit. That is why Planet Earth continually remains on the top even though many other titles outsell it at the unit level. Amazon ranking have been continually proven to be not relevant to sales conversations. Wrong.

Its based on unit sales for the DVD rankings.

I know this question will probably upset some people, but I think it is a valid question. As somebody pointed out, one problem for Universal is that Best Buy doesn't seem to be stocking their catalog titles. They also aren't stocking many other catalog titles, but this question is mostly about Universal and I think Best Buy stocks some catalogs. While Best Buy is officially neutral and seems to be for the most part (other than some BBs having bigger Blu-ray sections), I wonder if Universal going neutral or even switching sides would get BB to start stocking their catalog titles. Given that Best Buy would only need one section and there wouldn't be the issues with the format war, it would not surprise me at all if a move to Blu-ray exclusively by Universal would get Best Buy to start stocking those titles which they seem unwilling to stock now.

I doubt Universal is going to just switch sides like that (it would upset a lot of people) and I don't know if going neutral would be enough to get Best Buy to start carrying the majority of their catalog titles, but I think Universal really should be giving some thought to their current problem of BB not carrying so many of their titles and what they could do to change that.

--Darin Universal executives know that HD DVD sales will be lower than DVD sales at big box retailers if they are not on retail display, are not stocked at brick and mortar locations and are priced significantly higher than DVD SKUs.

What is important to them is trending of the sales, which has been steadily upward for HD DVD and the newer owners seem to be buying catalog and older releases just like the earlier owners did.

The volumes of both HD DVD and Blu-ray sales are so low right now compared to DVD that that all the sales comparisons don't mean much right now.

Again, as the installed base of players increase on both sides, retailers will have an incentive to drop disc retail prices and stock and display more. That will happen in the Nov-Dec sales timeframe.

AND

One thing to remember.

From a retailer and studio standpoint, current release HD sales are basically a cannabilization of day and date DVD sales. The only benefit for moving to HD DVD or Blu-ray if new releases are the only sales of note over the long term is the price premium that consumers may pay over a DVD purchase. That will attrit downward over time, and may not even be $5 in the short term per title.

If new releases were the only sales, or the majority of sales, like Blu-ray is concentraing on, and is its current strength, based on PS3 penetration, then that is just a revenue shift, subtracting from the DVD sales line item , to the HD sales line. Same revenue to the studios and retailers, just different SKUs.

What makes this whole HD format transition worthwhile to the studios is new or revived revenue streams. Not just a substitution of HD for DVD sales.

HD Price Premium : They need consumers to want to pay more for HD content.

Interactive Sales: Additional revenues for interactvce content, online sales links, additional content, etc.

Catalog Sales: Revenues from reselling the catalog titles



Over the long term, the additional revenue stream of re-selling their existing libraries is one of the largest possible revenue sources as it is money that is above what the retailers and studios get over just having a new DVD release.

If they are just substituting HD for DVD sales, then what's the point from a revenue standpoint?

Universal and Warner are setting the groundwork for that additional catalog sales revenue down the road a bit when the installed base of players is larger. That's when it is important.

Right now, the new release sales comparisons don't mean as much, as the catalog sales sales will mean in the 4th quarter and first quarter of next year.

HD DVD PRG activities are focused on increasing the installed base of players throughout this year, as those hardware sockets give the potential for increased catalog and day and date disc sales when retailers drop prices and increase display inventory later in the year.

For both HD DVD and Blu-ray, its probable that when either or both side get the equal of 1.5 million ot 2 million dedicated players in North America, it becomes rational for retailers to get serious about software sales. That was the tipping point for DVD after its launch.

Its looks like HD DVD price drops will make those numbers posssible by the end of the year, and if PS3 sales increase in the fall also, the PS3 users using Blu-ray movies will move toward that point also, supported by standalone Blu-ray sales.

Bottom line is all HD DVD has to do is be competitive until its installed base reaches a tipping point, and that these short term sales numbers are interesting but less significant than the long term trends of new revenues.

I don't think the term "obsolete" is extreme at all, and the word has been used in relation to this issue by very credible publications.

hd dvd players are already obsolete since they can't play the dominant hd format.

I keep seeing "wait a few more weeks for HD DVD". This has been a moving target.

It seems to me that we had a big sale of HD DVD players starting in Mid-May, and we have had the Universal catalog blitz since April. These were things that were supposed to make a big difference.

Yet they have not shown up in the Videoscan numbers yet in any quantifiable way. Certainly not the difference we saw in December after the PS3 launch in November, when the numbers dramatically turned around in favor of Blu-ray.

So, here is my question: can some of the HD DVD supporters agree on what trends they are looking for, when we will see them, and (most importantly) under what conditions they will be willing to agree that the format war is basically a foregone conclusion and time to move along with Blu-ray?

I believe it is safe to assume that as long as HD DVD has over a 30% market share, in the short term there is no question that the format war will be a forgone conclusion. Furthermore, the real battle will be over standalone players and unless BD can prove that they can have set top boxes with mass appeal the format war will be far from over - the battle is not over game console owners who will buy a few films but over a mass market product. Right now I doubt BD has exceeded sales of the first few months of UMD for the PSP.

What we are seeing now is a slower than expected adoption of set top boxes as a result sales are skewed heavily towards the PS3 installed base....the base that would have largely existed whether the PS3 included a BD player or not, and the volume of BD purchases right now on a weekly basis is around 20-25K higher than HD DVD sales, which isn't really saying much. I believe that volume difference has remained the same since Jan - the % really means nothing. I believe even people who are making a big deal about the % gap know fully well that the units sold gap is much more relevant.

HDDVD apologists out in full force today. No matter how you guys try to spin it, the numbers don't lie. Bottom line is that HDDVD is getting seriously murdered and no amount of spin is going to change that. It's going to get a lot worse for HDDVD in the next few months leading into the holiday season. Great times ahead!! ;)

HDDVD apologists out in full force today. No matter how you guys try to spin it, the numbers don't lie. Bottom line is that HDDVD is getting seriously murdered and no amount of spin is going to change that. It's going to get a lot worse for HDDVD in the next few months leading into the holiday season. Great times ahead!! ;)
LOL Who has to apologize for what? BD has come up short so many times, it should be embarrassing. Fact is, Sony has been buying BD sales through the PS3. An unsustainable strategy.

The numbers don't lie. Ratios are remaining rather constant, so growth, or lack thereof, is about the same for each format. I'm no apologist, but I don't understand why it would matter if I, or anyone else here, would "agree that the format war is basically a foregone conclusion and time to move along with Blu-ray." It's not our call as to whether this "war" is over. We're not even sure it's a war that will matter at all in the long run.

It's a shame so many here have personalized this whole thing.

HDDVD apologists out in full force today. No matter how you guys try to spin it, the numbers don't lie. Bottom line is that HDDVD is getting seriously murdered and no amount of spin is going to change that. It's going to get a lot worse for HDDVD in the next few months leading into the holiday season. Great times ahead!! ;)

Yep the pro-DRM/anti-Consumer forces will have a field day with the DRM BD+ laden Spider-Man 3 release

Wrong.

Its based on unit sales for the DVD rankings.

Do you have any link or so to back this up? I've been looking to stuff online and nothing I saw is definitive about this.
I'm honestly just interested to know since commercially it would make much more sense to take turnover rather than numbers as the criterium. So it puzzles me why Amazon would use simple sales numbers.

I believe it is safe to assume that as long as HD DVD has over a 30% market share, in the short term there is no question that the format war will be a forgone conclusion. Furthermore, the real battle will be over standalone players and unless BD can prove that they can have set top boxes with mass appeal the format war will be far from over - the battle is not over game console owners who will buy a few films but over a mass market product. Right now I doubt BD has exceeded sales of the first few months of UMD for the PSP.

What we are seeing now is a slower than expected adoption of set top boxes as a result sales are skewed heavily towards the PS3 installed base....the base that would have largely existed whether the PS3 included a BD player or not, and the volume of BD purchases right now on a weekly basis is around 20-25K higher than HD DVD sales, which isn't really saying much. I believe that volume difference has remained the same since Jan - the % really means nothing. I believe even people who are making a big deal about the % gap know fully well that the units sold gap is much more relevant.
".........the real battle will be over standalone players and unless BD can prove that they can have set top boxes with mass appeal the format war will be far from over......."

I don't believe your premise here but will accept it for the sake of argument. If you pay attention to current Blu-ray "standalone" sales I think you will realize they have "mass appeal". The B&M stores are selling the sub $500 Blu-ray players quickly and are having trouble keeping them in stock. Amazon shows "delivery within 1 - 2 months" for the new BDP-S300s, meaning they are turning them over quicker than they can get them in. "Mass appeal" has arrived at the Blu-ray player market. Demand for them is greater than supply. Meanwhile many HD-DVD players are gathering dust. I suspect things will only go further south for HD-DVD at this point.

I believe it is safe to assume that as long as HD DVD has over a 30% market share, in the short term there is no question that the format war will be a forgone conclusion.Do you believe that as long as it is "over 30% market share" that will be enough to get Universal to stay exclusive while getting a Blu-ray studio to go neutral?

As far as the total $ thing, maybe I missed it, but do you agree or disagree that you total $ analysis also leads to showing that Disney has more to lose to piracy if one format has poorer copy protection and is losing more if the war is causing reduced sales overall because of people unwilling to get in until the war is basically over? Seems that if you are going to apply it to the logic that the studio with the highest sales is losing the most sales by not being neutral (and therefore that will push that studio toward neutrality the hardest), it also applies equally well to those other 2 things.

--Darin

I believe it is safe to assume that as long as HD DVD has over a 30% market share, in the short term there is no question that the format war will be a forgone conclusion. Furthermore, the real battle will be over standalone players and unless BD can prove that they can have set top boxes with mass appeal the format war will be far from over - the battle is not over game console owners who will buy a few films but over a mass market product. Right now I doubt BD has exceeded sales of the first few months of UMD for the PSP.

What we are seeing now is a slower than expected adoption of set top boxes as a result sales are skewed heavily towards the PS3 installed base....the base that would have largely existed whether the PS3 included a BD player or not, and the volume of BD purchases right now on a weekly basis is around 20-25K higher than HD DVD sales, which isn't really saying much. I believe that volume difference has remained the same since Jan - the % really means nothing. I believe even people who are making a big deal about the % gap know fully well that the units sold gap is much more relevant.

People keep talking about how HD DVD has a larger stand alone install base but they are also ignoring the fact that there are people like me and lots of other Blu Ray owners who bought the PS3 not as a game console but as our stand alone player. There is no way to mesure the amount of people that chose to use the PS3 as there stand alone player and i think if there was a way to mesure it people might be very surprised who was winning the stand alone contest along with all the other parts of this race


Sean

hd dvd players are already obsolete since they can't play the dominant hd format.

Joe Pesci ladies and gentlemen, he's a really funny guy! :D

The point is, BD had 3 whole months (Q1) where week after week they had more and better releases.

For April, May & June, the releases were pretty equal in number, but with BD having around 5 or 6 big blockbusters.

We now have 2 months where HD DVD appears to have better releases, and no BD-exclusive blockbusters.

And we have BD fans insisting that HD DVD's 'Summer push' has failed because it's been unable to overturn those blockbusters in just one week, with only 1 non-catalogue title, which wasn't HD DVD-exclusive anyway.

If the 2 months of Summer releases don't pull HD DVD way back up, fair enough. But after just one week? Give it a rest.

Steve W

Good point, but to make your argument stick, you need to show that HD DVD will start to have a lot of blockbusters coming out within the coming months.

Where are these coming from? Clearly Warners and Paramount have some, but they are also supporting Blu-ray. [Even Warners seems to have moved away from its semi-exclusive tone.] So you are left with Universal.

Universal has put a lot of its releases on the table through the end of the year (if you count what has been published in thedigitalbits.com rumor mill, which everyone says is correct.) Universal hasn't had many hits. Bourne will be, Knocked Up will do some business on HD DVD, and Evan Almighty looks to do badly on HD DVD after its box-office reception.

Compare this to the staggering release schedule for the Blu-ray exclusive studios, and you begin to see the depth of the HD DVD problem.

The strategy was clearly to use Universal's catalog blitz to increase sales together with massive player price reductions. We have had two price reductions on the A2 in the last several months (it was originally $499 if you recall). Universal shipped 33 titles in 3 months.

What you need to do is to argue how the available HD DVD releases are going to make a difference. I don't see the scenario myself.

If the 2 months of Summer releases don't pull HD DVD way back up, fair enough. But after just one week?


I'm bookmarking this one so I can be laughing my ass off September 1. :D

Darin, if piracy was of such importance to Disney they would have stopped releasing on DVD long ago!

Piracy comes after revenue. Unless BD revenue lost due to HD DVD is greater than the revenue gained from supporting HD DVD, piracy should not matter.

Also, someone said the demand curve for BD is 2X as great as HD DVD. I'd like to see a single sale report from anyone that shows a 2X priced BD standalone player selling better than HD DVD Player...i.e. the Sony BDP 300 selling the same as the A2. The A20 doesn't count since people will substitute the A20 for the A2 - but the BDP 300 cannot be substituted for a lower priced BD player.

Also, while we are discussing demand curves, IF both formats had the same demand curve for movies, the avg. $ spent per person with a BD or HD DVD player should be the same. Is it? I believe it to be higher for HD DVD.

So, why is BD selling more? Simply because there are a lot more game consoles with BD drives and even if each owner buys a couple of disks, BD ends up with a sales lead....has little to do with demand for BD. In my own personal example I end up buying a few DVD-A disks because my car came with a DVD-A player from the factory...

In a nutshell the market for HD media is just too small to draw reasonable conclusions right now. Anyone know the relative market share for DVD-A and SACD? Does anyone care? We cannot draw conclusions on the format war when the market is small enough that it can be easily distorted via subsidies and other marketing programs....and with a game console that will sell in the millions so selling a few tens of thousands of disks a week isn't what will decide the format winner.

If the PS3 took off and we were seeing double digit weekly sales growth in disk sales....that would be something else.

People keep talking about how HD DVD has a larger stand alone install base but they are also ignoring the fact that there are people like me and lots of other Blu Ray owners who bought the PS3 not as a game console but as our stand alone player. There is no way to mesure the amount of people that chose to use the PS3 as there stand alone player and i think if there was a way to mesure it people might be very surprised who was winning the stand alone contest along with all the other parts of this race


Sean

Indeed, for all the talk about "standalone" installed base (while unduly ignoring the PS3), it has not done a single thing to change HD DVD software sales. Why? There's an undeniable fact that Blu-ray has a larger an insurmountable *userbase* than HD DVD, regardless of what its constituents are.

Darin, if piracy was of such importance to Disney they would have stopped releasing on DVD long ago!

Piracy comes after revenue. Unless BD revenue lost due to HD DVD is greater than the revenue gained from supporting HD DVD, piracy should not matter.

Also, someone said the demand curve for BD is 2X as great as HD DVD. I'd like to see a single sale report from anyone that shows a 2X priced BD standalone player selling better than HD DVD Player...i.e. the Sony BDP 300 selling the same as the A2. The A20 doesn't count since people will substitute the A20 for the A2 - but the BDP 300 cannot be substituted for a lower priced BD player.

Also, while we are discussing demand curves, IF both formats had the same demand curve for movies, the avg. $ spent per person with a BD or HD DVD player should be the same. Is it? I believe it to be higher for HD DVD.

So, why is BD selling more? Simply because there are a lot more game consoles with BD drives and even if each owner buys a couple of disks, BD ends up with a sales lead....has little to do with demand for BD. In my own personal example I end up buying a few DVD-A disks because my car came with a DVD-A player from the factory...

In a nutshell the market for HD media is just too small to draw reasonable conclusions right now. Anyone know the relative market share for DVD-A and SACD? Does anyone care? We cannot draw conclusions on the format war when the market is small enough that it can be easily distorted via subsidies and other marketing programs....and with a game console that will sell in the millions so selling a few tens of thousands of disks a week isn't what will decide the format winner.

If the PS3 took off and we were seeing double digit weekly sales growth in disk sales....that would be something else.

plazman, the demand curve for Blu-ray IS 2x HD DVD. Open your eyes, have a real look - don't be afraid. People watch *movies*, they don't watch *players*.

As to the ridiculous statement that blu-ray disc sales has little to do with demand for blu-ray, what could possibly have made you say that? What on earth could have generated the sales for blu-ray discs, if it wasn't actually demand for blu-ray discs? It is time to get back to reality, plazman.

Yep the pro-DRM/anti-Consumer forces will have a field day with the DRM BD+ laden Spider-Man 3 release
I guess HD DVD's DRM stradegy is working, since you won't be able to watch it on that format. I think I'll stick with the one where the movie is playable. ;)

plazman, the demand curve for Blu-ray IS 2x HD DVD. Open your eyes, have a real look - don't be afraid. People watch *movies*, they don't watch *players*.

As to the ridiculous statement that blu-ray disc sales has little to do with demand for blu-ray, what could possibly have made you say that? What on earth could have generated the sales for blu-ray discs, if it wasn't actually demand for blu-ray discs? It is time to get back to reality, plazman.

BD disc sales are being kept afloat by the PS3. Unless Sony can undercut Toshiba with lower cost players, the sales lead will be temporary. It might not happen tomorrow, but stand alone players will ultimately win out.

BD disc sales are being kept afloat by the PS3. Unless Sony can undercut Toshiba with lower cost players, the sales lead will be temporary. It might not happen tomorrow, but stand alone players will ultimately win out.

As someone who is about to buy his second PS3 for use as a Blu-ray player, I tire of this. I also have a Samsung 1000, previously the most unfairly maligned CE device ever made. Now it is the Ps3.

One might as well say that HD DVD disk sales are being kept afloat by Toshiba players.

A player is a player and the PS3 is a very good one.

Do you have any link or so to back this up? I've been looking to stuff online and nothing I saw is definitive about this.
I'm honestly just interested to know since commercially it would make much more sense to take turnover rather than numbers as the criterium. So it puzzles me why Amazon would use simple sales numbers.

Go to http://eproductwars.com/DVD/ (http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/) and compare for yourself. Boxed sets are selling as many copies as single disk releases with a similar ranking.

Amazon has no reason to care about supplying turnover for the products. They have little reason to give unit umbers as well of course but for some reason they do.

People keep talking about how HD DVD has a larger stand alone install base but they are also ignoring the fact that there are people like me and lots of other Blu Ray owners who bought the PS3 not as a game console but as our stand alone player. There is no way to mesure the amount of people that chose to use the PS3 as there stand alone player and i think if there was a way to mesure it people might be very surprised who was winning the stand alone contest along with all the other parts of this race


Sean

This is fact. I bought the PS3 as a Blu player first, gaming machine second.

I keep hearing, the strategy is unsustainable... I call BS on this one. The strategy is clearly working, and will continue to work, until the pricing of the standalones drops, and then it's a moot point.

PS3 wins Blu the momentum until the standalones are the price for mass adoption... The titles are geared towards this demographic...

Like the strategy or not, it's a solid one. Sony may have sacrificed their holy grail of a machine to win a format war, no doubt... but they will win... you have a 70/30 lead every week in software sales... better releases (for sales, movies are subjective. :) ), etc...

Sony's going to win this one... Universal doesn't have the titles to sustain, that should be the argument here... couple that with the fact their latest HD releases have looked like trash... they aren't helping matters.

I know you HD DVD supporters don't like to hear it... but I just bought the PS3 for bluray playback...I would imagine many others did the same.

Go to http://eproductwars.com/DVD/ (http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/) and compare for yourself. Boxed sets are selling as many copies as single disk releases with a similar ranking.

Amazon has no reason to care about supplying turnover for the products. They have little reason to give unit umbers as well of course but for some reason they do.

1) I spent some time (starting back in jan) looking at that but I don't find much evidence given how unreliable it is to determine sales from very slowly changing stock levels (that get replenished at unknown rates). The only reliable sales numbers you can get are for Planet Earth at this point (in part because there is no doubt on when these get replenished).

2) Second, it does not have to be exclusively one or the other. Given that they seem to do a combination of different rules in how they combine data over time, they may do the same thing in the data they use. So a simple 'eyeballing some data' isn't going to prove much.

3) As to their reasons for proivding this. Amazon provides these numbers as a guide to buyers, to help them figure out their choice. They want to replace B&M and know that this kind of info is the only way to achieve that. Second, since people do care about the public rankings, they will try to maninpulate them by buying from amzn, which is good business for amazon. But for both reasons, you would expect them to tilt towards more expensive products to nudge people in that direction.

BD disc sales are being kept afloat by the PS3. Unless Sony can undercut Toshiba with lower cost players, the sales lead will be temporary. It might not happen tomorrow, but stand alone players will ultimately win out.

I don't know if it's due to temporary production ramp up problems, higher then expected demand or a combination of both, but my local B&M consumer electronics stores are having problems keeping the new less then $500 Blu-ray players in stock. They sell out quickly after they're restocked. If the rumored price reduction of PS3 to below $500 happens, they might become hard to find also after a while at the new price point.

There's no problems finding low-cost Toshibas; they're sitting on shelves and not moving very fast now.

Also, someone said the demand curve for BD is 2X as great as HD DVD. I'd like to see a single sale report from anyone that shows a 2X priced BD standalone player selling better than HD DVD Player...i.e. the Sony BDP 300 selling the same as the A2.

I guess the someone meant 'inverse demand curve' : at the same price selling twice the number of discs (or players, if we're talking player demand). I haven't seen a salesreport neither, so I have no info, but I do think this potentially may be true. I agree with you that the demand curve statement is probably not correct.

My theory is that only a portion of PS3 can be reliably counted on as a BD player, but overall, the attach rate is probably comparable once we factor in what this percentage is. The sales numbers tell us that the installed base of 'BD players' is roughly 2X of HD DVD players, and has roughly stayed at the same level when the HD-A2 reduced their street prices from 499 to 449 to 399 to 299 to 250 to 199. The only cheap player until BDPS300 at 499 is the PS3 which is mostly 599 (with some 499 20GB), there are some samsungs sold close to 500 at ebay and other places, but it's fair to say that the BDPS300's late introduction did not factor into this disk buying calculations.

It's not a stretch to note that throughout 2007, so far, BD players have been priced at > 2X the cheapest HD DVD player, yet the movie sales have very consistently stayed at 2X BD:HD DVD.

It's already July, if after all these months of incentives with HD-A1s and A2s, and the price now < 1/2 of 6 months ago, the movie sales ratio is relatively constant constant, that is a pretty good indication that 'bd players' in total are maintaining a 2:1 sales ratio over 'hd dvd players' (including the x360). This in spite of the > 2X street pricing delta.

It is quite easy to conclude that the price demand curves for the 'aggregate bd players' is at least 2X to the right/on top of the HD DVD player. In fact, it is a lot higher, because we are talking about selling twice as many at twice the price.

If we're comparing standalones, we see that the standalones are 3X-5X the street pricing of the HD-A2 (closer to 3X with the $799 samsungs, which was damaged by bad press on the cortez chip, 4X is a closer estimate with BDPS1 and panasonic BDMP1 street).

The pricing on all these players follow the classic price war pattern with both players reducing street pricing (or with coupons, rebates etc), with the PS3 still at the same price and X360 adddon now around $150 from $199, and standalones half their MSRP.

Again : Once we factor in 'BD-intended' PS3 & X360 addon, the two aggregate player demand curves is showing selling at about 2X at > 2X the price throughout the price war reduction following both camps.

What do those two curves look like?

The following are the releases from July 3rd

Blu-ray
Flatliners (Sony)
The Patriot (Extended Cut) (Sony)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

HD DVD
Blood Diamond (Warner)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

No day and date releases but Blood Diamond is a high profile release for HD DVD, I will predict....

67/33

No predictions on top 3 for me because I am no good at it.

The following are the releases from July 3rd

Blu-ray
Flatliners (Sony)
The Patriot (Extended Cut) (Sony)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

HD DVD
Blood Diamond (Warner)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

No day and date releases but Blood Diamond is a high profile release for HD DVD, I will predict....

67/33

No predictions on top 3 for me because I am no good at it.

Blood Diamond will top the HD DVD list, The Patriot will top the Blu-Ray list. However Planet Earth could come back again and be the number one title on both formats.

plazman, the demand curve for Blu-ray IS 2x HD DVD. Open your eyes, have a real look - don't be afraid. People watch *movies*, they don't watch *players*.

