Apple: Blu-ray Won the Format War

Posted January 17, 2008 01:13 PM by Josh Dreuth


Jim Goldman of CNBC recently sat down with Steve Jobs to discuss the new and upcoming products Apple announced during the MacWorld Expo held earlier this week. Jobs was asked about the format war and if he thought Apple had usurped both Blu-ray and HD DVD with their addition of HD movie rentals to iTunes. His response was, "Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will care about what format is where." We, of course, disagree with the "Mac Daddy" about the second part. What he failed to mention about Apple's iTunes HD movies is that they use much lower bit-rates than Blu-ray and are only encoded in 720p, half the resolution of Blu-ray, which encodes all film content at 1080p (Full HD). The result is a picture which is only half as sharp, half as colorful, and half as beautiful as Blu-ray. Furthermore, only some of the iTunes HD movies have surround sound, and those that do only make use of the archaic Dolby Digital technology. Anyone who has listened to a PCM, Dolby TrueHD, or DTS-HD Master Audio track knows that there is simply nothing that can compare to a lossless/uncompressed audio track. I hope someone sends him a copy of 'Ratatouille' on Blu-ray soon to show him what True HD really looks like and that not all HD is created equally.
Source: CNBC \| Permalink \| [Country settings]

News comments (127 comments)

Iago

Jan 17, 2008

Ratatouille has to be one of the best movies on Blu-ray. I love it! :-)

And we all knew that blu-ray won :-D

I like Apple and Jobsy, but 720p downloads, regardless of who offers them (Apple, Netflix, Microsoft), won't be overtaking optical media any time in the near future. It definitely won't be overtaking the Full 1080p Blu-Ray market. I hate to break it to him, but Apple TV Take 2 isn't going to be any more successful than take 1.

You can bet now because of their own HD Downloads and iTunes movie rentals, Apple won't be releasing anything Blu-Ray.

blacknation

Jan 17, 2008

apple is good for make mac...ipods....no for movies a think

FilmmakingFiasco

Jan 17, 2008

"Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will care about what format is where."

The new world order of online movie rentals. Why is everyone up in arms about this? Apple is not competing against Blu-ray. Their HD downloads are only rentals, not purchases. You can't even rent an HD movie from iTunes unless you're using an AppleTV...which I'm sure most people aren't.

Blu-ray Fanatic

Jan 17, 2008

He has no idea what he's talking about. What an idiot

UltimateFighter

Jan 17, 2008

wow...I just lost all respect for Apple

maconomics

Jan 17, 2008

Bill Gates, Steve Jobs are two arrogant morons! Stick to your core competency a$$hole.

mystiksuicide

Jan 17, 2008

I must admit I am a little disappointed in what he said but I will continue to support both blu and apple

ShawnE94SL

Jan 17, 2008

I was thinking about buying an Apple TV too.........not so much anymore.

Blu-ray Fanatic

Jan 17, 2008

Just ignore his ignorance because we all know whats best.

CptGreedle

Jan 17, 2008

He admits Blu-ray won, but he is now just trying to sell his new product of digital download renting.
I think for renting it is going to sell well, but I am upset he is brushing Blu-ray aside like that.
He actually has better studio support than Blu-ray right now, but no where near the quality.
I hope he does not stick to brushing Blu-ray aside like this.

russ

Jan 17, 2008

I would only be sad if I were Blockbuster.

Blu-ray Fanatic

Jan 17, 2008

I disagree with digital download renting because where am I going to watch it? On my computer? I hate watching movies on my computer because it skips a lot. Now he's coming out with Apple TV? Not a bad idea but only with 720p? He'll learn his lesson

CptGreedle

Jan 17, 2008

http://www.apple.com/feedback/macpro.html
Request that they add Blu-ray support to their computers and voice how upset you are over his recent
announcement.

BTW, AppleTV has been out for over a year... this is just a re-working of it.

Blu-ray Fanatic

Jan 17, 2008

Blu-ray is the King of HD. Has he ever seen a blu-ray film before? If not, he has no idea what he's missing out on

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w_tanoto

Jan 17, 2008

I knew that they can't be relied upon to adopt BD. I just knew it never comes. Steve Jobs is such an idiot. 1080p is the same as 720p? Dolby 5.1 is the same as PCM? Get a life.

