nice comment guys..

some people cant see other countries ... like mine

in my country we cant buy more than 10 Mb/s service ..

and for home users we cant have more than 512Kb/s . .

and right now LCD HDTVs sell like hot cakes here.. so what we can do?

the answer is : BLU-RAY for many years

There will always be a physical media format until ISPs come out of their cave and upgrade their networks to allow high speed connections and "unlimited" bandwidth.

Atm i dont see this happening anytime soon. The ISPs seem to be adamant on keeping their profits as they are and not upgrading anything especially in the UK and US.
This will stunt digital downloads taking off like it should. The UK broadband might even get worse if the government and RIAA/MPAA has anything to do with it.

I think bluray and any physical format to come will be here to stay for 10-15 years at least.

I'm sure Sony will make a tidy profit from bluray over the next few years.

Yes, this is a big accomplishent for Sony. I think it was well worth the effort, but I think it is a two part situation and eventually it will not be like the DVD era. Sony owns 33% of the tech that is blu-ray, so thats 30% of the profit respectively. However, I think DD is the way of the future. I know many of you will say that bandwidth, physical products, etc is what will hamper DD. Some will agree to diagree on that, but what I see is something similair to MP3. True movies are a lot larger than MP3, but look back to the mid to late 90's when MP3's (digital Music Downloads=DMD) were just surfacing. It took while to download one song (28k, 56K, or maybe even 128KB if lucky, but rare) and the RIAA did not think it would work and opposed digital downloads, Sony was one of the first opponents, becuase they thought that there was no future with it and the security issues (copyright protection). Then you had sites like Napster, Limewire, etc doing it illegally or legally. Then just a few years later (2 to 3 years) internet speeds increased and are still ever increasing. Also you slowly started seeing companies applaud DMD's. Companies/websites starting signing music labels like wildfire, look even Sony's BMG, what! Now you have the likes of Itunes, Raptor, hell even Walmart got in on this enourmas and profitable change. The MP3 player even made this product sky rocket. However, has it totally replaced CD's completly, No, but how many people do you know who own ore than 50 CD's or how many people own MP3's instead of CD's. How many people are walking down the street listening to CD players or listening to them in their cars vs doing the same thing with MP3 or MP#/WMA files.

All though the RIAA and Movie industry is diffrent I think mos of thse principles apply. So my second part of the answer is a no, becuase I think Sony was banking on Blu-ray having the same success as DVD (profits, popularity, etc). We all know that consumer technology is ever changing rapidly and thie adaptation to DD is inevitable. Sony is a smart company and pick up on this, but they need to get in this game early.

Another dumb article.
They wouldn't even say the same thing if HD DVD had won.
More like praising it.

Stupid question...
Everyone knows what BR means for Sony. Were Consoles worth Microsoft’s effort? Even with the problems it has it's worth for big M. this articles are nothing but stupid...

to "Is RROD worth Microsoft's effort?"

was dvd worth it in the ps2

i think we know the answer to that

yes?

The engineer has it right. Hardware fails! Would keep buying hard drives for back ups ? No. You back up to disk it's just the way it is.

when hd-dvd wasn't "dead", why didn't you bring out the digital download stories then mr. kuwabara? dd will never be mainstream for a variety of reasons. i do think it's interesting however, seeing kuwabaras frustration at hd-dvds failure come out in these kinds of "articles".

was betamax+minidisk+umdmovie+Blue ray worth it in order to get a successful "DOMINANT" format for media? Yes (I think?).

... only when DVD is dead, will it be 100% worth it.

Digital downloads replacing disk is not as close as everybody thinks for one we are so far behind in the US in internet speed second there are tons of people that still dont have internet. Look at how much we will lose with DD a disk has some value if you get tired of a movie you can trade it or sell it, what about taking the movie to play at places besides your home, will DD have all the extras that disk based movies have. If DD replace disk I see it more as a lose for consumers and more control for the movie companies I want to own my movies and have the freedom to do whatever I want with them I just dont see that being possible with DD.

NOO of course it wasn't, cause then we would be playing mgs4 in 4 discs. I just love standing up and changing discs. No really... Was it worth wasting your time writing that article?

Everyone whom has operated a computer or a console online has downloaded something. It is a direct simple way to get content to a consumer. I think non-physical media and games will become standard. That is why I don't buy physical media other than 360 games. Music, downloaded, and movies watched online and viewed on my 360. I watched Jumper yesterday while I was on my couch.

Imagine when game companies start sending you your full games through online networks. The cost will be lower. Why? Marketing cost are severely reduced. No box for a game sent online. No need for an art designed for packaging. No shipping cost to mail the game. The benefit is a game that can be made and distributed quickly to the consumer as soon as it is done. With only a simple approval process. You blu-ray, and hddvd fans want to ignore this.