As to the ridiculous statement that blu-ray disc sales has little to do with demand for blu-ray, what could possibly have made you say that? What on earth could have generated the sales for blu-ray discs, if it wasn't actually demand for blu-ray discs? It is time to get back to reality, plazman.

The demand curve plots price and quantity - all other factors staying the same. My post was in response to someone who said that he say the demand curve of BD players to be 2x as great as HD DVD. For this to be true, the Sony BDP 300 which costs 2x as much as the A-2 would have to be selling as many units as the A-2.

We can't compare demand curve for movies since the number of hardware for each is different, which means the demand curves are different since for an equivalent comparision of demand for titles the number of players would have to be the same....

plazman, the demand curve for Blu-ray IS 2x HD DVD. Open your eyes, have a real look - don't be afraid. People watch *movies*, they don't watch *players*.

As to the ridiculous statement that blu-ray disc sales has little to do with demand for blu-ray, what could possibly have made you say that? What on earth could have generated the sales for blu-ray discs, if it wasn't actually demand for blu-ray discs? It is time to get back to reality, plazman.

The demand for BD titles is an indirect demand as a result of demand for the PS3 game console - not a direct demand for the titles themselves.

So, IMO the demand is for the PS3. Once people buy the PS3 they end up buy a few BD disks.....of course there are a few people who buy the PS3 as a result of direct demand for BD disks - but that is a minority.

For a format to succeed it will need direct demand. UMD failed because it relied on indirect demand.....

I'm bookmarking this one so I can be laughing my ass off September 1. :D

I really don't see what's so strange about what I've said.

The Q1 releases were clearly in favour BD, in both number, and blockbusters.

The Q2 releases were far more even in number, but BD still had more blockbuster releases.

In Q3 HD DVD currently (**) appears to have the edge in both areas (though not by as much as BD had in Q1 & Q2).

I'd like to hear anyone factually dispute any of those points.

Steve W

ps I hope your bottom is okay.

SW

** It's quite possible that one side or the other (or both) release titles in July/August about which we don't yet know - I'm going on what we currently know is coming out.

Steve W

People watch *movies*..

If only they'd watch films instead.

Steve W

The demand curve plots price and quantity - all other factors staying the same. My post was in response to someone who said that he say the demand curve of BD players to be 2x as great as HD DVD. For this to be true, the Sony BDP 300 which costs 2x as much as the A-2 would have to be selling as many units as the A-2.

We can't compare demand curve for movies since the number of hardware for each is different, which means the demand curves are different since for an equivalent comparision of demand for titles the number of players would have to be the same....

Unless the attach rate for BD is significantly higher, I would state that the disk sales as an indication of "player" sales is a valid one to make. Note I don't see any general difference in the red supporters and blu supporters, meaning after we take the aggregate numbers, both groups of buyers are likely very similar people who happened to have picked one (or have no preference). This would also lead me to conclude that taken as a whole, the attach rate should be close, meaning the weekly disks_sold/players_installed should be comparable for both.

If they are comparable for both, then with the disks_sold roughly 2:1 every week, this tells me installed base is roughly 2:1 and staying at that range. Whatever the new HD DVD player units sold are, I expect the new BD players (all) is staying roughly 2:1 or the weekly disks_sold ratios would have gone down by now.

If we want to take away the discrepancy in movie releases (eg : the CR launch that skewed things 3:1) the monthly or quarterly or YTD numbers are better (the SI can be used too), but the weekly numbers are better forward indicators at the risk of release selection skewing the numbers, while the YTD/SI numbers have too much inertia and combined numbers to show any trend until it becomes firmly entrenched.

Taking only single players would not be a valid comparison for the 'aggreggate player curves' divided by format, as there are many more brands of BD players than HD DVD players : the factors for the quantity/price demand curve is affected by many factors, including movie selection, features and brand preference. The brand preference definitely plays a role, as I historically lean towards Panasonic DVD players due to good experience --- but I picked PS3 as the player because of features and price.

Even with the price delta between the BDPS300 and the panasonic players, there are still people who prefer the PS3, and there are also people with racks or HT setup that cannot accomodate a PS3 (in spite of the price and feature advantage).

If only they'd watch films instead.

Steve W

But then we'd have a lot more pretentious people. I don't think the world nor the internet could handle that.

Why not?

It appears to be able to handle countless high definition copies of 'Ghost Rider' and 'X-Men:3'.

May the good Lord have mercy on our souls!

Steve W

BD disc sales are being kept afloat by the PS3. Unless Sony can undercut Toshiba with lower cost players, the sales lead will be temporary. It might not happen tomorrow, but stand alone players will ultimately win out.
Which do you have, a crystal ball or a time machine 'cuz you've got some real nice, baseless insight there. :)

I don't know if it's due to temporary production ramp up problems, higher then expected demand or a combination of both, but my local B&M consumer electronics stores are having problems keeping the new less then $500 Blu-ray players in stock. They sell out quickly after they're restocked. If the rumored price reduction of PS3 to below $500 happens, they might become hard to find also after a while at the new price point.

There's no problems finding low-cost Toshibas; they're sitting on shelves and not moving very fast now.

Where I am standalone HD DVD players, according to the salespeople, are outselling standalone BD players close to 4:1 so I guess this changes from geographic region to geographic region.

Cheers,

Grant

Where I am standalone HD DVD players, according to the salespeople, are outselling standalone BD players close to 4:1 so I guess this changes from geographic region to geographic region.

Cheers,

Grant

Did you ask them 2 months ago? You cant find a BDP-S300 or Panny 10a anywhere, sold out every store (cc, best buy, etc). I think hd-dvd owners are in for a rude awakening at a soon to be revealed time frame.

Did you ask them 2 months ago? You cant find a BDP-S300 or Panny 10a anywhere, sold out every store (cc, best buy, etc). I think hd-dvd owners are in for a rude awakening at a soon to be revealed time frame.

It is comments like this where I question the integrity of the poster. For example at Circuit City the S300 and HD-A2 are both in stock for every store within 50 miles of my house. This is just one state, but it is an example. I still am not sure why there is such hostility in this format war, but I guess people have too much time on their hands.

It is comments like this where I question the integrity of the poster. For example at Circuit City the S300 and HD-A2 are both in stock for every store within 50 miles of my house. This is just one state, but it is an example. I still am not sure why there is such hostility in this format war, but I guess people have too much time on their hands.

Why would you question his integrity? At my local stores the S300s and Pannys are out of stock at all their locations. My local Costco had ten S301s left yesterday morning, I don't know if any are left today. All these locations have A2s in stock. If your local B&M stores have the S300s in stock, you folks are fortunate.

I really don't see what's so strange about what I've said.

The Q1 releases were clearly in favour BD, in both number, and blockbusters.

The Q2 releases were far more even in number, but BD still had more blockbuster releases.

In Q3 HD DVD currently (**) appears to have the edge in both areas (though not by as much as BD had in Q1 & Q2).

I'd like to hear anyone factually dispute any of those points.

Steve W

ps I hope your bottom is okay.

SW

** It's quite possible that one side or the other (or both) release titles in July/August about which we don't yet know - I'm going on what we currently know is coming out.

Steve W

Week after week Blu-rays older blockbusters continue to sell very well, so much so they almost single handedly outsell any of HD-DVD's new releases, particularly catalouge titles.

With the exception of Planet Earth, pretyy much every recent dual format release has performed stronger on Blu-ray, so HD-DVD isn't going to close the gap through Warner/Paramount.

The odd, big, day and day Blu-ray release this summer, i.e Wild Hogs or Vacancy will push Blu-ray ahead another few points, then we're moving into Q4.

Edit:- You're also asuming HD-DVD owners are buying software as regularly as late 2006/early 2007.

As confidence improves in Blu-ray I, and I'm certain others, have upped the number of titles purchased per month, particularly as earlier titles are regularly discounted..

Hey, you may be right- it'll be interesting to see.

I just thought it important to balance things up with a few facts.

As I said, if HD DVD don't claw the lead back over the next 2 months, then they're in trouble, but that it'd be better to watch what happens over those 2 months, rather than just at one week's figures.

Why that statement is being treated as the rantings of a fan boy is beyond me - I thought that it was a pretty measured statement.

Steve W

I agree, but you'd expect 12-2, or whatever it was, releases in favour of HD-DVD, in combination with an apparent surge in standalone sales, would see the figures shift just a little.

Looking now at Amazon, even 300 and Planet Earth are being outsold by Blu-ray. I won't read much into this, but HD-DVD is tradiontally very strong with pre-orders.

I agree, but you'd expect 12-2, or whatever it was, releases in favour of HD-DVD, in combination with an apparent surge in standalone sales, would see the figures shift just a little.

They did.

The week before it was 70:30 to BD. This week it's 65:35.

3 more weeks like that and it's 50:50 (I'm not predicting this, BTW :D ).

BTW, looking at the figures it appears that in Q1 BD had 69 releases to HD DVD's 29. Big advantage in numbers to BD, and the really big sellers of the quarter were, I believe, 'Casino Royale' & 'Night At The Museum' - both BD-exclusive.

In Q2 it was 70 HD DVD to 63 BD - a lot closer, and I think we'd all agree that BD had more blockbusters in that quarter - particularly in the last few weeks, with 'POTC1', 'POTC2', 'Apocalypto', and 'Ghost Rider'.

As far as I can tell from High Def Digest, in the rest of July, August & September we currently have announced 53 HD DVD titles v 44 BD, and very little in the way of a 'blockbuster gap'.

Certainly 'Wild Hogs' & 'Vacancy' will do very well, but that appears to be it for big BD-exclusive releases (I stand to be corrected). Meanwhile, HD DVD has 'Hot Fuzz' and 'Heroes'.

More importantly perhaps are the number of non-exclusive releases, which should even things up a little. Releasing 10 back-catalogue titles won't win asgainst 3rd week sales of 'POTC' & 'Apocalypto', but it might if all else is equal.

Steve W

I wonder what effect The Matrix trilogy will have on Blu-ray sales.

Unless the attach rate for BD is significantly higher, I would state that the disk sales as an indication of "player" sales is a valid one to make. Note I don't see any general difference in the red supporters and blu supporters, meaning after we take the aggregate numbers, both groups of buyers are likely very similar people who happened to have picked one (or have no preference). This would also lead me to conclude that taken as a whole, the attach rate should be close, meaning the weekly disks_sold/players_installed should be comparable for both.

...................................



It may be possible that attach rates for BD stadaloes are higher right now than HDDVD - althugh with the PS3 out there skewig things it may be impossible to tease out those numbers.

In the years after DVD launched the studios saw a rather dramatic downward shift in attach rates as prices of players went down. It makes sense that someone who is willing to spend $500 - $1000 on a player is more likely to buy numerous discs at $30 than someone who only spent $200. As prices of players dropped below $100, DVD largely became a rental format until studios dropped the prices of catalog titles and re-releases (and even new releases to some extent) causing things to even out again.

So it is conceivable that HD-DVD hit this point early.


Based on the numbers out there, I wouldn't be surprised if HD-DVD standalones are in twice as many homes as BD standalones, but the BD stadalones have 20-30% higher attach rates with the remaining being made up by the PS3.

I wonder what effect The Matrix trilogy will have on Blu-ray sales.

Matrix must be a disappointment for Warners given the apparent sales numbers. They prepared two special boxed sets for this.

I do not expect huge results for Blu-ray either, perhaps even less. The main benefit will be the psychological one of showing that Warners has become truly neutral. The Matrix exclusivity was a talking point for Microsoft evangelists.

While Matrix sold a lot of titles considering they are catalog, it did not have the affect that many people predicted. I recall posts going back over a year saying that Matrix would win the format war for HD DVD. Well, it was at best a nice uptake, but no real contribution to ending the format war.

Catalog titles in general just are not that important in the format war. New tittles day-and-date with DVD are what the current demographic is looking for.

More importantly perhaps are the number of non-exclusive releases, which should even things up a little. Releasing 10 back-catalogue titles won't win asgainst 3rd week sales of 'POTC' & 'Apocalypto', but it might if all else is equal.

Steve W

Random catalog titles are not being supported by the B&M channel.

I was in Target yesterday (looking for another PS3 at 499!) and looked at their selections. They had many of the key Blu-ray titles of recent months (like Pirates, Museum). Their HD DVD selection was mainly titles that have been out for a while (like Troy). They had exactly 0 of the Universal catalogers from 6/26.

I suppose that folks who are counting titles on highdefdigest can be impressed by Universal's efforts, but I consider their strategy to be a failure.

I wonder what effect The Matrix trilogy will have on Blu-ray sales.

I'm sure the BDA will hope that it's more than the effect it had on HD DVD sales.

Funny thing - that week was pegged as 'POTC' v 'Matrix'. BD won the war in %ages, but when everything had died down it turned out that, if you counted 'The Matrix' boxes as 3 films (which they were) it sold a similar number to 'POTC'.

I notice a number of people at another thread discussing attachment rates for the PS3, and some bright spark chirping in "Hey, I bet the studio execs don't care what they attachment rate is, they're only bothered about sales".

Well, that's not strictly true. They're only bothered about money. And if one 'Matrix' boxed set only counts as one sale, but they're getting three times as much money, I know which figure they'll be most interested in.

Steve W

Which do you have, a crystal ball or a time machine 'cuz you've got some real nice, baseless insight there. :)

How is that baseless? It is a fact that HD stand alones are outselling BD stand alones. It is also pretty obvious that the PS3 is boosting BD software sales.

Not everyone will be buying a PS3 for movie watching, regardless if thats what some people have done. Down the road, most people will be buying regular players instead of gaming machines. It has always been that way.

Therefore if Toshiba can continue to outsell BD stand alones, eventually the market penetration will exceed the number of PS3-owning movie watchers. On a longer timeline it will be the stand alone players that will decide the outcome, not the current surge in BD software sales.

I'm sure the BDA will hope that it's more than the effect it had on HD DVD sales.

Funny thing - that week was pegged as 'POTC' v 'Matrix'. BD won the war in %ages, but when everything had died down it turned out that, if you counted 'The Matrix' boxes as 3 films (which they were) it sold a similar number to 'POTC'.

I notice a number of people at another thread discussing attachment rates for the PS3, and some bright spark chirping in "Hey, I bet the studio execs don't care what they attachment rate is, they're only bothered about sales".

Well, that's not strictly true. They're only bothered about money. And if one 'Matrix' boxed set only counts as one sale, but they're getting three times as much money, I know which figure they'll be most interested in.

Steve W

I think the shock was how little Matrix sold. The pirates movies are large family fun and even "kiddy" to a degree. The Matrix is more suited towards the techgeeks who buy into new formats - ie US.

...........................

Not everyone will be buying a PS3 for movie watching, regardless if thats what some people have done. Down the road, most people will be buying regular players instead of gaming machines. It has always been that way.

Therefore if Toshiba can continue to outsell BD stand alones, eventually the market penetration will exceed the number of PS3-owning movie watchers. On a longer timeline it will be the stand alone players that will decide the outcome, not the current surge in BD software sales.


I think there is a disconnect in your logic.

It seems like you are saying;

- there are more people now buying into BD when you include those using the PS3 for movies
- in the future people will be buying regular players for movie watching instead of the PS3
- and therefore Toshiba will selll more players and movies in the long run regardless of studio support and the price of BD players.

It seems like for that to work you would need;
most PS3 movie watchers are ambivalent about which format they watch movies on
all future PS3 buyers to stop watching movies (claims like this have been here for years now)
All future standalone player buyers will soley be driven by the cheaper Toshiba players and not by the movies available on them.



Right now it is a given that there are more people watching BD movies than HD-DVD movies. Nobody has given much of a reason why that should change over time.

I think the shock was how little Matrix sold. The pirates movies are large family fun and even "kiddy" to a degree. The Matrix is more suited towards the techgeeks who buy into new formats - ie US.

Do you mean little as in compared to Pirates? I think most everyone saw that coming.

1. They were sold as box sets only, meaning much higher price.

2. A number of matrix owners only wanted the 1st movie, not all 3. Many may be waiting for an individual release.

3. Pirates is newer and the 3rd movie just came out. Of course it's going to sell better. Plus it's not rated R so it will have a larger audience.

I have to say that that between pirates and matrix, I think the matrix was a better buy for me. The reason is that I noticed a bigger jump in quality from DVD to HD-DVD than DVD to BLU-RAY. I think it's because the Matrix is darker and needs the extra detail to make it look better.

It seems like for that to work you would need;
most PS3 movie watchers are ambivalent about which format they watch movies on
all future PS3 buyers to stop watching movies (claims like this have been here for years now)
All future standalone player buyers will soley be driven by the cheaper Toshiba players and not by the movies available on them.



Right now it is a given that there are more people watching BD movies than HD-DVD movies. Nobody has given much of a reason why that should change over time.

You are assuming that all PS3 buyers made a format choice when they bought the system, rather than BD playback being a bonus. So yes, I think most are somewhat ambivalent about the format of the discs. When looking at PS3 sales vs. disc sales, it suggests that the number of systems used for BD is a marginal percentage.

My point was, the PS3 won't be putting BD players into 100 million homes anytime soon. Over the long term, there will be more stand-alone players than PS3s.

Price may not be the only factor in choosing a player, but it is the biggest. When you are talking about mass adoption, $100-200 can be a big difference for a lot of people. BD stand alones are currently being outsold precisely because of this reason. It is not unreasonable to think that HD players could exceed the number of movie-watching PS3 owners if sales trends continue.

I don't know how to put a finer point on what I am saying.

I'm sure the BDA will hope that it's more than the effect it had on HD DVD sales.

Funny thing - that week was pegged as 'POTC' v 'Matrix'. BD won the war in %ages, but when everything had died down it turned out that, if you counted 'The Matrix' boxes as 3 films (which they were) it sold a similar number to 'POTC'.

I notice a number of people at another thread discussing attachment rates for the PS3, and some bright spark chirping in "Hey, I bet the studio execs don't care what they attachment rate is, they're only bothered about sales".

Well, that's not strictly true. They're only bothered about money. And if one 'Matrix' boxed set only counts as one sale, but they're getting three times as much money, I know which figure they'll be most interested in.

Steve W

This battle had been argued to death and every argument showed that the Pirates movies sold more discs and made more money. You can spend the time researching all the threads on here as there are plenty. Also it seems as if the pirates movies have more staying power in the rankings that Ive seen from Nielson.

I still am not sure why there is such hostility in this format war,

My theory posted in another thread.

1. If their format secedes, then mine will fail. (I fall into this category) :D
2. If my choice is good then their choice must be bad. (Or as seen in politics, if my choice is bad, then their choice is more badder.) :eek:

Darin, if piracy was of such importance to Disney they would have stopped releasing on DVD long ago!That isn't true and you really should know better. Disney didn't have an alternative that would get them near the revenue and definitely not one that is selling better and seems to have better protection (at least from professional pirates) while in a war where one of them could pretty much go away. Your a logical guy most of the time and you should know that Disney releasing on DVD in no way shape or form means that they wouldn't prefer something with better copy protection.

--Darin

Since this is the Nielsen thread, anybody care to comment on HDTVFAN0001's claim here that the Nielsen numbers are not for actual sales:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10976408&&#post10976408

The Nielson numbers are based on averaged distributor numbers of shipped disks, as opposed to actual sales.
--Darin

I won't read much into this, but HD-DVD is tradiontally very strong with pre-orders.

True, but the HD DVD public is changing. People who buy $250 players are a different segment from those who buy a $500 player. More casual movie watchers, more renters. Once the price hits $199, you're really into a different group.

Edit: just consider how the player base has expanded versus software sales. Clearly a different attach rate.

1) I spent some time (starting back in jan) looking at that but I don't find much evidence given how unreliable it is to determine sales from very slowly changing stock levels (that get replenished at unknown rates). The only reliable sales numbers you can get are for Planet Earth at this point (in part because there is no doubt on when these get replenished).

2) Second, it does not have to be exclusively one or the other. Given that they seem to do a combination of different rules in how they combine data over time, they may do the same thing in the data they use. So a simple 'eyeballing some data' isn't going to prove much.

3) As to their reasons for proivding this. Amazon provides these numbers as a guide to buyers, to help them figure out their choice. They want to replace B&M and know that this kind of info is the only way to achieve that. Second, since people do care about the public rankings, they will try to maninpulate them by buying from amzn, which is good business for amazon. But for both reasons, you would expect them to tilt towards more expensive products to nudge people in that direction.

1. Go look again. There wasn't that many box sets with prices 3-4 times a regular release in January so that may explain why you had a problem seeing anything. It's easy enough today. I have stats for a number of titles for almost every day going back to March. Believe me that if i say that for example Batman and Ultimate Matrix lately going up and down around 1000 mark are selling very close to the same units the last 2 weeks. If you actually save the numbers yourself it's not that hard to see when other factors such as new stock arrival makes a dent.

For example on average a 500 rank will sell 10-15 copies a day. A 1000 rank 5-10 copies a day. If there is a drop of 50 copies in stock without a significant rank change it's easy enough to figure out that those were not sold copies. When stock goes up it's easy enough just to discard that date and look at the next week or two without any big jumps and figure out the average. Sometimes a title will have unit numbers going up and down strangely for a week. Not a problem if you have 20 other weeks of data.

2. Yeah well, they may factor in a beauty factor for the covers multiplied with todays temperature as well. You seem to be aiming to discredit any reason for looking at Amazon at all. Fact is that a box set at any rank that sells as many copies in a week as a single disk ranked the same will have stock levels changed very close. I fail to see how you can interpret that any other way.

3. Of course they do it as a service to customers who do want to know what others are buying. I wanted you to post this yourself and you did. That's exactly why they don't want to screw it up with weird formulas. Why would they complicate this anymore than necessary?

'This kind of info is the only way to do that' (replace b&m)??? And here I thought it had something to do with good prices and a deep catalogue of titles but you seem to have Amazon figured out. I think it's pretty harsh though to say not as a question but as a statement that 'they will try to manipulate'. Maybe someone here is trying to manipulate readers to see ghosts where there aren't any.

You never commented on whether you thought they used anything else than units on hardware ranks as well? Can you imagine what your value based theory would say about the PS3s performance?

Yeah, I spend to much time on this but I like playing with numbers. It's fun. It's also useful to see trends for different titles when trying to estimate Nielsen sales for different titles each week. I have no stock in Amazon and have bought less than 5% of my HD disks from them.

Since this is the Nielsen thread, anybody care to comment on HDTVFAN0001's claim here that the Nielsen numbers are not for actual sales:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10976408&&#post10976408


--Darin

I think most everyone here would agree that he's wrong.

Do you promise to make us aware every time a Blu Ray fan misinterpret any Nielsen number :p

You seem to be aiming to discredit any reason for looking at Amazon at all.
I just don't like to look at numbers where I have to guess what they mean. Let's just say I'm a bit more academic in nature (and in my interest in this war).


'This kind of info is the only way to do that' (replace b&m)??? And here I thought it had something to do with good prices and a deep catalogue of titles but you seem to have Amazon figured out.

I said and really meant 'replace'. Those people who still buy books in B&M go there for a reason. If they want to capture these people, they have to offer what these people currently find in B&M, such as advice on what to buy.
(This is pretty standard retail strategy 101 stuff at this point.)


I think it's pretty harsh though to say not as a question but as a statement that 'they will try to manipulate'. Maybe someone here is trying to manipulate readers to see ghosts where there aren't any.
Do you know that for a while Amazon raised prices for people who visited their site often? Until they were outed by the Reg (article 6/9/2000). Smart price discrimination though. But so I may have overestimated them this time.

I'm bookmarking this one so I can be laughing my ass off September 1. :D
The post is actually correct. Types of releases is a major factor in determining the outcome. To be specific, it is the recent blockbusters (eg : top 20 boxffice list from recent years). [I chose top 20 because that mainly matches the >$100M domestic gross list]

If Universal has more major blockbusters (this century) than Sony+Disney+Fox (assuming they come back)+MGM(same) combined to be released in the summer, then BD will lose. The simple problem here is that the list of blockbuster movies is part of historical record, Universal's top 20 in each year of this century are already out, and there are a lot of blu studios that have not released their equivalent blockbusters yet.

Until recently, most people probably don't realize who owns distribution of which movies, but in this format war, studio distribution rights now become a critical piece of data to fact-check.

The post is actually correct. Types of releases is a major factor in determining the outcome. To be specific, it is the recent blockbusters (eg : top 20 boxffice list from recent years). [I chose top 20 because that mainly matches the >$100M domestic gross list]

If Universal has more major blockbusters (this century) than Sony+Disney+Fox (assuming they come back)+MGM(same) combined to be released in the summer, then BD will lose. The simple problem here is that the list of blockbuster movies is part of historical record, Universal's top 20 in each year of this century are already out, and there are a lot of blu studios that have not released their equivalent blockbusters yet.

