DreamWorks Animation has an interesting stance post-HD DVD/Blu-ray war: they're going to stick with HD DVD until Toshiba gives them the okay to switch to the other side.

While it may be honorable to honor your contract (DreamWorks Animation signed on with HD DVD the same time that Paramount did back in August), it's also logic defying to stick with a format that no longer exists for all intents and purposes. We could be seeing a situation where the little dog follows around the big dog until the big dog finally has to tell the little one to go home, that it just wants to be alone.

DreamWorks has a potentially large-selling family movie coming out on DVD in March in Bee Movie. And yes, it appears that for now it will only be available in HD DVD - the format which no one is buying anymore.

Way to make the HD-loving little kids cry DreamWorks.

Well you just knew someone was going to stick around to feed off of the dead - that vulture will be LG. The electronics giant announced that they would not be discontinuing their support of the HD DVD format like everyone else - including its creator, Toshiba - and instead will go right on making their dual format player.

So why is LG doing this? Well they clearly want to suck in those poor early adopters who bought a ton of HD DVD discs and will now want to get on the Blu-ray bandwagon. What's confusing is that those people undoubtedly already have an HD DVD player so why would they opt for the more expensive HD DVD/Blu-ray combo when they undoubtedly could just purchase a stand-alone Blu-ray player for cheaper? I guess if they just want one box in their living room?

Still, this news was't quite as good as Universal announcing they had "chosen" to side with Blu-ray hours after Toshiba announced they were discontinuing the HD DVD format. That must have been a really tough "choice" for Universal to make. Go with the format that won the war or one that no longer exists? What a gutsy move.

While most of the mainstream media was cluing into the fact that HD-DVD was dead over the weekend, it's led to panic on the part of some readers and writers that Toshiba didn't formally announce its death today and made a few comments perhaps to the contrary.

Just to placate everyone I'll repeat for the 784th time: HD-DVD is dead. Dead, much like how a body is dead before the coroner officially pronounces it as such.

That cornoner, Toshiba, is still expected to declare the format dead tomorrow despite rhetoric like "We are currently assessing our business strategies, but nothing has been decided at this moment."

That is business-speak. Nothing more, nothing less. Look at it this way: see how far they've come since their Baghdad Bob stance last month?

It's over. HD-DVD is dead. Repeat: Dead. No hope. Don't listen to today's rhetoric, listen to tomorrow's announcement that production will halt and all sales could end as soon as March.

Newsflash: Blu-ray has killed HD-DVD. Something which I and many others have been noting for a long time now (prediction #3 for 2008, and I was talking about it long before that - hell, in March 2006 I wrote "There likely won't be a clear winner in the format war until next year at the earliest, but if I had to guess my money is on Blu-ray.") is finally making the mainstream press with Toshiba's formal surrender coming as soon as this week. But that is not what I want to talk about right now - quite frankly after the past year of talking about it, I'm almost entirely talked out about the war (again, almost). I want to talk about something that was has been brought up again this weekend by Wired, and then by Mashable: that digital downloads will kill Blu-ray before it gains steam.

While I first started talking about this possibility several months ago, and was reiterating it as recently as December/January here, here and here - I now believe a combination of factors will help Blu-ray be a success over digital downloads for the foreseeable future.

Back in May of last year I wrote:

It really is becoming more of a possibility that neither HD-DVD nor Blu-ray will win their war - Digital HD Video Downloads could come seemingly out of nowhere and take the crown. Digital music downloads have been chopping away at CD sales for the past few years, but neither HD-DVD or Blu-ray has nearly the legs to stand on that the CD did. This is all coming together at just the right time...

So don't expect huge back catalogs of films on HD-DVD or Blu-ray anytime soon. In fact we could be seeing them much sooner in digital format as various studios have already shown with iTunes just how easy it is to setup and distribute older films digitally.

Once the broadband gets just a little bit faster and the cost of storage drops just a little bit more, the fully-digital age may start a rapid ascent to the top of the movie mountain.

