The closest analogy to the current Blu-ray vs. HD DVD war is the VHS vs. Betamax contest of the early 1980s, but the stakes are higher now.
Betamax was the better product 25 years ago. The reason VHS prevailed was due to many things including better marketing. We think the biggest drawback for Betamax was the short one-hour recording length -- not long enough to record a movie. VHS offered a minimum recording time of three hours.
The current war has Sony, Samsung and Pioneer supporting Blu-ray, while Toshiba, Intel, and Microsoft support HD DVD.
Ken Graffeo, the co-president of the North American HD DVD Promotional Group, was not pleased with Blockbuster's change of position. He said that "trying to make a format decision using such a short time period is really not measuring what the consumer is saying."
Mr. Graffeo should not be surprised, however, because Blu-ray has been outselling HD DVD titles, as well as offering a larger selection of titles since the beginning of this year.
The move by Blockbuster could be the first step in resolving a format war that has kept consumers from buying new DVD players until they can determine which format will dominate the market.
Blockbuster has been renting both Blu-ray and HD DVD titles in 250 stores since late last year and found that consumers were choosing Blu-ray titles more than 70 percent of the time.
It seemed like consumers needed to wait until a clear winner was established or pay extra for a dual format disc player. Now, it looks like the purchase of a Blu-ray disc player may be a safe choice.
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