Until recently, most people probably don't realize who owns distribution of which movies, but in this format war, studio distribution rights now become a critical piece of data to fact-check.


QFT. Universal's catalogue releases aren't going to win this war. It's the day and date releases that will, this has been proven every single week by the sales numbers...

If HD DVD doesn't get a BD studio to go neutral before Q1 08 (assuming the BD train wrecks HD DVD as badly as I think it will due to blockbuster releases), I think the game is over... BD and HD DVD will have had a full year of numbers... the software sales won't lie, and the attach rates will become moot, simply because the standalones will be cheap enough to not need the PS3 @ that point.

Blu will have riden the momentum of the PS3 long enough to get the stand alones in the price range, BD 1.1 will be out in the wild, and the titles will seal the deal.

What I find sad is this:

HD DVD, with a lead out of the gate on BD.... with BD falling flat on its ass with the BD-25s and crapola quality @ the beginning, and with no REAL spec on its players, will have found a way to lose the war they had in their grasp...

Had they HAMMERED home the win early... snubbed BD before it gained momentum by appealing to the masses with LOTS of releases, great quality and cheap players.. we wouldn't even be here now.

You can thank Toshiba and Universal for losing the battle that was theres to win.

We can't compare demand curve for movies since the number of hardware for each is different, which means the demand curves are different since for an equivalent comparision of demand for titles the number of players would have to be the same....

Of course you can compare them. It just depends on what question you are trying to answer. Your issue is only relevant if you want attachment rate-like comparisons ('demand per player'). But if we simply want to compare current overall demand for BD vs HD DVD, then there's nothing wrong with that. It just is a different kind of comparison than the one you suggest.

Wanna know why the HDdvd of Planet Earth sold more on places like Amazon...?


Many who bought an HD upconverting DVD player probably thought they could play an HDdvd. Their TV is an HDTV, the box their DVD player came in said HD on it....


2 of 53 people found the following review helpful:
HD DVD Format?, May 24, 2007
By Francesca Matterhorn "skeptic" (WA) - See all my reviews
Thanks to Amazon's pathetic scheme, I now own an HD DVD format piece of plastic. It was very deceiving of them to have the HD formatted DVD as the first choice in a search on this series. So I'm out almost $80 because I took the plastic off... I now know that an HD DVD is not only a different format, but is being compared to laserdiscs, so don't bother buying this version of Planet Earth or an HD DVD player for that matter.

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8 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
Be careful before you buy an HD DVD!, May 23, 2007
By Jeffery C. Ottesen "Jeff" (Juneau, AK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I've given the Planet Earth DVD 5 stars because the cable broadcast of the work is so compelling. I can only wait to actually see it in High Definition. Alas, that is the rest of this story.

Owning a shiny new HD TV (Sony Bravia) and a tenured DVD player I opted to purchase the HD version of the Planet Earth series. Here is where I made my mistake (and Amazon too!)

I did not understand that only HD DVD players can play a HD DVD. Your ordinary DVD player simply can't read the new technology on the HD DVD. Period.

OK, it does say so, in the very fine print on the back of the DVD case. Why with 10X reading glasses I might have even noticed. But no where on the ordering process on teh Amazon web site is this requirement brought to my attention.

Sure, snicker, you video-philes who are early adopters and know this implicitly. But trust me, I have talked to at least a dozen people who like me didn't have a clue. And not one person I have discussed this with was aware of the DVD shortcoming with HD DVD format.

So, just hop out and buy an HD DVD player you say. They don't cost that much. Wrong, the lowest price I found using on-line vednors IE.g., Amazon, Costco) was $430 then jumping to $700 for the second lowest priced option. Not your ordinary DVD player price is it?

So go slow, if you have the TV but not the player. My advice: Wait til Christmas, the prices always come down a notch.


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0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
wish i knew about hd dvd's, June 29, 2007
By Niki N. Marcino "fathers day gift a bust" (wyndmoor, pa) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I ordered this series for father's day gifts. I have yet to see it. I am now learning what hd dvd means. I hope to get the regular version soon. Ordered three and no one can watch it.

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5 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
had to return item, May 26, 2007
By T. Shelton - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I thought since I have a high def TV that this would work but apparently you have to have a high def DVD player to play this dvd. I couldn't use or play this so I had to return it. I will be buying the regular dvd though.

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0 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Planet earth DVD collection, High Def. - Terrible, June 27, 2007
By Steve D. Chevalier "chevalierconstruction" (Bremerton, WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
Not one but two shipments of this DVD collection will not play on ANY player. High Definition or otherwise. I still have both sets and am waiting for a return envelope that I was told would arrive so that I can send them both back. I would love to have a good copy of this production. Do you have any?

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0 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Couldn't even view it!!, June 27, 2007
By Girlies Mommy (California) - See all my reviews
We must be technologically behind, I guess, because we were unable to view this HD DVD on any of our DVD players. In full disclosure, we only have one HD DVD player in the house, but it still didn't work there. The most unfortuneate aspect is that we gave the set as a gift to my dad for Father's Day, and he couldn't even view it!! He also has a (fairly new) HD DVD player. Inside the box there is a little note about going online to your player's manufacturer's website and finding out about available software upgrades for your player, so that you can view these DVDs "created using the latest technology". I wish I would have known this when I was purchasing, I would have just ordered the regular (non-HD) version.

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0 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
If I only had an HD DVD player, June 26, 2007
By Jonathan G. Way "jw" (cape cod, ma) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I don't have an HD DVD player and stupidly didn't realize they only work on an HD player. It would be great if I had that. Amazing picture but now it is useless.

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1 of 33 people found the following review helpful:
Buyer beware!, June 14, 2007
By E. Rooney-Kuhn "avid reader" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This is a beautiful video, but without an HD DVD player it would not read, and I had to exchange it for the other format. The write-up did not warn of this--very inconvenient.

The video is spectacular, though! What an amazing collection of video about the earth--and the creatures that inhabit it. Not for the fainthearted! At times it is graphic in the violence of nature, but well worth viewing.

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1 of 60 people found the following review helpful:
Horrible Experience, May 30, 2007
By Elaine E. Paasch - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
Real rating is a minus 30! I was unable to access the DVD on ANY player! I took it to Best Buy, and they said it will not work in any player they have in stock and are unable to program any player to play the DVD. It was a total waste of money and a horrible experience with Amazon because they will not help in any way to correct the problem.

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2 of 48 people found the following review helpful:
The Complete BBC Series , May 29, 2007
By Charles A. Jacques "Tony" (S.C.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I Purchased the HD DVD to finf out that it would not work in my DVD Player. I could not return It because it was opened but not used. How are you supose to know it a thing works if you don't open it. So your return is not worth a dime! I ored the regular DVD and Found that all one needs is DVD one. The outher four DVD Has the same things as on the first DVD.
I was very dissapointed in the series and wouldn't recomend it to any one.
It is to much money for the little you get.

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and the best...



1 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
MISLEAD, May 27, 2007
By Dwight F. Entwistle (satellite beach, florida United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I ORDERED THIS ITEM WITH GREAT ENTHUSIASM. MUCH TO MY SURPRISE, MY DVD PLAYER COULD NOT PLAY AND IT AND I WAS ADVISED TO CONTACT THE MANUFACTURER FOR "FIRMWARE OR SOFTWARE" UPDATES. THE MANUFACTURER WAS OF NO HELP AT ALL BECAUSE, AS IT TURNED OUT, THEY DO NOT MAKE THE NECESSARY HARDWARE. SO FAR, I HAVE HAD TO BUY A NEW "BLUE LASER" DVD PLAYER AT A COST OF $500 (AND AT THAT I AM BETTING ON HD DVD AS OPPOSED TO BLU RAY) PLUS A $138 REMOTE TO PLAY THE HD DVD WITH MY EXIXTING HD TV AND MY CURRENT $600 AV RECEIVER SO I WON'T HAVE TO SPENT $800 OR MORE FOR A MORE ADVANCED AV RECEIVER. OF COURSE I COULD HAVE RETURNED THE PLANET EARTH DVD SET AND GOTTEN A REGULAR RED LASER SET FOR POSTAGE COST, BUT I WAS CURIOUS ABOUT THE "NEWEST" TECHNOLOGY. WHAT'S NEXT? ALL THIS IS JUST VENTING! THANKS FOR LISTENING. POINT: I DO FEEL YOU SHOULD HAVE INCLUDED A CAVEAT SOMETHING LIKE "THIS HD DVD SET WILL NOT PLAY ON YOUR CURRENT DVD PLAYER. PERIOD!!" YOU WOULD BE CORRECT 99.9+% OF THE TIME.

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Wow, all this guy had to was return the set but instead is dropping mucho $. A new $138 remote so he can watch it!

All these were sales of the HDdvd to clulelss people who should have just bought the DVD set. There are many more but you get the idea from these.... I doubt too many bought the BluRay set by accident.... So, difference in sales numbers...





edit: well, I just read the reviews of the Blu Ray and not ONE complaint.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/cus...ustomerReviews

interesting.

"Honey? remember that series "planet earth" that looked so great on TV in HD?"
"Yes."
"Well, let's get it, it just came out."
"Groovy! Let's get it."
"Well, it was shot in HD so let's get the HD set as that's how we watched it on our TV here, in HD."
"Great."
They order the set to watch on their HDTV like they saw it on Discovery HD and it doesn't work.
LOL :D

Yep!

.

The post is actually correct. Types of releases is a major factor in determining the outcome. To be specific, it is the recent blockbusters (eg : top 20 boxffice list from recent years). [I chose top 20 because that mainly matches the >$100M domestic gross list]

If Universal has more major blockbusters (this century) than Sony+Disney+Fox (assuming they come back)+MGM(same) combined to be released in the summer, then BD will lose. The simple problem here is that the list of blockbuster movies is part of historical record, Universal's top 20 in each year of this century are already out, and there are a lot of blu studios that have not released their equivalent blockbusters yet.

Until recently, most people probably don't realize who owns distribution of which movies, but in this format war, studio distribution rights now become a critical piece of data to fact-check.

These data are available and have been analyzed. The industry's standard web site is http://www.boxofficemojo.com. If you scan through it you find a lot of information on releases, domestic and international grosses, etc.

My overall conclusion is this: about 50% of the big studio product is controlled by Blu-ray exclusive studios, about 10% by HD DVD exclusive studios, and about 40% by neutral studios. That gives Blu-ray 90% of the content and only 50% for HD DVD.

This conclusion obtains whether you look at titles, grosses, this year, last year, etc.

Here is one example of this overall conclusion. Look at the 2007 domestic grosses so far on:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/chart/?yr=2007&p=.htm

The films on this list are those that are likely to be released by the end of the year. Of the top 10, 5 are from Blu-ray exclusive studios, 4 from neutral studios, and 1 from an HD DVD exclusive studio ("Knocked Up" at position 7). The exact list will evolve as the year progresses, but if you look at the upcoming release schedule, you realize that the trend will remain.

We can already project a pretty good list of what is going to be released on both formats in the fourth quarter based on this list plus a few more yet to be released (Harry Potter, Bourne Ultimatum, Hairspray among them). Titles released in September or later will be held back until 2008 in general.

The three biggest HD DVD exclusive titles will be: The Bourne Ultimatum (yet to be released theatrically), Knocked Up, and Evan Almighty. [I think that is it.] Look at the list from Blu-ray exclusive studios and that is what we are looking at in terms of new blockbusters.

I have puzzled over these charts without being able to understand what HD DVD's winning strategy is. If someone can explain it to me, I would be grateful.

These data are available and have been analyzed. The industry's standard web site is http://www.boxofficemojo.com. If you scan through it you find a lot of information on releases, domestic and international grosses, etc.

My overall conclusion is this: about 50% of the big studio product is controlled by Blu-ray exclusive studios, about 10% by HD DVD exclusive studios, and about 40% by neutral studios. That gives Blu-ray 90% of the content and only 50% for HD DVD.

This conclusion obtains whether you look at titles, grosses, this year, last year, etc.

Here is one example of this overall conclusion. Look at the 2007 domestic grosses so far on:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/chart/?yr=2007&p=.htm

The films on this list are those that are likely to be released by the end of the year. Of the top 10, 5 are from Blu-ray exclusive studios, 4 from neutral studios, and 1 from an HD DVD exclusive studio ("Knocked Up" at position 7). The exact list will evolve as the year progresses, but if you look at the upcoming release schedule, you realize that the trend will remain.

We can already project a pretty good list of what is going to be released on both formats in the fourth quarter based on this list plus a few more yet to be released (Harry Potter, Bourne Ultimatum, Hairspray among them). Titles released in September or later will be held back until 2008 in general.

The three biggest HD DVD exclusive titles will be: The Bourne Ultimatum (yet to be released theatrically), Knocked Up, and Evan Almighty. [I think that is it.] Look at the list from Blu-ray exclusive studios and that is what we are looking at in terms of new blockbusters.

I have puzzled over these charts without being able to understand what HD DVD's winning strategy is. If someone can explain it to me, I would be grateful.

IMHO the best bet for HD DVD is that both coexist and dual format players come down dramatically in price. Also, the HD DVD group has to hope that Uni is willing to stay exclusive for the foreseeable future. If they go neutral, it's pretty much game over. I don't see any other way around it, and I support HD DVD over BD even though I'm format neutral.

I have puzzled over these charts without being able to understand what HD DVD's winning strategy is. If someone can explain it to me, I would be grateful.

They have no strategy. They will just keep reducing player prices until they are dead for good. Pretty soon Toshiba will be handing out players from the back of the shipping trucks to anyone walking by on the street. It's just the hardcore zealots that are keeping HDDVD on life support.

How is that baseless? It is a fact that HD stand alones are outselling BD stand alones. It is also pretty obvious that the PS3 is boosting BD software sales.

Not everyone will be buying a PS3 for movie watching, regardless if thats what some people have done. Down the road, most people will be buying regular players instead of gaming machines. It has always been that way.

Therefore if Toshiba can continue to outsell BD stand alones, eventually the market penetration will exceed the number of PS3-owning movie watchers. On a longer timeline it will be the stand alone players that will decide the outcome, not the current surge in BD software sales.
Sorry, but I don't wish to take the time to point out all the flaws.

1. Most simply you are stating your vision of the future as fact which is not inline with AVScience code; not that you are alone there, mind you and not to say I've never done that myself, but that fact remains.

2. You act as thought the PS3 and Blu-ray are exactly like your past models. Things are not nearly so simple. Even a poor selling gaming machine can easily out pace an HD DVD standalone for years. Now if the PS3 simply dies say sometime next week...

I know the PS2 is not a great example, but it has sold 120M units worldwide. That's very nearly all DVD standalones sold in the U.S.! The PS3 doesn't have to do well at all to continue to be a very dominant force in HiDef.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_2

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/cemadvdsales.html

3. thomopolis did a good enough job explaining the rest.

Cheers

I have puzzled over these charts without being able to understand what HD DVD's winning strategy is. If someone can explain it to me, I would be grateful.

The only strategy I've ever been able to extract from HD DVD fans is that Toshiba or the Chinese will keep lowering prices on players until they hit whatever the "magic mass-adoption number" for that week is. What people will watch on those players is always a mystery though. Also, if the "magic mass-adoption number" is hit and mass-adoption doesn't occur, drop the number by $50 or $100 and that is the new number.

Lately it seems like there is no "win strategy", but a "don't lose strategy" where both formats co-exist.

59/41 SI might be 59.49/40.51. That wouldn't take much to move to 59.51/40.49 or 60/40 --- just saying....


Very likely. In fact that provides us with a window into actual sales numbers.


Hypotheses:
- Sales in 2006 were 367K BD / 578K HD DVD (source: Home Media Research (http://www.homemediamagazine.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10559))
- YTD sales were 67/33 (margin of error between 66.55/33.45 and 67.45/33.55 BD/HD)
- SI sales were 59.55/40.45

It follows that:

BD sales in 2007 H1: 1,760K
HD DVD sales in 2007 H1: 867K

BD sales SI: 2,127K
HD DVD sales SI: 1,445K

Hey, BD just broke 2 million and they didn't even notice! ;)

edit: Initial post updated

Sorry, but I don't wish to take the time to point out all the flaws.

An easy pejorative to suggest my opinions have no validity.

1. Most simply you are stating your vision of the future as fact which is not inline with AVScience code; not that you are alone there, mind you and not to say I've never done that myself, but that fact remains.

I didn't mean to imply I had any hard facts. I made the assumption that in a thread that is mostly speculation, I wouldn't have to certify my predictions when talking in the future tense.

2. You act as thought the PS3 and Blu-ray are exactly like your past models. Things are not nearly so simple. Even a poor selling gaming machine can easily out pace an HD DVD standalone for years. Now if the PS3 simply dies say sometime next week...

It can? I thought I was the one making baseless statements presented as fact.

I know the PS2 is not a great example, but it has sold 120M units worldwide. That's very nearly all DVD standalones sold in the U.S.! The PS3 doesn't have to do well at all to continue to be a very dominant force in HiDef.

Cheers

The PS2 was also $200 less expensive when it launched ($150 if you count inflation), and took 7 years to sell 120M units. Not forgetting that only a percentage of PS3 owners currently even have an HDTV, I said that the PS3 probably wouldn't sell 100 million units anytime soon. Regardless, I will retract that.

The point I was getting at is, that many people who are looking for an HD player for their new TV might be more inclined to buy a dedicated stand-alone player versus a PS3. Just the same as when they purchased their first DVD player, their first choice was probably not the PS2 or Xbox. Given that the software lead is only 2:1 and the dedicated BD players are being outsold at the moment, things could swing either way. While the PS3 may sell 100 mil. units in 5 years time, that doesn't guarantee anything as far as the home video market goes. Low-priced dedicated units may be selling at an even faster pace by then.

What is HD DVD's winning strategy? What is Sony's winning strategy? A winning strategy does not have to include wiping out the competition in the short term....if that were the only winning strategy then the PS3 or Wii or xbox or thousands of other products in thousands of other areas made by thousands of companies do not have a winning strategy but a coexistance one!

Sony wants you to believe that the only possible winning strategy is a short term win in this format war....that usually never happens, and with coexistance in the long term the more efficient technology will win. So HD DVD very much has a strategy - coexist until both formats can reach mass adoption levels and then use its economic advantages such as cheaper replication costs (which is non factor now since total of 2M disks sold can be easily subsidized) and cheaper hardware costs to gain market share...BDs stretegy is to win via an early shock and awe campaign - price drop of the PS3 is probably the last big card left to play. By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured....

As a consumer we would all be better off with 2 rather than 1 format. Sony and Tosh (to a much smaller degree) of course will be worse off. But why should we care about that.

What is HD DVD's winning strategy? What is Sony's winning strategy? A winning strategy does not have to include wiping out the competition in the short term....if that were the only winning strategy then the PS3 or Wii or xbox or thousands of other products in thousands of other areas made by thousands of companies do not have a winning strategy but a coexistance one!

Sony wants you to believe that the only possible winning strategy is a short term win in this format war....that usually never happens, and with coexistance in the long term the more efficient technology will win. So HD DVD very much has a strategy - coexist until both formats can reach mass adoption levels and then use its economic advantages such as cheaper replication costs (which is non factor now since total of 2M disks sold can be easily subsidized) and cheaper hardware costs to gain market share...BDs stretegy is to win via an early shock and awe campaign - price drop of the PS3 is probably the last big card left to play. By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured....

As a consumer we would all be better off with 2 rather than 1 format. Sony and Tosh (to a much smaller degree) of course will be worse off. But why should we care about that.

I agree with some of your thinking. However, I don't agree with the following:

"By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured...."

While I think HD-DVD will not have a 30% market share at the end of 2007 (it will be less), I think the REAL critical time will be VERY early in 2008. That's when the effect on Blu-ray disc sales will be felt from what I predict will be an absolutely HUGE Christmas season for Blu-ray players and particularly PS3s. I think Blu-ray disc sales will be dwarfing HD-DVD sales by then and studios and retailers will be making some very critical decisions. Decisions which I believe will be to the further detriment of the HD-DVD format.

I agree with some of your thinking. However, I don't agree with the following:

"By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured...."

While I think HD-DVD will not have a 30% market share at the end of 2007 (it will be less), I think the REAL critical time will be VERY early in 2008. That's when the effect on Blu-ray disc sales will be felt from what I predict will be an absolutely HUGE Christmas season for Blu-ray players and particularly PS3s. I think Blu-ray disc sales will be dwarfing HD-DVD sales by then and studios and retailers will be making some very critical decisions. Decisions which I believe will be to the further detriment of the HD-DVD format.
I don't see how the price positions can result in a huge lead for BD - it just isn't there

I don't see how the price positions can result in a huge lead for BD - it just isn't there

Pricing is one factor. Of course pricing matters, and it's a big one, but there are a lot of other factors that play into customers' decisions. If it was the only factor, then hd-dvd would be leading blu-ray because it has an absolute price advantage, hands down. As blu-ray is leading 2:1, obviously there are other factors that matter to consumers in making their hi-def purchases.

Pricing is one factor. Of course pricing matters, and it's a big one, but there are a lot of other factors that play into customers' decisions. If it was the only factor, then hd-dvd would be leading blu-ray because it has an absolute price advantage, hands down.
I'm not sure if I agree with that. Many people bought the PS3 for gaming and got Blu-Ray playback for "free". Blu-Ray surely had a big price advantage for that group of people at least.

If HD DVD doesn't get a BD studio to go neutral before Q1 08 (assuming the BD train wrecks HD DVD as badly as I think it will due to blockbuster releases), I think the game is over... BD and HD DVD will have had a full year of numbers... the software sales won't lie, and the attach rates will become moot, simply because the standalones will be cheap enough to not need the PS3 @ that point.


Uh-huh. The software sales don't lie, and the biggest seller has barely broken the 100,000 mark. The most profitable title has been Planet Earth. What does that tell you? As much as you wish it, attach rates aren't going to be moot. We'll have to wait and see about the cheap standalones.
J

I know the PS2 is not a great example, but it has sold 120M units worldwide. That's very nearly all DVD standalones sold in the U.S.! The PS3 doesn't have to do well at all to continue to be a very dominant force in HiDef.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_2

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/cemadvdsales.html
In addition to being a bad example, it's an inaccurate comparison. PS2 in the US vs. DVD players in the US is a fair comparison. PS2 worldwide vs. DVD players worldwide is also a fair comparison. PS2 worldwide vs. DVD players in the US is UTTERLY MEANINGLESS. For the US, the comparison is 44M vs. 126M, or about 1 PS2 per 3 DVD players.

However, getting back to the bad example issue, I'll stand up and say the PS3 will NEVER sell 100 million units worldwide. Go ahead and bookmark this page, and come back in 8 years to laugh at me if I'm wrong. :) Look to the original PlayStation for your reason. It had basically no competition. The Super Nintendo released 3 years earlier (which dominated that generation) didn't even hit 50 million units wordwide. The N64 launched 2 years after the PS and barely hit 30 million. And yet the essentially unopposed PlayStation just barely cracked 100 million. The PS2 again ran nearly unopposed (the Dreamcast doesn't count since it was discontinued less than a year after the PS2's launch), with the late-blooming Xbox unable to gain much traction. It went on to be the most successful console in history at 120 million worldwide--probably 150 by the time it's discontinued. The PS3, by comparison, has not one but TWO solid competitors. Combine slow sales with the fact that it is no longer the cheapest Blu-Ray player available (whereas the PS2 was in many countries for almost two years after release, and breakeven in the US), and its influence will slowly wane, replaced by standalones. Will it ever be totally meaningless? Of course not. There are probably a few thousand people out there who use the PS2 as their primary DVD player.

Despite what some of the regular HD-DVD advocates say, for so many reasons (and I wont bother rehashing them) I just can't see how HD-DVD will be relevant a year from now.

And for those that think there is a good chance of HD-DVD surviving as a co-existing format, you guys are truly delusional... There is virtually no chance of co-existence being a possible outcome.

Q3 and Q4 of 2007 will be ugly for HD-DVD. Q1 of 2008 the walls will be falling. HD-DVD will be dead for all practical purposes by this time next year.


With that said, I am curious to see if HD-DVD can pull back some of their losses this summer (if only briefly) since they are going to be having more releases in the short-term... so far this doesn't even look promising for them.