Back catalog films are now coming to services like iTunes much faster than the high-definition discs just as I predicted, and while broadband is creeping up in speeds and storage prices continue to drop, Blu-ray was able to gain a decisive victory much sooner than I imagined. Thanks to this, the format definitely has a chance to grow those legs - especially with encouraging sales figures finally coming in from Sony on the Playstation 3 (which of course has a Blu-ray player built in).

But here is what I see as the main problem currently for digital distribution: while the digital movie rental services by Apple and Microsoft are very good - they are far from great, especially with regards to HD content. The last part is key there - you really can't call this stuff 'HD' content - it is simply not. George Ou has written a few great posts about this, and I've talked about it here as well.

I downloaded an 'HD' rental over Xbox Live this weekend - there is no question that the convenience was great, but the quality was far from HD. While most of the time it was better than regular DVD quality on my HD TV - it was just barely better. Other times, especially during dark scenes, it was noticeably worse than DVD - again this is an 'HD' download. While it's true that for a lot of people this won't matter, and they're perfectly happy to be tricked into thinking they are downloading a real HD movie on par with a Blu-ray or HD-DVD HD movie, the fact that it is not the same experience still means something.

This difference is part of what is going to keep Netflix in business while they transition over to the digital realm (their LG box you connect to your TV will be ready later this year, and there is whispers of downloads right to game systems). When the public at large hears about Blu-ray winning the format war, they are going to buy Blu-ray players. They are going to rent Blu-ray discs via Netflix and in Blockbuster stores just as they do now with regular DVDs. Digital downloads just aren't there - yet.

None of this is to say that digital distribution won't eventually kill Blu-ray and DVD just as in the music industry it is killing the CD - eventually it will. Steve Jobs knows it, even Bill Gates knows it, but we're not there yet.

Would Steve Jobs even want digital distribution to kill Blu-ray right now? After all he is the largest shareholder in Disney - a studio which has backed Blu-ray from the beginning and stands to make a lot of money off of selling their entire catalog on the new standard format. If he was trying to take out Blu-ray right now, Jobs could start by implementing something like a rent-to-own system that I laid out for iTunes in which you could rent a movie via your computer or Apple TV, and then if you like it, buy it minus the price you paid for it - that's not happening just yet.

Hollywood isn't stupid. Part of the reason why this format war is ending so quickly is that they all got together and realized that having one unified HD format is the only thing that was going to bring in the customers for all of them. Sure, they're allowing for digital distribution to start, but are putting a lot of restrictions on it (24-hour expiration periods, etc) - they know it's the future as well, but why not make a ton of money off of a new format (Blu-ray) rather than just go straight to digital?

Hollywood is in fact so smart that they're doing something I never thought they'd actually do when I wrote a post about it back in May: release DVDs (and presumably soon Blu-rays) with digital copies of films right on them for a user to utilize. Who wouldn't buy an HD version of a movie Blu-ray that came with an easy-to-transfer digital copy, rather than just the sub-HD digital copy itself? This will keep physical units moving.

So even though I've touted digital distribution as a potential Blu-ray/HD-DVD killer for a long time now, I now think Hollywood acted quickly enough to make Blu-ray a legitimate heir to the DVD. That doesn't meant digital distribution won't kill it eventually, but it's a few years farther down the road.

I wasn't even going to mention it because I consider HD-DVD to be completely dead now and there is no point in making those early-adopters of the format feel any worse, but quite a few people how now emailed me asking if I heard that Wal-Mart was deciding to back Blu-ray exclusively - yes, I did, fear not.

So for the sake of mentioning it for those who don't know yet, yes, Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer - and top seller of DVDs currently in the United States - is going to stop carrying HD-DVDs come June. Sam's Club will be making the transition as well. Not that it really matters who pulls out at this point because when Toshiba pulls the plug on the format in a few weeks, no one is going to be around making the discs or a large portion of the players soon anyway.

