Sony has released figures for the absolute numbers of HD DVD and Blu-ray discs sold, based on figures from Nielsen VideoScan.
Though it's hardly surprising that it puts both Blu-ray and Sony in a very favourable light, with five of the top 10 titles produced by the studio, and Blu-ray outselling HD DVD by a ratio of 9:2, what is more interesting is just how pathetic raw sales of high definition discs are.
For the week ending March 18, VideoScan put Blu-ray as having sold 844,000 units since inception, versus 708,600 HD DVDs sold.
Even some discs in the top 10 got there by selling less than 1,000 copies in that week.
Another reminder that high definition disc formats have nothing on standard DVD yet.
(Via High Def Digest)
"Another reminder that high definition disc formats have nothing on standard DVD yet."
Right, so how were DVD's selling roughly a year after launch?
For a site dedicated to HD you seem to be very quick to belittle these new video formats!
That's hardly fair, Meeple.
Would you prefer that we wrote about everything HD-related as if looking through rose-tinted spectacles?
We're here to report on what happens in the world of HD, not explicitly to promote it.
The fact is that manufacturers and groups on both HD DVD and Blu-ray are using statistics (many of which we've reported on here) to claim that one or other format is winning. However, the numbers are so small at present that these claims are over-inflated.
What this report shows is that the numbers and margins are far too small for either side to claim a victory. We are still very much in 'early adopter' territory.
It's not a case of me belittling either HD DVD or Blu-ray - I happen to think they are amazing technologies. However, certain claims that one or other will take over from DVD, and wipe the other format out, in just a few years I think is inflated propaganda, or at best aggressive marketing.
We're never going to publish articles that unfairly promote or degrade these, or any other, formats. Take a look through the archives and you should see that we've reported on many aspects of these two formats.
Surely if you think about it, you wouldn't want us to do things any differently. We're independent and not tied to any of the manufacturers or promotions groups - just as it should be.
Bullshit, BlueRay is not out-SELLING HD-DVD, Sony had to GIVE AWAY FOR FREE copies of the new Bond film, Casino Royal to boost Blue-Ray sales figures, no one is buying, BlueRay or HD-DVD, they will both fail.
Did you notice how Sony chose to show sales figures during the month that HD-DVD didn't release many, if any, titles. I'm sure that with titles like Children of Men now having been released and all the upcoming HD-DVD movies that will be released over the next few months, that the numbers will be much closer.
how good will Sony's sales be when profile 2.0 goes live and the people who are buying bluray players now find they can't play the latest movies
Oh WOW! Thanks for the great info!!