Despite what some of the regular HD-DVD advocates say, for so many reasons (and I wont bother rehashing them) I just can't see how HD-DVD will be relevant a year from now.

And for those that think there is a good chance of HD-DVD surviving as a co-existing format, you guys are truly delusional... There is virtually no chance of co-existence being a possible outcome.

Q3 and Q4 of 2007 will be ugly for HD-DVD. Q1 of 2008 the walls will be falling. HD-DVD will be dead for all practical purposes by this time next year.


With that said, I am curious to see if HD-DVD can pull back some of their losses this summer (if only briefly) since they are going to be having more releases in the short-term... so far this doesn't even look promising for them.

I also cannot fathom a possible way that hd-dvd can come back to 50/50, let alone winning. At this point, toshiba has to fight nail and tooth just NOT to disappear. In the eyes of most consumers, Blu-Ray is already the next step. With the big holiday blockbusters all coming out, it is going to be devastating, to say the least, for anyone who owns a hd-dvd player. I actually do feel bad for anyone who honestly loves movies and made the mistake of owning a hd-dvd player, and would advise these good people to get rid of their discs/hardware while there is still a market for them.

I know true movie fans just want awesome movies in HD with lossless sound, we should all unite to support the cause and not let microsoft get their chance to tear us apart and turn HD media into a mail order feature.

this thread really needs to be locked after friday and then opened again on the next friday....how long can the same people say the same things week after week and not get tired of reading their own BS. Please lock this thread.

this thread really needs to be locked after friday and then opened again on the next friday....how long can the same people say the same things week after week and not get tired of reading their own BS. Please lock this thread.You're not a moderator, and you don't contribute to the thread. If you don't like what's being said, don't read it, but don't tell us we can't continue to post.

Q3 and Q4 of 2007 will be ugly for HD-DVD. Q1 of 2008 the walls will be falling. HD-DVD will be dead for all practical purposes by this time next year.


With that said...

Actually, could you back up a bit and explain -- in detail -- why you see Q3 and Q4 being "ugly" for HD DVD?

There are great titles and great exclusives on both sides. And it looks like everyone's going to get a ton of releases. Granted, BD has Spider-Man 3 and Pirates... but a few titles alone won't make things "ugly" for HD DVD. And there are also some great (albeit, smaller) exclusives coming for HD DVD, such as Heroes, Grindhouse, Knocked Up, 1408, etc.

I also cannot fathom a possible way that hd-dvd can come back to 50/50, let alone winning. At this point, toshiba has to fight nail and tooth just NOT to disappear. In the eyes of most consumers, Blu-Ray is already the next step. With the big holiday blockbusters all coming out, it is going to be devastating, to say the least, for anyone who owns a hd-dvd player. I actually do feel bad for anyone who honestly loves movies and made the mistake of owning a hd-dvd player, and would advise these good people to get rid of their discs/hardware while there is still a market for them.

I know true movie fans just want awesome movies in HD with lossless sound, we should all unite to support the cause and not let microsoft get their chance to tear us apart and turn HD media into a mail order feature.

I don't consider it a mistake to own an HD DVD player. You bash MS but wrap your arms around SNE.

Are you simply trying to justify your purchase? Why do you even care in the least which format, of many to come and go, is available for the time period 2006-2011?

You're not a moderator, and you don't contribute to the thread. If you don't like what's being said, don't read it, but don't tell us we can't continue to post.

No, he's not a moderator, but he has a point. There is a general "battle" thread. It would be better for many of us if this thread would spend more time on topic and all the "war" discussion went where it was more on topic.

The thing is, from a software sales perspective, unless Warner throws HD DVD more bones (ala Matrix, Batman Begins), there will be no big exclusive HD DVD titles the rest of the year. The next Bourne movie may do pretty well, but the rest Universal are releasing will be catalog titles for the most part which don't do real well in terms of sales. So, Blu-ray will have Warner (with Batman and Matrix supposedly coming which will be big as they were for HD DVD), Disney (Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction, Sin City, Pirates III, etc. all likely ), Sony (Spider-man III, etc.), Fox (bigger recent titles likely), and Paramount, of course. Fourth Qtr definitely favors Blu-ray by a wide margin - no question about it.

Please get on topic, mates.

-Disclaimer: I bought an HD DVD player out of anger at Sony delaying the PS3 in Europe, plus I liked Universal 2006-2007 slate better than Lionsgate+Sony.

what should be found out. is how many people actually buy a hd-dvd player for only upcoverting dvds. since it could very well be. that people dont really know their is actually a difference between a hd-dvd disc or an upconverted dvd. hence the name hd-dvd. it could very well people think hd-dvd is upconverted dvds. at least that would make sence seeing that last week 12 catalog titles didnt do anything for hd-dvd sales vs bluray.

The thing is, from a software sales perspective, unless Warner throws HD DVD more bones (ala Matrix, Batman Begins), there will be no big exclusive HD DVD titles the rest of the year.

Again:

Heroes
Knocked Up
Evan Almighty
Borne Ultimatum
Grindhouse
Chuck and Larry
1408
etc.

I think it's a little deceptive to say that there are no 'big' exclusives coming for HD DVD this year. None of these are Spider-Man 3, but pretty much all of them are going to be big sellers on HD. Plus there are the neutral studios that will have great stuff for HD DVD as well (Transformers, Harry Potter, Ocean's 13, etc.)

You've also discounted Universal's strong catalog titles while highlighting catalog stuff for Disney (???)


I don't see anything here to lead me to believe that Q3/4 will be "ugly" for HD DVD.

Again:

Heroes
Knocked Up
Evan Almighty
Borne Ultimatum
Grindhouse
Chuck and Larry
1408
etc.

I think it's a little deceptive to say that there are no 'big' exclusives coming for HD DVD this year. None of these are Spider-Man 3, but pretty much all of them are going to be big sellers on HD. Plus there are the neutral studios that will have great stuff for HD DVD as well (Transformers, Harry Potter, Ocean's 13, etc.)

You've also discounted Universal's strong catalog titles while highlighting catalog stuff for Disney (???)


I don't see anything here to lead me to believe that Q3/4 will be "ugly" for HD DVD.

You are fooling yourself. I won't comment on the catalogue releases as they haven't shown to be sellers for HD DVD @ all. It's the day and date that get it done.. these are what move players, which move software...

All of the day and date releases you mentioned , with the exception of Ultimatum(which I expect will do very well...), won't be moving players.... None of them were all that exceptional in the box office(knocked up... comedies don't do so hot moving in HD @ this point) ...

Blu has either dual format or exclusivity to 90% of the summer blockbusters...
They just got a price cut on the PS3, which "should" increase blu penetration even further...

Yeah, I'd agree, I think it's going to be a rough Q3 and Q4 for HD DVD.

Despite what some of the regular HD-DVD advocates say, for so many reasons (and I wont bother rehashing them) I just can't see how HD-DVD will be relevant a year from now.

And for those that think there is a good chance of HD-DVD surviving as a co-existing format, you guys are truly delusional... There is virtually no chance of co-existence being a possible outcome.

Q3 and Q4 of 2007 will be ugly for HD-DVD. Q1 of 2008 the walls will be falling. HD-DVD will be dead for all practical purposes by this time next year.


With that said, I am curious to see if HD-DVD can pull back some of their losses this summer (if only briefly) since they are going to be having more releases in the short-term... so far this doesn't even look promising for them.

Did you work for Rumsfeld :)

Granted, BD has Spider-Man 3 and Pirates
You know, I found those really boring and long in the theater, and they would never be a reason for me to buy BD. YMMV

You know, I found those really boring and long in the theater, and they would never be a reason for me to buy BD. YMMV

Same here... although they're obviously going to be huge sellers overall.

BTW look at the YTD charts. Interesting changes in a month:

As of May 27:
1. Casino Royale BD 100.00
2. The Departed BD 75.00
3. The Departed HD 42.52
4. The Prestige BD 41.51
5. Night at the Museum BD 33.61
6. Batman Begins BD 30.98
7. Happy Feet BD 30.50
8. Planet Earth HD 30.38
9. Crank BD 29.67
10. PotC: Dead Man's Chest BD 28.35

As of June 24:
1. Casino Royale BD 100.00
2. The Departed BD 69.67
3. Planet Earth HD 44.56
4. PotC: Dead Man's Chest BD 44.54
5. The Departed HD 42.42
6. PotC: Curse of the Black Pearl BD 38.85
7. The Prestige BD 38.82
8. Apocalypto BD 36.58
9. Night at the Museum BD 34.88
10. Ghost Rider BD 34.33

Planet Earth (HD DVD) is showing incredible legs.

Again:

Heroes
Knocked Up
Evan Almighty
Borne Ultimatum
Grindhouse
Chuck and Larry
1408
etc.


1 Spider-Man 3 Sony $334,391,000
2 Shrek the Third P/DW $316,597,000
3 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End BV $301,741,000
4 300 WB $210,556,253
5 Wild Hogs BV $167,152,896
6 Transformers P/DW $152,500,000
7 Knocked Up Uni. $132,026,000
8 Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer Fox $123,791,000
9 Blades of Glory P/DW $118,012,730
10 Ghost Rider Sony $115,802,596

Only one of the titles you mention is in the top 10 (which is dominated by Sony, Disney and Fox). Of course, there are a couple that remain to be seen...

Also it appears that 1408 is MGM/W so it could be released on BD through MGM.

BTW look at the YTD charts. Interesting changes in a month:

As of May 27:
1. Casino Royale BD 100.00
2. The Departed BD 75.00
3. The Departed HD 42.52
4. The Prestige BD 41.51
5. Night at the Museum BD 33.61
6. Batman Begins BD 30.98
7. Happy Feet BD 30.50
8. Planet Earth HD 30.38
9. Crank BD 29.67
10. PotC: Dead Man's Chest BD 28.35

As of June 24:
1. Casino Royale BD 100.00
2. The Departed BD 69.67
3. Planet Earth HD 44.56
4. PotC: Dead Man's Chest BD 44.54
5. The Departed HD 42.42
6. PotC: Curse of the Black Pearl BD 38.85
7. The Prestige BD 38.82
8. Apocalypto BD 36.58
9. Night at the Museum BD 34.88
10. Ghost Rider BD 34.33

Planet Earth (HD DVD) is showing incredible legs.
...one more data to add to that list :

XX. Planet Earth BD 31.93

Since this is the Nielsen thread, anybody care to comment on HDTVFAN0001's claim here that the Nielsen numbers are not for actual sales:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10976408&&#post10976408


--Darin Besides the fact that I think he is wrong? :D

NPD does something that that for hardware (ie player) numbers where they use multiple sources including shipped data and then use analysis voodoo to get estimated sales numbers.

But Nielson AFAIK never does this, they use POS data collection and random sampled survey data from participants to develop the captured numbers that they report.

Maybe he was just confused?

1. Go look again. There wasn't that many box sets with prices 3-4 times a regular release in January so that may explain why you had a problem seeing anything. It's easy enough today. I have stats for a number of titles for almost every day going back to March. Believe me that if i say that for example Batman and Ultimate Matrix lately going up and down around 1000 mark are selling very close to the same units the last 2 weeks. If you actually save the numbers yourself it's not that hard to see when other factors such as new stock arrival makes a dent.

For example on average a 500 rank will sell 10-15 copies a day. A 1000 rank 5-10 copies a day. If there is a drop of 50 copies in stock without a significant rank change it's easy enough to figure out that those were not sold copies. When stock goes up it's easy enough just to discard that date and look at the next week or two without any big jumps and figure out the average. Sometimes a title will have unit numbers going up and down strangely for a week. Not a problem if you have 20 other weeks of data.

2. Yeah well, they may factor in a beauty factor for the covers multiplied with todays temperature as well. You seem to be aiming to discredit any reason for looking at Amazon at all. Fact is that a box set at any rank that sells as many copies in a week as a single disk ranked the same will have stock levels changed very close. I fail to see how you can interpret that any other way.

3. Of course they do it as a service to customers who do want to know what others are buying. I wanted you to post this yourself and you did. That's exactly why they don't want to screw it up with weird formulas. Why would they complicate this anymore than necessary?

'This kind of info is the only way to do that' (replace b&m)??? And here I thought it had something to do with good prices and a deep catalogue of titles but you seem to have Amazon figured out. I think it's pretty harsh though to say not as a question but as a statement that 'they will try to manipulate'. Maybe someone here is trying to manipulate readers to see ghosts where there aren't any.

You never commented on whether you thought they used anything else than units on hardware ranks as well? Can you imagine what your value based theory would say about the PS3s performance?

Yeah, I spend to much time on this but I like playing with numbers. It's fun. It's also useful to see trends for different titles when trying to estimate Nielsen sales for different titles each week. I have no stock in Amazon and have bought less than 5% of my HD disks from them. They developed the ranking systems so vendors ( ie sellers) could get an idea how their books were selling on a day by day basis. Later they developed their online tools for developers.

The DVD ranking system was just a carry over at first from the book ranking system which they have extended to other catagories.

They consumer reason for the rankings is that its nice for consumers to see what is hot. The vendor side allows for authors ( and now everybody) and studios to see what is selling and to maybe adjust inventory and perhaps even MSRP and other pricing options.

QFT. Universal's catalogue releases aren't going to win this war. It's the day and date releases that will, this has been proven every single week by the sales numbers...

If HD DVD doesn't get a BD studio to go neutral before Q1 08 (assuming the BD train wrecks HD DVD as badly as I think it will due to blockbuster releases), I think the game is over... BD and HD DVD will have had a full year of numbers... the software sales won't lie, and the attach rates will become moot, simply because the standalones will be cheap enough to not need the PS3 @ that point.

Blu will have riden the momentum of the PS3 long enough to get the stand alones in the price range, BD 1.1 will be out in the wild, and the titles will seal the deal.

What I find sad is this:

HD DVD, with a lead out of the gate on BD.... with BD falling flat on its ass with the BD-25s and crapola quality @ the beginning, and with no REAL spec on its players, will have found a way to lose the war they had in their grasp...

Had they HAMMERED home the win early... snubbed BD before it gained momentum by appealing to the masses with LOTS of releases, great quality and cheap players.. we wouldn't even be here now.

You can thank Toshiba and Universal for losing the battle that was theres to win.

Day and date HD sales just substitute for DVD sales. Its almost revenue neutral at this level for the studios as a Blu-ray or HD DVD sale of a new movie is basically cannabalizing a DVD sale.

Sure its important at this point for the horse race, but the studios need catalog sales over the long run, as thats the real bonus money. The re-selling of the studio libraries.

That's why the installed base of hardware reaching 2 million or so sockets out there in the wild is so important and why the pricing and sales of standalone players are so important in the long run.

HD DVD backers are counting on the fact that over the long term, hardware tends to drive software sales, and that when hardware installations are so small, the software numbers don't mean much.

HD DVD software sales have not reached Blu-ray yet because of the PS3 volume and the size of the PS3 base. But eventually HD DVD prices will fall to mass consumption levels before the end of the year.

But they might start to close that sales gap, starting this week if the releases start coming to support the continuing hardware sales.

But no major sales burst for HD DVD or Blu-ray disc sales is going to come until later in the year when retailers make the decision to stock more titles and reduce the prices closer to DVD day and date prices.

Universal executives know that HD DVD sales will be lower than DVD sales at big box retailers if they are not on retail display, are not stocked at brick and mortar locations and are priced significantly higher than DVD SKUs.

What is important to them is trending of the sales, which has been steadily upward for HD DVD and the newer owners seem to be buying catalog and older releases just like the earlier owners did.

The volumes of both HD DVD and Blu-ray sales are so low right now compared to DVD that that all the sales comparisons don't mean much right now.

Again, as the installed base of players increase on both sides, retailers will have an incentive to drop disc retail prices and stock and display more. That will happen in the Nov-Dec sales timeframe.

AND

One thing to remember.

From a retailer and studio standpoint, current release HD sales are basically a cannabilization of day and date DVD sales. The only benefit for moving to HD DVD or Blu-ray if new releases are the only sales of note over the long term is the price premium that consumers may pay over a DVD purchase. That will attrit downward over time, and may not even be $5 in the short term per title.

If new releases were the only sales, or the majority of sales, like Blu-ray is concentraing on, and is its current strength, based on PS3 penetration, then that is just a revenue shift, subtracting from the DVD sales line item , to the HD sales line. Same revenue to the studios and retailers, just different SKUs.

What makes this whole HD format transition worthwhile to the studios is new or revived revenue streams. Not just a substitution of HD for DVD sales.

HD Price Premium : They need consumers to want to pay more for HD content.

Interactive Sales: Additional revenues for interactvce content, online sales links, additional content, etc.

Catalog Sales: Revenues from reselling the catalog titles



Over the long term, the additional revenue stream of re-selling their existing libraries is one of the largest possible revenue sources as it is money that is above what the retailers and studios get over just having a new DVD release.

If they are just substituting HD for DVD sales, then what's the point from a revenue standpoint?

Universal and Warner are setting the groundwork for that additional catalog sales revenue down the road a bit when the installed base of players is larger. That's when it is important.

Right now, the new release sales comparisons don't mean as much, as the catalog sales sales will mean in the 4th quarter and first quarter of next year.

HD DVD PRG activities are focused on increasing the installed base of players throughout this year, as those hardware sockets give the potential for increased catalog and day and date disc sales when retailers drop prices and increase display inventory later in the year.

For both HD DVD and Blu-ray, its probable that when either or both side get the equal of 1.5 million ot 2 million dedicated players in North America, it becomes rational for retailers to get serious about software sales. That was the tipping point for DVD after its launch.

Its looks like HD DVD price drops will make those numbers posssible by the end of the year, and if PS3 sales increase in the fall also, the PS3 users using Blu-ray movies will move toward that point also, supported by standalone Blu-ray sales.

Bottom line is all HD DVD has to do is be competitive until its installed base reaches a tipping point, and that these short term sales numbers are interesting but less significant than the long term trends of new revenues.

1 Spider-Man 3 Sony $334,391,000
2 Shrek the Third P/DW $316,597,000
3 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End BV $301,741,000
4 300 WB $210,556,253
5 Wild Hogs BV $167,152,896
6 Transformers P/DW $152,500,000
7 Knocked Up Uni. $132,026,000
8 Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer Fox $123,791,000
9 Blades of Glory P/DW $118,012,730
10 Ghost Rider Sony $115,802,596

Only one of the titles you mention is in the top 10 (which is dominated by Sony, Disney and Fox). Of course, there are a couple that remain to be seen...

Also it appears that 1408 is MGM/W so it could be released on BD through MGM.

Again, I think I made it clear that the titles I listed won't be as "huge" as Spidey or Pirates. But they're still really solid titles... (one of them being a TV show, so it can't even be compared to the others).

5 of those 10 can/will show up on HD DVD (one of them being exclusive).


I'm not saying that BD doesn't have a stronger potential day-and-date lineup in Q4. They obviously do.

But I don't see how this turns "ugly" for HD DVD. They have a lot of solid neutral releases and some great exclusives. The fact that Wild Hogs and Ghost Rider aren't available on HD DVD doesn't particularly hurt player sales, in my opinion.

And while we know that Spidey 3 and Pirates will sell like pancakes to BD owners, we don't yet know other factors such as overall player prices. The average consumer walking into Best Buy won't have a list of which titles are exclusive to which format. They'll see a huge pile of blue movies and a huge pile of red... and those piles will be pretty equal in terms of total numbers (and total exclusives).

We don't know if exclusive titles will sway format adoption in Q4. Player prices may be the larger factor. Or types of titles (i.e. -- not everyone cares about Spidey and Pirates... some may be looking for classics/catalog).



(My understanding is that the video release of 1408 is handled through Weinstein, but I'd be happy if someone could correct me.)

Day and date HD sales just substitute for DVD sales. Its almost revenue neutral at this level for the studios as a Blu-ray or HD DVD sale of a new movie is basically cannabalizing a DVD sale.

Sure its important at this point for the horse race, but the studios need catalog sales over the long run, as thats the real bonus money. The re-selling of the studio libraries.

That's why the installed base of hardware reaching 2 million or so sockets out there in the wild is so important and why the pricing and sales of standalone players are so important in the long run.

HD DVD backers are counting on the fact that over the long term, hardware tends to drive software sales, and that when hardware installations are so small, the software numbers don't mean much.

HD DVD software sales have not reached Blu-ray yet because of the PS3 volume and the size of the PS3 base. But eventually HD DVD prices will fall to mass consumption levels before the end of the year.

But they might start to close that sales gap, starting this week if the releases start coming to support the continuing hardware sales.

But no major sales burst for HD DVD or Blu-ray disc sales is going to come until later in the year when retailers make the decision to stock more titles and reduce the prices closer to DVD day and date prices.

I realize the logic... but I don't think it is playing out this way. Where I truly think HD DVDs problem is that the mindshare being taken by BD with their day and date releases, coupled with the BB announcement and now players that are approaching more realistic pricepoints.

Sony and the BDA are gambling that the PS3 and their releases targetting that demographic will build a sales gap and momentum beyond what HD DVD can overcome... while the straight numbers might not be unattainable to HD DVD, I would argue that the mindshare is...

The catalogue is the revenue source, no doubt, but I would argue while day and date might cannibalize DVD sales, it does further a format's chance @ survival, which is the more important dog in this fight for the BDA.... Universal is a studio, and obviously, in the long haul cares not what format lives or dies.... They have a collection, and they'll release on whatever format is selling.. however, if the BDA builds a mindshare lead(which I do not believe anyone who is following this can argue against....) along with momentum in sales from the PS3... The public is going to consider HD DVD the Titanic...

Doesn't matter the price of the ticket, it's still a sinking ship...

Q3 and Q4 Day and Date releases are just going to hammer this home even further.

Earlier on, I was an adamant HD DVD supporter... I caved... I caved because I can see the writing on the wall...

The PS3 can be the WORST selling console in this battle, and currently it is... but it's building momentum and mindshare that HD DVD can't catch.

Couple that with a release schedule that is moving discs, and suddenly, I believe you'll see that by the time HD DVD get it's prices to "mass adoption", its going to be for naught... BD will be there, right behind it... with enough mind share and sales momentum to not even let HD DVDs party really get started.

however, if the BDA builds a mindshare lead(which I do not believe anyone who is following this can argue against....)
Not if you mean: Only in the minds of some BD fanboys around here.

They developed the ranking systems so vendors ( ie sellers) could get an idea how their books were selling on a day by day basis. Later they developed their online tools for developers.

The DVD ranking system was just a carry over at first from the book ranking system which they have extended to other catagories.


Aha, now this makes a lot of sense. Thx, Kosty.

Heroes
Knocked Up
Evan Almighty
Borne Ultimatum
Grindhouse
Chuck and Larry
1408
etc.


Ok, good list, let's go through it.

Knocked Up: Big BO for a 30M movie but not a blockbuster. Not especially suited for hidef. Will do some business but not a hidef blockbuster.

Evan Almighty: A flop, does not fit the hidef demographic, will not do very well.

Bourne Ultimatum: Assuming it is released in 2007, should do well.

Grindhouse: A flop at the BO. Will Weinstein go neutral? I would not count this as HD DVD exclusive just yet.

Chuck and Larry: Will it be released in 2007? Medium business.

1408: Is it MGM or Weinstein? Will Weinstein go neutral? I would not count this as HD DVD exclusive just yet.

etc.: what is the "etc." I am not seeing many more. Mr. Bean?

_____

Looking at the current list of top 10 grossing films of 2007, there is only 1 HD DVD exclusive on the list, compared to 5 BD exclusives. While this list may change a bit, it is still overpowering.

An easy pejorative to suggest my opinions have no validity.
Your opinions certainly do, but your prediction of the future as a statement of fact ought to have some extremely good evidence to back it up. I'm sorry, but it doesn't.

I didn't mean to imply I had any hard facts. I made the assumption that in a thread that is mostly speculation, I wouldn't have to certify my predictions when talking in the future tense.
I disagree. Most of the speculative posts here are qualified as such with "I feel" "I bet" and so forth. The ones that are not, are subject to the same rhetoric that yours were.

It can? I thought I was the one making baseless statements presented as fact.
Don't worry, you still are. :) It "can" is most certainly different than it "will." The fact that I need to point this out goes to your first quote in this post. I don't wish to be rude, but I won't be spending any more of my time on this.

The PS2 was also $200 less expensive when it launched ($150 if you count inflation), and took 7 years to sell 120M units. Not forgetting that only a percentage of PS3 owners currently even have an HDTV, I said that the PS3 probably wouldn't sell 100 million units anytime soon. Regardless, I will retract that.

