Adam Tyner

Excerpts from an article in Variety:

matome

Sounds good to me

pinata242

I only buy BD anymore and this only helps the format grow, so I'm on board. However, I don't want these exclusive windows to be extra justification for inflating MSRP.

stingermck

Thats what im talking about!

sauce07

Now it's time for Fox to announce that their BD's will be coming out 3 weeks after the DVD, like they did with DVD and VHS back in the day.

cpgator

I see this as a way to really tick of the majority of their customers.

Gizmo

Aside from Dance Flick being a film no one cares about...

I hope they don't inflate the 'sale' price just because its the only version available. Other then that, cool. At this point, I don't even care anymore. Let the studios do what they want to do because they will either make the format a success or throw it into niche. Regular consumers and retailers won't be happy by this move "where is the DVD?".

Wolf359

And chris_sc77!!

Gizmo

It's only 83 minutes long, he won't be buying it.

dx23

Do the studios think that there is someone so anxious about getting a film like Dance Flick on home video that they are going to spend money in getting a Blu-ray player and getting this shitty film on BD before it comes on DVD? And they wonder why they are "losing" money.

We are in an economic recession and people will wait 8 more weeks for a DVD. If the also inflate the prices of the early BD releases, people will wait on that too until the prices come down. Unless the film is a huge blockbuster like The Dark Knight, people will be willing to wait rather than to buy this form of entertainment at a higher price.

islandclaws

I'm ok with anything that gets people to buy BD.

However, that being said, Dance Flick isn't exactly going to assist in the push. They need to do this with a MAJOR title to get some real results. Something like Star Trek or TF2.

Gizmo

I think retailers would throw a fit.

pinata242

Disney is doing Snow White. They should do this for Up.

Qui Gon Jim

I agree completely. This will make matters more complicated for retailers, and I suspect will not help bring lower pricing to the format, but will give studios an excuse to charge premium prices for early release.

Blu Man

Honestly, I don't care whether we get some BD's early or not. If it help's the format grow, great, but it really does nothing for me.

Michael Corvin

How is this complicated? It seems like a great* way for the studios to reintroduce rental windows that were prevalent on VHS.

Also, I doubt there will be much debate here since we all own BD players. A more lively debate would happen if this were in the DVD forum.

*great for them, not consumers

orangerunner

They scrapped the rental window model with DVD because they realized they could sell a lot more copies of a title at a retail-friendly price than at the $100 rental price.

The studios have the best of both worlds. They still make their money from the rental stores as well as all the additional revenue from the retail consumers.

There may come a day when they offer smaller films (The Wrestler, The Reader etc.) as rental only but the blockerbusters will always be sold at retail.

Everyone on the HD forum wants to see better prices, more titles and a widespread adoption of the format. The studios are taking a gamble with pushing Blu-ray so aggressively while degrading the DVD with fewer add-ons and a more lengthly release date.

Think about it, if consumers are turned off by this approach, Blu-ray may become a niche item which will mean prices will stay where they are and you'll probably see less catalogue titles.

Be careful what you wish for...

Gizmo

Snow White includes a DVD copy so they can still technically say a DVD version is available.

pinata242

Any reason to think that won't be the case for Up? I haven't kept... up...

rfduncan

But you see this "delay" can actually benefit the rental outlets. Titles that people may have just purchased when they were out of stock at the local video store will simply HAVE to wait until the title becomes available. Which may backfire for the studios as the "blind buys" may dry up...

Gizmo

It'll include a DVD and Digital Copy. Disney will be so with every kids film they release (Day and Dates...not sure on catalog stuff).

Giles

jiggawhat

Funny thing is that this worked for DVD and it affected retailers in the beginning but they got over it for obvious reasons.

jrsl76

Yeah, I own a BD player, but I still think this is a shitty thing to do to people with DVD players.

orangerunner

Not that I claim to be a marketing whiz but when the studios start potentially alienating 90% of their home video consumer base for the sake of pushing a newer format to quickly recoup their investment, they may want to rethink it.