Movie sales on DVD are likely nearing their peak worldwide as more people look to computer downloads and video-on-demand to watch their favorite programming, according to a report released on Wednesday.
“The PC industry is champing at the bit to provide downloaded movies that might compete with DVD sales, and Pay-TV services want to add movies to their video-on-demand services, to their new disk-drive-equipped set-top boxes, and to their emerging high-definition TV services,” said Gerry Kaufhold, an In-Stat analyst and author of the report.
Now, just a bit more bandwidth and here comes IPTV.
I agree, but the hardware penetration worldwide ensures at least twenty years of media support for DVD. That was the fate of VHS. The copy protection fiasco brewing in the HD-DVD/Blue-ray media format will probably prevent the mass market from ever giving a damn about changing again anytime soon. The next big switch will most likely be a mini-disk format that holds vast amounts of data and will coexist with Hi-def downloads. But like I said, it’s gonna be a while.
The DVD is on the way out, not from IPTV, but by the ‘Movie on Demand’ capability of cable TV. Capble TV may start delivering content by IP, but that fact is really irrelevant.
Pure IPTV is now, and the foreseeable future, purely the domain of geeks. Who really wants to watch movies on their computer? So when IPTV actually arrives, it will be to dedicated set-top boxes, as part of the home network, but no different from a cable box of today… go on screen on your TV, order the movie or TV show, and watch it on your TV. The packet delivery method is irrelevant.
Think IP Telephony. I have a Vonage account, hooked up to the cable modem, and looped back via the Telephony converter to the house’s old phone wiring. I pick up the phone anywhere in the house, and get a dial tone. Same with IPTV.. it will deliver straight to a dedicated box, via your internet connection… but so what? I’ts still cable TV, but smarter.
American Telcos and Cablecos must feel they have a mandate for being backwards. They drag their feet to keep from offering customers access to up-to-date technology. In my neck of the woods, the phone company didn’t offer DSL until this year. Comcast didn’t offer me broadband until I pointed out that a previous cableco had put in fibre optic and all Comcast had to do was hook up to it!
Yet, in the UK, today, BT announced that in addition to the DSL they already offer, they’re adding VOIP and IPTV by next summer. No extra monthly charge for the IPTV! Pigs will sprout wings before Qwest, Comcast or Verizon makes a similar offer.
The copy protection fiasco brewing in the HD-DVD/Blue-ray media format will probably prevent the mass market from ever giving a damn about changing again anytime soon.
Agreed.
When people with existing HDTV-sets discover they need to buy a newer one with a HDMI-connection (required for HDCP) to watch Blu-ray/ HD-DVD media – the crap should hit the fan. 🙂
H.264-encoding allowing compressed HD-format video to be stored on regular DVDs should also make the transition to a new disc-format less enticing.
Wiki entry on HDCP:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDCP
I’m pleased to say I’m in total disagreement with all of you.
– The DVD format will be around for a long time because there is no other delivery mechanism that brings you content for less money and at a higher quality that you own. Yes, VoD, IPTV and the like have their advantages, but none of them beat DVDs at low cost/high quality content.
– Video on Demand, meanwhile, is not a killer application. If it was, Dish and DirecTV would be out of business. VoD has had some time to catch on now and it hasn’t to any great degree. Besides, a properly setup PVR duplicates the functionality of VoD… for free.
– Eidard, I agree that many telecom companies are behind the curve on this, but the idea that some sort of national IPTV service in this country is going to force them to catch up is foolish. They’ve got congress and the media in their pocket: Any potential technology that could destroy them will be legislated to death.
– HDCP is not a 100% thing. It could happen, but that doesn’t mean it will. Also, many DVI (non-HDMI) equiped televisions are HDCP compliant. As for the folks without any digital connection to speak of, someone will come up with a workaround if there is a market for one. Once again, however, HDCP isn’t a lock, and I doubt this will come to pass.
James — IPTV as promulgated abroad is often cheaper than DVD’s. It can compete against DVD rentals — the sell is convenience — which would almost be impossible to implement as poorly as has done Dish or D*.
I don’t see anyone offering IPTV service other than through private companies [like BT, for example] and I don’t expect the usual suspects to play a leading role. I agree completely with your analysis of which of the several congressional pockets we might examine; but, then, part of what I do as contributing editor is ask those questions, offer the posts, and hope the DU commenters come up with informed answers. As many usually do.