The point I was getting at is, that many people who are looking for an HD player for their new TV might be more inclined to buy a dedicated stand-alone player versus a PS3. Just the same as when they purchased their first DVD player, their first choice was probably not the PS2 or Xbox. Given that the software lead is only 2:1 and the dedicated BD players are being outsold at the moment, things could swing either way. While the PS3 may sell 100 mil. units in 5 years time, that doesn't guarantee anything as far as the home video market goes. Low-priced dedicated units may be selling at an even faster pace by then.
Stated this way, I can recognize your point and it is valid, though I don't completely agree. I'm willing to bet that many of the PS3s sold were bought, primarily as blu-ray players and many even as players only, no gaming intended. I'm also willing to bet that if these could be counted and counted as standalones, blu-ray would be way ahead in the standalone market.

Also remember that the PS3 is being billed as the total home entertainment system. The PS2 never took things nearly that far. I think some HD DVD fans have their heads in the sand when it comes to the PS3. I think your hopes for its failure or at least its marginalization are internalized more as fact, but they're not. They're hopes. The PS3 has powered on for its release and sales have slid, but Christmas is not too far off and I'm also willing to bet that the PS3 will be outselling HD DVD players for at least another 2 holiday seasons. All the blu-ray standalones need to do is keep pace with HD DVD players to keep BD in the lead. I don't see that as a problem... ever.

Cheers

Sony wants you to believe that the only possible winning strategy is a short term win in this format war....that usually never happens, and with coexistance in the long term the more efficient technology will win. So HD DVD very much has a strategy - coexist until both formats can reach mass adoption levels and then use its economic advantages such as cheaper replication costs (which is non factor now since total of 2M disks sold can be easily subsidized) and cheaper hardware costs to gain market share...BDs stretegy is to win via an early shock and awe campaign - price drop of the PS3 is probably the last big card left to play. By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured....

As a consumer we would all be better off with 2 rather than 1 format. Sony and Tosh (to a much smaller degree) of course will be worse off. But why should we care about that.

We'll get 1 format in the end one way or another, guaranteed. BetaMax reached a base of ~25 million decks, and that clearly wasn't enough to ensure mutual survivability. Sure, there are some differences between this war and that one, but the reasons only one format won that war (most hardware manufacturers not wanting to have to produce both formats, most consumers not wanting to deal with both formats, etc) all exist here as well.

In addition to being a bad example, it's an inaccurate comparison. PS2 in the US vs. DVD players in the US is a fair comparison. PS2 worldwide vs. DVD players worldwide is also a fair comparison. PS2 worldwide vs. DVD players in the US is UTTERLY MEANINGLESS. For the US, the comparison is 44M vs. 126M, or about 1 PS2 per 3 DVD players.

However, getting back to the bad example issue, I'll stand up and say the PS3 will NEVER sell 100 million units worldwide. Go ahead and bookmark this page, and come back in 8 years to laugh at me if I'm wrong. :) Look to the original PlayStation for your reason. It had basically no competition. The Super Nintendo released 3 years earlier (which dominated that generation) didn't even hit 50 million units wordwide. The N64 launched 2 years after the PS and barely hit 30 million. And yet the essentially unopposed PlayStation just barely cracked 100 million. The PS2 again ran nearly unopposed (the Dreamcast doesn't count since it was discontinued less than a year after the PS2's launch), with the late-blooming Xbox unable to gain much traction. It went on to be the most successful console in history at 120 million worldwide--probably 150 by the time it's discontinued. The PS3, by comparison, has not one but TWO solid competitors. Combine slow sales with the fact that it is no longer the cheapest Blu-Ray player available (whereas the PS2 was in many countries for almost two years after release, and breakeven in the US), and its influence will slowly wane, replaced by standalones. Will it ever be totally meaningless? Of course not. There are probably a few thousand people out there who use the PS2 as their primary DVD player.
Thank you for finding the proper figures for me. I didn't have that kind of time. It appears you did notice that I, at least qualified my statements as "worldwide" and "U.S." I still think my figures did have some meaning. The fact that the PS2, "worldwide" was able to keep pace with DVD in the U.S. is quite something, IMO!

Also, I never said that the PS3 will sell like the PS2. My point was that gaming machines can keep on a' sellin'. I believe that the PS3 will do just that, though not at any miraculous PS2-esque paces. In time there will likely be more and more exclusive A-titles for it and with the coming price drop, more and more buyers. It's a tortoise and hare thing. Oh and as blu-ray takes more and more of a foothold, it will probably sell better and better when J6P figures out it's a multi-threat. The holidays are not too far off. :)

Again:

Heroes
Knocked Up
Evan Almighty
Borne Ultimatum
Grindhouse
Chuck and Larry
1408
etc.

I think it's a little deceptive to say that there are no 'big' exclusives coming for HD DVD this year. None of these are Spider-Man 3, but pretty much all of them are going to be big sellers on HD. Plus there are the neutral studios that will have great stuff for HD DVD as well (Transformers, Harry Potter, Ocean's 13, etc.)

You've also discounted Universal's strong catalog titles while highlighting catalog stuff for Disney (???)


I don't see anything here to lead me to believe that Q3/4 will be "ugly" for HD DVD.

The type of catalog titles Universal is releasing are basically NOT huge sellers (except maybe Bourne) - the data proves it. Disney titles such as Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction, Sin City, etc. will be huge - especially for the PS3 crowd - but also non-PS3 owners. Those titles you mentioned by Universal do not even compare to the ones I mentioned previously. I'm sure some others can say them same. Q4 will be ugly for HD DVD only in comparison of the Blu-ray studio onslaught that will take place in terms of big/popular titles some of which are new, some of which are a few years old. Keep in mind Wanrer is likely to release some titles which have been carrying HD DVD (like Batman Begins and Matrix. Batman has had great staying power.) All I'm saying is the Nielson number disparity will grow larger due to the studio support advantage really coming to life for Blu-ray along with the PS3 effect, Blockbuster, and lower priced standalone Blu-ray players. I'm predicting at least 80:20 for Blu-ray by January, but we'll see. :)

We'll get 1 format in the end one way or another, guaranteed. BetaMax reached a base of ~25 million decks, and that clearly wasn't enough to ensure mutual survivability. Sure, there are some differences between this war and that one, but the reasons only one format won that war (most hardware manufacturers not wanting to have to produce both formats, most consumers not wanting to deal with both formats, etc) all exist here as well.
Based on that 25M figure, I agree, though in this case I don't believe HD DVD has to sell quite that many to remain viable. One of those "differences" you referred to is the whole niche market thing. Maybe half that or 12M might be the tipping point, but we're a LONG ways off from there and I no longer think they can do it. Of course this is all purely speculative, but I believe it's only a matter of time.

JMHO

Ok, good list, let's go through it.

I'm happy to, but you're completely ignoring the first one on the list. Heroes is a big title -- it's a very popular new show. Even though it has a $100 retail price and doesn't come out for 2 more months, it's sitting at #32 on Amazon's list right now.

Knocked Up: Big BO for a 30M movie but not a blockbuster. Not especially suited for hidef. Will do some business but not a hidef blockbuster.

Evan Almighty: A flop, does not fit the hidef demographic, will not do very well.

Knocked Up: It's at $130+ million and still climbing a bit. It most certainly is a blockbuster. Whether it appeals to an HD crowd remains to be seen. Not everything has to have killer robots or CGI to be in HD.

Evan Almighty: It did flop relative to its budget, but will still pull in around $100 million in theaters domestically. It's a family comedy with lots of special effects -- that "does not fit the hidef demographic"?


As an aside, I have to say that the focus on a demographic may be one reason why adoption of HD formats is so slow. If studios just release eye candy and ignore a more well-rounded release approach, they may be alienating the "average folks" who would consider diving in. I would guess that there's a lot of people who are 35+, can afford HD, but are underwhelmed at what's being offered.

Will it be released in 2007?

That can be said of most of the BD titles that people are tossing around too... including Spidey and Pirates which have yet to be officially announced. I'm just trying to make reasonable assumptions. I think it's reasonable to assume that Spidey and Pirates are coming out in Q4. I also think it's reasonable to assume that Chuck+Larry and Borne are coming out as well.

etc.: what is the "etc." I am not seeing many more. Mr. Bean?

The etc. was just there because there *are* other exclusives coming... I'm just not 100% sure how well the movies will do at the box office and/or if they'll hit HD DVD by Q4: Evening, The Kingdom, Talk to Me, Halloween, Eastern Promises, Lust Caution, and... yes... Mr. Bean.

Again, I don't expect any of these to do Pirates-level business... but something like Lust, Caution or Evening definitely offers an alternative to people who don't have any interest in Spidey.


Looking at the current list of top 10 grossing films of 2007, there is only 1 HD DVD exclusive on the list, compared to 5 BD exclusives. While this list may change a bit, it is still overpowering.

It is. BD definitely has a strong day-and-date option for Q4. I've said that a few times.

But does that make it "ugly" for HD DVD? I don't think so. No more so than the lack of Heroes or Borne makes it "ugly" for BD. Both have strong lineups going into Q4. That's all I was saying.

Ok, good list, let's go through it.

Knocked Up: Big BO for a 30M movie but not a blockbuster. Not especially suited for hidef. Will do some business but not a hidef blockbuster.

Evan Almighty: A flop, does not fit the hidef demographic, will not do very well.

Bourne Ultimatum: Assuming it is released in 2007, should do well.

Grindhouse: A flop at the BO. Will Weinstein go neutral? I would not count this as HD DVD exclusive just yet.

Chuck and Larry: Will it be released in 2007? Medium business.

1408: Is it MGM or Weinstein? Will Weinstein go neutral? I would not count this as HD DVD exclusive just yet.

etc.: what is the "etc." I am not seeing many more. Mr. Bean?

_____

Looking at the current list of top 10 grossing films of 2007, there is only 1 HD DVD exclusive on the list, compared to 5 BD exclusives. While this list may change a bit, it is still overpowering.

Whats with the "Will Weinstein go neutral" comments? It doesn't matter how many times you type it, that won't affect any studio's decision.

Based on that 25M figure, I agree, though in this case I don't believe HD DVD has to sell quite that many to remain viable. One of those "differences" you referred to is the whole niche market thing. Maybe half that or 12M might be the tipping point, but we're a LONG ways off from there and I no longer think they can do it. Of course this is all purely speculative, but I believe it's only a matter of time.

JMHO

In order to survice as a niche, a product must deliver something (technical or perceptual) that the mainstream does not deliver. e.g. Beta was perceived to deliver a better image than VHS.

If we're talking about 2-4 years down the road and that BD is the mainstream solution, you've have to ask what advantage that HD DVD (technical or perceptual) can deliver that BD cannot. If you can answer that, then you'd can say that HD DVD will survive or not.

It is. BD definitely has a strong day-and-date option for Q4. I've said that a few times.

But does that make it "ugly" for HD DVD? I don't think so. No more so than the lack of Heroes or Borne makes it "ugly" for BD. Both have strong lineups going into Q4. That's all I was saying.

In the context of disc sales, having only 4 of the top 10 discs of 2007 should be considered "ugly" when compared to the rival Blu-ray format that has 9 of the top 10 available. Especially when we know that sales of the neutral 4 of the top 10 predominantly lean towards Blu-ray by at least 60/40. Whether that means it's "plain jane" or "ugly" might depend on the eye of the beholder, but it's certainly not "pretty."

The converse, Blu-ray not having 1 of the top available, doesn't measure nearly so much.

lower cost, no BD+

By the end of the year if HD DVD maintains a 30% market share, I'd say coexistance in the short term (until end 2009) would be almost assured....It seems like you want to avoid questions like this, but do you think that maintaining a 30% market share would be enough to keep Universal from going neutral by the end of CEDIA 2008?
Besides the fact that I think he is wrong? :D

NPD does something that that for hardware (ie player) numbers where they use multiple sources including shipped data and then use analysis voodoo to get estimated sales numbers.

But Nielson AFAIK never does this, they use POS data collection and random sampled survey data from participants to develop the captured numbers that they report.

Maybe he was just confused?He is now claiming to know somebody in the industry and that the Neilsen numbers aren't actual sales. If there is any validity to his claim I would like to know it, but I would be more inclined to believe him if he hadn't earlier posted this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10923619&&#post10923619):If you back out the PS3 units (and most of those folks aren't buying movies, they're buying games - numerous reports support that fact), there's actually a 325,000 to 168,000 lead in the number of HD DVD players over Blu Ray. PS3's are a non-factor in terms of movie purchasers.when anybody in the know would realize that PS3s are a factor in terms of movie purchasers. Blu-ray didn't get to where it is for software sales in the US or Europe without the PS3.
Day and date HD sales just substitute for DVD sales. Its almost revenue neutral at this level for the studios as a Blu-ray or HD DVD sale of a new movie is basically cannabalizing a DVD sale.Not anymore. Might have been that way for the whole industry, but no one studio can stop HD now and there are many of us who will buy an HD version that is day-and-date with a DVD, but would not have bought a DVD version. And that group should grow. Any studio that decides not to release day-and-date should see some missing sales over what would have happened if they had released in HD also.
But no major sales burst for HD DVD or Blu-ray disc sales is going to come until later in the year when retailers make the decision to stock more titles and reduce the prices closer to DVD day and date prices.You seem to think it is up to the retailers to do this. Are you expecting that the prices that they get charged will come down, or that they will reduce their margins?
(My understanding is that the video release of 1408 is handled through Weinstein, but I'd be happy if someone could correct me.)I agree. Looks like the Weinsteins have the home media rights to me.

--Darin

Whats with the "Will Weinstein go neutral" comments? It doesn't matter how many times you type it, that won't affect any studio's decision.
It's called subliminal messaging. :D

But you got to wonder, though... You should think Universal and Weinstein soon would reconsider their exclusive HD DVD support. What are they gaining from staying HD DVD exclusive? Unless they're sponsored by Toshiba/Microsoft, it seems they're only losing out on Blu-ray revenue. (I would have loved to buy Heroes on Blu-ray. I can't. What did I do with the episodes I missed on TV? Downloaded them in 720P... As I said, if available, I would gladly have bought it on Blu-ray.)

Now, to pre-empt the inevitable, you can't flip the argument around and say "Why don't the Blu-ray exclusives support HD DVD? They're just losing revenue." Player base is smaller, software sales are smaller, they know they're winning, why prolong the war etc. YMMV slightly...

I wouldn't be surprised if Disney went HD DVD, but I think it is even more probable that Universal go Blu-ray. For them as a studio, with no IP revenue from hardware or codecs, it simply does not make sense not to start publishing for the larger platform out there. Of course, they know (as do Toshiba and Microsoft) that if they go neutral, it is essentially Game Over for HD DVD. It doesn't take a rocket scientist then to figure out why they stay exclusive if they d :rolleyes: o....

In the context of disc sales, having only 4 of the top 10 discs of 2007 should be considered "ugly" when compared to the rival Blu-ray format that has 9 of the top 10 available. Especially when we know that sales of the neutral 4 of the top 10 predominantly lean towards Blu-ray by at least 60/40. Whether that means it's "plain jane" or "ugly" might depend on the eye of the beholder, but it's certainly not "pretty."

The converse, Blu-ray not having 1 of the top available, doesn't measure nearly so much.

They have 5 of the top 10 currently, not 4.

The top 10 will also change a bit in the next few weeks, since Harry Potter, Simpsons, and Borne haven't been released yet. (And Ratatouille is still climbing...)

While the Top 10 is a great shorthand for how things are going, there's a lot more to the overall success of the formats than that. Recent blockbusters are a key component, but there's also overall title selection and hardware pricing to consider.

We also can't discount the fact that Disney and Fox/MGM are fairly spotty with their releases so far. I don't think we can count on a guaranteed release of Fantastic Four or Ratatouille for Q4 (although I wouldn't be surprised to see both).


There's a whole pile of titles coming out (on both sides) in Q4. And there are lots of people who are going to be much more excited about stuff like Blade Runner, American Pie, 2001, or Meet the Fockers than they are about Pirates, Borne, or Wild Hogs.

I just think we do both formats a disservice if we are making Q4 predictions based solely on the # of potential releases in the 2007 top 10. That's far too limited a scope in my opinion.

Whats with the "Will Weinstein go neutral" comments? It doesn't matter how many times you type it, that won't affect any studio's decision.

There are several reasons to ask this question.

1. They do not have any announced titles for HD DVD right now. After months of putting everything onto HD DVD, they have passed up a few (like Miss Potter).
2. They put much of their catalog onto HD DVD, could they be thinking that they might as well dip into Blu-ray too?
3. Weinstein has an exclusive deal with Blockbuster so they may follow them into Blu-ray.
4. Harvey Weinstein is very mercurial. I certainly would not predict what they will do. Therefore, it is a question, which is why I asked it.

I'm happy to, but you're completely ignoring the first one on the list. Heroes is a big title -- it's a very popular new show. Even though it has a $100 retail price and doesn't come out for 2 more months, it's sitting at #32 on Amazon's list right now.



Sorry I simply dropped this in my word processor. What I would have said about it is that it is hard to predict overall sales from looking at Amazon. I follow thedvdwars.com carefully as well, and find that they buyers there are somewhat special. We will have to wait and see.

Reading over many of these posts, I get the feeling that a lot of people are thinking that HD DVD can "survive" if it hangs onto a minority percentage of Videoscan throughout the year. Several people are saying that 30% (for example) would guarantee survival.

I am not so sure. At some point, the studios and retail channel are going to want this called so we can all move forward. Having it drag out indefinitely, or having two niche formats, is not in their interest. It is not in Toshiba's interest.

So my question: at what percentage for the fourth quarter would you expect to either see a continuation of the format war or some kind of shutdown?

Reading over many of these posts, I get the feeling that a lot of people are thinking that HD DVD can "survive" if it hangs onto a minority percentage of Videoscan throughout the year. Several people are saying that 30% (for example) would guarantee survival.

I am not so sure. At some point, the studios and retail channel are going to want this called so we can all move forward. Having it drag out indefinitely, or having two niche formats, is not in their interest. It is not in Toshiba's interest.

So my question: at what percentage for the fourth quarter would you expect to either see a continuation of the format war or some kind of shutdown?

Nothing will shut down the format war this year. It's WAY too early. Toshiba is selling players very well (based on PRs) and holiday pricing will drive even more HD DVDs into households.

The PS3 on the other hand also saw a price cut and sales will likely increase over the holiday as well.

For me, the bottom line is that the PS3 is extending the format war right now. Some early adopters got it exclusively for HD content, but the majority use it for games. It's nice to have a system that CAN play HD content though, and that's why BD is seeing such software sales right now.

However, there is NO WAY the PS3 is going to become a mainstream HDM player in the household.

This leaves it up to standalone BD players, which are getting trounced by HD DVD players currently. By the time the BD players get to the "magical" price point, the HD DVD players will most likely be under $100.

Everything hinges on the next 12 months. Player prices, holiday sales, etc. Compared to these, the software sales mean next to nothing at this stage of the game.

Actually, could you back up a bit and explain -- in detail -- why you see Q3 and Q4 being "ugly" for HD DVD?

Why do I believe this will happen?

Let's start with software sales. As you have already noted, the BDA has the upper hand on exclusive releases during Q3/4 of 2007. You've mentioned a few exclusive titles that will do okay on HD-DVD (such as Borne), but the BDA clearly has a MUCH stronger list of exclusive hits that will hit the market during this time period (no need for me to list the obvious). I don't believe the HD-DVD exclusives will come close to countering the BR exclusives. Then we have the other studios that have been holding back for one reason or the other. The big missing Warner titles (Matrix, Batman...) should be coming out on BR as the specs are formalized in the coming months, and we already know these will sell well. Speaking of specs, the still unformalized BR specs for manly extra fluff (which appears to mainly be a concern for HD-DVD supporters) will be formalized and implemented during this time period as well. Fox, MGM, and also Disney to a lesser extent, have been holding back titles as they have been waiting for BD+ to be implemented, and it appears BD+ is now ready. Obviously these studios releasing during Q3/4 will only solidify the BR sales advantage. Blockbuster deciding to rent Blu-ray exclusively in it's stores will certainly help mainstream adoption. All I really see HD-DVD having to counter any of this is the Borne series and S1 of Heroes. IMO, it looks like Universal has very little left in reserve to 'fight another day', and certainly not enough to counter all of the above. My guess is Universal will be format neutral by the end of Q1 2008, which again means the death of HD-DVD.

Hardware? Obviously BR stand-alone players will continue to drop in price at an equal or faster rate than HD-DVD players. There's a very good chance Korean and/or Chinese BR players will hit the market before the holidays at even lower prices which should significantly tighten or even nullify any hardware pricing advantage HD-DVD might have. Sony has dropped the price on the PS3, that coupled with scheduled Q3/4 exclusive gaming software for this machine, should give the PS3 a nice bump in sales (and we already know how much the PS3 can influence HDM sales). I can't see Toshiba cutting the prices too much more on their hardware as I believe they are already subsidizing players at the current price... They might get to $150 by the end of the year (w/o a fire sale), but I doubt it. Given the current and predicted war status, along with Toshiba's cut-throat hardware pricing, I don't believe there is much room or incentive for cheaper Asian hardware to enter the market. By the end of the year I suspect there will be very little advantage for one format or the other regarding pricing... unless Toshiba has a complete fire sale. Either way it looks like the BDA will be in a position to move a lot more hardware.

This is why I believe Q3/4 will be ugly for HD-DVD and all but dead by this time next year. I don't want this thread to get OT so I'm done replying to this line of questioning...

:)

In 2008, it will be more of the same. PS3 sales will underperform & HD-DVD standalones will continue to outsell their BD counterparts. You won't see a mass interest in HDM in the US until 2009 when people realize they are in the HD world. The masses will look for the low cost solution, and that looks like HD-DVD, today. Since the numbers will still be small in 2008, why should Universal admit they were wrong to begin with? They can wait another year, at least.

Wet1, I couldn't agree more. Nice analysis.

I can't believe that a company like Universal only thinks 6-9 months ahead. I don't think you can talk about Universal going neutral unless we have a situation where they make no money on the format from now through Q4 2008.

I am still wondering why LG and Samsung made combo drives if blu-ray were doing so good, maybe it's because sony capatitilized the market so far with the lower price ps3 and now there lower price standalone leaving the other hardware makers high and dry.

I am still wondering why LG and Samsung made combo drives if blu-ray were doing so good, maybe it's because sony capatitilized the market so far with the lower price ps3 and now there lower price standalone leaving the other hardware makers high and dry.

There could be any number of reasons. One might, as you suggest, think that they lack confidence in Blu-ray, but other reasons might include:

-- they want to have multiple products for different customers
-- they want to build transitional products that will allow HD DVD owners to move up (down? over?) to Blu-ray gracefully
-- they want to fill a product niche that no one else is filling successfully. Since the LG appears to have been a flop, this could be Samsung's motivation.
-- they think that both formats will survive via combos
-- they don't know what is happening and want to be covered

BTW I think that Toshiba has far more grabbed the HD DVD market than Sony has grabbed the Blu-ray market. So far, the only other pure HD DVD player on the market is the Microsoft add-on, which is built by Toshiba. The rumored Onkyo is apparently built on the Toshiba HD-XA2.

There are several reasons to ask this question.

1. They do not have any announced titles for HD DVD right now. After months of putting everything onto HD DVD, they have passed up a few (like Miss Potter).
2. They put much of their catalog onto HD DVD, could they be thinking that they might as well dip into Blu-ray too?
3. Weinstein has an exclusive deal with Blockbuster so they may follow them into Blu-ray.
4. Harvey Weinstein is very mercurial. I certainly would not predict what they will do. Therefore, it is a question, which is why I asked it.

1. So what? There were points in time where every studio had no title announced for HD DVD or Blu-Ray. Universal earlier this year, Fox, MGM, etc etc
2. Why both since the Blu-Ray market is just as small?
3. Another reason why HD DVD could get a bigger piece of Blockbuster

1. So what? There were points in time where every studio had no title announced for HD DVD or Blu-Ray. Universal earlier this year, Fox, MGM, etc etc
2. Why both since the Blu-Ray market is just as small?
3. Another reason why HD DVD could get a bigger piece of Blockbuster

Could be, we will have to see.

My only statement is that I think the status of Weinstein is QUESTIONABLE at this point.

Nothing will shut down the format war this year. It's WAY too early. Toshiba is selling players very well (based on PRs) and holiday pricing will drive even more HD DVDs into households.