Seretur

Jan 17, 2008

Both the big software gurus, Jobs and Gates, are so out of touch with the movie distribution reality that they genuinely believe their own spin.

Of course, not everything can be shrunk to portable size, especially hi-def movies -- offering quality that rivals and outshines most theaters. Digital downloads are fundamentally the same thing as pay-per-view -- except that their quality can in no way match the current high industry standard for home viewing, which is Blu-ray.

Jobsy is a good guy, but he's making a mistake in not offering BD-enabled Macs. He's just lost a customer in me, and I guess I'm not the only one. What am I supposed to do over the next five years, burn DVDs? Or order legal downloads in mid-def from an island in the Adriatic?

Please.

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Guinness7

Jan 17, 2008

I guess he feels anything apple has is the best, but the rest of us know that is not true in the movie department.

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ckenisell

Jan 17, 2008

Sony needs to pull support for this product.

Sweetstache

Jan 17, 2008

digital downloads are far more niche than optical media. At least, in regards to legitimate purchasing of such content.

JT_Designer

Jan 17, 2008

I'd glad Steve didn't try to say his movie downloads on iTunes were just as good. But I disagree with Steve here. People do care where their copy of a movie is. iTunes movie downloads are at 720p while Blu-ray is at 1080p, twice the resolution and blu-ray has high def uncompressed audio.

Who wants to have a movie on their computer when they could hold a physical copy and bring to their friends place to watch instantly? Or should you go to a friends place, spend hours trying to download your HD movie on their cable Internet connection only to find they don't have the correct equipment or that everyone has fallen asleep by the time it's all done setting up...

AlexCruz

Jan 17, 2008

To be honest I don't think Steve really cares about Blu-ray, and I don't think he should. I'm a
hardcore Mac user (it's illegal to bring Microshit into my house). I mean most people have DVD drives
in the computer's, but the main reason for it is so they can make copies. You can't copy Blu-ray... yet.

monkeytap

Jan 17, 2008

"but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals"

calm down people....he has a job to do.

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bhampton

Jan 17, 2008

Of course everybody rents no one buys.

If Apple had it's way all music and movies would just be pirated.

-Brian

greekjgg

Jan 17, 2008

I think blu-ray.com is mis-interpreting Mr. Job's.

Do you really think Fox would have went through all the trouble to get on itunes to compete with blu-ray. Rentals and purchasing are two different mediums.

APple will be competing more with Netflix/Blockbuster.

I think he was trying to say that for him it doesn't matter that blu-ray won as they are a different beast.

Don't think for a second that APple isn't working on encoding in 1080p. If anyone can pull it off, its apple.

JT_Designer

Jan 17, 2008

AlexCruz: I rent and watch DVD's on my PC's internal DVD drive. I have a 24" widescreen ViewSonic 1000:1 contrast 1920x1200 rez. My monitor it better than the two other tv's in my house.

bkbluray

Jan 17, 2008

I am SO glad I didn't buy a Mac when I got a laptop in December. Steve Jobs is just showing his true side.

What's more, 1080p is far better than 720p and Dolby Digital soundtracks are a joke compared to lossless. And on top of that, you have to have 'apple TV' to watch these movies? Forget about it.

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Johk

Jan 17, 2008

I like Apple products but for movies I prefer Blu-Ray!

Even if they supported 1080p movies with lossless, how am I gonna download 50 gb of data (even if it was only 20 gig)... With my current ISP the download limit is 20gb (sure I could pay more like 7.95$ per gb exceeding my limit but it would be cheaper to own the movie on blu-ray then renting it) !

They wanna take over the movie business like their success with music but I don't think they'll succeed as easily... Maybe in 10 years when the infrastructure is there and when it'll take 1 min to download a movie!

HeartOFHatred

Jan 17, 2008

Online movie rentals will never overtake Blu-ray. It will always simply be a alternative to going out your local movie store and renting a BD there. NOTHING compares to the feeling of owning a actual copy of a movie you love in FULL 1080P that you can take anywhere you go.

NovaBomb

Jan 17, 2008

yeah, this has nothing to do with the format war. Its a whole different ball game. That why Sony Pictures allowed this, its money for them.

Luis_A51

Jan 17, 2008

Jobs is definitely too full of himself with his recent successes.

