MCV

This guy is outright stupid in my opinion.

First of all millions and millions of movie lovers prefer discs for many reasons, it has extras on their usually and they can have collectors edition and other things.

Now from what Microsoft offer on Xbox Live usually when I am extremely bored I download a movie most of the movies are in stereo and only in 720p and have NO extras.

Also not everyone has really fast connections to download these movies.

I want an add-on, I want choice, I want the actual discs!

JIMMY RECKON!!!

Up until 3 weeks ago Microsoft were pushing HD-DVD as the future of hI-tech entertainment. Now that Blu-ray has crushed it like a grape, Microsoft say disc based media is dead!
JIMMY RECKON!!!

I bet you anything that the next xbox uses some form of optical storage drive!

Discs will still be the consumers choice for HD video playback.

The quality of dlc films isn't a patch on blu-ray, and takes hours to download becuase of slow consumer broadband.

But mainly, the whole XB video marketplace business concept is flawed:
1. I want to be able to buy films, not just rent them
2. When my 360 dies (not if), I don't want to either have to redownload all my films, or have DRM issues moving them to another console.

Digital distribution is no doubt the future, but its too early and the 360's drm handling means it is too flawed to be the platform to deliver it.

I'd always go for a hard copy rather than a download and I'd happily pay more for it. I think MS need to wake up a bit to what people want rather than what they want to sell us.

This is exactly how people felt about music a few years ago, but attitudes change quickly.

Downloads of 1080P films is more than a decade away unless downloading for a week per movie is acceptable. Seriously it just not feasible with the current net infrastructure. Has this guy got a £50 a month 100Mb+ speed broadband connection - or something? How do I download special boxsets? Where are the extras?


To be fair Blu-Ray has some catching up to do in the presentation stakes (I don't mean resolution, I mean product in your hands feeling like its worth it value.) Time for the studios to think of Blu-Ray discs as gift items: Package them & value-add to them as a reflection of that and then suddenly downloads look awfully boring.

I wonder what kind of salary that Chris Lewis guy makes in terms of MS points.

The music model is totally different to movies. The whole reason music downloads are now so popular is because music is very much something you can listen to whatever you are doing, be it sat on a bus or going to the gym etc. Watching a film is a different experience altogether because it requires your full attention. And so I think movie downloads do have there place but I don't see them becoming as popular or indeed as useful as music downloads either in the medium or longer term.

I don't see how the differences in consumption of music and movies have anything to do with distribution models. Only a few years ago, during the dial-up era, downloading a 3MB music track was a pain. Now it takes seconds. It will be the same with movies before you know it, too.

I see what you are saying but think logically movies are in gigs and you dont get any of the extras when downloading them.

With Music they dont always come in super duper collectors editions i.e. 2 discs nor does music usually have extras and content also music is usually a few meg.

Movies are totally different, however see your point that later on download speeds will become faster BUT having a movie collection with extras, special editions and the discs themselves is seen more of a collectable point of interest and you can keep them once purchased.

I think it's too early to tell - the online media model is still relatively new to the general public and most people are now only just getting used to not having a CD collection. The whole HD-era is also very much still in its infancy and the vasy new majority of the public are not buying into it yet...
With more advanced compression and faster net connections, which are really not that far away, we'll very likely be streaming HD within a couple of years.
As for the extra bonus content you find on discs, why can't this also be served up online? The studios will be looking for new ways to prevent piracy and make more money, so it makes sense for them to do this - charging subscriptions for a portal, supported by ads, etc...

If we do look at the music model it has been a big success that has taken iTunes & time to grow a business model. But yes it works! However, the pertinent fact is that CD sales are still going strong. The reason being people like a physical object to hold. Forget the old people, Im talking younger generation. I am not a technophobe, in fact I love all sorts of electro gadgets, but I cant get my head around paying for a data file that is lower quality than CD, or a 'Xbox HD movie that has a far worst bit rate than a VCD!


The next 10 years will see the growth of DLC, and an increase in movie rental downloads via console. But a console needs to be able to store a generations worth of games. I guess a 2 TB hard drive?!