That summer window is about when I expect HD-DVD to formally cease to be - as in new releases will stop coming out on the format. Lets start guessing what the historic last release will be on HD-DVD. My money is on The Spiderwick Chronicles.

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that HD-DVDs main backer and parent Toshiba is expect to pull the plug on the format. Though nothing is official yet, "reliable industry sources" are saying this should happen in a matter of weeks.

This move has obviously been expected by me for a while (have I written about anything more often recently?) and was my Prediction #3 in the 2008 list. Though I wrote that I expected it to happen towards the end of the year, I did say that when and if Warner Brothers sided with Blu-ray it would be all but over. That, of course, was the catalyst that started this fall from grace back on January 4th.

Shortly thereafter Paramount was said to be wavering on their deal with HD-DVD - and though they wouldn't officially say they would trigger their opt-out clause, you got the feeling they were almost just waiting until they had sold all their HD-DVDs and had some Blu-rays to unleash. Next several retail chains began announcing they would stop selling the format and soon Blu-ray sales were said to be accounting for over 90% of the market - something which HD-DVD called a fluke.

Sony, the parent of Blu-ray, meanwhile got some good news about PS3 sales figures (which of course has a Blu-ray player built-in) and that they had a breakthrough in creating cheaper Blu-ray lasers which should drive prices down in 2008. In what I called their "last stand" the HD-DVD group decided to spend $3 million dollars on a Super Bowl ad - essentially trying to trick people into buying their newly very cheap HD-DVD players. Microsoft followed these price cuts by making their Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on next to free.

The final blows came last week when on the same day, Netflix decided to pull their HD-DVD support and Best Buy announced they would promote the Blu-ray format over HD-DVD. The HD-DVD group responded to this with news trying to be positive, but there it was very clear that this war was over.

Interestingly enough, Microsoft, HD-DVD's other main player isn't mentioned as being a part of this decision by Toshiba to pull the plug. Microsoft of course has the HD-DVD external player for the Xbox 360, but their support of the format is much deeper than that (even if they now downplay it).

The New York Times last year also called them "the most prominent technology company supporting HD-DVD". And as The Hollywood Reporter notes, when Paramount sided exclusively with HD-DVD last year, it was Microsoft that was sending out the PR to journalists around the country about the deal. Today saw a very different picture:

Several phone calls to Kevin Collins, Microsoft's normally accessible "HD DVD evangelist," were not returned.

Though Bill Gates all but gave the format a vote of no confidence in an interview at CES (right after the Warner Brothers announcement), he's no longer running the company. Whoever is might want to give Toshiba a call, if for nothing else to see when the service for friends and family is going to take place.

The HD-DVD Promotions Group issued a statement in response to yesterday's double-whammy that Netflix would back Blu-ray exclusively and that Best Buy would promote Blu-ray over HD-DVD in its stores - it's generic, bland, and a bit melancholy:

"We have long held the belief that HD DVD is the best format for consumers based on quality and value, and with more than 1 million HD DVD players on the market, it's unfortunate to see Netflix make the decision to only stock Blu-ray titles going forward. While the Best Buy announcement says they will recommend Blu-ray, at least they will continue to carry HD DVD and offer consumers a choice at retail."

You can help but feel that HD-DVD is just going through the motions now as it waits to die. This basically equates to "positive note, generic statement, positive note". Even they know they are no longer fooling anyone.

What I do find somewhat interesting is that HD-DVD labeled this turn of events as "unfortunate" in their response. You'll recall that yesterday Microsoft also called Yahoo's decision to reject their takeover offer "unfortunate". 'Unfortunate' is such a cop-out word - it's the 21st century's "disappointing" - why don't you tell us how you really feel guys?

I personally would love to see HD-DVD go out with a bang. Perhaps give some mean parting shots at all those who backed Blu-ray like "be careful what you wish for" or "enjoy your Sony overlords". Something, anything, but this bland death whimper.