WHat do you expect from a guy who created a laptop with NO optical drive whatsoever? This guy needs to get a grip on reality.

camper

Jan 17, 2008

Isn't this exactly what Gates said, except without the 'rental' word?

CptGreedle

Jan 17, 2008

If it wasn't for the fact that he said Blu-ray won, I would ask that this be taken off the site.
He is in the business of digital downloads and has been ever since iTunes came out.
This is not part of the war, and I am sure he will still support Blu. He did not say he wouldn't but he
needs to sell his product now too.

BigGeezy

Jan 17, 2008

Whatever, if you're like me and about 250 million other American consumers, when I pay for something like a movie, I want the movie with the box, the disk, and receipt. Who cares if it's instant. There's fun in opening a brand new Blu-ray disk and popping it into the drive. There's fun in watching the previews. It's The Movie Experience that will utterly be lost to this download, now, now, now crap.

cajun1975

Jan 17, 2008

Like it matters. Apple is full of it!

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teunis

Jan 17, 2008

"Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will care about
what format is where."

I think Steve is completely separating HD downloads and Disc Media. If I had AppleTV and did my movie
rentals online with them, and that's all that I did, then I might not care about the format war or even disc media
for that matter. Please don't hate on him, these comments could easily be taken out of context. Although I did
mention earlier that I think Jobs doesn't believe in disc media.

Good thing I am a collector and love my Blu-ray movies, cause there ain't nothing like it. Especially a
downloaded 720 HD film.

blu-backer

Jan 17, 2008

Never cared for the man and don't care for him now.

I've never owned an Apple product and have no inclination or reason to go out and buy one. The man's arrogance and hypocricy permeates through that company and filters to its fanboys.

AppleTV 2 will be as successful as AppleTV 1.

bbg

Jan 17, 2008

I think it's great that Jobs openly states that Blu-ray has won. I'm pretty sure we'll be seeing Blu-ray drives in Macs by the end of this year.

Apple usually lags a couple of months behind the latest technology, so I think by this summer Blu-ray equipped Macs will be more of a reality.

E-Dogg

Jan 17, 2008

Oh well, I'll still be supporting Blu-Ray period. I will be buying a Mac soon, but he's opinion matters very little to me.

J.Grisham

Jan 17, 2008

Yeah,
After posting his remarks good ol Steve probably did a swan dive into his luxury home theatre complete with; 150" Panasonic Plasma TV, Latest Digital Surround Sound System, And Of Course His Plush Multiple Title Blu Library!

LynxFX

Jan 17, 2008

Apple has no stake in Blu-ray just like Microsoft had no stake in HD DVD. These are two companies that are very much the same. I know MS bashing is pretty much a given on this site, but if you actually paid attention you would see that Apple is just as bad if not worse than MS on certain issues.

frenchglen

Jan 17, 2008

This is just one of those instances where Steve Jobs is mentioning a rival in one of Apple's markets that they are competing in.

It just so happens that in this case he's in competition with blu-ray.

A little bigoted IMO, but you know how he wants to take over the world and all. Apple take no chances.

Paltry chances though, we all know blu-ray has a very sunny future and will probably have a similar life expectancy to DVD: 10 years. It will take a long time for people to change over from physical media, and in that process many people will fiercely hold onto their discs for as long as possible.

Metal_Kizz

Jan 17, 2008

well i duno about you lot but i for one have ALWAYS wanted to watch then lame apple mac vs pc adverts in 1/2 HD with dolby digital poor mans audio

. so im very happy at this!. nah but seriously anyone know if the resident evil trilogy is regions ABC ie free, like some other sony blu rays i bought in the EU. inc spiderman trilogy. as its not sheduled to be released over here so we are stuck with apocalypse and the extinction altho the latter is a far better blu ray

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Josh

Jan 17, 2008

I am a fan of Apple products. I have a MacBook and an AirPort Extreme. I own a Nano. But I just don't think Jobs should compare his new downloads to Blu-ray until he can improve the quality, and he really shouldn't be saying Blu-ray won't matter in comparison. Especially when I am one of those people who really wants a BD drive in my MacBook

Zarathustra

Jan 17, 2008

That D/L movies onto a hard drive is ridiculous...why?...what the hell do I do if I wanna bring the movie over my friends house? ummmmmmm yeah...lame.

