Warner sides with Blu-ray in HD format war :: Film & TV News :: Articles

Warner Bros. issued a press release Friday saying that, beginning in May, the company would only be supporting Blu-ray discs in the ongoing HD format war. According to Warner's Chairman and CEO Barry Meyer, “Warner Bros.’ move to exclusively release in the Blu-ray disc format is a strategic decision focused on the long term and the most direct way to give consumers what they want. The window of opportunity for high-definition DVD could be missed if format confusion continues to linger. We believe that exclusively distributing in Blu-ray will further the potential for mass market success and ultimately benefit retailers, producers, and most importantly, consumers."

This has huge implications, since Warner is currently the largest producer of DVD in the world and has up until now been producing for both formats, seemingly in the hopes of finding out which would be the eventual winner before committing. Blu-ray discs hold more data, ultimately giving them better video quality if compressed correctly, while HD-DVD's have been defended as easier to produce and a cheaper alternative for consumers. While Warner claims that "consumers have clearly chosen Blu-ray," which is somewhat supported considering that Blu-Ray disc sales are higher than HD-DVD, the latter's player sales are much higher and disc sales have been increasing steadily. On the flip side, Blu-ray players are built into every single PS3, even if polls have shown that a majority of consumers fail to realize this.

Already the effects of this sea change have started, with Warner subsidary New Line announcing that they, too, would start producing only Blu-ray discs. Almost before the formats were even released, seven out of the eight largest film studios (Disney, Fox, Warner, Paramount, Sony, Lionsgate and MGM) supported Blu-ray, with Disney, Fox, Sony, Lionsgate and MGM exclusively on the format. Adding Warner to that list leaves only Universal (and subsidaries Focus and Rogue), Paramount (including Vantage, MTV and Dreamworks) and the Weinstein company. Warner, in fact, initially supported just HD-DVD, but that clearly hasn't lasted long.

The HD-DVD group cancelled its press conference at Consumer Electronics Show in light of the announcement, stating, "Based on the timing of the Warner Home Video announcement today, we have decided to postpone our CES 2008 press conference scheduled for Sunday, January 6th at 8:30 p.m. in the Wynn Hotel. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. We are currently discussing the potential impact of this announcement with the other HD DVD partner companies and evaluating next steps."

The other winner of this announcement, as mentioned above, is the PS3, which has somewhat hinged on the success of the format from the beginning. Its competitor, the XBox 360, can support an HD-DVD add-on, but this optical drive is one of the main features that separates the two machines. In fact, there were rumors that the "ultimate" version of the XBox 360 would be announced at CES, with a built-in HD-DVD.

Of course, while all the hubbub has been focused on the HD format wars, both sides seem to forget, or perhaps ignore, that while they're working on their discs, new methods of digital distribution are coming out and seem just as likely to succeed the DVD as the primary format. Netflix issued a press release last week about the development of a set-top box for digital download (long rumored to be in production), while Apple TV, Movielink and, strangely enough, Xbox Live, have all also been working on similar efforts to displace physical formats for film distribution. As of this moment, it's impossible to predict how we'll be watching films at home even five years from now.

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