Two more US companies have decided that HD DVD's days are numbered, and have started pushing the Blu-ray format.
Netflix, the online movie rental service, has announced to its customers that it will gradually phase out HD DVD over the coming months. An email sent to current users states that "in order to provide the best selection of high-definition titles for our members, we have decided to go exclusively with Blu-ray" and that "while we will continue to make our current selection of HD DVD titles available to you for the next several months, we will not be adding additional HD DVD titles or reordering replacements."
At the end of this month, HD DVD discs that users have in their Saved Queue will be replaced with standard definition DVDs.
Meanwhile, Best Buy has made it very clear that Blu-ray is its preferred high definition disc format. Though it won't be immediately dropping HD DVDs, it has stated it will "recommend Blu-Ray as the preferred format".
In other words, stores will continue to sell HD DVD products, but will allocate much more space and sales patter to Blu-ray hardware and discs.
Things really don't look at all good for HD DVD now, as these two companies are not insignificant entities.
(Via Rope of Silicon and Barron's)
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