Let's have a Blu 2008!...and stop confusing the herded masses

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tilallr1

Jan 17, 2008

You guys have got to calm a little. There is no way Apple TV can even touch Blu-ray. They aren't even in the same market place. We are talking renting vs buying. For those of us who are purchasing a movie blu-ray can't be beat. Renting on the other hand, I will give it to Apple they have got everyone beat. Renters don't want to get up and go to a store, browse selection to find all the recent releases have been rented. Its frustrating, been there done that. But with this piece of hardware, you can download the movie and watch it over and over again, with no late policy.

But in terms of comparing it on a purchasing framework Apple TV doesn't even come close the Blu-ray. Picture quality and Audio are not even close and NO special features, sucks as well. Purchasers love (NEED) something tangible (I love the box art and goodies). Also, it will take a better part of a decade before there is affordable large storage capacities to house the 1000+ movies I own. Of course could you imagine what type of bandwidth is required to download true HD movies. First it would take days to download on the fastest bandwidth speeds. Second most of us have limits, which would be easily passed doing this. So until internet bandwidth issues are resolved, I don't see this getting better either for a better part of a decade.

So sorry Blu is King and Apple you have along way to go before you can touch this format. I will say right now 5-10 years. But by then Blu will have 200 GB discs, so it will be back to the drawing boards for Apple.

nennew

Jan 17, 2008

I am an Apple fan and I take two things from this. Jobs is acknowledging the fact the the Warner switch will end the war and that Blu-ray has won the disk wars. The second thing about Apple TV and digital downloads being the future I take with a lot of salt. He just promoted a new service and is looking to play up his product. Personally I have seen Apple TV and I am not impressed. I have Directv HD DVR with pay per view and on demand movies in 720P or 1080I and it pails in quality to Blu-ray. The iPod and iTunes may have cut into CD sales but Movies are another thing all together. You want a big tv, a surround system and the ability to just put the best on it and pay for the thing once. I will be very surprised if Apple TV 2.0 is any great success. Can we say Mac Mini or the Mac Cube? Not everything that Apple produces is like the iPod or iPhone. Buy Blu!

J.Grisham

Jan 17, 2008

Have any members heard anymore news on the alleged payouts Fox and Warner received from Sony to go Blu? Two more news sources are claiming it's true, one out of Boston and one out of New York I believe. I don't believe it at all but more sources keep turning up. Check it out over at DVDtown.com. The HD-DVD fanboys are having a field day over there!

Blu-Beard

Jan 17, 2008

The only part of his statement that mattered was "Clearly, Blu-ray won" all the rest is just him trying to save face. It's a natural human reaction and to be expected.

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Bullseye

Jan 17, 2008

I have to say Apple are no different from MS in this regard. At least i guess they did not get involved in the format war like MS.

seto

Jan 17, 2008

Steve Jobs' famed black turtleneck is obviously choking off the blood supply to his brain. 720p material with old audio codecs is not the way home entertainment is heading. If it was, Apple TV would have exploded long ago.

Shawnsmail35

Jan 17, 2008

I am also dissappointed. As much as I love Blu for now i will continue to support Apple over Microsoft.

Commodus

Jan 17, 2008

I think a lot of you are a little too short-sighted.

Yes, right now a Blu-ray disc is going to offer a sharper video with better audio. But to see the advantage over an iTunes HD rental, you need a fairly large 1080p HDTV (or monitor) with an HDMI connection, a Blu-ray player, and a 7.1-channel surround receiver plus speaker setup. That's a few thousand dollars before you start even renting or buying movies.

Not that making the most of Apple TV is cheap (you still need a 720p set and 5.1 surround), but it's more accessible -- and importantly, more convenient. Jobs' point is not that he believes iTunes videos are technically superior; it's that people are soon very likely to simply download the movie through a service rather than trudge to the video store.

Personally, I can see a lot of people glomming on to iTunes rentals once enough titles are available, even if they're not 1080p; for many, the simplicity of a download at 720p is going to outweigh those extra pixels from a hard copy.

Rob_BluRay

Jan 17, 2008

Tangible media will never be replaced by downloads. Enthusiasts and collectors like building collections and showing those collections off. Very hard to do with a hard drive.