The PS3 on the other hand also saw a price cut and sales will likely increase over the holiday as well.
Sales of the PS3 are absolutely soaring as a result of the price reduction to $499. I checked earlier this afternoon and the 60gb PS3 has risen to #1 in games from #28 (even well above the wii now). I think these higher sales will continue and the offer of 5 free Blu-ray movies to the buyers of the PS3 will introduce those who are gamers to the wonderful world of Blu-ray movies.


However, there is NO WAY the PS3 is going to become a mainstream HDM player in the household.

This leaves it up to standalone BD players, which are getting trounced by HD DVD players currently. By the time the BD players get to the "magical" price point, the HD DVD players will most likely be under $100.

Based upon the way retailers are having difficulty keeping them in stock, I think that the "magical" price point for the BD players is currently $499. These babies are flying off the shelves. Retailers around me still have plenty of Toshibas sitting on their shelves.

They have 5 of the top 10 currently, not 4.

BD has 5 of the top 10 currents as exclusive. HDDVD only has 1 of the top 10 as exclusive. I was giving both sides the benefit of the remaining 4 of the top 10, who are from neutral studios. As I mentioned, the neutrals still benefit BD more than they do HDDVD since they take a greater share of the disc profits in every case except only Planet Earth, which does not apply to the context of this point of discussion.

Indeed the top 10 are changing, but I really doubt the ratio of 5 BD, 1 HDDVD, 4 neutral will change by the end of the year.

Sales of the PS3 are absolutely soaring as a result of the price reduction to $499. I checked earlier this afternoon and the 60gb PS3 has risen to #1 in games from #28 (even well above the wii now). I think these higher sales will continue and the offer of 5 free Blu-ray movies to the buyers of the PS3 will introduce those who are gamers to the wonderful world of Blu-ray movies.It will be interesting to see what happens with the Bluetooth remote for the PS3. I believe it was #51 when I checked this morning and #21 when I checked a few minutes ago. The HD DVD add-on for the XBOX360 is in the same section (Video Games) and is currently #774, although I'm guessing at $200 most people would just buy the A2 for a little more.
Based upon the way retailers are having difficulty keeping them in stock, I think that the "magical" price point for the BD players is currently $499. These babies are flying off the shelves. Retailers around me still have plenty of Toshibas sitting on their shelves.Given how the 20GB at $499 didn't seem to fly off the shelves I don't see how $499 can be the magic price point going forward. I think they need a lot more good content (especially games).
As I mentioned, the neutrals still benefit BD more than they do HDDVD since they take a greater share of the disc profits in every case except only Planet Earth, which does not apply to the context of this point of discussion.I disagree as it would be better for Blu-ray if it was 3 against 1 than 5 against 3 (depending on how low you go counting studios). The ratios and incentives for buying Blu-ray players over HD DVD players would be more in Blu-ray's favor if all the neutral stuff didn't come out. Put another way, something like LOTR being released on both formats should push the balance of releases closer to 50-50, since without the neutral studios the balance of releases would be even more in Blu-ray's favor.

--Darin

They'll see a huge pile of blue movies and a huge pile of red... and those piles will be pretty equal in terms of total numbers (and total exclusives).


I think any sane people will see that there are a lot of desirable titles in the blue 'pile' that are not in the red 'pile'.

The complete lack of Disney/Pixar and the Spider-man movies I think will be painfully obvious. Let's face it - in most stores the 'piles' are co-located with the most desirable titles facing forward - you can do the comparison at a glance.

People that don't make this comparison before buying hardware are foolish...

Sales of the PS3 are absolutely soaring as a result of the price reduction to $499. I checked earlier this afternoon and the 60gb PS3 has risen to #1 in games from #28 (even well above the wii now). I think these higher sales will continue and the offer of 5 free Blu-ray movies to the buyers of the PS3 will introduce those who are gamers to the wonderful world of Blu-ray movies.


Soaring? Give it time for the price to set in. Nobody can judge the success of the price drop in 1 day.



Based upon the way retailers are having difficulty keeping them in stock, I think that the "magical" price point for the BD players is currently $499. These babies are flying off the shelves. Retailers around me still have plenty of Toshibas sitting on their shelves.

Anecdotal evidence that means nothing. The magical price point for HD media players is either 199 or lower. HD DVD had prices at $299 for a while and it took the $100 promo to really get things moving. Most likely the same thing for Blu Ray.

Until I see some sales data, nobody can say they are "flying off the shelves."

Seriously, I'm more than welcome to discuss any of this with you, but leave the fanboy FUD at the door (in reference to the bold above.)

I think any sane people will see that there are a lot of desirable titles in the blue 'pile' that are not in the red 'pile'.

The complete lack of Disney/Pixar and the Spider-man movies I think will be painfully obvious. Let's face it - in most stores the 'piles' are co-located with the most desirable titles facing forward - you can do the comparison at a glance.

People that don't make this comparison before buying hardware are foolish...

Yeah, God forbid the selection of quality movies should be compared instead of just the quantity. Just take a look at the 5 Free DVD offer from Sony right now and compare it to the HD DVD one.

BD has a LOT of junk titles out there. Maybe you like them, but I doubt the general public is going to flock to titles like "stealth", "little man", and 'Resident Evil 2".

Both sides have stinkers, but FOR ME, Blu has WAY more junk.

:D dead cat bounce

Soaring? Give it time for the price to set in. Nobody can judge the success of the price drop in 1 day.




Anecdotal evidence that means nothing. The magical price point for HD media players is either 199 or lower. HD DVD had prices at $299 for a while and it took the $100 promo to really get things moving. Most likely the same thing for Blu Ray.

Until I see some sales data, nobody can say they are "flying off the shelves."

Seriously, I'm more than welcome to discuss any of this with you, but leave the fanboy FUD at the door (in reference to the bold above.)

I think you're absolutely right that you can't judge the success of the $100 price reduction in only one day and only time will give a true measure of its success. If you go to the Amazon 60gb PS3 page and click on "biggest sellers", you'll see that the PS3 has moved to #1 position. And in the customer forum toward the bottom of theat PS3 page you'll see where someone has posted a link about the increase being a 2,700% increase. That's nothing to sneeze at and I hope that it doesn't represent merely a momentary spike followed by a "retreat" to original sales levels. The spike will go down, but I suspect it will settle at a level substantially above the former stasis level.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0009VXAM0******pd_kar_gw_1/104-5430756-0213547

Yeah, God forbid the selection of quality movies should be compared instead of just the quantity. Just take a look at the 5 Free DVD offer from Sony right now and compare it to the HD DVD one.

BD has a LOT of junk titles out there. Maybe you like them, but I doubt the general public is going to flock to titles like "stealth", "little man", and 'Resident Evil 2".

Both sides have stinkers, but FOR ME, Blu has WAY more junk.

This is partly a matter of opinion.

For me, neither side has shipped very much that I want. Here is what has happened IMHO.

The studios initially had long lists of great titles. Take a look at the promos from CES 2006 and drool over what we were being promised.

Sony, for example, promised Lawrence, Kwai, Navarone. Warners promised The Music Man. Etc.

Then, when the shipments started, it didn't take long to see that titles like Forbidden Planet and Spartacus died, while Serenity and Batman Begins were big winners.

The titles we are being offered on both formats are the titles that will sell for the most part to the current demographic. Only Warners occasionally tries to subvert the paradigm with a classic, but less so than last year.

We are stuck with the current genres until the end of the format war when adoption increases.

I actually feel a bit sorry for Universal with their failed catalog blitz. At least there were a few good movies included in the mix (Lost in Translation, Meet Joe Black) that somehow slipped by the Universal execs (who clearly have better taste in film than they have sense of the market). Of course, they decided they didn't want my business. :)

Reading over many of these posts, I get the feeling that a lot of people are thinking that HD DVD can "survive" if it hangs onto a minority percentage of Videoscan throughout the year. Several people are saying that 30% (for example) would guarantee survival.

I am not so sure. At some point, the studios and retail channel are going to want this called so we can all move forward. Having it drag out indefinitely, or having two niche formats, is not in their interest. It is not in Toshiba's interest.

So my question: at what percentage for the fourth quarter would you expect to either see a continuation of the format war or some kind of shutdown?

I completely agree.

As to the timing, that is a little more difficult, but I would say that unless something dramatic happens, HD-DVD will be a hurtin' and feeling the pressure by this time next year.

The complete lack of Disney/Pixar and the Spider-man movies I think will be painfully obvious.
Remind me again how many Disney/Pixar movies are available on Blu-Ray? Cars? Nope. Toy Story? Nope. Lady and the Tramp? Nope. Lion King? Nope. Any other Disney/Pixar classics? Nope. The only thing painfully obvious is that "traditional" Disney and Pixar films are not available in Hi Def, period. Pick whatever format you like, you STILL can't get any of these movies. Except for that ONE lone title that's announced for sometime in the middle of 2008 maybe.

1 Spider-Man 3 Sony $334,391,000
2 Shrek the Third P/DW $316,597,000
3 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End BV $301,741,000
4 300 WB $210,556,253
5 Wild Hogs BV $167,152,896
6 Transformers P/DW $152,500,000
7 Knocked Up Uni. $132,026,000
8 Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer Fox $123,791,000
9 Blades of Glory P/DW $118,012,730
10 Ghost Rider Sony $115,802,596

When looking at box office numbers one thing to take into account is that to make it into the $200 - $300 million realm you need a lot of repeat ticket buyers.

And the biggest repeat buyers are teenagers and familys with children.

Since most teenagers probably have a gaming system you can look at the top 10 and figure that SP3, 300, Transformers, Knocked up, FF4 , Blades of Glory will be purchased by them or for them as gifts.

With these titles you've got 5 available on BD and 4 for HD DVD. Since neutral titles tend to skew towards BD that would leave Knocked up to make up sales against SP3 and FF4. Not very likely.

Now The family movies Pirates 3 and Shrek 3 (I really don't want to count SP3 twice)

You will probably have Harry Potter, Ratatuille and the Simpsons joing the kids line up with Chuck and Larry for HDDVD and Superbad BD for the teenagers

That would mean a 5 to 2 advantage for BD kids flix with the possibility that Evan Almighty might be a purchase for some.

So going into this holiday season if you were going to be purchasing a Highdef player for your household and you have kids and teens, do you buy the BD player for a little more money so they can watch SP3,Pirates,Ratatuille,FF4 and the Simpsons.

IMO a lot of people will.

Remind me again how many Disney/Pixar movies are available on Blu-Ray? Cars? Nope. Toy Story? Nope. Lady and the Tramp? Nope. Lion King? Nope. Any other Disney/Pixar classics? Nope. The only thing painfully obvious is that "traditional" Disney and Pixar films are not available in Hi Def, period. Pick whatever format you like, you STILL can't get any of these movies. Except for that ONE lone title that's announced for sometime in the middle of 2008 maybe.

Do you realize that you just made a rather compelling argument as to why Blu-ray will probably win this format war?

If Blu-ray is still outselling HD-DVD by about 2 to 1, despite the fact that few of their top exclusive titles have been released yet (such as those mentioned in your post), what does this say about the future? It would seem that once those types of titles are being released, the disparity in sales between BD and HD-DVD will grow even more in BD's favor.

Remind me again how many Disney/Pixar movies are available on Blu-Ray? Cars? Nope. Toy Story? Nope. Lady and the Tramp? Nope. Lion King? Nope. Any other Disney/Pixar classics? Nope. The only thing painfully obvious is that "traditional" Disney and Pixar films are not available in Hi Def, period. Pick whatever format you like, you STILL can't get any of these movies. Except for that ONE lone title that's announced for sometime in the middle of 2008 maybe.

Same for Star Wars, Indiana Jones, ET (from Universal), Jurassic Park (also Universal), etc. None of these "super-catalog" titles from any studio will be available until the format war is over and adoption has increased.

What will probably be happening in most cases is that new titles like Pirates, Ratatoille, Live Free or Die Hard, will ship on Blu-ray day-and-date with DVD. The studios have figured that much out. It may also be true that when existing titles are reissued (as is Disney's practice), that we will see a Blu-ray disk day-and-date with the reissued DVD.

So what we really have to do (which is what my posts have focused on) is to look at the release schedules and project when titles go to home video.

But it is pointless to look to the big titles of the past from any studio at all. This, to me, is the most compelling argument for finding a solution to the format war rather than hoping that the clearly losing format will find a way to keep it going.

Remind me again how many Disney/Pixar movies are available on Blu-Ray? Cars? Nope. Toy Story? Nope. Lady and the Tramp? Nope. Lion King? Nope. Any other Disney/Pixar classics? Nope. The only thing painfully obvious is that "traditional" Disney and Pixar films are not available in Hi Def, period. Pick whatever format you like, you STILL can't get any of these movies. Except for that ONE lone title that's announced for sometime in the middle of 2008 maybe.

So do you really think Disney will not release these movies at some point in the future?

1 Spider-Man 3 Sony $334,391,000
2 Shrek the Third P/DW $316,597,000
3 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End BV $301,741,000
4 300 WB $210,556,253
5 Wild Hogs BV $167,152,896
6 Transformers P/DW $152,500,000
7 Knocked Up Uni. $132,026,000
8 Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer Fox $123,791,000
9 Blades of Glory P/DW $118,012,730
10 Ghost Rider Sony $115,802,596

...With these titles you've got 5 available on BD and 4 for HD DVD...

#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #8, #9, and #10 will be on Blu-ray. That's 9 (not 5).

5 of those titles will ONLY be available on BD and 1 for HD DVD.

I disagree as it would be better for Blu-ray if it was 3 against 1 than 5 against 3 (depending on how low you go counting studios). The ratios and incentives for buying Blu-ray players over HD DVD players would be more in Blu-ray's favor if all the neutral stuff didn't come out. Put another way, something like LOTR being released on both formats should push the balance of releases closer to 50-50, since without the neutral studios the balance of releases would be even more in Blu-ray's favor.



How so? If it holds true to every other release, something like LOTR would sell ~50k discs on Blu-ray and 30k discs on HDDVD... If it's a set, it would probably be more like 25k on BD and 15k on HDDVD. BD still has probably 20,000 more discs sold on a 5:3 to 6:4 ratio. That's if it's like Happy Feet. If it's the Departed or Superman Returns it's much closer to 2:1.

Add that to BD exclusives... Spidey 3 will be at least as successful as Casino Royale, as will Pirates 3. Expect respectable showings for Live Free or Die Hard and FF4. Transformers and 300 both play better to the PS3 demographic. Guess that leaves Knocked Up... Evan Almighty is not going to come close to even the most mediocre of the BD blockbusters. Bourne Ultimatum should do good. Grindhouse? Better hope it does better on disc than it did in theaters... Chuck and Larry? 1408? C'mon now...

Disc sales for Q4 are probably going to be between 3:1 and 4:1 or more. Bookmark it. I'll happily eat crow and buy an HD-D2 in the first week of January if it's otherwise (or be hoping that white/silver 65nm Elite is out that takes 8CH PCM to replace my current 360 Pro). :) Obviously I agree 5:1 or 6:1 would be catastrophic and likely result in an abortion of HDDVD at CES 2008, but if it's one more year, is it really that big of a difference?

#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #8, #9, and #10 will be on Blu-ray. That's 9 (not 5).

5 of those titles will ONLY be available on BD and 1 for HD DVD.

Exactly. Vikingsfan was using that HD-DVD funny math. ;)

Exactly. Vikingsfan was using that HD-DVD funny math. ;)

Not funny math. I put #'s 1,4,6,7,8and9
in the teenager category. If you go with BD you can get 5 (1,4,6,8,9) of those, if you get HDDVD you can get 4 (4,6,7,9).

Kids got #'s 2 and 3
BD 2 (2,3) HDVD 1 (2).

So 7 on BD, 5 on HDDVD.

I didn't but Wild Hogs in because I'm not sure that's a family/teen movie ( I didn't see it) and Ghostrider isn't staying in the top 10.

And I happily own a PS3

I think any sane people will see that there are a lot of desirable titles in the blue 'pile' that are not in the red 'pile'.

The complete lack of Disney/Pixar and the Spider-man movies I think will be painfully obvious. Let's face it - in most stores the 'piles' are co-located with the most desirable titles facing forward - you can do the comparison at a glance.

People that don't make this comparison before buying hardware are foolish...

First, I'd point out that there is currently a complete lack of Disney/Pixar (animation) and Spider-man movies on *both* formats, although that is likely to change by Q4.

Second, I'd point out that your definition of "sane" may differ from other people. Some people (like, well... me) would look at a red pile and see Casablanca, The Deer Hunter, Forbidden Planet, The Sting, The Adventures of Robin Hood, etc. and look at the blue pile and not see those titles. That makes the decision VERY easy for me... and is just as sane as the 20-something who may gravitate more towards the Disney/Spidey/Pirates pile.


But, more importantly, I'd say that you're assuming that average customers are even aware of studio exclusives. That's an entirely new scenario for video consumers, and not one that they necessarily know about.

With VHS, DVD, and even laserdisc -- every studio released on the format. Most customers are still unaware/confused that some titles go out-of-print (either because of rights issues, lack of interest, or a "disney vault" type of thing). Ask anyone who's worked in a video store -- lots of people walk in and expect every store to carry every film ever made. They really get confused if you try to explain why they can't buy Snow White for their kid or some obscure 1940s film noir that's no longer available.

THESE are the type of people that both formats need to sell to if they're to get beyond niche. And these people aren't going to be making any sort of detailed comparison between software titles. ("Honey, they have The Mummy and Meet the Fockers in Red, but Spider-man and Cars in Blue... what should we do?")

Honestly, it's in everyone's best interest if they *aren't* aware of that and just buy the machine that best meets their needs (by price or whatever). Because the vast majority of people would walk away from both formats and wait it out if they knew that there were some titles that may never be available.

Second, I'd point out that your definition of "sane" may differ from other people. Some people (like, well... me) would look at a red pile and see Casablanca, The Deer Hunter, Forbidden Planet, The Sting, The Adventures of Robin Hood, etc. and look at the blue pile and not see those titles. That makes the decision VERY easy for me... and is just as sane as the 20-something who may gravitate more towards the Disney/Spidey/Pirates pile.


Sure. I would just hope you'd admit that the titles in the "20-something" Blu-pile category will get far more sales than the Red-pile classics. We're not saying it's right (or wrong), but that's just the way that it is....

The logical next step is that in the context of a format war (if not the more narrow purpose of this thread), that's what matters, but I expect more disagreement from you on that, given your previous posting proclivities. ;)



THESE are the type of people that both formats need to sell to if they're to get beyond niche. And these people aren't going to be making any sort of detailed comparison between software titles. ("Honey, they have The Mummy and Meet the Fockers in Red, but Spider-man and Cars in Blue... what should we do?")



The best way to get out of a niche is to sell more product to more people. What most of us are saying is that the movies in Blue are going to be more numerous and more requested than the movies in Red, which means Blue is winning right now and will ultimately win the format war.


Honestly, it's in everyone's best interest if they *aren't* aware of that and just buy the machine that best meets their needs (by price or whatever). Because the vast majority of people would walk away from both formats and wait it out if they knew that there were some titles that may never be available.

The majority of people might want that... if they weren't largely ignorant of the battle at all at this stage, as you point out. We can surely understand why the executives of the CE companies flocked AWAY from the chosen path of their previous association (DVD Forum) and that why the decision makers on the Blue side are unwilling to forsake the potential of their very real advantage over the Red decision makers.

Not funny math. I put #'s 1,4,6,7,8and9
in the teenager category. If you go with BD you can get 5 (1,4,6,8,9) of those, if you get HDDVD you can get 4 (4,6,7,9).Ah. I get what you were trying to say now. You do realize that 70% of teenagers can't/couldn't even buy tickets to #4 or #7. If they saw those flicks they probably bought tickets for another movie at the multiplex and then switched theaters.

This is partly a matter of opinion.

For me, neither side has shipped very much that I want. Here is what has happened IMHO.

The studios initially had long lists of great titles. Take a look at the promos from CES 2006 and drool over what we were being promised.

Sony, for example, promised Lawrence, Kwai, Navarone. Warners promised The Music Man. Etc.

Then, when the shipments started, it didn't take long to see that titles like Forbidden Planet and Spartacus died, while Serenity and Batman Begins were big winners.

The titles we are being offered on both formats are the titles that will sell for the most part to the current demographic. Only Warners occasionally tries to subvert the paradigm with a classic, but less so than last year.

We are stuck with the current genres until the end of the format war when adoption increases.

I actually feel a bit sorry for Universal with their failed catalog blitz. At least there were a few good movies included in the mix (Lost in Translation, Meet Joe Black) that somehow slipped by the Universal execs (who clearly have better taste in film than they have sense of the market). Of course, they decided they didn't want my business. :)

You have to compliment Universal for the catalog blitz even though they know that almost noone will buy them.

In fact, I am still wondering why Universal went ahead when the other studios all blinked and mostly delayed their older catalogs. They must have known going in this was going to happen, but had to go ahead for some reason. What should be painfully obvious is that for older catalogs to sell, the installed base has to be much higher. If a catalog release sold 1000 copies, then to sell 10,000, the installed base should be 10x higher.

I will sing praises about Casablanca, and I await LoA with eager anticipation, but I suspect I'm in a very small minority. That's just the way it is.

Spartacus was a mess. The authoring/mastering was pitiful and they should not have released that disk.

How so? If it holds true to every other release, something like LOTR would sell ~50k discs on Blu-ray and 30k discs on HDDVD...I sure wouldn't say "every other release" given Planet Earth and others that are closer, but I'll try to illustrate my point. Let's say that 2 sides each have one player, but the price for side A is $499 and the price for side B is $299. Now they each release some movies. What do you think would get the biggest percentage to buy the player for A over the player for B:

If it was:
A: Spiderman 3, Pirates 3, Live Free or Die Hard
B: Knocked Up

Or:
A: Spiderman 3, Pirates 3, Live Free or Die Hard, LOTR, Transformers
B: Knocked Up, LOTR, Transformers

I would say that the first one if much more likely to favor format A as far as player sales. Just going by absolute number of releases it is 3:1 instead of 5:3, but even based on perceived quality added up for each release, the second grouping is closer relatively. Of course, that is with just a few releases to illustrate the point. Imagine the same thing with 300 releases vs 100 releases, or with 500 releases vs 300 releases (200 neutral titles), as an example (or 200 vs 100 or 400 vs 300). I think the neutral releases tend to help even things out and make it more likely for people to justify buying the less expensive player.

--Darin

In order to survice as a niche, a product must deliver something (technical or perceptual) that the mainstream does not deliver. e.g. Beta was perceived to deliver a better image than VHS.

If we're talking about 2-4 years down the road and that BD is the mainstream solution, you've have to ask what advantage that HD DVD (technical or perceptual) can deliver that BD cannot. If you can answer that, then you'd can say that HD DVD will survive or not.
By then, IMO DVD will still be the "mainstream solution." This is one of the reasons why our current battle is not a perfect mirror of the Betamax/VHS war.

Then you get into the whole multi-format players (much more difficult for the bulky, differently sized tape machines) thing and on and on. We're still in uncharted territory, IMO.

In 2008, it will be more of the same. PS3 sales will underperform & HD-DVD standalones will continue to outsell their BD counterparts. You won't see a mass interest in HDM in the US until 2009 when people realize they are in the HD world. The masses will look for the low cost solution, and that looks like HD-DVD, today. Since the numbers will still be small in 2008, why should Universal admit they were wrong to begin with? They can wait another year, at least.
:D

"So certain are you? Here you nothing that I say?"

"...looks like HD DVD today?" I thought you were talking about next year and the year after? Do you really believe HD DVD will have even a respectable price advantage by 2009?

You have to compliment Universal for the catalog blitz even though they know that almost noone will buy them.

In fact, I am still wondering why Universal went ahead when the other studios all blinked and mostly delayed their older catalogs. They must have known going in this was going to happen, but had to go ahead for some reason. What should be painfully obvious is that for older catalogs to sell, the installed base has to be much higher. If a catalog release sold 1000 copies, then to sell 10,000, the installed base should be 10x higher.

I will sing praises about Casablanca, and I await LoA with eager anticipation, but I suspect I'm in a very small minority. That's just the way it is.

Spartacus was a mess. The authoring/mastering was pitiful and they should not have released that disk.

I am guessing that they were being paid to help HD DVD and gave it their best shot. Apparently they wanted to release some of the Spielberg titles but were precluded from doing so. I am sure they would have been thrilled to be able to release recent hits like Casino Royale but they didn't have any.

