The first Blu-ray (BD) disc drive for desktop PCs is here, but be warned — it won’t play commercial BD movies.
Vincent Bautista, Sony’s product manager for data storage, told CNET.com.au that due to copy protection issues and lagging software development, the drive will only play user-recorded high-definition content from a digital camcorder, and not commercial movies released under the BD format.
Wow, Hollywood is so paranoid about piracy that they are actually selling a player that won’t play movies! It appears that online satirist Brian Briggs nearly got it right when he jokingly predicted Hollywood would start selling blank discs to thwart piracy!
The MPAA and an association of DVD manufacturers have finally agreed on a standard for high-definition DVDs. The new ” Crystal” format provides unbreakable copy protection and Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) features.
The discs hold 0% of the data of conventional DVDs. Drive manufacturers said that it will be much easier to meet these specs compared with HD-DVD and Blu-Ray discs. “They’ll work with existing machines without any changes, said Niigata.
“Of course, some users might complain about the fact that there is no content on these discs, but we’re certain our law-abiding customers will see that as a small price to pay for the security resulting from the advanced DRM.”
I wish these guys would wake up and realize that ALL media that is stored in a digital format can be copied and shared. So competition is the only cure. iTunes seems to be pretty successful and it’s much easier to download a song (or at least quicker). If they think they can stamp out piracy AND file sharing (they are 2 different things), they are sadly living in a make-believe world. BTW, the 2nd story was hilarious! I wouldn’t doubt they would go that far.
A few years ago I read a biography of Thomas Edison. It seems that when Tom started offering prerecorded music for his new phonograph, he was vigourously and repeatedly sued by the publishers of sheet music.
This was only the first time that the entertainment industry went all out to kill a technology that eventually made them billions.
They fought telivision, cassette tapes and the MP3 player.
They also fought very hard to kill the VCR in the early 80’s. They have made 10’s of billions on home rentals since.
It seems the people in charge of these groups are 100% greed and 0% vision.
It’s almost worth going back to analog to avoid all this crap.
We need more formats! More, more, more…………………..
Are there any movies (or anything at all) in Bluray format? I could swore that they aren’t available at this time.
“I could swore that they aren’t available at this time.”
You can rent them from Netflix.
LOL Sony? Didn’t they used to make that walkman thing?
Ah, the suicidal paranoia of Sony 🙂
I cancelled my BMG membership during the rootkit mess. And started my personal “Boycott Sony”.
If I can help it; I don’t buy their products. Apparently this will continue.
Sony is P a t h e t i c !
Well, you can’t be surprised, sony isn’t known for buisness models that hold up in the real world.
Remember BetaMax? Sony seemed to think that they were the biggest company in existence, and thought that not opening t betamax would be the solution. I think that the same thing will start happening in blu-ray, if HD-DVD _will_ play on computers, and it will just be dwarfed by the other format
The MPAA would probably rather not have you play any DVD on your computer. They would rather have you buy a disk for your TV and some self destructing, one computer only copy, at an addtional cost, for your PC.
Am I the only one that thinks that Blu-Ray is quickly becoming BetaMax Take II.
Dear Sony,
die.
Yours truly
WHY does sony keep shooting themselves in the foot…
to much deversification??? One side fighting the OTHER??
…due to copy protection issues and lagging software development, the drive will only play user-recorded high-definition content from a digital camcorder, and not commercial movies released under the BD format.
Actually, I think this is a smart move on their part.
If content-owner mandated DRM is what is holding-up both blue-laser formats, screw’em and get a recorder on the market for all the people who will be buying the HD-camcorders that are at 2nd-generation – and soon to be 3rd generation.
If the PS3 won’t be the trojan-hourse to get Blu-ray into homes, a way to keep people from adopting the AVCHD format [which allows recording HD to red-laser DVD-Rs] is exactly what they need to get to market now.
#2,
Edison himslef was very strict about people misusing his patented media forms (phonograph, kinetiscope). I don’t know how true it is, but I heard that was so zealous in making early filmmakers pay him royalties that they literally moved as far away from him as they could – to Los Angeles.
Ever since I first heard of Blu-ray and HD-DVD, I’ve been telling everybody that asks me about them, TO NOT BUY THEM.
VHS sales are very slow these days. People have been replacing their VHS collections with DVDs for almost 10 years now, so DVD sales are slowing now.
What’s the cure for the poor media conglomerates with slowing DVD sales? That’s right kids, a new format!!!!
They want to sell consumers the same thing over and over and over, while filling landfills with polycarbonate trash that will last virtually forever.
DO NOT BUY THE NEW FORMATS.
Settle for DVDs for another 10 years. Give them a chance to make something really spectacular to replace DVDs, or for streaming on-demand services to become ubiquitous.
Is Sony a monopolist? I hope it isn’t, but it behaves like one. Ever since the rootkit fiasco, I haven’t bought anything from Sony whatsoever. I intend to keep it that way.
I’m with #18 here. Personally, DVD format looks good enough, HD formats are too expensive, drives are too expensive and I don’t see any compelling reason for me to upgrade and replace my entire library.