Sonny

Jan 17, 2008

I sure see Apple in a different light now. I guess I wont bother getting a 'mac' laptop if it does not have BD . Oh well the super rugged Panasonic is the best I have had & I will get another one soon...The Mac books are just so small & thin I wanted 1 bad:(

Malosch78

Jan 17, 2008

I guess Jobs is the reason, why my next laptop is from Sony!!!

TigerShark

Jan 17, 2008

I guess now I am going to purchase Windows PC with Blu-ray.

Dark Jedi

Jan 17, 2008

Is it not time to start an email campaign to Universa and Paramount and ask them to end this folly. The war is over, their denial is just hurting everyone.

tommyD

Jan 17, 2008

Apple missed the boat big-time with the Apple TV. They should have listened to the tech geeks and put in an HDTV (QAM/ATSC) tuner to add HD-DVR capabilities to it. As of now, it is a device that is redundant to your On-Demand services from digital cable, which has been out for a long time. Only for this device you have to pay another $229 for...

katharsis

Jan 17, 2008

Just left "feedback" at the apple site.
It really is a shame that they will not be supporting a blu drive at this time. They always try to be on top of things or even a step ahead, honestly I think HD downloads at this time are a step backwards since we are nowhere near ready to embrace this.
Oh well, lets see if they will get back...

CptGreedle

Jan 17, 2008

thank you for changing the title. It fits better now.
And please, if people post feedback, be polite and courteous.
This is not a complaint site, it is a feedback site. Ask them politely to add Blu-ray.

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darkpoet25

Jan 17, 2008

Given that the iPhone was easily hacked into, does he not think the same thing will happen with HD downloads? Sorry, I will continue to stick with my Blu Ray disc's. The last thing I want is to download a movie to a hard drive with a chance of it being hacked with a virus, thus corrupting said hard drive. A 720p movie, with a Dolby Digital encode can't compare to seeing a movie in beautiful 1080p with a lossless soundtrack. I realise this is more in competition with Blockbuster/Netflix, but at least with them you can get the FULL HD experience with renting a BD title.

bkbluray

Jan 17, 2008

@Commodus - "But to see the advantage over an iTunes HD rental, you need a fairly large 1080p HDTV (or monitor) with an HDMI connection, a Blu-ray player, and a 7.1-channel surround receiver plus speaker setup. That's a few thousand dollars before you start even renting or buying movies."

So does that make the online rentals as good as Blu-ray? I myself only have a 720p TV and a DTS 5.1 system, but I know that one day I will upgrade. I want my collection to be more future-proof than an online 720p download. And I love being able to display my Blu movies on a shelf. It's so much better than saying to someone, "Take a look on my computer and see all of the HD movies I've downloaded."

jryan

Jan 17, 2008

digital downloads are not even close to reality, and might never be.

1st the backbone to support that much data is not in place, and telecommunication companies are in no rush to expand.

2nd most people still don’t even have broadband, dial up still has about 40% of the market

3rd a good percentage can not even get broadband in rural locations still if they would want it.

4th Digital music has been in place for years now, and still has not threatened cds at all. And it already has a standard format, and a lot of devices to use it.

5th people like to have physical copies of things when they purchase them, even if they end up ripping it to another format.

6th the reason dvds are being replaced with blue-ray is capacity, 4gb is not enough size to fit a hq hd video, the internet is far from the capability of transferring data in the 30gb range even at the highest speeds.

So to say this war was pointless because of digital downloads is wrong. And if they find a way to compress hd video to a reasonable size, they will put it on a dvd and that would end the war.

Grady

Jan 17, 2008

Someone should give him a copy of Blu-ray Cars so he can hear the difference between DD and PCM. It's a lot like watching SD vs HD.

I've not seen Ratatouille other than in the theater but Cars blu my mind.

netmand

Jan 17, 2008

I haven't rented a movie since I could afford to just buy it (this goes back to VHS days). I'm sure there are a lot of people like me that like to physically have the disc and not be limited to playing it on propietary or limited selection of hardware.

Bookshelf full of discs > iTunes
as far as I'm concerned.

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jw

Jan 17, 2008

he knows the truth remember he has something to do with Disney's Pixar animation, and they are true blu and no kid wants a download for the bedroom, not very user friendly for a 5 year old

Sith

Jan 17, 2008

What a loser, i can rent movies if i want in hd off my 360.....Without paying an extra $299.00
for a box that only transfers data......I guess for renting something you wouldn't buy(though
i get bluray's day 1 from blockbuster online) would be ok to an extent, but the 720p is a joke

CAB

Jan 17, 2008

IMHO, this is great news for Blu-ray. How many Jobs disciples just heard him say Blu-ray beat HD DVD? How many of those guys would buy Blu just cause he said it?