Microsoft WOULD'NT DARE not use disc based media for the Xbox 3. Why? Because yes they would make more profit without paying for disc production costs, but the shops like GAME, HMV etc wouldnt stock a console that they couldnt sell games for. Its on the games that they make their profit.

So MS might say Blu-ray is pointless. But if it does become a success, why would they leave it out of the Xbox 3? It would be like failing to put in DVD movie playback on the 360.

While I have a PS3, I wont buy many Blu-Ray discs until Sony decides to stop raping us on the price. I have rented several movies using the XBOX Live download service simply because the same time it would take me to go to the rental store and pick it up, I can just start downloading it and be watching it. I dont want to own EVERYTHING I watch.

Obviously Sony is thinking the same thing Microsoft is since they will be offering downloadable movies too.

Less we not forget that $ony will be offering movie downloads as well...lets not go on about M$ doing this..

Microsoft are gonna have more problems with digital downloads for the 360, than Sony will have with the ps3. The Movies available now are in standard def & 720p (stereo) due to the lack of hard drive space on most 360's, they will never do a 1080p service because that could take up the whole 20gb.
Secondly the 360 only supports "mega-bit networks" and would struggle with faster broadband and larger volumes of data. The ps3 can handle "giga-bit networks" and will be able to offer a better digital download service. The hard drives are easily swapable and upto 500gb is currently available and tera-bit drives coming soon.

I love this from above:

'Secondly the 360 only supports "mega-bit networks" and would struggle with faster broadband and larger volumes of data. The ps3 can handle "giga-bit networks" and will be able to offer a better digital download service. '

I am still laughing...LOL!!

Everyone is talking as though blu-ray/HD is an established mature medium and that digital downloads will never succeed because of the advantages of a blu-ray disc. This might be right if we consider HD today, but the fact is only a small percentage of people even care about HD right now, and it is my opinion that by the time HD becomes the standard digital downloads have the potential to be a much more favourable medium. Technology is fast moving and by the time HD is the industry norm, digital downloads may have evolved beyond the limitations described above.
I agree with the limitations of digital downloads as they stand today, but anyone with a decent sense of business also considers the future:
i) I want addons - who says Digital downloads wont have the potential to have this in the future ?
ii) I want a disc - really ??? - really ??? - even if the download is much cheaper ? - of course some people will, but look at the number of people downloading songs these days.
iii) I want to own it not rent it - who says you wont be able to in the future ? Distribution agreements can be changed.
iv) Takes too long to download a movie - download speeds & compression of files will also evolve people.

I can go on - my point is, HD in general is only in its infancy, so it would be foolish to discount the role digital downloads can play in this.
Of course there are counter arguments, but do you really think a MS executive is this dumb ?
Do you really think Sony wont be getting involved in this in the future ?
I may be wrong and I have no stake in either medium, but my point is that HD is only young and it is too short sighted to compare blu-ray to digital downloads as they stand today when it is really only relevant in the upcoming years.

Hes never watched a Blu-Ray movie, that's why he can say such an idiotic comment.

...and a hard place when it came to choosing between Blu-Ray and HD DVD.

They could not integrate the former into the X360, because it has Sony leading it and that would've been a tad embarrassing or perhaps Microsoft was just too arrogant to do it.

And they couldn't include HD DVD either, because they (probably) did not feel confident enough that it would ultimately win the 'war' anyway.

So now, they have only one choice left: DVD storage with DLC to prop up its shortfalls (ie. limited capacity) and that's what they and most importantly their consumers are stuck with until the next generation XBox console.

Simple as that. I just don't understand why MCV are so p***y about asking them the tough questions!

Disappointing.