On the same day that Netflix announces they are going to go Blu-ray exclusive, Best Buy has announced that they will now be recommending Blu-ray as the preferred format in all of their stores. This is a devastating tag team on HD-DVD. I'm starting to feel bad for them.

While Best Buy won't completely stop selling HD-DVDs at this point, don't be surprised if you find them on the bottom shelf of the last row of the DVD section, perhaps hidden behind boxes of labels and all turned around backwards.

Best Buy, like everyone else save Toshiba and perhaps Microsoft, clearly wants to move forward. Here is their COO on the matter:

"Best Buy has always believed that the customer will benefit from a widely accepted single format that would offer advantages such as product compatibility and expanded content choices. Because we believe that Blu-ray is fast emerging as that single format, we have decided to focus on Blu-ray products."

Poor HD-DVD. Not only is your Prom date not showing up, the Prom is over, the after-Prom is over, and your house is now on fire. It's time to move on.

More thoughts:

• HD-DVD Takes Baghdad Bob Route, Claims Blu-ray Sales Are a Fluke
  
• If HD-DVD Discs Don't Exist On Shelves, Do They Still Exist?
• Swan Song Continues: Xbox 360 HD-DVD Drive Discounted Down to $129 - As Low As $79 - Hell, They're Basically Paying You To Take It
  
• Sony Prepares Cheaper, Smaller Blu-ray Laser, Padded Room Prepared For HD-DVD
• Paramount to Support HD-DVD...Until Those Paramount Blu-ray Discs Are Ready to Sell
• HD-DVD and Blu-ray to Co-Exist Peacefully By 2012? I Say No Way.
  

In a move that probably couldn't be any less shocking, Netflix has decided it will only carry Blu-ray discs as their next generation format of choice going forward. As much as Toshiba and Microsoft want to hold out hope of a turn around, are they waiting until you can only find HD-DVDs in garage sales to officially relent and give the industry what it wants: one format?

Netflix is citing a "clear signal from the industry" as a reason for the exclusive backing of Blu-ray. I'm not sure if that "clear signal" is Blockbuster stores only carrying Blu-ray, Warner Brothers backing Blu-ray, Paramount supposedly backing out of HD-DVD to back Blu-ray, Bill Gates giving HD-DVD a vote of no confidence and word Microsoft could make a 360 add-on for Blu-ray, word that the PS3 is going to sell strongly this year - which of course has a built-in Blu-ray, multiple retailers pulling out of HD-DVD to back Blu-ray, recent sales figures that extremely favor Blu-ray...you get my point.

The only ones not seeing these "clear signals" is the HD-DVD group which continue to claim that everything is fine and Blu-ray sales are a fluke in a very Baghdad Bob approach to the situation - as they meanwhile make their players basically free (or better, pay you to take them).

You're just embarrassing yourself at this point HD-DVD, swallow your pride, take your dignity, and die.

More thoughts:

• Sony Prepares Cheaper, Smaller Blu-ray Laser, Padded Room Prepared For HD-DVD
• Paramount to Support HD-DVD...Until Those Paramount Blu-ray Discs Are Ready to Sell
  
• As Blu-ray Start Dominating, Sony Readies New PS3?
• HD-DVD and Blu-ray to Co-Exist Peacefully By 2012? I Say No Way.
• Blu-ray 2.0 Is Coming, Buy a PS3 and You're Already On Board
• The Year Ahead 2008: 17 Predictions
  

You can keep believing that HD-DVD isn't dying if you want to, but you need look no further than how quickly HD-DVD price-cuts are coming down the pipeline than to know things are getting pretty desperate. The latest one is yet another price cut for the HD-DVD add-on to the Xbox 360.