So, why then is microsoft and sony working hard to get it to happen. Xbox live you can download full xbox games. Psn is about to allow you to download full ps2 games. How long till we see a full 360 or ps3 game. It's coming. My point don't start making blu-ray movie collections.

Is the dumbest in the history of N4g.

Profits in the billions is definitely not worth the little format war... /endsarcasm

The question should be: Was HD-DVD worth toshibas effort?

For those who think DD will reign... in order for it to

Digital Download for the win.

Half of the traffic on the internet is P2P Music, TV and Movie traffic *today*.

Anyone who thinks that we're not ready for Digital Download is kidding themselves. I've long since stopped buying plastic discs, I get everything I want on the net.

The MPAA and RIAA are going to do everything they can to monetize that traffic. The reason people do this isnt because they dont want to spend $2 or $3, its because it is vastly more convenient.

to use digital downloads and the infrastructure is good enough (worldwide) to feasibly download HD media, the technology will have moved on tho a higher level (2160P or something similar) and the new and improved infrastructure that is good enough for 1080P will not be good enough for the new one.

Unless a new compression formate is realized (entirely possible) then DD of HD media is not going to work for around 10 years.

At some point, the advantage of these higher resolutions will be mute, as people will not "see" the benefit.

People people, seriously, those of you who think the slow american sloth is going to be downloading 40gb movies can honestly **** themselves in their a**es. I have just had it with these ****ing articles on this site. Was bluray worth Sony's trouble!!!!!!!!!!!

GEE, I FU*KING WONDER? I guess retards need things spelled out in front of them 45 times before they can ingest the truth that Bluray was a specific and coordinated plan all along, it has won the war no argument and now we are asking our stupid little selves was it worth it............. ehhhhh, no, just cancel everything, the whole PS3 thing was a failure. Let's make a console with no HD no HDMI and DVD9. The world will be safer.

was it worth it? hell yea it was and it will prove to be a beautiful decision.

Well VHS paid off for Toshiba so I think BluRay will do Sony just fine! I think Sony will start to distribute bluray films with links to digital downloads like Soundtrack etc
Things are going to get interesting :)

Blue ray Disc was a great investment for sony with PS3 in my opinion ,even if it was late getting to the shelves. for those of you that want to go purely to downloads keep in mind thats still pretty far away to going mainstream. 100% uncompressed audio and video are the way to go on the blue ray disc. My home theater looks great with the PS3 playing br-discs on my sony 1080p tv, so I highly suggest ps3 for anyone that loves to watch movies or play games in HD.

Yes.
That's it.

I like format wars. The more epic the battle, the bigger the consumer price cuts.

What answer are you expecting?

its a shame that we will not be able to see that awesome pic again......
*sigh* it was bound to happen

people are ok with downloading 50GB video files per movie from the internet.
digital download is great
but there is a huge market for high definition quality movies
with good colour pallettes and hardly visible compression

at the end of the day you will see most digital downloads are prologic encoded .. up to dts

audiophiles across the world notice the difference between that an linear pcm before the first dialogue in a movie.

i think i draw the difference right here:

when i have a bluray, i can say 'i own that movie.. on this disc'
when i have a downloaded movie, i can say 'i own this movie, on this computer, .. and no other'

it's like the itunes store, very popular, but it got no where to demolishing cd sales.

people like something tangible, especially consumers.

i tihnk digital download works best with things like games
STEAM is an excellent example of DD done right.
but still, who wants to login everytime they get a movie
and who wants to have to buy a movie their friend in the same house already owns because of content restrictions

go get black hawk down on bluray
i have never heard something so insane in my life

Yes i agree sony blu ray all the way.....on a 1080 tv of course

They finally have a decisive victory and people are already trying to downplay it.

in the some advance countries in the world for the next 5 years but Physical media will be dominant in most countries in the world that don't have the bandwidth which perhaps is home to 80% of the worlds population. DD is and will continue but it will only be for a niche market but physical media will still be dominant unless someone find a way most people can have super fast and super cheap ISP's. From one gen to another. Data size increase. Like from DVD to Blu. Now when the next gen comes around like Ultra definition that i am already hearing about we will be back to square one with DD. Physical media though will not be as we would like any time before can just get a physical media over the counter like with VHS and DVD. DD on the other hand will have to upgrade to a Ultra fast internet infestructure in order to continue.

Up to now i am still haven't got a good argument from DD supporters why they think DD will in the near future will make Physical media obselete. Anyone with common sense would see that there are some major problems with DD taking over from physical media and yet we still see these kind of articles.

