Warner Brothers received 500 Million reasons to go Blu-Ray

When asked about when The Matrix and Batman would be coming out on Blu-ray the response was when PiP and interactivity was ready for Blu-ray.

So, they dropped the one platform that already had all this working, on all machines, for something not ready and won't work on all their machines.

Way to alienate customers.  Especially those who bought into HD DVD since the massive sales started on Black Friday.

I am a huge HD DVD fan for a lot of reasons.  Mostly because Sony has a bad history with overpricing their technology and Blu-ray is no different.  If Blu-ray actually wins this fight, we can look forward to much higher prices for our players and discs.  Sony hasn't won a format war in a long time and they've dug into the bank accounts to try and make sure they don't lose this one.  I sincerely, for all our sakes, hope they lose this one too.

I agree with both of the comments left so far.  My problem with all of this is that this is that left out of the discussion is the fact that Sony has essentially in a single transaction thrown HALF A BILLION DOLLARS behind Blu-Ray in this move which demonstrates to what lengths they will go to to protect their franchise.  Obviously a BIG approval had to be signed by Sony management before they executed on this move and obviously that move was predicated on this being the "death knell" for HD-DVD.

The question is, how/why was it that the HD DVD forum missed this achille's heel - that their entire go-to-market strategy was predicated on Warner's faithfulness.  I find it very hard to believe that this didn't completely take them off guard.  To cancel their press conference only confirms this, after all, they undoubtedly had things to announce but they couldn't go in front of the press and not have a good response to this so instead of facing the firing squad, they chose to delay their own execution before they had something to fight back with.

The question now is, who has as much to lose as Sony does in this war and what weapons/ partnerships/ monies can they bring to bear against a $500M buyout like this?

NBC Universal?  They've sunk their entire bankroll into HD DVD.  Could they switch midstream?  Likely.  Although it would late to the party, they could likely make a switch in manufacturing for their titles.

Toshiba?  Well, duh.  They're completely invested in this war being the primary technology innovators.  The problem is that they aren't a multidimensional conglomerate like Sony is, thus the war chest can't be as large or as liquid.

NEC?  They are equally vested in HD DVD along with Toshiba.

Microsoft?  They are the innovators of HDi, HD DVD's interactive menuing technology that is not only non-Java based, but also much more Windows & PC friendly from both a playback and development side.  They are also advocates of the "Video Server" future, where HD content is copied to a central server in an authorized fashion - a feature that Blu-Ray does not readily support.

Intel?  By virtue of the fact that concepts like Desktops & Video Servers are driven by Intel's chips, Intel has a strong interest in backing HD-DVD over Blu-Ray.

One thing to consider is the repositioning of 3-layer HD DVD as a very low cost consumer storage medium, shipping as a standard with certain key influential user's PC's somehow subsidized by partners, instead of as primarily a movie disc format.  The history of the CDROM has shown us that when we make a technology cheap and easy for developers & computer users to use, they will come.  Conversely, when we penny pinch consumers into paying too much for a proposed standard, we end up losing the standards war to "good enough" - just as the case of the ioMega ZIPDrive which never was able to succeed the floppy disc and the CDR-ROM became the standard.

The Ace in the Hole is that if NBC/Toshiba/NEC can't come through, Microsoft & Intel has DEEEEEEEP pockets for strategic investments that could outspend, outmarket, and outstrategize Sony, if not by brute force if they view this as a major strategic loss.

But if they don't see this as a major loss, and Microsoft simply switches camps and says that it's not worth the fight, and ships a Blu-Ray drive for the 360... then this will be a major coup for Sony, giving them an upgrade in status from contender to champion.

One has to wonder why it is that HD DVD's are being outsold by BluRay discs.  Is it simply market momentum where PS3s are shipping and forcing people to essentially buy a BluRay disc here and there?  Meanwhile HD DVD's aren't standard for 360s and thus, HD DVD doesn't have the benefit of having 2M quasi-desired players?  Or is it that HD DVD player owners are simply cheaper than BluRay owners?