Watch out Best Buy! Here they come!

Deacon220

Jan 17, 2008

I think the only market downloads will threaten will be rentals and the majority of rental customers don't buy now anyway. They are also the market with the least access to high speed internet usually because of income or just plain cheapskates. There is a joe sixpack market out there but he's not buying movies now anyway he rents them from the blockbuster store or Kroger. Anyone who has the desire to own a HD TV will not be satisfied with "near" HD quality. That's like going to a five star restraunt and ordering only a glass of their finest tap water. Downloading and storing hastles aside I relly think they are really missing the boat on this one at least at this time. Just because little Jonny likes to download lots of tunes at .99 cents doesn't mean Daddy is going to deal with the cost and trouble associated with movie downloads. The infrasturcture is not in place, ISP don't have the bandwidth or will deffinately up the prices if you hammer their capacity downloading huge files on a regular basis. I think they need to think again if they think the market is out there for downloads.

blu-backer

Jan 17, 2008

And with TimeWarner Cable testing a pay per usage rather than flat fee for internet pricing, yeah, downloading HD movies sure looks like it'll be coming real soon to the masses. They're doing this because of network congestion caused by high downloading of a small percent of their users. Think how it will be like if a larger percent start downloading HD movies.

Yeah, HD downloads FTW! </sarcasm>

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alphadec

Jan 17, 2008

Thats very u are dead WRONG JOBS!!!. We want to own the film I want that is why online movies will fail!. I and I think most do not want to pay every time I wanna see my fav film.

FruityOatyBar

Jan 17, 2008

What's with all the hate coming from these comments? Steve Jobs just announced HD movvie
rental through iTuens. Do you really think he'd say/do anything to jeopardize this new venture's
coolness factor? No way. He's running a business people.

When the first Mac has a BD drive he will be just as effusive talking about how cool and cutting
edge that is.

Besides renting/downloading an HD movie instantly (even if it is 720p) directly from your TV is
pretty awesome and something to crow about. I know I will be renting fewer BDs from Netflix
because of it.

As it stands right now for Apple, it really doens't matter which HD format wins the war. They have
thier own distribution to worry about. Jobs doensn't have it out for HD media, he's looking out for
his company and iTuens is a huge portion of that company. He needs to work to make sure it
remains relevant.

Rainman208

Jan 17, 2008

No way I'm downloading my HD content. If BD movies were no less than $40-$50 he might have a shot but with hard media available for as low as $14.99 and showing in full HD picture and audio quality I think he's going to be very disappointed.

EvolutionCherry

Jan 17, 2008

I am sick of the Bill Gates and Steve Jobs of the world tryin to sell people on Downloadable crap! WE ARE NOT THE DOWNLOADING GENERATION! I know I am certainty NOT. I am a VHS baby and I need something I can take out of a package and pop into a machine and press play with. Also I like the idea of walking into a store and spending my hard earned money on a home video product. I cringe at the idea that this will all lead to a place where people will not want to leave their homes. This almost makes me not wanna buy a PC or a mac at all. Two small minded computer company CEOs are putting me off from it. I always believed that downloads are for MP3s not films.

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

I think you guys are taking his comments out of context.
"Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will
care about what format is where.
What I get out of this is just that online movie rentals, this has absolutely nothing to do with
blu/HDdvd or any other format other that online digital downloads. As far as send him a copy of
Ratatouille, I'm pretty sure he has seen it more than most of us. Do we forget Apple is in the Blu
group, Jobs was CEO of Pixar now sits on the board of Disney. He is just trying to promote Apple's
new download rentals. Sometimes people read way to much into things.

