Blu-Ray Blinks First

In the Blu-ray/HD-DVD battle, it looks like the Blu-ray side has been the first to blink. Ryoji Chubachi, Sony's president-elect, said at a news conference last week that he would be open to talking to the DVD Forum to merge Sony's Blu-ray format with the Toshiba-developed and Forum-backed HD-DVD format.

"Listening to the voice of the consumers, having two rival formats is disappointing and we haven't totally given up on the possibility of integration or compromise," said Chubachi. The DVD Forum has not publicly responded or commented on Chubachi's statement.

This is the second time Sony has lifted an olive branch in the general direction of HD-DVD. In January, executive deputy president Ken Kutaragi said a format war was not in the public interest and that Sony had not ruled out the possibility of uniting the formats.

His most telling comment was that while Sony's engineers have come up with some great products, they didn't always sell. Sony has had a long string of technically-superior products that failed in the marketplace: Betamax, MiniDisc and Network Walkman, just to name a few.

Sony may ready to talk peace with the HD side, but Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. isn't giving up so easily. The company plans to set up a theater in the Panasonic Hollywood Laboratory at Universal City for studios to check out Blu-ray movies and to provide feedback on the quality. The plan is to use this feedback to help improve the mass -production technology for Blu-ray discs.

There are two potential solutions. The first would be a single deck that plays both separate formats. The other possibility is merging the two formats into one. The latter is seen as less likely, as the two formats are so close to shipping to consumers. However, this would mean less trouble for the studios, as they would have only one format to support.

Also, the divided film community means all manner of headaches. Titanic was a joint production of Fox and Paramount. Paramount has the U.S. rights, Fox has international. Paramount is in the HD camp, Fox hasn't picked a side but is on the Blu-ray board. So which format do the studios use? Both?

Master & Commander is even more muddled. That production is a combination of Miramax (Blu-ray, via Disney), Universal (HD) and Fox (undecided).

Story source: ign.com.