Is Sony growing weary of the Blu-ray format war?

Speaking in New York on Thursday, the Sony chief executive Howard Stringer had some conciliatory things to say about the bruising next-generation DVD format war it is waging with Toshiba and Microsoft. It was the first sign that the consumer electronics giant regrets that the two sides failed to hash out a standard years ago.

Losing a key content rival in Universal's Paramount Pictures had Mr Stringer sounding oddly nostalgic. "We were trying to win on the merits, which we were doing for a while, until Paramount changed sides," he was quoted by Associated Press as saying, adding that the two formats are locked in a "stalemate".  He then revealed he had always wanted the two sides to work together on a unifying format. According to AP, Mr Stringer "wishes he could travel back in time to make that happen."

Those aren't fighting words! What happened to the winner-takes-all rhetoric from earlier this year?

We were all aware this collision course would happen. When it comes to home electronics, consumers religiously tolerate a single technology in their homes to play their movies or their music. In the personal computing arena, there will always be multiple formats and standards, but once we move into the living room we become insistent upon a simple, elegant solution. Those who invested in DAT recordings and Betamax players can ruefully attest to this.

At least there's some positive news on the PlayStation 3 front. A price cut last month in Europe, has triggered a surge in PlayStation 3 sales, he says, putting the company on track to sell ten million PS3s by the end of the fiscal year in March. Nintendo, AP points out, has already sold 13.2 million Wiis. And, according to Shiny Media's PSP gamer site, Sony's sales spike may be short-lived.

Comments

[J Foggitt]

As an ex-Betamax enthusiast - it was technically superior to VHS, and a user of Minidiscs - wonderful compact portable digital sound recording systems, I've become VERY wary of Sony's proprietary developments. Technically they may be superb but Sony either doesn't promote its products well enough and/or the licencing costs for other companies to manufacture the Sony technology are way too high. The result is an enthusiastic start as technical afficionados delight in the new product followed by weak sales and an ultimate failing of the product range - anyone remember the Elcassette? Twice bitten, forever shy, I now avoid Sony products if they have any proprietary limitations, e.g. Sony cameras utilising the Memory Stick - what's wrong with the SD Card, Sony? So I'm avoiding both Blu-ray and HD DVD until a clear winner emerges. Don't the protagonists realise that after the Beta-VHS war, consumers will avoid new technology if there are conflicting systems. Finally, why are there so many different mutually incomatible battery types for cameras and camcorders? Show me a camera that takes SD cards and AA batteries and you're immediately more than half way towards making a sale (thankyou Canon!).

[Keith]

When is everyone going to realise that Sony cant win the war, Sony is tied to Disney, Disney doesnt do porn, porn is bigger than most people think and will use the other format because Disney doesnt do porn etc etc

[Bruce Everett]

mechanical formats have missed the day - mp4, Apple TV, data. That what its all about now. Both BluRay and HD-DVD are risky technologies.

[Mike]

Technical excellence to the exclusion of every thing else is no way to design a mass consumer product. Apart from the Betamax vs VHS war where Sony lost out, there are a raft of other design ideas that also failed or succeeded based purely on cost & convenience to the consumer. Cassette tapes scored big because even though their quality was lower than vinyl records, they were portable. Mini discs and a successor to audio CD's didn't because they were expensive and CD quality was perfect for most home users. MP3 players scored massively purely thru low costs and convenience on the move just like cassette tapes. HD video is more than enough for most home users as to benefit from all the capabilities of Blu Ray you need to spend a fortune on new DVD discs and players and have a cinema room to see the benefits. Unless you're a poser or Bill Gates, most people won't spend that sort of money.

[Ryan]

I bought a ps3 and dont think that any 1 would buy a gaming console and a seperate player for hd-dvds when u have bluray already in your gaming console
unless your a hardend xboxer
but the way i look at it is i love my ps2 so i bought a ps3 and waheyyy its got wifi blueray hdmi bluetooth i mean come on why would any 1 want to really buy a blue ray player for £400 when u can buy a ps3 for less or even buy an xbox ewwww nah to many broken trays and overheating typical microsoft product (my opionion of course)

[Daniel Francis]

If it ain't broke why buy a new one? I'm still very happy with visual and sound quality of regular DVDs. Is it really necessary to change for change sake? I shall be sticking to DVDs until they are no longer available.

[Mukesh]

The motto of most consumers is " Never forgive Sony ".

Their company philosophy is to corner the market and squeeze consumers and deprive other companies of business.

If microsoft is spoken of poorly in a similar vein, Sony is the grandfather.

I am going to buy HD DVD this holiday season to prove the point.

Hit hard on Sony's knuckles so they never try their strategy again.

All Consumers

[Jonathan]

The comparison to the VHS/Beta rivalry is a little misplaced; in that instance it was clear that a victor would emerge, as both formats were offering something genuinely new, in the form of home video. Similarly, there was genuine value in the transition from VHS to DVD (and from cassette to CD too); primarily driven by convenience (random access, longevity) with an added bonus of quality improvements. The success of downloaded music (MP3, iTunes etc) demonstrates the consumer's priorities: He is prepared to trade-off some quality for the sake of further convenience, just so long as the deterioration in quality is only marginal.

The failed HD-Audio formats (SACD, DVD-A) are a much better analogy; these offered improved quality and little else, just as HD-DVD and Blu-Ray offer an improved video quality; and for both Audio and Video examples the quality improvement can only be perceived on mid/high-end equipment – it’s just not transformational enough to get the market traction that is necessary to make the format “The” standard.

As such, it is likely that the video market will follow the music one, and move to electronic distribution; after all, the bandwidth requirements are already met for 720p/1080i formats. Thus, unless Blu-Ray and HD-DVD can be created in a hybrid DVD+HD format, for negligible additional cost, they seem likely to both be consigned as irrelevancies.

Now, does anyone remember Video 2000? . . .

[David Grindey]

I think the "spinning" disk may have a limited shelf life. If you look at the way personal cassette players moved to portable CD players moved to smaller MP3 players I think what drives the market is rapidly indexed, portable format. So why not Hi Def content on solid state memory/cards? Their capacity is getting bigger and they are more resistant to accidental damage. I could envisage a time when you buy a HI-Def film on a Read-only memory card.

You could then have devices such as iPODs with an HDMI output able to drive Hi-Def screens. Or use existing PCs/media server interfaces on the basis they have the drivers. Going forward a merging of a dedicated Hi-Def player to the composite media server, capable of downloading content (cable or sky) and playing purchased content through solid state interface.

My panacea would be something like a PVR with HD and a memory card slot on the front for Hi Def content, kind of Sky+HD with appropriate interface. Ahh Perfect.

[Lukas]

Sony is the most arrogant consumer electonic company there is. Thinking that their products are superiour and defined as "the standard" makes me sick. Always comes with their own proprietary "solutions". And Sony sees consumers as subordinate, remember the rootkit affair?
I try to avoid sony products like the plague..

ps3 might be blue ray and cheap compared to other blue ray players,but it still looks like a george forman grill. yuk

[Duke Truong]

I think that the only way both camps can win at this point is to have consumer players that can play both Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats in one box. This is what happened with DVD-R and DVD+R DVD-Roms. Those two formats still exist but DVD-ROMs these days are made with the ability to read and write both types... not the most elegant solution, but it's simple and it works.