An Age of Magic

I was going to buy a Blu-ray but…

It appears that this latest technology might be staring extinction in the face within a very short period of time.Time is running out for Blu-ray discs, the high definition format that are supposed to be replacing the DVD. Despite the launch of new Blu-ray players and talk of rising sales at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, manufacturers know they are in a race to make a real impact on the market before the new kid on the block, downloading or streaming HD films directly from the internet, consigns the format to a footnote in video history.

I liked the look of the format while browsing in an electrical store before Xmas. The quality of the picture looked fantastic on one of those flat screen TV’s.  But the format is not catching on as hoped.

Sales of DVDs are not being dented by sales of Blu-ray discs. In the UK, figures from the British Video Association reveal that the number of DVDs sold last year actually rose slightly by 1.9 per cent to 252.9 million at an average price of £8.97. There were only 3.75 million Blu-ray discs sold in the year at an average price of £19.29. The top-selling DVD Mamma Mia! The Movie shifted more than 5 million copies in just five weeks while Dark Knight sold only about 300,000 copies on Blu-ray.

This reminds me of those ‘laser discs’ from way back in the 1980’s – remember those? they were like a large CD and never caught on basically because they were too expensive and people still liked their videos.

So not all fancy technology is a success.

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