Agreed, but I guess I don't understand the significance, particularly when the second article projects out that spending on Blu-ray will be about triple what is spent on all VOD in 2008.

I'd thought it'd be more since a BR movie usually costs more than 3 times what a VOD does unless VOD is much more popular than I thought.

it's hard to say what they're including in their VOD number. do they include all netflix subscriptions since "Watch It Now" service is included at no extra charge? do they include other subscription fees that may include no-extra-charge VOD, such as some Cable accounts?

Ok. Thanky. I'll be looking forward to getting a few of these on Blu. :up:

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c2...-ray-stats.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c2...ay-stats-2.jpg

Good week of sales but it was expected due to the release of Batman Begins. Still not bad at all.

It appears The Dark Knight is going to break Spidey 3's opening weekend record and earn over $157 million. No doubt this is the title the industry is going to look at as being the title that starts to get mainstream attention.

Start selling PS3's at $299 or stand alones at $199 and you will see solid growth. Sell the BR stand alone players at $99 and you will see massive growth. It is as simple as that.

While this strategy might do better for BD in 2008 with more studios, the strategy failed for HD DVD in 2007.

The problem was that the $99 price-point for HD DVD was only available for a short window, then the prices went right back up again. People said, "I'll wait for the next $99 sale", which never came.

A permanent price drop on BD SAPs might be the impetus the format needs, especially in the crucial 4th quarter.

CE's are not going to make money on $99 players this soon.

Also, the entry level HD DVD player was still consistently under $200 for months before the format's demise. $200 is was called the "sweet spot" by many. It didn't help.

The content has to be there, and at a good price. $100 players are fine, but when the movies still cost $30, adoption is not going to skyrocket.

Totally agree with you. It's going to take great content like Dark Knight for people to realize that I want this film in the best available quality to jump into blu-ray. I have a couple of friends ready to jump to Blu-ray but they are waiting for Iron Man and Dark Knight to come out before they buy into it.

Dark Knight : Blu-ray

as

Matrix : DVD

?

Possibly, but I don't get the mentality of waiting on a particular title to get in. You'd think that those interested in TDK would want Batman Begins, which is already available. (Spare the bitrate comments, as the average consumer isn't aware of this.)

TDK better look great on Blu, then. Because I don't wanna read a shitload of justifications on this forum about "Yeah, but the overwhelming grain--which makes my Blu-ray movie look like an upsampled DVD--is supposed to be there! Those HD Noobs!"

It better look damn good, or it's going to be hard to justify a mass-adoption scenario. Batman Begins looked great on HD DVD (and I'm assuming on Blu as well), so hopefully nothing will change.

If it's anything close the the Imax prologue, it should be great.

Sounds good. I can add it to the top of my list when I get my Blu-ray player later this year.

Agreed. I think that BD players are now in an accessible price range (another $100 drop across the board wouldn't hurt). It is now the price of the software that needas to come down to more of a mass-appeal level.

Blu-rays biggest % yet, but considering the only new things on DVD were Batman Gotham Knight and Stop-Loss...its no big surprise.

That's still a fairly large leap. I would have expected like 9% not 12.

07/20/2008 numbers released:

HomeMediaMagazine

Blu-ray sales DOWN 9.58% over previous week to $7.61 Million.....8% of Top 20 vs. DVD Top 20.

DVD was DOWN also, losing 2.66% over previous week.

Blu-ray 'Transforms' the Charts

"Last week will go down in history as Blu-ray Disc’s coming-of-age party. Paramount/DreamWorks’ two-disc special edition of a catalog title, Transformers, debuted at No. 3 on the national sales chart, primarily because of strong sales on Blu-ray Disc.

Indeed, more than two-thirds of the first-week sales total was generated by the Blu-ray Disc version, according to Nielsen VideoScan First Alert data. Transformers was initially released a year ago on DVD and HD DVD only.

Not surprisingly Transformers also topped the Blu-ray Disc First Alert sales chart for the week ended Sept. 7, with the second-ranked Blu-ray Disc seller, Walt Disney Studios’ The Nightmare Before Christmas, moving just 13% as many units as Transformers its sophomore week in stores."

http://www.homemediamagazine.com/new...ticle_ID=13482

So how many copies did it sell?

And is it #3 because of the BD or the re-release of the DVD as well (combining all those numbers into one general SKU)?

Transformers was the third best selling title last week. The BD was responsible for 2/3 of that amount, which put it at #3 on the national chart. I'd say it moved a good amount.

Gotcha. Not all too surprising since the only other things that came out that day on DVD were TV on DVD shows like Office, Desperate Housewives and Supernatural. Curious to see how many units it moved, but I doubt we'll be privy to that information.