Blu-ray Prices Go In The Wrong Direction (For Now)
from the wait-and-see dept
Gizmodo points us to the news that it appears Blu-ray DVD player prices have gone up, rather than down, in the wake of finally winning the standards battle with HD DVD. Of course, the immediate finger pointing is to the fact that it no longer needs to compete with the cheaper HD DVD players (and certainly that new HD VMD thing isn't serious competition). However, it seems unlikely that this price hike will last very long. As more movies come out on Blu-ray and competition heats up between the makers of Blu-ray players, price drops are inevitable. Besides, given the growing (if still quite weak) efforts to deliver movies online, Blu-ray isn't completely free and clear of competition. Besides, as the Tom's Hardware article makes clear, buying a standalone Blu-ray box these days doesn't make much sense, as the standard is about to be upgraded, and most of the players on the market today won't be upgradeable.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Filed Under: blu-ray, competition, prices
Reader Comments
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What article?
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Er. There is a link...
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No way Blu-Ray
I don't know how they won this format war in the face of $150 HD-DVD players. It confounds me.
I will gladly watch plain old DVDs on my set until Blu-Ray players go under $200. You can see the difference but its nothing like the difference between broadcast tv and hd.
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I told you so..
I hate, hate, hate stupid Sony. They can go to hell. Oh, and now blu-ray can ride there with them.
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Am I the only one...
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Not enough difference
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Blu-Ray != Sony. Sony is just one member of a larger organization in charge of the Blu-Ray standard.
NewEgg is currently carrying BD players made by Samsung, Sharp, Philips and Panasonic (not including the PS3)
I'm still trying to figure out what all this has to do with Sony. I'm also trying to figure out why Blu-Ray is suddenly a monopoly when there are at least 5 companies making players. The market is still competitive and prices will come down.
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I do, however, refuse to buy blue-ray discs as they are still too expensive for my budget. Thankfully, netflix carries blue-ray discs, so I have begun to add them to my queue.
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b)yep, DRM.....and region coding.....NO REGION CODING!!! ARGH
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This is a common misconception. While the others have *some* input into the standard, Sony owns the core patents to Blu-Ray, and therefore has the ultimate control over it.
The others are parties to no more than a marketing agreement.
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