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/mar/10blu-ray.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs

don't be so sensitive Pixar films/Disney are brought to you by your friendly Apple CEO

designguybrown

Jan 17, 2008

i'm thinking that the two formats will appeal to 2 different types of people - collectors and
consumers. Right-- so there is room for all these delivery methods. The download is all about get-a-
movie, consume-it, discard-it.. get new, get old, get popular, whatever. Hi-def stuff is more about
the collector - picking some faves and buying them and putting them up on your case. Of course
there are overlaps and hybrids of these --- i'll probably collect my top 50 super faves: LotR and
such.. but then there'll be the bi-weekly gimmes - the downloads..
and even a third category - mail-subscription when you want to view old or rare or international
stuff that may not be available as part of the couple-of-thousand of offerings that are likely to be
available in download for the forseeable future - the 'long-tail' phenomena...
my plan is consume 10-15 dvds a month from mail subscription, old, b-movies, hard-to-find, int'ls,
whatever.. every month.. then of course there are movies that i want now.. gimme.. downloads
maybe once-a-week... and then oooohhhh the big, full-featured, gotta-have blu-ray releases to be
treasured whenever they come out.... and there you have.. the well-movied life...

bluwillwin

Jan 17, 2008

He should have ended the sentence after he said bluray won. Sure igroupies will adopt his new scheme but people with eyes and ears for true HD will look elsewhere until 1080p can go ondemand download._That should be at least a few years, and even then it will go for at leat $5 per download-so most people like myself would rather have something physical for only another 10 bucks or so. Steve jobs should take more things into context before prognosticating how the masses will react in the future. But all the gatesgroupies and jobbers lemmings will follow along like goofs.

bkbluray

Jan 17, 2008

I'm just wondering why Apple sits on the board of directors for Blu-ray when Jobs says things like "Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will care about what format is where."

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

Wrote a quick note to Apple
"Greetings,
I was writing to comment on my current systems.
We have 3 Mac Pros and 3 Mac Book Pros.
While we do like the systems we would like to make a couple of request.

1. Updated video card options to purchase "after the Build" to keep
up with evolving technology and squeeze the most out of our pro systems.

2. The biggest request though is the addition of a blu-ray superdrive.
We deal in media all day and archiving the footage as well as authoring
and distributing our shows would really benefit from the blu technology.
The value this adds to our productions would be overwhelming and help us
to move ahead in our particular field.

I know Apple has been a Blu-ray supporter, Pixar and
Disney as well. Yet we have not gotten even the slightest hint on when
we can expect to see this support implemented into our pro line machines.
We look over and see other manufactures offering this and feel as we may be left behind.

Please let us know if this is indeed an upgrade coming soon
or if we need to look somewhere else for this kind of support.

Regards

-David
Production Coordinator
Weather Insight"

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

I'm thinking because downloads and physical media aren't the same things?

"bkbluray » Jan 17, 2008 17:19:
I'm just wondering why Apple sits on the board of directors for Blu-ray when Jobs says things like
"Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will
care about what format is where."

designguybrown

Jan 17, 2008

i haven't read all the comments to see if it was already said - but it should be pointed out that there is
a blu-ray drive for both pro and macbook pro - internal - as a 3rd party from fastmac.com -- ahh. but
no blu-ray player that i am aware of... just archiving and such...

apollo92178

Jan 17, 2008

I was looking at CSI:Miami off my HD DVR and compared to my PS3 IT LOOK LIKE CRAP. And I'm
thinking this is from a fat cable that just handle audio and video. The Broadcast side of the house has
been at this since what? 1998? and they still haven't gotten it right or provide a lot of channels.
Cellphones have been "digital" since 1997? And they still haven't gotten onboard with 3G yet. Sure
downloading might be the way of the future but i'm guessing 15 to 20 year in the future.

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

here is the situation in which they are hoping the downloads come through.

Unanticipated watching. what? do we do this?
You know when your at home and for some out of the
ordinary reason you have nothing to do and your you know bored?
Say it's past closing time at blockbuster,
or they were out of the movie you wanted?
You don't happen to own it oh wait download it hmm ok.

SOme people don't like the public and could care less to go to the store,
some don't like to purchase something they ill only watch once.
Not everyone thinks the same or thinks"different"
that is why we have some many choices.

Honestly I most likely wouldn't download one of these,
not because I never get that bored, but I like to have the physical disc, I like ownership.
And by the time we get the kids to sleep I'm lucky to be awake more than an hour.
Though I know plenty who don't. Who think buying movies that get watched 1-3 times
for $20 compared would be absurd when you could rent it without leaving the house for
less than 1/4 of that cost.

