July 5, 2007 2:41 PM PDT

Pie charts indicate Blu-ray victory over HD DVD assured

Posted by David Carnoy

A taste of humble pie for HD DVD?

(Credit: Pixel Perfect Productions)

If a picture's worth a thousand words, a pie chart has to be worth at least 500. Well, Ken Pierce over at Pixel Perfect Productions has cooked up five pie charts' worth of data on why the HD DVD/Blu-ray war is over--and as James Carville would say, it's all about the content, stupid.

To give credit where credit is due, I first noticed this link in Bill Hunt's "My Two Cents" column on Digital Bits. (Sorry, the item was from a couple of days ago, but I've been on vacation). Says Hunt: "Ken's looked at the biggest films of the last few years and calculated the percentages of those films, by studio grosses, that are available for release on each format. It's called By The Numbers, and you'll find it in Ken's Random Thoughts blog over at the Pixel Perfect Web site."

Pierce goes through the top grossing films of 2005, 2006, 2007 (so far), as well as the top 100 grossing films of all time. For 2007, for example, he says, "Of the top 100 2007 (YTD) films, 47 are from Blu-ray exclusive studios, 14 are HD DVD exclusive studios, 29 are dual-format studios and 10 are not supporting either format currently." The rest of the pies look pretty similar. I don't care who wins, but those charts have to be pretty scary-looking if you're an HD DVD supporter.

