Should faster download speed kill Hi-Def optical media?

[dighn]

Originally posted by: baronzemo78
Someday maybe, but with the current infrastructure and the horrible DRM that I'm sure will accompany digital downloads I wouldn't hold my breath for it. I give Blu Ray at least a 10 yr life cycle.

Agreed. It'll happen, but I just don't believe the infrastructure will support it on a large scale anytime soon. It'll be a niche market compared to physical media for quite a while (at least in technology terms). Maybe in 5 - 10 years it'll be commonplace.

 

[BigJ]

Originally posted by: Wuzup101

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: sdifox
I prefer physical media, download is not efficient.

Even if you could get it within minutes or view while streaming in the background?
I think many people believe the internet we have today is the internet we will have tomorrow. A decade ago 640kbps DSL was a luxury item. Now most cable companies have a base of 3Mbps with tiers running near 50Mbps. A decade from now have a large base of people on a 100Mbps line wont be surprising.

I don't mean just for me... I meant overall. stamping out dvds is a hell lot cheaper than a whole bunch of people streaming.

Yes, but downloading/streaming is a hell of a lot more convenient for the vast majority of the market (assuming we get internet speeds that support it). You don't think that everything in our society is based on efficiency do you? I agree that optical media isn't going to simply disappear (even CDs are still very popular despite the success of mp3 downloads and such). However, a box that sat under your home theater TV and allowed you to "rent" movies by streaming them would likely be adopted by a large part of the market. I'm not talking about an iTunes like service that allows you to "buy" a movie. I'm talking a "rental" service like Netflix or Blockbuster that allows the user to view content on demand.

I'm a fan of HD media, and like I said in my original post, I will own it for years to come. However, if a "rental" service that offers streaming content for a reasonable price comes along, I will be all over it. That is a HUGE convenience boost over the current services. Just imagine... being able to simply click on the movie you want to watch and have it sent right to your TV... no waiting for mailings... no having to drive to the store... and no having to deal with the wait times associated with "out of stock" titles. In such a case, the only BR/HD-DVD discs that I would be willing to purchase would be the ones that I wanted to watch in the absolute highest quality (assuming the downloads would be subject to more compression and thus they would be of lesser quality). How much would you pay for a service that allowed you unlimited movie watching? A BR new release is already going to cost you $25+... I would be willing to pay more for the convenience (and added amount of viewing) over a mail order system like Netflix (where I am likely to get only 12 rentals per month due to throttling even if I send them in the next day). Could they do this for $30-40 a month... perhaps... at $30 I would be hard pressed to turn it down. For people that don't watch that many movies... all they would need to do is come up with a price per movie that was competitive with normal rentals.

In any case, the advantage of this type of system isn't to download and keep the movies (the way you would download and keep mp3s from iTunes or whatnot). The point would be to offer on-demand rentals... With a large catalogue, this service could be HUGE if done right.

For the record, public transportation is MUCH more efficient (in many respects) than owning a car. Apparently some people still own cars... I don't know why...

You do realize they already have exactly what you're talking about. It's called "On Demand." It's not HD yet around here, but you can absolutely rent a movie like that.

Oh yea, and before they had on demand, they had a little something called Pay-Per-View. Maybe you've heard of it? Not exactly on demand, but then again you didnt have to go out for rentals or anything like that.

If people don't use On Demand, I don't see why they would all of a sudden use it to rent HD movies.

 

[tvarad]

I really think that the concept of a movie will be passe once fat pipes become ubiquitous. It has been popular so far simply because of the limitations placed on the distribution channel (first it was just movie houses, then home-viewing). Much like the VCR and then DVD's changed the way we watched movies, fat pipes will change what we will be watching in the future. But as I type this on a 1080P 46" LCD TV that's bringing in the likes of Youtube, I cannot help but think that a revolution is on it's way. I wish I knew what the end result is, but if I did, I'll probably be in Silicon Valley raising a few millions for a new venture -)).

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: Wuzup101

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: sdifox
I prefer physical media, download is not efficient.

Even if you could get it within minutes or view while streaming in the background?
I think many people believe the internet we have today is the internet we will have tomorrow. A decade ago 640kbps DSL was a luxury item. Now most cable companies have a base of 3Mbps with tiers running near 50Mbps. A decade from now have a large base of people on a 100Mbps line wont be surprising.

I don't mean just for me... I meant overall. stamping out dvds is a hell lot cheaper than a whole bunch of people streaming.

Yes, but downloading/streaming is a hell of a lot more convenient for the vast majority of the market (assuming we get internet speeds that support it). You don't think that everything in our society is based on efficiency do you? I agree that optical media isn't going to simply disappear (even CDs are still very popular despite the success of mp3 downloads and such). However, a box that sat under your home theater TV and allowed you to "rent" movies by streaming them would likely be adopted by a large part of the market. I'm not talking about an iTunes like service that allows you to "buy" a movie. I'm talking a "rental" service like Netflix or Blockbuster that allows the user to view content on demand.

I'm a fan of HD media, and like I said in my original post, I will own it for years to come. However, if a "rental" service that offers streaming content for a reasonable price comes along, I will be all over it. That is a HUGE convenience boost over the current services. Just imagine... being able to simply click on the movie you want to watch and have it sent right to your TV... no waiting for mailings... no having to drive to the store... and no having to deal with the wait times associated with "out of stock" titles. In such a case, the only BR/HD-DVD discs that I would be willing to purchase would be the ones that I wanted to watch in the absolute highest quality (assuming the downloads would be subject to more compression and thus they would be of lesser quality). How much would you pay for a service that allowed you unlimited movie watching? A BR new release is already going to cost you $25+... I would be willing to pay more for the convenience (and added amount of viewing) over a mail order system like Netflix (where I am likely to get only 12 rentals per month due to throttling even if I send them in the next day). Could they do this for $30-40 a month... perhaps... at $30 I would be hard pressed to turn it down. For people that don't watch that many movies... all they would need to do is come up with a price per movie that was competitive with normal rentals.

In any case, the advantage of this type of system isn't to download and keep the movies (the way you would download and keep mp3s from iTunes or whatnot). The point would be to offer on-demand rentals... With a large catalogue, this service could be HUGE if done right.

For the record, public transportation is MUCH more efficient (in many respects) than owning a car. Apparently some people still own cars... I don't know why...

What is with the instant gratification? Take BT for example, people can pirate basically anything they want now yet they are still selling dvds and hd movies. And you can already watch high definition movies for 30/40 a month, it's called cable/satellite on demand. Again, it's a huge waste of bandwidth.