The new $50 price-cut brings the drive down to a nice $129 (still with the 5 free HD-DVDs), but as Engadget noted yesterday, Amazon was willing to even go further and discount the drive down to $79 - with 6 free HD-DVDs and free shipping - it not surprisingly sold out very quickly. Or maybe I should say 'surprisingly', because who would want to buy it now knowing that HD-DVD is dying? Sure it's a great deal for the movies that are out there on HD-DVD right now, but in the not-too-distant future there will be no more new releases on the format.

When you consider that 5 HD-DVD discs are probably going to run you about $125-$150 - you're basically getting this drive for free, or with the Engadget deal, they are paying you a substantial amount of money to take it. Still think HD-DVD is safe?

I predict a Blu-ray add-on for the 360 before the year is through.

While it's somewhat humorous to joke around with HD-DVD and their insistence that they haven't yet lost the next generation format war to Blu-ray despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, it's just kind of sad that they are going to spend nearly $3 million dollars for a 30-second ad during the Super Bowl. Despite their denials and spin, that is likely to be HD-DVDs true last stand.

But more so than the HD-DVD group, I feel really bad for the consumers out there who will see the advertisement promoting crazy low prices for HD-DVD players and think that the time is finally right to buy one. Having no idea about any of the recent Blu-ray news, quite a few will likely go to the store and come home with a new HD-DVD player and a multitude of discs - all of which will be obsolete in a few months time.

Just how bad are things for HD-DVD at this point? It's even being reported now that Microsoft held talks with the Blu-ray camp about creating a drive for the Xbox 360. Mirsosoft was of course one of the leading partners in the HD-DVD format. At least it seems they're being realistic.

I hope this $3 million dollar swan song by HD-DVD will at least be funny.

More thoughts:

• HD-DVD Takes Baghdad Bob Route, Claims Blu-ray Sales Are a Fluke
  
• If HD-DVD Discs Don't Exist On Shelves, Do They Still Exist?
• Sony Prepares Cheaper, Smaller Blu-ray Laser, Padded Room Prepared For HD-DVD
• As Blu-ray Start Dominating, Sony Readies New PS3?
• Paramount to Support HD-DVD...Until Those Paramount Blu-ray Discs Are Ready to Sell
• War Over? Warner Brothers Sides With Blu-ray
• HD-DVD and Blu-ray to Co-Exist Peacefully By 2012? I Say No Way.
  
• Bill Gates All But Gives HD-DVD a Vote of No Confidence

Finally the moment we've all been waiting so long for - we can now officially walk into a store and know which type of media to buy - if we're buying recordable DVDs that is - and if that's the case it looks like it now officially doesn't really matter, not that is has for the past several years anyway.

The DVD6C consortium has now added the "pluses" to its product list to go along with all those "minus" discs, thus rendering the plus/minus war that never really heated up that hot to begin with - a draw. This conclusion makes sense seeing as almost all DVD readers and writers now can handle both formats and have been able to for some time.

Quite a few people pointed me towards this longstanding war to try and sway me that the Blu-ray/HD-DVD war would end in an eventual stalemate. I didn't buy it because even though both involve optical discs, there is a fundamental difference in the primary usage of these discs and what the public is expecting from each. One is a recording format while the other is the next generation of high definition entertainment - which do you think the public is going to care more about?

Just imagine if Blu-ray/HD-DVD dragged on for a decade while public confusion and apprehension to choose a side remained. Naturally the hybrid players (that were already starting to come out) would have become large sellers, but it would take a lot longer for sales to reach a level they would be at if there was only one format for people to buy (which was at least part of the reason why Warner Brothers decided to pick a side and effectively end the war).

It's nice to see the 'pluses' and the 'minuses' set aside their differences and decide that neither is right and neither is wrong. Blu-ray and HD-DVD looks to have a much more decisive ending - soon.

All indications are that Blu-ray is now quickly destroying HD-DVD. HD-DVD of course won't admit as much, but the outcome has looked inevitable for weeks now, and consumers appear to be making it clear that they want this format war over. Sony may be preparing the actual final death blow right now - a new 160 GB Playstation 3.