First, I'd point out that there is currently a complete lack of Disney/Pixar (animation) and Spider-man movies on *both* formats, although that is likely to change by Q4.

Second, I'd point out that your definition of "sane" may differ from other people. Some people (like, well... me) would look at a red pile and see Casablanca, The Deer Hunter, Forbidden Planet, The Sting, The Adventures of Robin Hood, etc. and look at the blue pile and not see those titles. That makes the decision VERY easy for me... and is just as sane as the 20-something who may gravitate more towards the Disney/Spidey/Pirates pile.

^^^ I like this man (woman?). And I'm so glad of the six "Pirates" and "Spider-Man" movies the only one that interests me enough to double-dip in HD is "Spider-Man 2" (never seen any "Pirates" movies, "Spidey 1" is barely OK and "Spidey 3" sucked ass). I can wait until a Blu-ray deck is dirt-cheap or Sony publishes on HD-DVD before repurchasing "Spider-Man 2," whichever comes first. I can afford to wait for the PS3/Blu-ray players to drop down to current-or-lower HD-DVD levels (and the Tosh players are such great upconverters I can watch BD exclusive movies on DVD). Can Sony afford to subsidize Blu-ray forever? People forget that just because HD-DVD might go away that doesn't automatically mean every HD-DVD purchaser will become a Blu-ray customer (hello, DVD?). Some of us have long memories and don't forget so easily root kits, lies, empty promises and crappy first-gen MPEG 2 BD releases at full price. :mad:

I hope that the data we get for the week ending July 15th will include the top 5 for each format with percentages for the week along with the top 10 combined. The reason I say that is because it might give us the final, no question about it, answer to whether Amazon is included in the numbers. Basically, they are running a deal for the PS3 where people get a copy of Memento and the Bluetooth remote. That title wasn't selling much at all, so if other retailers don't include it with the PS3 and it ends up in the top 5 or 10, it will pretty much tell us that Amazon was included. BTW: That movie has been rising and is currently up to #5 in the DVD rankings on Amazon. They only have between 1200 and 1300 in stock, so if they don't get more they might run out and it might not make it into the top 10 anyway (although there aren't any new Blu-ray releases this week and so that might be enough).

--Darin

^^

Yeah, it's pretty nuts. It's beating out PE & 300 on both formats.

I see a lot of talk about blockbusters, and how back catalogue titles don't sell.

Well, yes there's a lot of truth in that. But here's a cautionary note.

Two weeks ago the VideoScan date sat at 70:30 to BD.

Then we had one new title releases, which came out on both formats, plus 11 back catalogue titles, all but one of which was HD DVD-exclusive.

So, if we count the two dual-format releases as cancelling each other out, more or less, we have 10 HD DVD titles causing a 5% swing - that's half a % per title.

That's very small indeed. But lots of little things add up to one big thing.

Back catalogue titles will not win this war. But every little helps, and that 5% shouldn't be discounted. After all, at 5% per week, we'd be at 50:50 in 3 more weeks! Now I'm not saying that'll happen, I'm just adding a tiny bit of food for thought.

Steve W

I remember when the Toshiba price cuts were announced. We saw indications that the units were "flying off the shelves" but the end result was that maybe 50k units were moved in that month... more than what was sold before but the size of the market was miniscule.

The ps3 might suddenly be "flying off the shelves" due to assorted price cuts but we'll have a better idea of their sales for the month of July in a month or so. Don't be surprised to see the 80k/month sales to come to an end, but don't expect wii-like 300k sales a month either.

pecker. great food for thought. except that you go out of the same scenario. the problem is how many catalog titles would you stack against a title like 300. where the bluray version will outscore the hd-dvd version with a incredible margin.

look at what the hd-dvd camp is trying to do. they put hot fuzz on july 31th, shaun of the dead, warner resceduled their release of blue planet to july 31th. why? to offset the sales percentage that 300 will cause for bluray. specially since the price deduction of the ps3.

I see a lot of talk about blockbusters, and how back catalogue titles don't sell.

Well, yes there's a lot of truth in that. But here's a cautionary note.

Two weeks ago the VideoScan date sat at 70:30 to BD.

Then we had one new title releases, which came out on both formats, plus 11 back catalogue titles, all but one of which was HD DVD-exclusive.

So, if we count the two dual-format releases as cancelling each other out, more or less, we have 10 HD DVD titles causing a 5% swing - that's half a % per title.

That's very small indeed. But lots of little things add up to one big thing.

Back catalogue titles will not win this war. But every little helps, and that 5% shouldn't be discounted. After all, at 5% per week, we'd be at 50:50 in 3 more weeks! Now I'm not saying that'll happen, I'm just adding a tiny bit of food for thought.

Steve WBut just one day and date title the week before swung the percentage 6% towards Blu-ray and it wasn't even a blockbuster title. Just 6 more exclusive day and date titles and we'd be at 100:0.

pecker. great food for thought. except that you go out of the same scenario. the problem is how many catalog titles would you stack against a title like 300. where the bluray version will outscore the hd-dvd version with a incredible margin.

look at what the hd-dvd camp is trying to do. they put hot fuzz on july 31th, shaun of the dead, warner resceduled their release of blue planet to july 31th. why? to offset the sales percentage that 300 will cause for bluray. specially since the price deduction of the ps3.

We’ll see. 300 will sell well on BD because it fits right into the BD demographic. Still we should consider the fact that the HD DVD version is going to be the superior version so most format neutral buyers will get that version. Then there is the fact that there are fewer “mindless romps” available on HD DVD. While BD fans have been having fun with “quality” titles such as Ghost Rider, The Marine, Crank and CR we HD DVD fans have had to make due with more tame fare like CoM and TGS. Perhaps there is a built up demand that 300 will satisfy for the HD DVD crowd.

Then there is the fact that there are fewer “mindless romps” available on HD DVD. While BD fans have been having fun with “quality” titles such as Ghost Rider, The Marine, Crank and CR we HD DVD fans have had to make due with more tame fare like CoM and TGS.

Uh huh. Which is why the top-selling 2007 Universal release is the high-brow arthouse gem that is Smokin' Aces. ;)

Uh huh. Which is why the top-selling 2007 Universal release is the high-brow arthouse gem that is Smokin' Aces. ;)

'Vienna' by Ultravox was kept off the number one spot by Joe Dolce's 'Shaddup Ya Face'. Sales, in this respect at least, mean nothing.

BD fans can bleat on about how well 'Ghost Rider' has done all they want, but whilst 'Casablanca' and 'Deer Hunter' are HD DVD-only, then Blu-ray is the vastly inferior format, and I don't care how many thousands 'X:Men:3' has sold.

If HD DVD ends up dying, then the only people who can be happy are those who prefer 'POTC' over 'Spartacus'.

Steve W

So do you really think Disney will not release these movies at some point in the future?
No, I think they will release ONE Of them 10-12 months from now, as they've announced. If it sells well, more may follow. But a year is still a long time in this market.

'Vienna' by Ultravox was kept off the number one spot by Joe Dolce's 'Shaddup Ya Face'. Sales, in this respect at least, mean nothing.

BD fans can bleat on about how well 'Ghost Rider' has done all they want, but whilst 'Casablanca' and 'Deer Hunter' are HD DVD-only, then Blu-ray is the vastly inferior format, and I don't care how many thousands 'X:Men:3' has sold.

If HD DVD ends up dying, then the only people who can be happy are those who prefer 'POTC' over 'Spartacus'.

Steve W

My point is that action movies (aka 'mindless romps') tend to be move large numbers, be it on DVD, HD DVD or Blu-ray.

Uh huh. Which is why the top-selling 2007 Universal release is the high-brow arthouse gem that is Smokin' Aces. ;)

Ah you must have access to some HD DVD sales numbers then. Very good post up the linkage.

I’ll be the first to admit that Smokin’ Aces is a cheap Pulp Fiction rip-off, which is why I have Lucky Number Slevin in my collection instead. I’m not here to bag on anyone’s tastes, but the BD library is definitely less balanced and more testosterone laden than the HD DVD library. Cinema has existed for nearly a century now, but by looking at the BD catalog one would think that film was invented about a decade ago. There a VERY few films in the BD library that were made prior to the mid-nineties. Not a big deal right now when the majority of the installed BD base consists of people with PS3s hooked up to an SDTV, but it could be a factor in the future.

warner resceduled their release of blue planet to july 31th. why? to offset the sales percentage that 300 will cause for bluray. specially since the price deduction of the ps3.

What?? By all accounts Blue Planet should sell similarly on both formats and is unlikely to sway the percentages much in either direction. If anything, its likely going to sell better on blu-ray.

I know that Amazon sales charts are a bit wacky, but if you compare National Geographic: Relentless Enemies on both formats, the BD version is consistently outselling the HD DVD version. Although Planet Earth may be selling better on HD DVD, I think by looking at Relentless Enemies we can see that there's a healthy audience for documentaries on blu-ray as well.

Where do these conspiracy theories originate...

Second, I'd point out that your definition of "sane" may differ from other people. Some people (like, well... me) would look at a red pile and see Casablanca, The Deer Hunter, Forbidden Planet, The Sting, The Adventures of Robin Hood, etc. and look at the blue pile and not see those titles. That makes the decision VERY easy for me... and is just as sane as the 20-something who may gravitate more towards the Disney/Spidey/Pirates pile.



No offense, but this post shows your age and how extremely out of touch you are with the reality of HD movie sales. Forbidden planet sold less then 5k copies total, and thats with over 300k HD-DVD players in the US + not counting worldwide exports. That is horrible. If HD-DVD fans are truly movie aficionados, why isnt Forbidden Planet selling 50-100k copies? Easy answer is, most HD-DVD owners jumped in because it was cheap, not because it was the format they wanted to win. There were a few die hard movie lovers like yourself in the mix, but you are the extreme minority. All those titles you listed sold horribly, and they are "the big titles" as you so call it. And considering those movies ARE NOT on blu-ray and hd-dvd is still being outsold by a silly margin, what then? What does that tell you?

Of all the times ive been in the isles for HD movies at frys, best buy, circuit city, etc, ive ONLY seen one older guy buying movies (he had flags of our fathers/letters from iwo jima blu-rays in his hand) the entire time ive been buying blu-ray flicks. The rest are mid 30s, 20s and teens. That IS the MAJOR demographic buying HD movies. You guys account for a small, tiny piece of the pie which has **0** bearing on the outcome of this format war. I know you like to think you do, but the results speak for themselves. The movies you THINK are important, are not. What is important is BIG blockbusters which are Day/Date. What is important is family movies, such as disney movies. HD-DVD has nothing left to come back swinging except dropping prices more and more. Universal will NOT release the big speilberg titles on hd-dvd. Speilberg would never allow it with such pathetic sales #s (look to: Matrix) and how easily hacked hd-dvd is. How many more price drops will hd-dvd see this year? Regardless of price, if you cant get the movies you want (think major demographic here), then it could be given away free, and no one would want it.

In other words, look at the facts in front of you (Neilson Sales #s which are used by the studios themselves) and conclude what you want.

I think a lot of this would be better suited for the Format Battle thread http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=850822

Again, my predictions for this week are 68/32

The releases last week were...

Blu-ray
Flatliners (Sony)
The Patriot (Extended Cut) (Sony)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

HD DVD
Blood Diamond (Warner)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

No offense, but this post shows your age and how extremely out of touch you are with the reality of HD movie sales. Forbidden planet sold less then 5k copies total, and thats with over 300k HD-DVD players in the US + not counting worldwide exports. That is horrible. If HD-DVD fans are truly movie aficionados, why isnt Forbidden Planet selling 50-100k copies? Easy answer is, most HD-DVD owners jumped in because it was cheap, not because it was the format they wanted to win. There were a few die hard movie lovers like yourself in the mix, but you are the extreme minority. All those titles you listed sold horribly, and they are "the big titles" as you so call it. And considering those movies ARE NOT on blu-ray and hd-dvd is still being outsold by a silly margin, what then? What does that tell you?

Of all the times ive been in the isles for HD movies at frys, best buy, circuit city, etc, ive ONLY seen one older guy buying movies (he had flags of our fathers/letters from iwo jima blu-rays in his hand) the entire time ive been buying blu-ray flicks. The rest are mid 30s, 20s and teens. That IS the MAJOR demographic buying HD movies. You guys account for a small, tiny piece of the pie which has **0** bearing on the outcome of this format war. I know you like to think you do, but the results speak for themselves. The movies you THINK are important, are not. What is important is BIG blockbusters which are Day/Date. What is important is family movies, such as disney movies. HD-DVD has nothing left to come back swinging except dropping prices more and more. Universal will NOT release the big speilberg titles on hd-dvd. Speilberg would never allow it with such pathetic sales #s (look to: Matrix) and how easily hacked hd-dvd is. How many more price drops will hd-dvd see this year? Regardless of price, if you cant get the movies you want (think major demographic here), then it could be given away free, and no one would want it.

In other words, look at the facts in front of you (Neilson Sales #s which are used by the studios themselves) and conclude what you want.

Not all "older guys" are interested in "older" movies. I think I fall in the "older guy" category and I have zero interest in Casablanca or similar vintage titles. Nevertheless, I have managed to find probably 80 BD titles that I cared enough to buy. (Not to mention about 40 HD DVD titles before I decided to stop.)

No offense, but this post shows your age and how extremely out of touch you are with the reality of HD movie sales. Forbidden planet sold less then 5k copies total...

As long as a title will sell more than c.1,000 copies a year, it'll be profit making, and worth the studio releasing.

Steve W

Not a big deal right now when the majority of the installed BD base consists of people with PS3s hooked up to an SDTV, but it could be a factor in the future.

Link? How do you know this? Not being a wise guy but would very much like to read this info.

As long as a title will sell more than c.1,000 copies a year, it'll be profit making, and worth the studio releasing.

Steve W
That number sounds a little low to me, where did you get this info?

I go for 62/38.

Blood Diamond should have done well, with all its bells and whistles. And Ghost Rider / Terabithia BD sales will be waning.

That number sounds a little low to me, where did you get this info?

He pulled it out of a certain body part. The studios need to sell 50k+ copies to see a profit.

The releases last week were...

Blu-ray
Flatliners (Sony)
The Patriot (Extended Cut) (Sony)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

HD DVD
Blood Diamond (Warner)
The Untouchables (Paramount)
The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut (Paramount)

I'll take 67:33 in favor of BR.


BTW, I bought The Untouchables on BR last week and I was very happily surprised at the PQ of this title given its age... Nice work guys! :)

fist of south.

the only way 300 on hd-dvd will outsell 300 on bluray is if warner only made 20.000 copies on bluray and around 50.000 copies for hd-dvd. besides people who bought the hd-dvd player arent intrested in games. so i dont think the game included in 300, would do much good. because a lot of people on this forum are saying, that people who bought the ps3 only, buy it for games only, so why would warner have included a game on the hd-dvd version???? is it maybe those people are talking out of their.............. :)

philnerd. i agree . blue planet wasn't a good 1 to prove my point. it had more to do i was disappointed i had to wait another 2 weeks to get it. i want to watch it bad! and the only reason for it warner delays it, is to make a bigger high definition sales day. still the delay of shaun of the dead and hott fuzz to 31th of july i am correct in though.

"...looks like HD DVD today?" I thought you were talking about next year and the year after? Do you really believe HD DVD will have even a respectable price advantage by 2009?
BD is positioning itself as a high-end CE product. Even the stripped down players can't be too cheap or they make the additional features too marginally expensive. Whereas HD throws all features into all models, and there is a price continuum.

Ah you must have access to some HD DVD sales numbers then. Very good post up the linkage.

I’ll be the first to admit that Smokin’ Aces is a cheap Pulp Fiction rip-off, which is why I have Lucky Number Slevin in my collection instead. I’m not here to bag on anyone’s tastes, but the BD library is definitely less balanced and more testosterone laden than the HD DVD library. Cinema has existed for nearly a century now, but by looking at the BD catalog one would think that film was invented about a decade ago. There a VERY few films in the BD library that were made prior to the mid-nineties. Not a big deal right now when the majority of the installed BD base consists of people with PS3s hooked up to an SDTV, but it could be a factor in the future.
Grubert posted these a while ago :
http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom061707/index.php?startpage=53

Smokin Aces sold 17,200 through may 27 2007. This makes it Universal's best selling HDM title in 2007. There was also an earlier comprehensive set of numbers in mar-april that showed that classics like casablanca something like 1000-2000 copies, which would be enough to make people in those studios think long and hard about subsequent catalogs. (It looks like it did). Until more players are available, the older catalogs may be very expensive for the studios, they will likely continue to test the waters, but they likely will do it gradually (imo).

He pulled it out of a certain body part. The studios need to sell 50k+ copies to see a profit.

With studios getting say 10 bucks (for a catalogue) above physical manufacturing of the disk that would mean they needed 500.000 to pay for authoring and encoding etc. HiDef masters are already or will have to be made anyway for TV broadcasts.

You really think it costs 500.000+ to produce a catalogue title? I'ld say it's closer to a tenth of that.

No offense, but this post shows your age and how extremely out of touch you are with the reality of HD movie sales.

None taken. But I'd point out that what you quoted had nothing to do with "HD movie sales". I was responding specifically and exclusively to the comment than any sane person would look at the format with Pixar and Spidey and buy that.

The fact is that there are many sane people who actually like movies that are older than 10 years old and weren't made for 10 year olds.


Again, nothing to do with sales -- I'm fully aware that Spiderman 3 (or, hell, Little Man) will move many more copies than Forbidden Planet. But that doesn't make it insane to prefer the latter as a movie buff... and use that as a decision to gravitate towards the format that offers it.


they are "the big titles" as you so call it.

I did no such thing. I know these titles didn't sell well and never indicated that they did. Please don't put words in my mouth.

The rest are mid 30s, 20s and teens. That IS the MAJOR demographic buying HD movies. You guys account for a small, tiny piece of the pie which has **0** bearing on the outcome of this format war.

It's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophesy, no? If the vast majority of titles are crappy, recent flicks (Stealth, Van Helsing, Doom, Little Man, Eragon, and on and on), the only demographic that would be interested in buying is 12-32 (or whatever).

As the overall title catalog gets more well-rounded (on both formats), *then* people who wouldn't even consider watching Talladega Nights suddenly get interested.

I'm not saying this will happen tomorrow, but it certainly may happen. (And it's going to have to happen at some point... HD media will stay niche if it caters soley to the PS3 crowd.)

A lot of people seem to be pretending that this format war ends during Q4 or Q1 08. But it won't be over that quickly. Right now, even if sales are 65/35 in BD's favor, there are a lot of people who geniuinely think that HD DVDs overall catalog (currently released) is more appealing. Whether that has an eventual impact on sales or not is yet to be seen. Universal obviously thinks it will, or they wouldn't have so many titles on the schedule that lack explosions.

Not all "older guys" are interested in "older" movies. I think I fall in the "older guy" category and I have zero interest in Casablanca or similar vintage titles. Nevertheless, I have managed to find probably 80 BD titles that I cared enough to buy. (Not to mention about 40 HD DVD titles before I decided to stop.)

I suspect I fit in the same (or similar) demographic as you, and though I would love to have access to Casablanca and Forbidden Planet, I make due with titles such as The Searchers.

Being an Art Fag, most of the film source that I am interested in, is unlikely to make it to *any* HD medium anytime soon, if ever. I'd much prefer to own the films of Chris Marker, Michael Snow or Hollis Frampton over *anything* that has been produced by Jackson, Spielberg or Lucas.

Having been on AVS for a number of years there are a number of us who do choose simply because we believe it *is* about the technology, not simply the movies, right or wrong.

ted

I'd like to suggest a new topic for discussion: 'neutral' releases.

It has been argued that the sales of exclusive titles don't tell us much about the format war, and that we should look at the relative sales of titles that get released on both formats. So I decided to have a look at the sales of new releases that get released simultaneously on both formats.

Initially, I only used the relative sales numbers for the top 10 published in Home Media Magazine. But to supplement that, I have used alternate sources, as described below.


Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures

I'd like to suggest a new topic for discussion: 'neutral' releases.

It has been argued that the sales of exclusive titles don't tell us much about the format war, and that we should look at the relative sales of titles that get released on both formats. So I decided to have a look at the sales of new releases that get released simultaneously on both formats.

Initially, I only used the relative sales numbers for the top 10 published in Home Media Magazine. But to supplement that, I have used alternate sources, as described below.


Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures
Great stuff Grubert!

I would think that these numbers are the numbers that most interest a studio in determining the strength of either format. One would also want to look at trends in hardware sales, I suppose.

I would guess that as long as either format holds at least a 33% share of simultaneous releases that it is still considered viable. What do you think?

I'd like to suggest a new topic for discussion: 'neutral' releases.

It has been argued that the sales of exclusive titles don't tell us much about the format war, and that we should look at the relative sales of titles that get released on both formats. So I decided to have a look at the sales of new releases that get released simultaneously on both formats.

Initially, I only used the relative sales numbers for the top 10 published in Home Media Magazine. But to supplement that, I have used alternate sources, as described below.


Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures

Great job!!!
But why do more HD-DVD people like the Ant Bully, and more BR people like Norbit?

Great stuff Grubert!

I would think that these numbers are the numbers that most interest a studio in determining the strength of either format. One would also want to look at trends in hardware sales, I suppose.

I would guess that as long as either format holds at least a 33% share of simultaneous releases that it is still considered viable. What do you think?

Not that you asked but we need one format for consumer confidence and greater adoption.

When you can get all the HD movies on one player (preferably the PS3 ;)) adoption will dramatically increase.

Not that you asked but we need one format for consumer confidence and greater adoption.

When you can get all the HD movies on one player (preferably the PS3 ;)) adoption will dramatically increase.

How could any rational person honestly disagree with this?

Grubert posted these a while ago :
http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom061707/index.php?startpage=53

Smokin Aces sold 17,200 through may 27 2007. This makes it Universal's best selling HDM title in 2007. There was also an earlier comprehensive set of numbers in mar-april that showed that classics like casablanca something like 1000-2000 copies, which would be enough to make people in those studios think long and hard about subsequent catalogs. (It looks like it did). Until more players are available, the older catalogs may be very expensive for the studios, they will likely continue to test the waters, but they likely will do it gradually (imo).
Somewhere, someone asked these questions here, but are these HMM NV numbers projected totals from POS, and where does HMR get their numbers from?

I suspect I fit in the same (or similar) demographic as you, and though I would love to have access to Casablanca and Forbidden Planet, I make due with titles such as The Searchers.

Being an Art Fag, most of the film source that I am interested in, is unlikely to make it to *any* HD medium anytime soon, if ever. I'd much prefer to own the films of Chris Marker, Michael Snow or Hollis Frampton over *anything* that has been produced by Jackson, Spielberg or Lucas.

Having been on AVS for a number of years there are a number of us who do choose simply because we believe it *is* about the technology, not simply the movies, right or wrong.

ted

I confess that I am not familiar with the names you mention. But I would certainly like to be able to get contemporary independent films in HD.

I can force myself to watch SD for titles that are not available in HD, but HD would be so much more enjoyable.

And it is also true that many of the titles that I've bought in HD I would never have bothered with in SD.

That number sounds a little low to me, where did you get this info?

I used to work in a record shop (sold CDs/DVDs).

I talked to a rep about why some things got deleted and others didn't. At the time it was about 1,000 DVDs/CDs.

I know it's now come down to runs of 500 for CD.

The person saying you need to sell 50,000 is joking.

Look at releases like this from Anchor Bay UK:

http://www.anchorbay.co.uk/perl/search.pl?CO=ABNWD01

If you think that sold anything like 50,000 (or even over 5,000) you need your bumps feeling.

Steve W

I used to work in a record shop (sold CDs/DVDs).

I talked to a rep about why some things got deleted and others didn't. At the time it was about 1,000 DVDs/CDs.

I know it's now come down to runs of 500 for CD.

The person saying you need to sell 50,000 is joking.

Look at releases like this from Anchor Bay UK:

http://www.anchorbay.co.uk/perl/search.pl?CO=ABNWD01

If you think that sold anything like 50,000 (or even over 5,000) you need your bumps feeling.

Steve W

I am not claiming any personal knowledge or any thought that it needs to be 50,000. But we aren't talking about 'pressings' we are talking about going through the mastering or remastering process on a title and producing the release, not just how many of each release are pressed or produced.

So I would think it would be higher unless the mastering was already done, which in many cases it could have been for an HDTV broadcast.

But I would certainly like to be able to get contemporary independent films in HD.