Plus, most movies these days suck anyway. Why the hell would I need an even clearer high-definition version of the suck.
I can see it now, the latest romantic-uncomedy with Jennifer Manniston in pure HD-SUCK.
You might think a consumer electronics maker that also owns media content would have an ADVANTAGE in deliverying usability to the market. Yet Sony repeatedly proves just the opposite, as its media arm continues to wreck the company and screw consumers.
These idiots need to divorce media from hardware ASAP — actually the market has already started doing that for them.
Now wait a minute, wasn’t there a big deal a couple of months back about the new Vaio laptop that had a Blu-Ray drive, and they were showing it off by playing House of Flying Daggers? Of course, that wasn’t actually a Blu-Ray disc, the reporter kicked it out and saw it was a copy on a DVD+RW, but still, they were promoting this laptop as being able to play Blu-Ray movies, right?
Good lord, I used to actually like and respect Sony. This is really getting sad watching them implode like this.
OK,
Do you ALL understand why, they want a LARGER format??
Its not the Quality…
Its Security.
EVEN a DVD can be rendered DOWN to Video CD format, and with VERY little LOSS..
copying of a HD video, MIGHT take longer to do, as you need to REREDER it, and cut some pixels out… But it WILL STILL BE DONE.
If you consider that MANY DVD, have more then 1 copy of the movie INSTALLED on the DVD, english, Spanish(other language) Options, out takes, deleted scenes, AND so forth…. The MOVIE REALLY dont take up much space..
used to love Sony for their asthetic design and apparent care in feature vs quality through the early 90’s.. but after a number of failed, mid to topshelf items (MD’s, CD players, VCR’s etc.) and pathetic support is Australia, I stopped buying… now I’m just abandoning all hope… nice one Fony.
No,
Its good. Let SONY go out of business… I stopped liking Sony a few years ago because of this kind of mentality. And the PLAYSTATION Fanbois still want to buy their crap?
Let them go out of business.. Quit supporting these kinds of business practices people!
Need to clear a few things up:
#22 Andy: Get the story right, the Blu-ray laptop demo didnt go down as initially reported. See the updates:
http://gearlog.com/blogs/gearlog/archive/2006/05/16/11622.aspx
http://www.engadget.com/2006/05/16/sony-throws-party-for-vaios-fakes-blu-ray-demo/
#23 ECA: You dont really know what your are talking about. There are not multiple copies of a movie on a dvd, the different lauguages are simply audio tracks. You obviously have no experience with HD video, MOVIES REALLY DO take up alot of space
If you treat your good customers like criminals they start to think and act like criminals. Draconian laws really do turn honest customers into pirates. I’ve seen it happen.
26,27…
so what, I use 2 VCD over 1 DVD to store movies…
why should I waste 4.9 gigs of room, when I can get it stored on LESS.
I dont THINk you have LOOKEd at the storage use on a DVD, with the Extras and so forth… Iv seen a DVD with 2-3 cuts on the disk, and still have over 1 hours Documentary…
It comes down to DPI of display…Your TV only needs 97dpi to display a decent picture.. and EVEn with a wide screen HD, at 1900×1084
figure your numbers for LARGE SCREEN….32″ screen is about 27″ wide…1900/27=70.37 DPI….DO your Math…
Sd is 320×200 and abit more…
Pull the cork out of your EARS and start THINKING… Only NICe thing about HD is you can get a LARGE screen and NOt loose the DPI… THATS ALL.. You Arnt gaining much.. Ever View a 256 color pic that Looks JUSt as good as the 16but picture…IF NOT, you Certainly Arnt OLD enough to have an opinion.
90% of digital cameras DONT even USE 16 bit color.. OR didnt you LOOK??
ECA my friend, im sorry to say, you are a moron.
“so what, I use 2 VCD over 1 DVD to store movies…
why should I waste 4.9 gigs of room, when I can get it stored on LESS.
I dont THINk you have LOOKEd at the storage use on a DVD, with the Extras and so forth…”
wasting 4.9 gigs of room, were exactly did that number come from? You are talking about “storing movies” and VCD vs DVD. So if you are making a 2disk VCD you are either ripping a dvd or manipulating a preripped source. Why would using DVD to “store movies” require you to include the extras? Your obviously already comfortable ripping dvds and working with other file formats since you can create VCD, removing the extras is then almost trivial.
Dont even know were to get started on your DPI nonsense. “you arnt gaining much” with HD, wtf? maybe i dont understand what you are saying, i guess you were quoting the 1080HD resoultion and saying you cant see the difference betwen SD on a 1080 32in? Only helps in big screens, retarded. 1080p video on a 24in LCD looks substantially better than any SD to even the most geriatric.
Maybe your just too OLD too see properly.
ECA, your nonsensical rantings would be a bit easier to read if you were to use small tricks like proper syntax and correct spelling.
In tHaT ways iT arnt ToOk me’s 1 (wun) hours 2oo rEEds.