Reports last week were that Sony was oddly discontinuing its high-end 80 GB PS3, leaving only the 40 GB one on the market. But Opposable Thumbs has a supposedly very reliable informant that claims Sony is killing off the 80 gig PS3 so that they can introduce a new high-end model at the same $499 price point that will feature either a 120 or 160 GB hard drive and the new Dual-Shock 3 controller. Sony would continue to sell the 40 GB PS3 for $399.

This would appear to make a lot of sense. The PS3 has supposedly been making some inroads against its main competitor, the Xbox 360, and this new unit would not only keep that trend going, it would likely bolster Blu-ray sales even further.

It might have been nice for Sony to take this proactive approach 13 months ago when I suggested it - rather than fall to 3rd place in a war they were once completely and utterly dominating in, but hey, Blu-ray rolled their way so not all ended up being lost apparently. Once Blu-ray vs. HD-DVD is over, PS3 vs. Xbox 360 could turn ugly. Wars beget wars.

More thoughts:

• Blu-ray 2.0 Is Coming, Buy a PS3 and You're Already On Board
• War Over? Warner Brothers Sides With Blu-ray
• Price Cut Helps PS3? Shocking.
• The $399 PS3 With Free Spider-Man 3 Blu-ray, Is Sony Finally Starting To Get It?
• Why Apple Is Smart and Sony Is Dumb (Price Cuts)
• PS3 Price Cut Is Temporary - Sony Is Laughably Stupid
• Who Would Have Guess, a PS3 Price-Cut
• Will Sony Finally Cut the PS3 Price?
• Sony Unofficially Admits Their Stupidity By Killing Off the 20 GB PS3
• PS3 vs. Xbox 360 Elite - It's All About Perception

If the Blu-ray group didn't have enough good news seeing as they are utterly dominating HD-DVD in sales recently (even though HD-DVD calls it a fluke), Sony has apparently been able to now shrink the all important Blu-ray laser. And guess what? This new tiny version is also cheaper than the previous models - meaning, yes, prices are going to be coming down even further.

This also means that it will now be much easier to create Blu-ray laptop drives - something which again, HD-DVD seemed to have an advantage in. Sony expects these new small lasers to be used in laptop drives this year.

According to Tech.co.uk: "Sony's new 3mm Blu-ray module will bring the high-def technology to the mainstream". That Blu-ray bandwagon is sure getting heavy right about now...

More news in the format war - if we can even still call it a "war", it's more like a format slaughter at this point - between Blu-ray and HD-DVD today. Toshiba, one of the main backers of HD-DVD, has come out and said that the NPD report from a few days ago that showed Blu-ray accounting for 92.5% of all HD player sales during the second week of January was a "fluke".

They claim that Blu-ray simply had heavy discounts and promotions during that specific time frame and that accounted for the huge surge in sales. Meanwhile they claim that their major price reduction one one popular HD-DVD player also happened to end that same week, causing its sales to go down.

Uh huh. Okay, sure that explanation no doubt contributed SOME to the Blu-ray's uptick in sales, but for an over 41% increase in sales? No way. HD-DVD is running the risk of sounding like Baghdad Bob at this point. "There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!" As the US tanks roll in behind him on camera...

That may be a question we will begin asking ourselves soon. Electronista is reporting that several retail chains will start pushing Blu-ray discs ahead of their HD-DVD counterparts in stores. This despite the major price-cuts HD-DVD has seen in recent weeks hoping to offset the growing belief that they have lost the format war. HD-DVD for now is still refusing to yield, and they may very well keep talking up their format until the last HD-DVD boxes are shipped back to them, unsold.

