My first first!

That's not too bad for all 3 formats. As long as they pass the savings on to us this is a good thing.

Lower price is always good.

Well crap this means I have to actually go out and buy an HDTV now doesn't it...?

OK, a 40% decrease in cost resulting in an 11 cent fee for a Blu-Ray discs. That made the old rate what? 18 cents?
Am I missing some big savings somewhere?

around here blueray players and disks are very expensive, i'm talking about $25+ per movie!, $10 more than dvd version.

*cough* sabers suck *cough*

I actually never find buying movies to be too expensive. Blu-ray here are $5-10 more but it's more than worth the money. Plus you would only buy movies you want to keep, so its not that much more per movie, or for your entire collection.

Blu-ray write-once blanks cost $5. DVD write-once blanks cost 20 cents.

Hook me up with your blu-ray connections please... check out best buy's website. $30-$40 for blu-ray new releases. How is that only $5-$10 more?

Cheaper prices for the consumers or more margin for the producers? I would say a lot more of the latter and a tad of the former.

Sorry _horse for makin fun of the sabers.... I am Canadian, it's my obligation. no offence to you

didnt know that. hopefully now that the hd media is over blueray prices will drop and dvds will go away.

Heh, all my friends think I'm crazy because I can't see an appreciable difference between DVD and Blu-Ray. Maybe it's just the enormous barrier to entry in price -- for a college student -- that's clouding my vision.

I would like to join a federation of Computer Patent Owners, where anyone who is in the federation is free to make use of patented items within the federation with no liscensing issues. That way I wouldn't have to worry about the several thousand patents Microsoft filed and just pay a small subscription fee.

when these manufactures of HDTVs make a decent display with integrated Bluray Player at an affordable price, that's when it will go mainstream. I would be interested in a quality 32"LCD w/built-in player in the low US$400s

Packaging things together is a great way to sell low quality products for more than they're worth.

Does this mean that CD and DVD will be subsidizing Blue ray ?

No, not quite. It's simply creating a single governing body so companies don't have to deal with multiple people when creating devices using these technologies.

And considering that the same group of people pioneered these technologies, I don't think they can be subsidized.

And it's Blu-ray, not Blue (you can't copyright colors).



Maybe, but you may want to read it over again

So the savings are even less than that! =D

But then again, the article was written by Marcus Yam, so all the figures are suspect. =P

@Tindytim
Yeah, I caught that after I posted. Either way, I don't see any decrease in Blu-Ray as a direct result of this news.

Sorry, decrease in CONSUMER Blu-Ray products.

I don't either. I was simply pointing out that those insignificant savings, were even more insignificant as far as the consumer is concerned.

If this is truly newsworthy (which I doubt), then I that really brings into question, how large are the profit margins if a such small licensing fees are so significant in comparison to the large prices.

Keep in mind, that $0.07 difference gets bigger as the product goes through manufacture, wholesale, retail, etc.

If it costs Sony (for instance) $0.11 per disc, they'll charge $0.22 to whomever they sell the disk too, in order to make profit. That wholesale distributor will then sell that same disc for $0.44 to make their profit and cover their own overhead. So the retailer then could be paying $0.88 per disc, and then resell it to you for twice that.

So even small costs at the very beginning of the process, make a difference by the time you're buying it at some retailer. Plus you add in actual materials and manufacturing costs. But generally, that's how mark-up works. Lots of times companies simply double the price on something, and that generally covers their overhead costs plus gives them a little bit of profit.

Hopefully this spells much cheaper Blu-Ray players for all of us though. I'd love to finally get a Blu-Ray player for my HDTV, and a Blu-Ray drive for my PC.

Totally agree. I wouldn't buy a TV/DVD combo myself. You usually don't get the same level of quality you'd get from a good TV and good DVD player. Plus, there's to much chance both units day at once.

I recall the days of TV/VCR combo units, and I wouldn't have touched those to save my life. Besides the fact that you paid an extra premium for having them together, even though it was usually a poor quality TV and VCR.

Man I wish HD DVD had won out. The most expensive format won out;
not by the choice of consumers, but by behind closed door dealings with WB and Sony. At the time WB put the death nail in HD DVD's coffin, Toshiba was already promoting players at $150.

um my upconverting 60 dollar set top box is certainly good enough for my 1080p. Im a video nerd like most people, but in all reality, upconverting looks just as good as blu-ray. If you think otherwise, it's all mental. Or you have a 60inch TV

we, the consumers, wont see a difference, because companies will see it as a way to make more profit, by charging the same amount. Come on people, just look at how selfish the human race is, why do you think our prices would change at all when they can sell it at the same price and make more profit...?