Interesting HD-DVD / Blu Ray Article

[paulfoley]

This US Site reckon they have the answer to winning the battle :

"Here is the secret weapon that one side can use to win the format way, piracy. Piracy sells players and burners to early adopters, and others who are collectively known as influencers. There are studies all over the place saying that for every influencer, they tell X people about a product, and those X tell Y more, leading to hundreds or thousands of sales for each early adopter.

Now, if you want to make your format win out, let the geeks pirate with it. Build in a gaping hole in the protection mechanism. Build in direct unencrypted digital out, or better yet, don't use any DRM. You will sell them faster than you can make them. If one side allows copies, even if they are illegal to actually do, and the other doesn't, which one would you buy? Really, is it even a fight, much less a fair one?

So the side that wants to win, court the underground. Make a hole,and post it on the web sites that care about these things. Make the 'problem' known, and you will sell tons and tons of them. As soon as a model of DVD player is know to have a region free backdoor, it sells like hotcakes Now you know what to do to win the war, absolutely and quickly."

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=23568


Discuss ?

[rogeralpine]

....can't see the film industry buying into this tbh - I'd love to be a fly on the wall though when (and if) such things were discussed at high boardroom level.

In all fairness though, the lengths that they are going to to ensure that the content is protected is surely a flawed concept anyway? (Especially if that's one of the reasons we're seeing delays that is) Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't every predecessor copy protection system been cracked before so there is every presumption this one will as well? The 1st few years are surely are not where the big bucks can be made anyway - look at DVD. That was cracked long before it became mega-successful on the high street and you can't say piracy has stunted it's growth.

The cost of blank media and burners though has probably impacted somewhat on the availability/success in the early days of pirated material.