As if they needed any more writing on the wall, the early 2008 sales numbers are looking very bad for HD-DVD. The format apparently only accounted for only 15% of high-definition disc sales in early January and failed to land a single title on the best-sellers list - all were Blu-ray discs. Meanwhile the first Paramount Blu-ray discs are starting to pop up for pre-sale on Amazon beginning in March - this could be an error, but could just as likely be an indication of what I wrote a couple weeks ago: that Paramount would support HD-DVD...until those Blu-ray discs are ready to sell.

When 90% of HD-DVD sales come from the back of some dude's van is the HD-DVD camp still going to be holding firm?

ZDNet's George Ou has once again weighed in on the the lie that is HD quality over the Internet, and I'm glad he has because I remember his piece from last year and I wanted to write on it then but never got around to it.

This comes up again on the heels of Apple's announcement of "HD" movies available for rent on the Apple TV - as George makes clear, these should not be labeled "HD", nor should similar "HD" rentals from Microsoft via Xbox Live. Sure, their resolution is 1280x720 which is technically 720p HD quality, the problem is that their bit-rates are so low they barely crack the quality of standard DVDs.

As George notes:

Standard definition 480i DVD movies are typically 5 to 8 mbps (megabits per second) MPEG-2 whereas these so-called HD wannabes weigh in at a pathetic 1.5 to 4 mbps of 720p H.264.

While using a superior compression technology - in this case h.264 rather than MPEG-2 - will help hide artifact problems a bit, when iTunes Movie Rentals' bit-rates are 4 Mbps while Blu-ray meanwhile has a bit-rate of 40 Mbps, there is clearly going to be a huge difference. "HD" video over directly over the web is even much worse, at only 1.5 Mbps - again, standard DVDs have a bit-rate of around 8 Mbps.

George thinks the public rhetoric about these "HD" services will fool people for a while, but when cheap, nice quality large screen 1080p televisions start hitting stores this year and more people start getting them, they should begin to notice the difference based on what formats they are watching. I have a 1080p television right now, and I know I can barely tell the difference between standard DVDs played on it versus "HD" downloads via Xbox Live. That is exactly why I still plan on getting a Blu-ray player on top of an Apple TV.

The "HD" label shouldn't just be about the resolution - it's about the bit-rate too. I know that I had no idea about that before reading George's original article even though I could definitely see with my own eyes something was up with regards to the more compressed formats. Maybe Microsoft and Apple should re-brand their "HD" as "Enhanced Definition" just as some below hi-def standard televisions used to have to do. It's going to be a long while before we have true HD video delivered over the Internet.

Even when it began looking bleak for the HD-DVD format months ago, many were quick to point out that it was still the more mature format in terms of digital extras (such as Internet-based special features). HD-DVD themselves have been pointing this out in advertisements on certain DVDs for months now. So when Warner Brothers sided with Blu-ray it looked to some that the weaker format may somehow win again (just as VHS beat Betamax in the 1980s); but now it looks like Blu-ray is finally getting close to offering the same functionality as the HD-DVD players with its 2.0 spec, and though the public may be largely clueless still as to what that means, it could very well be the final proverbial nail in the coffin for HD-DVD.

While just about everyone now agrees that Blu-ray is going to win the format war, a lot has been written about it not making sense to buy a player yet as they won't work with the future "BD-Live" Blu-ray discs (those that match the bonus content functionality of HD-DVD). But it appears now that technically the Blu-ray player that most people own - the Playstation 3 (which accounts for 3 million of the 3.5 million Blu-ray players sold) - will be upgradable to the Blu-ray 2.0 spec when it becomes available. Now as soon as regular Blu-ray players start shipping with this 2.0 compatibility (for those who still don't feel comfortable or understand buying a videogame system as their main movie player), there should be nothing to stop the Blu-ray format going forward.

While I've really liked my Xbox 360, with news that the Playstation 3 will be upgradeable to the Blu-ray 2.0 spec, I have almost no doubt that I will be trading in the 360 for a PS3 at some point this year - Microsoft simply backed the wrong format and I'd prefer not to have a half-dozen different set-top boxes on my home entertainment stand. In the future history may show that the PS3 was in fact saved by Blu-ray, rather than it being the other way around as many had initially thought.