"Microsoft in Sour Grapes Shocker!"

not long ago they were desperate to 'win' the so called format war, now that was irrelevant, yeah, i believe that...

i believe in the long run downloadable content will be massive even for movies, but that's just a distant spot on the horizon, connections have to be MUCH MUCH faster than they are now

also 'e-content' will always have inferior value - less extras, compression issues, storage problems, time to get it, physical artwork and so on, and that will leave A LOT of room for discs

we cant compare movies to cds (and cds still sell a lot), well maybe only partly, and the same goes to books, e-books did NOT win, actually not a single person i know would buy an e-book instead of a REAL one

we're talking different media here, they have similarities, but mostly differences

the facts for me are:
dlc WILL be much bigger in the future and will have a relevant share of the market
ms wont be the only one out there as an option, Sony will be too, as well as others
people will ALWAYS favor the physical thing, no matter how easy and cheaper e-stuff get, music and books are a proof of that

Is he high?
First David Gardner and now this. Have all the PR pros gone on holiday or just left the industry?

His comments just sum up how out of touch the bosses at Microsoft are. They are a 2nd rate company with products to match.

MS always say that they want to give consumer a choice, hence all the add on on the 360. However, why do they keep on saying that downloads is the future? If they REALLY want to give consumer a choice, they would allow us to choose if we want our movies in our HDD (downloads) or DVD (Blu Ray if the movies in HD)

i will alway want a hard copy of any film i want and not just a down load that can be deleated at a push of a button come on microsoft release a Blue-ray dvd player for the xbox you no it makes sence we all no that you have already tested the codeing for it.

i cant believe i just wasted 10 min of my life reading these comments about something most normal people would be sad enough to care about. does this mean im as equally sad?

The PS3 is DIVX compatible. Because of this I stream some content such as TV shows etc from my PC to my PS3 quite often. File sizes can vary although very rarely exceed 700MB. Yes, they're not HD but they are "TV quality".

Can DIVX offer HD playback? I've no idea, but in my opinion DIVX would be the way forward for DLC.

@12

I agree that the whole process will take some time. And yes, music CDs still sell in large numbers. But they sell a lot less than they use to. Look at the struggles the likes of HMV and Virgin/Zavvi are going though - both of which are ramping up the space they give to games at the cost of shelf space for music.

@Redh3lix:
DivX does offer full 1080p encoding and playback, so this could be a possible choice for downloadable HD content. I've 'acquired' quite a few 720/1080 movies, which range from 4GB to 15GB, depending on the bitrate. All of which play very nicely over wireless through my xbox or my laptop :oP

You all need to get out more! Please, get a life.

Reason why microsoft aren't planning to use blu-ray, is as a world leader, he won't admit they are a loser and follow someone's technology, they are innovative, they don't want to be under-control by the others, and they are probably secretly designing another digital movie technology, the good thing about it, they can make more money, just like xbox 360, why they designed to have achievement points and xboxlive ? people are always like to compare and when u can't achieve anymore achievement u will start considering of buying a new game, and how u can use achievement points to buy classical game, and microsoft point to buy any extra features for the game, can u see how they are making money out of people, so when they are talking about movie in digital, in the future they will have more control on the anti-piracy thing, and expand their marketing strategy just like xboxlive development. Microsoft aren't stupid, he is making money on his every move.

@30

Says the man posting comments on a games site....

@31 - "...microsoft... they are innovative.."

MS Innovative!? You are kidding me. The biggest laugh I've had all week.

@33

The Xbox 360, in software and network integration terms, is certainly hugely innovative. Yes, I know the fanboys will immediately say that it breaks down all the time, RRODlol etc - but in overall integration terms it's a masterpiece.

Hello Fellow Gamers. M$ designed the X360 to do one thing very well, Play games. Also they integrated the online features with; Voice text chat, achievement points, Tv series & Movie downloads. Does SONY offer this these types of services for viewing content? UUhhmmmnnooo.
Blu-Ray, as of right now is way to expensive. Another factor to consider is piracy. There's not a Blu-Ray movie that's out in the retail market than can't be downloaded somewhere off the internet, FOR FREE!!! Since External HDDs are getting way cheaper, you can purchase this device & Download every Blu-RAY movie that you love & watch to you hearts content. Again for FREE without Loss of Quality.
So inclosing, will Blu-Ray every overtake DLC? maybe, maybe not. But Piracy will always play a role in that. M$ was very smart to offer dlc for TV shows, Movies & Anime. Netflix & many more companies will also signup with M$ to offer DLC. It's coming people & there's not denying it. DLC is a storm in the making.