“The format war has turned into a format death watch,” Thomas K. Arnold and Erik Gruenwedel report for The Hollywood Reporter. “Toshiba is widely expected to pull the plug on its HD DVD format sometime in the coming weeks, reliable industry sources say, after a rash of retail defections that followed Warner Home Video’s announcement in early January that it would support only the rival Blu-ray Disc format after May.”
“Officially, no decision has been made, insists Jodi Sally, vp of marketing for Toshiba America Consumer Products,” Arnold and Gruenwedel report. “But she hinted that something’s in the air. ‘Given the market developments in the past month,’ she said, ‘Toshiba will continue to study the market impact and the value proposition for consumers, particularly in light of our recent price reductions on all HD DVD players.'”
Arnold and Gruenwedel report, “Immediately after the Warner announcement, the HD DVD North American Promotional Group canceled its Consumer Electronics Show presentation. The following week, data collected by the NPD Group revealed Blu-ray took in 93% of all hardware sales for that week.”
“Microsoft is the other big player in the HD DVD equation. Last fall when Paramount Home Entertainment announced it was dropping its dual-format strategy and would release titles only in HD DVD, giving that side a brief resurgence, a pitch to journalists for interviews came from a Microsoft email address,” Arnold and Gruenwedel report. “Several phone calls to Kevin Collins, Microsoft’s normally accessible ‘HD DVD evangelist,’ were not returned.”
Full article here.
Our Take from September 02, 2005: “HD-DVD must die.” From September 27, 2005: “Imagine, Apple… on the side of the better technology while Microsoft chooses to go with the cheap, second-rate ‘solution.’ How typical is that?”
Again, word is that you can get XBox HD DVD players really, really cheap nowadays. 
We are amazed at recent developments in the the general public’s newfound ability to choose superior technology regardless of perceived price. Along with Blu-ray’s triumph (however short-lived it may be; get an Apple TV, that’s the real future), look at iPod+iTunes, iPhone, and the Macintosh resurgence as other examples of Joe and Jane Sixpack rapidly becoming more tech-literate with each passing day.
This ain’t VHS vs. Beta, folks. Now, in what can only be described as a pleasant surprise, the best formats and technologies are winning!
YESSSSSSSSSSSS!
NOOOOOOOOOOO!
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!
No HD-DVD burners. 1/2 the capacity. It was a matter of time.
Yes! Here’s a toast to more gigabytes.
UuuggghhhAaaah! There can be only one!!
GUESS THE MOVIE
… a decapitated body lying on the floor, next to it’s own severed head. So far no one knows his name….
<bagpipes chiming>
I know his name!
When will companies figure out that “partnering” with (aka volunteering to be ass-raped) Microsoft is the equivalent of taking all the money they invest in the venture and burning it?
You hear that BetaMax…We’re going to be okaaaaay! Steve Jobs says we’re all going to make it!
MDN is slooooow today!
Blu-ray had a cooler name. That is why it one out, plain and simple. And don’t forget the millions of PS3 with Blu-ray built in. And the better storage capacity. But really, the name is what sealed the deal.
To Jostiman: “Highlander”
No one seems to remember that it was Toshiba who sold (gave?) our silent (Submarine) screw technology to the Russians back in the cold war days. This cost the U.S. over 30 Billion $ to find new ways to track Russian subs. It warms the cockels of my heart to see Toshiba eat shit on anything. I have never bought anything that said Toshiba on it since.
We are amazed at recent developments in the the general public’s newfound ability to choose superior technology regardless of perceived price.
The general public gets it right when they are well informed, the problem is the quality of information not the public. Misinformation is the currency of the vested interests and permeated by the news media that they fund via advertising and ownership/stock holding. The vested interests also determine who you can vote for by funding candidates who support their positions – of both parties.
They’ve been at if for a few centuries and are quite good at it
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The bad part about this is that the bluray disks are likely to stay expensive and ive noticed a LOT fewer sales and deals through amazon since Warner jumped onto Bluray exclusively.
“No one seems to remember that it was Toshiba who sold (gave?) our silent (Submarine) screw technology to the Russians back in the cold war days. “
From what I remember this wasn’t the only case of them selling secrets to a communist nation.
The weight of MS support….buried it.
Monkey boy lost again!!!!
Yep. Pretty scummy bunch.
“In 1987, Toshiba Machine, the subsidiary of Toshiba, was accused of illegally selling CNC milling machines used to produce very quiet submarine propellers to the Soviet Union in violation of the CoCom agreement, an international embargo on Western exports to East Bloc countries. The Toshiba-Kongsberg scandal involved a subsidiary of Toshiba and the Norwegian company Kongsberg Vaapenfabrikk. The incident strained relations between the United States and Japan, and resulted in the arrest and prosecution of two senior executives, as well as the imposition of sanctions on the company by both countries. The US had always relied on the fact that the Soviets had noisy boats, so technology that would make the USSR’s submarines harder to detect created a significant threat to America’s security. Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania said “What Toshiba and Kongsberg did was ransom the security of the United States for $517 million.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba
Does that mean we’ll get Blu-Ray in our Macs?
.. consumers lose. Enjoy buying a new player when the next BR revision comes out suckers as it adds features HD DVD already had.
First Yahoo appears to want to deal with anyone but Microsoft, now the studios don’t want to have anything to do with Microsoft’s magnificent HD DVD technology. Fools. Spurning the fine folks at Microsoft will be your folly.
I can’t wait for the first HD DVDs to come out with WMV files for use on Zunes. You get the superior HD experience on your TV as well as the portability you desire for content on your Zune. Microsoft and Toshiba make the whole widget. Suck it, MAC dorks. The studios will come crawling back. Buh-bye Apple and your crappy I-Tunes and I-Pods.
95% of the world’s computer users can’t be wrong.
Your potential. Our passion.™
Kahuna: Don’t worry, a few of us remember. The only way I end up with anything Toshiba is an OEM part.
Sorry MDN, HD downloads (or any movie download for that matter) are not going to displace physical media anytime soon. Most people still don’t have the bandwidth available to them to download GB’s of data in a reasonable time. Many, many people don’t even have broadband connections. We are already starting to hear the ISPs rethinking their pricing schemes based on the potential increased bandwidth (i.e. RoadRunner). The increased bandwidth usage is not going to be free. Physical discs will be around and will be the primary distribution method for many more years. It doesn’t really matter how good AppleTV is, it doesn’t fix the availability or size of the pipe through which the content is currently distributed.
When I come across the sad troll comments by You Know Who® above I move along.
Nothing worth reading.
Now to the news:
I’m glad that BluRay has been picked – only because it was the format NOT chosen by Micros**t.
BlueRay, we are here for you! And yes, we will be getting BlueRay in our Macs. Apple, is on the BlueRay board.
Parker – MacSoftwareList.com
If Apple starts making use of Blu-Ray, which iit will, I expect M$ to not be far behind with some half-arsed, inverted copy of Apple’s application of it. We’ll probably even see a sad attempt to add external Blu-Ray drives to the XBOX 360.
Finally, the war is over. As I said elsewhere, let the troops go home. We can now expect people to massively begin buying players, which will also mean that studios can finally focus on delivering just one format. They all now have plenty of time to compete against each other for the consumers dollars and we will be the winners in the end. The movies will cost as much as we are willing to pay for them. Don’t forget, DVD movies were $35 just seven years ago!
For all those for whom broadband isn’t an option (i.e. 98% of the world market), optical HD will be sweet food for their never-utilised HD TVs.
Holiday season 2008 will be owned by HD (and Apple, of course).