More thoughts:

• The Console Wars Have Spread to HD-DVD vs. Blu-ray
• Where Are All the Back-Catalog HD-DVD and Blu-ray Discs?
• HD-DVD and Blu-ray To Peacefully Co-exist by 2012? I Say No Way.
• Bill Gates All But Gives HD-DVD A Vote Of No Confidence
  

While I already addressed this possibility in my post about Paramount being the latest to jump from the HD-DVD ship, I felt a new post was in order for all these rumors going back and forth about Paramount - which of course came out today and said it was still supporting HD-DVD. Think about it - Paramount currently ONLY has HD-DVDs on the market (unlike the other recent Blu-ray defector, Warner Brothers, which has both formats on the market), would it make any sense for them to announce they were ceasing to support these discs months before they are able to get the new format in stores on a massive scale? No.

We already know that Warner Brothers isn't technically pulling out of HD-DVD until May 2008, and it's certainly possibly that Paramount would be looking at the same early-summer timeframe for a switch. Aside from the production issues, who knows, there could well be terms in their opt-out clause requiring that they give a few months notice to HD-DVD before such a move. While it would be nice for them to let the consumer know what they are going to do in a few months, it would also mean basically no next-gen movie sales for possibly 6 months.

While it's certainly not impossible that Paramount would stick with HD-DVD it seems pretty unlikely given that their contract had a specific out clause in case Warners went to Blu-ray (which of course happened). So unless Toshiba and Microsoft decided to pony up a lot more money (which it didn't appear Bill Gates was ready to do given his basic vote of no confidence for HD-DVD the other day), I cannot see why Paramount would stay with HD-DVD, they are just prolonging the inevitable and holding up the rest of the industry with them.

3 days ago upon hearing that Warner Brothers was siding with Blu-ray, I wrote:

"When Paramount - one of the two big guns of the majors signed on to an exclusive deal with HD-DVD - sees this, expect them to start looking into ways of getting out of their deal"

And today we find that very prediction could be materializing. The Financial Times is reporting that Paramount is "poised to drop its support of HD-DVD" by utilizing an opt-out clause that was built-in to their exclusivity deal with HD-DVD in the event that Warner Brothers went to Blu-ray. This reminds me of a star athlete signing a deal with a team and having the opt-out clause if they feel the team isn't doing everything in its power to stay competitive.

While Warner Brothers going to Blu-ray was a major blow to HD-DVD likely signaling the eventual end of the war by the end of this year - Paramount now doing the same thing would be a much quicker fatal blow with HD-DVD possibly even ceasing to exist as early as May 2008 when Warner Brothers stops making HD-DVDs.

The story also notes that HD-DVD's now apparently lone gunman, Universal, declined to comment on their situation - but as I said in my previous post, if everyone else is on board, you can be sure they won't be left behind.

Nice knowing you HD-DVD.


[UPDATE]: Multiple reports are coming in with Paramount denying they are jumping from HD-DVD's sinking ship. I can't help but wonder if this is simply to sell some more HD-DVDs until they are ready to make the switch probably sometime in the summer (you'll recall Warner Bros. won't stop supporting HD-DVD until May).

If you only currently had one format on the market would you announce you were stopping support of that format before the other one is ready to sell? Probably not.

More thoughts:

• HD-DVD and Blu-ray To Coexist Peacefully By 2012? I Say No Way.
• Paramount and Dreamworks Pick HD-DVD, But Spielberg Refuses To Do the Same
• Blu-ray/HD-DVD War To Heat Up Even More: Apple Entering the Fray?
• Does Warner Brothers Know Somthing About a MacWorld Blu-ray Announcement?
• The Console Wars Have Spread To HD-DVD Vs. Blu-ray
• Bill Gates All But Gives HD-DVD A Vote Of No Confidence