Sony won. Its about time people accept it and move on.

people have got to stop saying that blue-ray will be easily replaced by digital downloadable content. it's going to take years for it to happen and completely phase out blue-ray. mainstream is still going to be with blue-ray. first blue was against hd-dvd and now the internet digital downloadable content. people are going to put it the way they want to hear because they don't want to hear the other side. ps3 is going to embrace blue-ray as well as digital content so there is no loss in LONG run or SHORT run.

Yes, obviously...

Of course it was worth Sony's effort. It will be proven even more valuable in the future.

the only thing ps3 has done so far is promote blueray. has blueray helped gaming...no. by the time we need that storage space the next thing will be here. prob DL onto solid state memory. so someone come and get me when the ps3 has a game that really needs and uses both the ps3s potential as well as bluerays, ill be playing smash bros....

is with all this spin on here, on the same front page somehow blu ray winning has been turned into a positive for microsoft and a negative/nominal gain for sony. I bet if hd-dvd won everyone would be like, oh noes! sony got pwned...

the only reason I switched from cd player to mp3 was the size of it, its small and can take where ever, nothing else.
Why I wont use DD any time soon?
First I dont care the size so when I wanna watch mmovie I put it in takes 20sec and watch and if I wanna borrow or go to at friends hpuse I can do that.
Second im in center europe and I got fastest connection in country available which is 20mb (dd at tops 2mb/sec)
third is space, movies can be 15-100gb who knows, and thats to big for hd ot takes to long to dd.
fourth is in some countries there are limits on how much you can download, here I can only dd 35gb per month, each extra 1gb cost 1euro.

So I say blu ray will stay for 6-15 years. and nothing you can do about it!

and btw even if dd takes over 1 day you will need to move or store or whatever your movies etc, thats why you will need a blu ray cd.
even now dvd/cd's sell good

So first its, "blu ray is gonna die", and now its "was it worth it". God just because someone proved you wrong it doesn't mean you have to go out of your way to question more things.

the day you can't connect to XBL to play your favorite game cuz the whole network is congested by gazillion dudes streaming HD porn.

you'll feel real stupid about yourself remembering the days when you bragged on n4g that HD downloads was so much kewler than bluray, won't ya?

when are you baboons gonna start growing a brain?
we need some infrastructure to cope with that kinda bandwidth, and it takes time.

Digital Downloads FTW! im doing it right now. Just DD'd I Am Legend.

"God just because someone proved you wrong it doesn't mean you have to go out of your way to question more things."

Of course it does, if you're locked into the same pattern of denial and ever-changing spin we've seen for the past year-plus. For some, the simple truth is too painful. There are an awful lot of people eating an awful lot of crow these days, and an awful lot of online accounts being abandoned by people running away from their previous arguments against Blu-ray, Sony, and the PS3.

Let's see: dominance of a market that's worth billions in royalties and consumer sales. A market that the competition spent huge amounts of money trying to win. Worth it? We'll have to get back to you on that.

Like the feeling of owning something tangible.

Why do you all think the only thing that's going to take down Blu-Ray is DD? Flash media and holo-disc are two types of storage that actually have staying power. Flash media's adaptable size makes it almost impossible to outdate, and holo-disc has size capacities that are so rediculous you can fit entire movie series on them in high definition with plenty of room to spare.

I'd be more worried about those two in the next 2 years than anything else. For blu-ray to really pay off, it has to become as standard as DVD is now, and there's a few reasons it will never happen:

- The upgrade from VHS to DVD had an increase in size, quality, features, and ease of use. the upgrade to blu-ray really only sees a size upgrade (the quality I talked about in the first one isn't just picture quality, it's all around quality).
- A lot of people don't and won't have HD sets in the next 3 years. Sure a lot of people might, but not nearly enough to make blu-ray suddenly outsell DVDs.
- To the average user, there is no real advantage to having blu-ray over DVD. If I have a standard TV, it looks exactly the same, performs exactly the same, and unless I'm an audiophile sounds about the same.
- It doesn't have staying power. The size increase is there, but it's not a "huge" increase.
- There's better options than blu-ray coming out in the next year, and even more coming out after that.

Blu-Ray just isn't as huge a deal as people make it out to be. Same with HD-DVD. It's just a space filler format till something really revolutionary comes along.

Dude, pick an argument and stick to it. On the one hand, nobody has an HDTV so Blu-ray is useless. On the other hand, there's whiz-bang technology coming out "in the next year" that'll make Blu-ray obsolete.

US HDTV penetration stands at around 40% of households RIGHT NOW. Have you been anywhere near a Best Buy or Circuit City lately? I would guess not, if you think that the average consumer doesn't have, or isn't on the verge of getting, an HDTV.

Tell ya what, we'll add your bold predictions to the long list of those that has failed to come true in the past couple of years. And I'm sure you'll be back on here posting a "my bad", just like all the other Nostradami that are suddenly nowhere to be found.