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Add a Comment (Log in or register) 70 comments (Page 1 of 7)
What did I say? Storage Size is the KEY!
by QuietStormX July 6, 2007 1:28 PM PDT
When I heard the pundants argue about this I said to myself after reading all the documents and specs. The DVD-HD people talked about how cheap it would be to produce the disc. The Blu-ray people trumpeted the Storage capacity now and in the future on a Disc. As would anyone know, storage capacity and security are the issue and HD-DVD is still left with talking about what might happen in the future. So HD-DVD is eating dust, like I said from the beginning Storage capacity wins out!
Reply to this comment
What did I say? Storage Size is the KEY!
by QuietStormX July 6, 2007 1:28 PM PDT
When I heard the pundants argue about this I said to myself after reading all the documents and specs. The DVD-HD people talked about how cheap it would be to produce the disc. The Blu-ray people trumpeted the Storage capacity now and in the future on a Disc. As would anyone know, storage capacity and security are the issue and HD-DVD is still left with talking about what might happen in the future. So HD-DVD is eating dust, like I said from the beginning Storage capacity wins out!
Reply to this comment
What do these mean?
by cdharris July 6, 2007 2:28 PM PDT
I think these charts are somewhat misleading. At first glance, they appear to compare sales of Blu-ray and HD-DVD disks. However, on closer examination of the text and the article in the link, they are only comparing the gross ticket sales of the movies which are available on the competing formats. Perhaps this is an indicator of what ultimate HD disk sales will result, or perhaps not. One of the biggest areas of DVD sales is in television programs, which are not reflected in these charts in any way. Is there a chart with the actual sales comparisons of Blu-ray and HD-DVD disks? What about the Blu-ray or HD-DVD units themselves? If HD-DVD gets a head start on Blu-ray, the studios not currently supporting it will have to jump on board.
Reply to this comment
What do these mean?
by cdharris July 6, 2007 2:28 PM PDT
I think these charts are somewhat misleading. At first glance, they appear to compare sales of Blu-ray and HD-DVD disks. However, on closer examination of the text and the article in the link, they are only comparing the gross ticket sales of the movies which are available on the competing formats. Perhaps this is an indicator of what ultimate HD disk sales will result, or perhaps not. One of the biggest areas of DVD sales is in television programs, which are not reflected in these charts in any way. Is there a chart with the actual sales comparisons of Blu-ray and HD-DVD disks? What about the Blu-ray or HD-DVD units themselves? If HD-DVD gets a head start on Blu-ray, the studios not currently supporting it will have to jump on board.
Reply to this comment
Blue Ray Victory or Multi-format Future?
by Starfires July 6, 2007 3:21 PM PDT
I admit that at first the wide support it enjoyed and it's capacity had ensured Blue-Ray's dominance. Then, when I saw how well the HD-DVD players were selling I wondered if it's cheapness to produce and pretty much equivalent capacity (for the main movie) had won the day. Now it seems that the decisions of studios and more recently by Blockbusters are having an effect- despite all the HD-DVD players out there, which leads me to suppose that... neither will in fact die, soon cheaper dual format players will thrive, but high-def downloads that can be played more easily are the future. A dual format player is a natural progression here, as they are both on disks, it just needs both lasers.
Reply to this comment
Blue Ray Victory or Multi-format Future?
by Starfires July 6, 2007 3:21 PM PDT
I admit that at first the wide support it enjoyed and it's capacity had ensured Blue-Ray's dominance. Then, when I saw how well the HD-DVD players were selling I wondered if it's cheapness to produce and pretty much equivalent capacity (for the main movie) had won the day. Now it seems that the decisions of studios and more recently by Blockbusters are having an effect- despite all the HD-DVD players out there, which leads me to suppose that... neither will in fact die, soon cheaper dual format players will thrive, but high-def downloads that can be played more easily are the future. A dual format player is a natural progression here, as they are both on disks, it just needs both lasers.
Reply to this comment
How's that Sony Yacht David?
by degenerazn July 6, 2007 11:21 PM PDT
Again David Carnoy strikes with his Blu Ray fanboy rant. You say your neutral (which you should be if you want to be a respected journalist) and you don't care which format wins, but reading through all your articles, it doesn't take a genius to figure out just how UNneutral you are. Can someone else in Cnet please take over reporting the news on the format war. Reading articles like these make me wanna vomit.
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How's that Sony Yacht David?
by degenerazn July 6, 2007 11:21 PM PDT
Again David Carnoy strikes with his Blu Ray fanboy rant. You say your neutral (which you should be if you want to be a respected journalist) and you don't care which format wins, but reading through all your articles, it doesn't take a genius to figure out just how UNneutral you are. Can someone else in Cnet please take over reporting the news on the format war. Reading articles like these make me wanna vomit.
Reply to this comment
This is useless information!!!
by nvisionmd July 7, 2007 2:45 PM PDT
I just read this article and was completely blown away at the niavity of the writer. First and formeost, this is entirely speculative information as there is no way someone can say that because the movies did so well at the box office that it will also perform as well on the home market. Also lets look at the last few years in movie studios. Seems like Sony has planned this out from the very beginning, acquiring movie house after movie house. Why? (and this is speculative by myself) Sony already knew that the war was imminent therefore by buying up all the studios ensuring that they could close the doors on Toshiba and HD-DVD. If i remember back a few years, Microsoft was shot down as trying to monopolise the computer industry by doing just was Sony is doing today. Why is it all right for Sony to get away with it but not Microsoft? Next, i'm all for more storage myself and admit that the current formats show Blu-ray as higher capacity by 15GB nonetheless. If so then why are we constantly seeing movie releases without any extra content? With all that storage i would figure that all the special feature, commentaries, audio tracks would be present. NOT. So tell me what good 50GB is? At least on the HD-DVD side of things we're seeing loads of features, extras, etc... on almost 100% of HD-DVD's? Finally, lets look at Blockbuster fiasco. For starters, blockbuster has carried BOTH formats now for almost a year in 293 stores throughout the U.S. Those stores must keep there rental and sales agreements with HD-DVD regardless of the Blu-ray deal. Also note that withing the last 6 months, Blockbuster has closed more than 250 stores in the U.S.. Oh yeah, and just last week they released a statement in which they plan to close an additional 232 stores by this years end. Well that can't possibly be a good thing for either formats but shows you at what level of desperation the Blu-ray camp is actually in. On a final note i'd just like to state my belief in the Blockbuster Conspiracy as i see it. Sony owns 6-8 of the major movie houses. Blockbuster inventory is comprised of close to 69% of movies made by these Sony affiliated studios. So lets say that Sony wants Blu-ray domination, if i were Sony i would approach BB and basically force them to choose Blu-ray over HD-DVD or else! Or else what you ask? Or else the cost of any future titles you buy from us will be at this new HIGHER price. OR you can stock Blu-ray and we'll cut you in. Let everyone think that one over. Neil
Reply to this comment
This is useless information!!!
by nvisionmd July 7, 2007 2:45 PM PDT
I just read this article and was completely blown away at the niavity of the writer. First and formeost, this is entirely speculative information as there is no way someone can say that because the movies did so well at the box office that it will also perform as well on the home market. Also lets look at the last few years in movie studios. Seems like Sony has planned this out from the very beginning, acquiring movie house after movie house. Why? (and this is speculative by myself) Sony already knew that the war was imminent therefore by buying up all the studios ensuring that they could close the doors on Toshiba and HD-DVD. If i remember back a few years, Microsoft was shot down as trying to monopolise the computer industry by doing just was Sony is doing today. Why is it all right for Sony to get away with it but not Microsoft? Next, i'm all for more storage myself and admit that the current formats show Blu-ray as higher capacity by 15GB nonetheless. If so then why are we constantly seeing movie releases without any extra content? With all that storage i would figure that all the special feature, commentaries, audio tracks would be present. NOT. So tell me what good 50GB is? At least on the HD-DVD side of things we're seeing loads of features, extras, etc... on almost 100% of HD-DVD's? Finally, lets look at Blockbuster fiasco. For starters, blockbuster has carried BOTH formats now for almost a year in 293 stores throughout the U.S. Those stores must keep there rental and sales agreements with HD-DVD regardless of the Blu-ray deal. Also note that withing the last 6 months, Blockbuster has closed more than 250 stores in the U.S.. Oh yeah, and just last week they released a statement in which they plan to close an additional 232 stores by this years end. Well that can't possibly be a good thing for either formats but shows you at what level of desperation the Blu-ray camp is actually in. On a final note i'd just like to state my belief in the Blockbuster Conspiracy as i see it. Sony owns 6-8 of the major movie houses. Blockbuster inventory is comprised of close to 69% of movies made by these Sony affiliated studios. So lets say that Sony wants Blu-ray domination, if i were Sony i would approach BB and basically force them to choose Blu-ray over HD-DVD or else! Or else what you ask? Or else the cost of any future titles you buy from us will be at this new HIGHER price. OR you can stock Blu-ray and we'll cut you in. Let everyone think that one over. Neil
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