I assume you saw this news last week?
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=869376

It's gonna be interesting...

I'd like to suggest a new topic for discussion: 'neutral' releases.

It has been argued that the sales of exclusive titles don't tell us much about the format war, and that we should look at the relative sales of titles that get released on both formats. So I decided to have a look at the sales of new releases that get released simultaneously on both formats.

Initially, I only used the relative sales numbers for the top 10 published in Home Media Magazine. But to supplement that, I have used alternate sources, as described below.


Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures

As always Grubert stands for Truth, Relevance and Clarity :)

If you needed to sell many more than 1,000 of each title, the vast majority of UK high def releases would be losing money, and lots of it.

If they were prepared to lose that much money, they'd probably have gone the whole hog and sold them at the same price as an SD DVD.

The sales requirements for high def discs might be marginally higher than for SD DVD, but not a lot - I would imagine it'd be way below 2,000.

This forum can be hilarious. For someone to say that I'm talking out of my backside, and the next to say that the studios lose money on every title that sells less than 50,000 copies, is beyond comprehension.

Steve W

The fact is that there are many sane people who actually like movies that are older than 10 years old and weren't made for 10 year olds.

Again, nothing to do with sales -- I'm fully aware that Spiderman 3 (or, hell, Little Man) will move many more copies than Forbidden Planet. But that doesn't make it insane to prefer the latter as a movie buff... and use that as a decision to gravitate towards the format that offers it.

It's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophesy, no? If the vast majority of titles are crappy, recent flicks (Stealth, Van Helsing, Doom, Little Man, Eragon, and on and on), the only demographic that would be interested in buying is 12-32 (or whatever).

As the overall title catalog gets more well-rounded (on both formats), *then* people who wouldn't even consider watching Talladega Nights suddenly get interested.

I'm not saying this will happen tomorrow, but it certainly may happen. (And it's going to have to happen at some point... HD media will stay niche if it caters soley to the PS3 crowd.)

A lot of people seem to be pretending that this format war ends during Q4 or Q1 08. But it won't be over that quickly. Right now, even if sales are 65/35 in BD's favor, there are a lot of people who geniuinely think that HD DVDs overall catalog (currently released) is more appealing. Whether that has an eventual impact on sales or not is yet to be seen. Universal obviously thinks it will, or they wouldn't have so many titles on the schedule that lack explosions.

Im with you man..... I KNEW there had to be others like me that would rather gouge my eyes out with a fork than watch the latest Nicholas Cage or Johnny Depp CRAP.

The beauty of the format battle is that HD movie formats are generally for "higher-end" consumers....not all, but a good number of them. So, in turn I suspect that many of the HD disc consumers will be interested in quality films with some long term redeeming value & re-watchability, not just the pointless, mindless drivel that the theater-goers like to see. In summary: Most of the people that will enjoy POTC or Spiderman are very likely going to buy the SD version of the disc because they could care less about HD optical media. Sure, a few converts will emerge but it will not make as big of an impact as the BD posse expects.

IMO, HD DVD has more "mature" titles than BD does. So do many of the other HD DVD supporters, hence the format is still hanging around. Actually, there are only like 2-3 movies on BD that I would even consider buying right now and I imported one of them so go figure. The rest of BDs offerings are just the over the top, CGI fests that lower your IQ as you watch them. No thanks.

So, if BD wants to "win" decisively, they had better start catering more to the real video enthusiasts and stop worrying about what pimply face college kids are watching.

Oh well..... :rolleyes:

Im with you man..... I KNEW there had to be others like me that would rather gouge my eyes out with a fork than watch the latest Nicholas Cage or Johnny Depp CRAP.

The beauty of the format battle is that HD movie formats are generally for "higher-end" consumers....not all, but a good number of them. So, in turn I suspect that many of the HD disc consumers will be interested in quality films with some long term redeeming value & re-watchability, not just the pointless, mindless drivel that the theater-goers like to see. In summary: Most of the people that will enjoy POTC or Spiderman are very likely going to buy the SD version of the disc because they could care less about HD optical media. Sure, a few converts will emerge but it will not make as big of an impact as the BD posse expects.

IMO, HD DVD has more "mature" titles than BD does. So do many of the other HD DVD supporters, hence the format is still hanging around. Actually, there are only like 2-3 movies on BD that I would even consider buying right now and I imported one of them so go figure. The rest of BDs offerings are just the over the top, CGI fests that lower your IQ as you watch them. No thanks.

So, if BD wants to "win" decisively, they had better start catering more to the real video enthusiasts and stop worrying about what pimply face college kids are watching.

Oh well..... :rolleyes:

I think its been clear from the start that the two formats have different target audiences. I'm generally not a big fan of most current releases, especially Blockbusters. While there are exceptions, such as Blood Diamond, Syriana, Children of Men etc., The vast majority of my purchases is older catalog titles, or just lesser known or imported titles. This goes for both formats, as well as DVDs.
To each his own.
J

The beauty of the format battle is that HD movie formats are generally for "higher-end" consumers....not all, but a good number of them. So, in turn I suspect that many of the HD disc consumers will be interested in quality films with some long term redeeming value & re-watchability, not just the pointless, mindless drivel that the theater-goers like to see. In summary: Most of the people that will enjoy POTC or Spiderman are very likely going to buy the SD version of the disc because they could care less about HD optical media. Sure, a few converts will emerge but it will not make as big of an impact as the BD posse expects.


Spare us your elitest BS...who determines if a movie has redeeming value and is re-watchable??? You???

If you don't care for a movie fine, but who made you judge and jury to put labels on others who don't have the same taste as you???

Money determines what makes a movie a success, not whether or not you think it is redeeming...

last time i checked, Ghost Rider, Spiderman and Pirates all did well at the box office...how well are your redeeming movies movies doing??

BD is positioning itself as a high-end CE product. Even the stripped down players can't be too cheap or they make the additional features too marginally expensive. Whereas HD throws all features into all models, and there is a price continuum.

"All models?" :D There have been a handful of models from a single manufacturer. The only other production model we've seen in LG's dual format, and we all know how well that turned out. The 360 add-on isn't a player and doesn't have all features anyways.

Im with you man..... I KNEW there had to be others like me that would rather gouge my eyes out with a fork than watch the latest Nicholas Cage or Johnny Depp CRAP.


I'm happy the people like you are irrelevent... as far as the sales numbers are concerned anyways. I certainly appreciate your help in niche markets for whimsical products that entertain me, but I'm definitely glad noone makes decisions on your habits.

Spare us your elitest BS...who determines if a movie has redeeming value and is re-watchable??? You???

If you don't care for a movie fine, but who made you judge and jury to put labels on others who don't have the same taste as you???

Money determines what makes a movie a success, not whether or not you think it is redeeming...

last time i checked, Ghost Rider, Spiderman and Pirates all did well at the box office...how well are your redeeming movies movies doing??

People ALWAYS get this topic confused. The $$$ a movie makes, makes it a success on the $$ front yes, but is it a GOOD MOVIE? Does it receive accolades and critical acclaim,etc. etc.?

What do these have in common?

Shawshank Redemption
Dances with Wolves
The Color Purple
Sideways
Last King of Scotland

What do these have in Common?
Ghost Rider
POTC
Transformers
Spiderman3

Now dont get me wrong, I enjoy ALL of those movies listed. But what does the last list have in common with the first? Nothing, its check your brain at the door movies,versus artsy, human interest stories. Old farts tend to like the first list, and the gamer kiddies(teen pre teens, young adults) love the second list.

There is room for everyone, as long as you know what you are expecting.

Spare us your elitest BS...who determines if a movie has redeeming value and is re-watchable??? You???

If you don't care for a movie fine, but who made you judge and jury to put labels on others who don't have the same taste as you???

Money determines what makes a movie a success, not whether or not you think it is redeeming...

last time i checked, Ghost Rider, Spiderman and Pirates all did well at the box office...how well are your redeeming movies movies doing??

Uhhhh huh huh....settle down Beavis.

There isnt anything elitist about anything I said. There are quite a few people that find the above films you mention pointless. Hey, I was agreeing with another poster that made the point that not all of us are enamored with Ghost Rider. Go ahead, watch it 50 times in a row. Its your time my man.

Now, I cant chat anymore, I'm cueing up the thought-provoking UltraViolet right now.... :D

I'm happy the people like you are irrelevent... as far as the sales numbers are concerned anyways. I certainly appreciate your help in niche markets for whimsical products that entertain me, but I'm definitely glad noone makes decisions on your habits.

Awe man.... am I irrelevant? Oh well, like I told the other guy, I cant chat anymore because I'm about to watch Tobey MacGuire fling around on buildings for two hours.....catch ya later brutha! :)

People ALWAYS get this topic confused. The $$$ a movie makes, makes it a success on the $$ front yes, but is it a GOOD MOVIE? Does it receive accolades and critical acclaim,etc. etc.?

What do these have in common?

Shawshank Redemption
Dances with Wolves
The Color Purple
Sideways
Last King of Scotland

What do these have in Common?
Ghost Rider
POTC
Transformers
Spiderman3

Now dont get me wrong, I enjoy ALL of those movies listed. But what does the last list have in common with the first? Nothing, its check your brain at the door movies,versus artsy, human interest stories. Old farts tend to like the first list, and the gamer kiddies(teen pre teens, young adults) love the second list.

There is room for everyone, as long as you know what you are expecting.

you helped me prove my point...you don't have to look down on others like the other poster did. People will always have varying tastes, but to take the tone he did in his post makes me want to puke my guts out. He probably has a jar of Grey Poupon in his Rolls...

Uhhhh huh huh....settle down Beavis.

There isnt anything elitist about anything I said. There are quite a few people that find the above films you mention pointless. Hey, I was agreeing with another poster that made the point that not all of us are enamored with Ghost Rider. Go ahead, watch it 50 times in a row. Its your time my man.

Now, I cant chat anymore, I'm cueing up the thought-provoking UltraViolet right now.... :D

you guys are comedy gold. Its only good if you like it. Do you have dentures and wear a diaper too? Give me a break. Everyone has different tastes in movies, i know people like myself who wouldnt give Casablanca or Forbidden Planet the time of day and would love to have all 3 spideys, pirates 1-3, Ratatouille, etc etc. The MAJORITY of the movie buying public is the same. You are a extreme minority and will always be. No wonder you are with hd-dvd.

People ALWAYS get this topic confused. The $$$ a movie makes, makes it a success on the $$ front yes, but is it a GOOD MOVIE? Does it receive accolades and critical acclaim,etc. etc.?

What do these have in common?

Shawshank Redemption
Dances with Wolves
The Color Purple
Sideways
Last King of Scotland

What do these have in Common?
Ghost Rider
POTC
Transformers
Spiderman3

Now dont get me wrong, I enjoy ALL of those movies listed. But what does the last list have in common with the first? Nothing, its check your brain at the door movies,versus artsy, human interest stories. Old farts tend to like the first list, and the gamer kiddies(teen pre teens, young adults) love the second list.

There is room for everyone, as long as you know what you are expecting.

100% correct. Guess Im getting old....geesh, at 36 years too. Anyways, yeah, I just dont get anything out of the check your brain at the door movies, at least most of them. Sure, I have some of them in my collection and do enjoy them... but for the most part I'll skip them.

Keep in mind though that having action in a movie or some CGI doesnt make it check your brain at the door.

Yes, there is room for everyone..... :)

you helped me prove my point...you don't have to look down on others like the other poster did. People will always have varying tastes, but to take the tone he did in his post makes me want to puke my guts out. He probably has a jar of Grey Poupon in his Rolls...

Yuk..... Frenchs mustard in my Ford pickemup works great for me.

:)

This is a fallacious debate.

As of March 18:

- Mutiny on the Bounty had sold 643 copies on HD DVD.

- None of the pre-1970 HD DVD titles had sold 3,000 copies.

You seem to think it is up to the retailers to do this. Are you expecting that the prices that they get charged will come down, or that they will reduce their margins?Yes

The retailers and thet studios, but it the retailers that are trying at least now to sustain the high margins.

I believe that the retailers are already starting to increase their HD stockages and will soon reduce the prices and that HD prices will fall in the 4th quarter.

Combo pricing and single HD DVD and Blu-ray prices for catalog titles will drop to under $24.99 and under $19.99 in most cases for catalog titles, even new releases.

New movie day and date HD releases will be within $5 of SD DVD.

After Black Friday, for HD DVD at least, the price premium will fall to about $5 over DVD.

you guys are comedy gold. Its only good if you like it. Do you have dentures and wear a diaper too? Give me a break. Everyone has different tastes in movies, i know people like myself who wouldnt give Casablanca or Forbidden Planet the time of day and would love to have all 3 spideys, pirates 1-3, Ratatouille, etc etc. The MAJORITY of the movie buying public is the same. You are a extreme minority and will always be. No wonder you are with hd-dvd.

No, but I have false teeth with braces and crap in toilets whenever avaialble. Casablanca? Couldnt care less. Forbidden what? Who?

Who said anything about HD DVD? Man oh man.... me thinks we have an irate BD supporter here. Dont get all mad, BD is clearly winning and its just a matter of time before they crush the little annoying HD DVD format..right?

:)

It's called subliminal messaging. :D

But you got to wonder, though... You should think Universal and Weinstein soon would reconsider their exclusive HD DVD support. What are they gaining from staying HD DVD exclusive? Unless they're sponsored by Toshiba/Microsoft, it seems they're only losing out on Blu-ray revenue. (I would have loved to buy Heroes on Blu-ray. I can't. What did I do with the episodes I missed on TV? Downloaded them in 720P... As I said, if available, I would gladly have bought it on Blu-ray.)

Now, to pre-empt the inevitable, you can't flip the argument around and say "Why don't the Blu-ray exclusives support HD DVD? They're just losing revenue." Player base is smaller, software sales are smaller, they know they're winning, why prolong the war etc. YMMV slightly...

I wouldn't be surprised if Disney went HD DVD, but I think it is even more probable that Universal go Blu-ray. For them as a studio, with no IP revenue from hardware or codecs, it simply does not make sense not to start publishing for the larger platform out there. Of course, they know (as do Toshiba and Microsoft) that if they go neutral, it is essentially Game Over for HD DVD. It doesn't take a rocket scientist then to figure out why they stay exclusive if they d :rolleyes: o.... Same answer on both sides.

Low volumes now don't mean much.

All studios can sell to the other side their catalog titles in the future and gain the same or more revenue (with larger installed bases).

Its only the hot new movie releases that lose some revenue now, and those numbers are still insignificant to the studios.

No reason for anyone to change now.

This is a fallacious debate.

As of March 18:

- Mutiny on the Bounty had sold 643 copies on HD DVD.

- None of the pre-1970 HD DVD titles had sold 3,000 copies.

Your missing my point. I never said catalog stuff sold like crazy, I am saying high sales does not mean it was a fantastic award winning movie.

Not that you asked but we need one format for consumer confidence and greater adoption.

When you can get all the HD movies on one player (preferably the PS3 ;)) adoption will dramatically increase.

I'm cool with that. When the BDA gets a feature final player out on the market at a consumer friendly price make sure to ring up the HD DVD crowd that is currently giving the BD folks a run for their money with the format neutral titles.

Your missing my point. I never said catalog stuff sold like crazy, I am saying high sales does not mean it was a fantastic award winning movie.

It sure does help sometimes. There is a lot of crap movies that dont make money for a reason. Stuff like Babel. That was such a miserable waste of my life. I dont know how someone could read that script and say ,"OK, Im miserable and depressed so that sounds like a good movie.

It sure does help sometimes. There is a lot of crap movies that dont make money for a reason. Stuff like Babel. That was such a miserable waste of my life. I dont know how someone could read that script and say ,"OK, Im miserable and depressed so that sounds like a good movie.

Oh crap, I blind bought that, havent seen it. Uh Oh LOL

Awe man.... am I irrelevant? Oh well, like I told the other guy, I cant chat anymore because I'm about to watch Tobey MacGuire fling around on buildings for two hours.....catch ya later brutha! :)

Well I was very specific to qualify that wrt sales. :)

Oh crap, I blind bought that, havent seen it. Uh Oh LOL

Sorry, you can form your own opinion if you want but it was such a miserable movie with nothing happy that was just slow and depressing. My copy was put on ebay about half way through the movie.

As long as a title will sell more than c.1,000 copies a year, it'll be profit making, and worth the studio releasing.

Steve W I've been told by multiple reliable sources that 5000 copies sold for a most HD DVD titles is breakeven and 10000 copies sold makes money for almost every catalog release.

If you take even 1000 copies sold and multiply by a 3-5 years years to an increasing base of new owners, that can add up.

Blu-ray's breakeven costs for a release currently are a bit higher due to the current error failure rate and BD50 cost, but 10,000 - 15,000 copies sold for Blu-ray discs should be break even, even at low volume production rates now.

From a studio standpoint, the money on production is really quite small and is probably considered an investment cost at this time.

Its probably more a marketing or production capacity and mastering scheduling time consideration for HD DVD and Blu-ray releases than a money issue at this point.

SOftware sales ( and movie sales) are heavily wieghted toward startup of production and the physical cost of production and professional time cost of mastering are basically fixed and are small compared to the MSRP of finished product.

And these titles can contimue to sell over time if the installed base is growing, on either side.

Your missing my point. I never said catalog stuff sold like crazy, I am saying high sales does not mean it was a fantastic award winning movie.

I think his point is that the pointy headed ivory tower "award-winning" movies are, at best, dismal failures from an HDDVD sales perspective. I'm sure they would have all sold much better on Blu-ray. :)

He pulled it out of a certain body part. The studios need to sell 50k+ copies to see a profit. Not for a title that has no marketing campaign.

You are absolutely wrong here.

Oh crap, I blind bought that, havent seen it. Uh Oh LOL
Sell it while it's still unopened and worth close to what you paid for it... you'll be happier. This movie was the biggest waste of 2+ hours I've seen so far this year.

With studios getting say 10 bucks (for a catalogue) above physical manufacturing of the disk that would mean they needed 500.000 to pay for authoring and encoding etc. HiDef masters are already or will have to be made anyway for TV broadcasts.

You really think it costs 500.000+ to produce a catalogue title? I'ld say it's closer to a tenth of that. This is much more accurate. But for a title that is a VC-1 or AVC port of a SD DVD title. its even less than that. Its only a bit more even if the audio is completely remastered like SONY is doing for a lot of its new releases.

I think his point is that the pointy headed ivory tower "award-winning" movies are, at best, dismal failures from an HDDVD sales perspective. I'm sure they would have all sold much better on Blu-ray. :)

No, they probably wouldnt have sold better on BD. Many of the BD users have PS3s. Id bet good money that the kids playing the latest "shoot innocent people with various machine guns" game arent rushing out to buy catalog titles of older "ivory tower" movies.

Of course, this is just a hunch and I have no link to prove it. :D

Yes, you hated it, we get it, now please let it go.

Jeeeezus.

Not everyone has the same taste in movies. I liked "A Scanner Darkly" and a friend of mine who is a giant sci-fi nerd hated it.

Just because you hated it doesn't mean everyone else will too (for the record, I haven't seen it and don't have any real interest in seeing it since it's not my cup of tea guvnah).

The tomatometer score for Babel was 68%, lets compare that to;

Ghost Rider (28%)
Spider Man 3 (61%)
300 (61%)

So ya, not everyone has the same tastes in movies that you do. Hell my wife likes to watch stuff like Fried Green Tomatoes that makes we want to go commit acts of violence but she LIKES THAT ****. Deal with it.

Why are you so mad at someone sharing there opinion?

BD is positioning itself as a high-end CE product. Even the stripped down players can't be too cheap or they make the additional features too marginally expensive. Whereas HD throws all features into all models, and there is a price continuum.
Whatever helps you sleep at night. ;)

I will buy the 5000-10000 numbers as a breakeven since these comport with what I have heard.

Now look at the Videoscan numbers and see how many titles actually make this. Many titles and especially catalog titles do not.

Why are you so mad at someone sharing there opinion?

Because he's shared it like 10 times.

Because he's shared it like 10 times.


Ohh, Ive only been reading this thread for the last 2 or 3 pages and hadnt seen him post other then that one. If it was before Im sorry.

Yes, you hated it, we get it, now please let it go.

Jeeeezus.

Not everyone has the same taste in movies. I liked "A Scanner Darkly" and a friend of mine who is a giant sci-fi nerd hated it.

Just because you hated it doesn't mean everyone else will too (for the record, I haven't seen it and don't have any real interest in seeing it since it's not my cup of tea guvnah).

The tomatometer score for Babel was 68%, lets compare that to;

Ghost Rider (28%)
Spider Man 3 (61%)
300 (61%)

So ya, not everyone has the same tastes in movies that you do. Hell my wife likes to watch stuff like Fried Green Tomatoes that makes we want to go commit acts of violence but she LIKES THAT ****. Deal with it.
Ten times?!?! I wrote two sentences on the topic and you've since wrote how many paragraphs on the topic attacking me? Sorry mister moderator... I won't do it again. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Sounds to me like you're the one who needs to "let it go".

Ten times?!?! I wrote two sentences on the topic and you've since wrote how many paragraphs on the topic attacking me? Sorry mister moderator... I won't do it again. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :confused:

Sounds to me like you're the one who needs "let it go".

Um, I didn't think he was talking about you...

At least not with the 10 times comment.

I could be wrong.

Um, I didn't think he was talking about you...

At least not with the 10 times comment.

I could be wrong.
No, I just reread the last several posts and it seems pretty clear he was talking to me since I'm the one he quoted...

Oh well, since someone made him the "Nielsen/VideoScan sales ratios and Top 5" special forces unit, I guess I'll just "deal with it". :rolleyes:

Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures

Great list Grubert, thank you.

Other than Norbit's first week or so, conspicuously absent from this list is Blu-Ray's much vaunted 2:1 sales lead. Funny how the sales are much closer when viewed title to title instead of total software from all manufacturers lumped together. I'm especially surprised by Iwo Jima, as the $5 combo hit normally hurts the HD DVD side quite a bit more.

I'd like to suggest a new topic for discussion: 'neutral' releases.

It has been argued that the sales of exclusive titles don't tell us much about the format war, and that we should look at the relative sales of titles that get released on both formats. So I decided to have a look at the sales of new releases that get released simultaneously on both formats.

Initially, I only used the relative sales numbers for the top 10 published in Home Media Magazine. But to supplement that, I have used alternate sources, as described below.


Date Title BD/HD Source
092606 The Lake House 1.27 NV03
103106 Mission Impossible III 0.99 HMM05
110706 Nacho Libre 1.19 NV03
112806 Ant Bully 0.62 NV03
Superman Returns 1.14 HMM05
121206 World Trade Center 1.12 NV03
121906 Lady in the Water 1.05 NV03
013007 The Wicker Man 1.43 NV03
021307 The Departed 1.64 HMM06
022007 Babel 1.14 HMM05
032707 Happy Feet 1.65 HMM06
042407 Planet Earth 0.72 HMM06
050107 Dreamgirls 1.53 NVRW
051507 The Fountain 1.50 NVRW
052207 Flags of Our Fathers 1.39 NVRW
Letters from Iwo Jima 1.21 NVRW
060507 Norbit 2.04 NVRW


HMM05: Data by Home Media Magazine as of May 27, 2007
HMM06: Data by Home Media Magazine as of June 24, 2007
NV03: Data from Nielsen VideoScan as of March 18, 2007
NVRW: Data based on release week Nielsen VideoScan figures

Norbit sold twice as many Blu-Ray's as HD DVD's.... that should be the new Blu-Ray advertising slogan

"We've sell 2:1 ratios! Twice as many people have bought Norbit on Blu-Ray instead of HD DVD!!!"

Anyway good list

Oh crap, I blind bought that, havent seen it. Uh Oh LOLIt wasn't that bad for one with a decent attention span and interested in viewing different cultures. The ending was not really depressing except for the North African family. No car chases except for one gettaway. My wife really liked it -- however the only TV she can stand to watch is PBS esp British mysteries. ;)

I guess this is related to "sales ratios" in that movie taste demographics vary. But we are getting far away from the numbers.

Ten times?!?! I wrote two sentences on the topic and you've since wrote how many paragraphs on the topic attacking me? Sorry mister moderator... I won't do it again. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Sounds to me like you're the one who needs to "let it go".

Ya, I responded to you when it was theforce who had made more than one reference to the movie sucking. I guess I lumped you two together. It happens.

For the record, this thread is about sales ratios and not how much a given movie "sucks". I will delete my response since it's apparently gotten you blu boys all riled up.