And for everyone challenging the downloaded movies idea,
um we've been doing it for years on bit and p2p for bad quality,
some people would pay for access to people dvd rips on their ftp sites,
cashing in legally with better quality is a business move, not only Apple is doing,
but i assure you sony will as well eventually.

There is plenty of room for this kind of format.
It has nothing to do with physical ownership, rather ease of use,
not dealing with people and being cheap.

BTW if you have the ps3 you could just stream it from the puter.

To wrap up this just brings us more options to enjoy HD,
720 is now 1080 later I'm sure and what about this

www.engadget.com/2008/01/14/33-megapixel-super-hi-vision-ultra-hdtv-could-be-on-the-air-in

We could argue all around the various things going on,
but keep in mind the more choice we have the better we are.
Digital downloads will not take away from blu.

Minimejer05

Jan 17, 2008

Atleast he said Blu won.

marzetta7

Jan 17, 2008

Ahhh, Stevie! I love Apple. But I will have to disagree with Steve on this one. He is simply trying to put his company in a position of download King. Simple as that. He is doing what he thinks is best for Apple, but I'm sure the public is not quite there yet. Sure, there will be some who want to go the download route, but for now, I think this avenue will be quite niche until network infrastructure is improved, and their quality equals what is already on optical disc. Moreover, I'm of the opinion that most consumers want a tangible movie, not one on a hard drive that can crap out at any time.

mjoshi

Jan 17, 2008

Nothing new with Jobsy's comment. If you think Microsoft was bad than Apple is evil, I've never seen a company that treats its customer so bad. What do you think about iPhone locking down scam ? Macbook Air is a copy of 4 year old notebook that Sony released and still he has guts to go out and preach others.

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

I have never understood the whole iphone lock down stuff? Can you unlock it? yes.
When I got my razr with cingular it was locked to Cingular, when I got my sony with T-mobile it was
locked to T-mobile? and copies are every where
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subnotebook

Top reviewer

aiman04

Jan 17, 2008

"I hope someone sends him a copy of 'Ratatouille' on Blu-ray soon to show him what True HD really looks like and that not all HD is created equally."

LOL.

He owned PIXAR until 2006, and now he's Walt Disney Company's largest individual shareholder and a member of its Board of Directors.

I'm sure he knows about the Ratatouille BD.

bkbluray

Jan 17, 2008

@ RaVeN - "I'm thinking because downloads and physical media aren't the same things?"

Everyone who responds here will be biased, either Mac-loving or Mac-hating. The way it sounds to ME (I personally don't like Macs much) is that he wants to turn people off of physical media and onto downloads.

As I've seen here, it sounds a lot more positive to Mac people.

Excalibur-king

Jan 17, 2008

Blu-ray won, but ipods suck.

mjoshi

Jan 17, 2008

Probably Jobs need to take a look at this post before going and peeing on others and start acting more professional instead of some school kid. Many times he speaks more stupider than idiots working at local Bestbuy.

http://gizmodo.com/345829/interview-sonys-thoughts-on-the-macbook-air

mjoshi

Jan 17, 2008

"

I have never understood the whole iphone lock down stuff? Can you unlock it? yes.
When I got my razr with cingular it was locked to Cingular, when I got my sony with T-mobile it was
locked to T-mobile? and copies are every where
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subnotebook
"

Probably you are missing point here, its okay to be phone locked to carrier but it should not brick phone if you install legal applications on iPhone and you do update after that. It seems Apple's attitude is although you bought phone it still belongs to Apple and they have all rights to lock it down with their updates, fuck off jobsy there are better alternative to your monopolistic attitude.

PeteS

Jan 17, 2008

CptGreadle said:
http://www.apple.com/feedback/macpro.html
Request that they add Blu-ray support to their computers ..

Did that, suggest others do too.

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

"monopolistic attitude"
If there are alternatives to the iphone,
which there are plenty, I can't see this as
a true statement.

And btw Sony does the same thing
for the psp, nintendo for the wii etc.

Considering the OS and how closed Apple
has been with OS X you have to go through
the SDK. I can understand this, while an
open system can benefit a lot from many
people creating new things it also can
bring the system down, with apps that do not
properly work on the system, windows is a
prime example of this over saturation.

The biggest point to me though is not that
it's such a problem if you can install those
apps you want on a black berry or other
phone get that phone.

You have choices thus
there is no monopoly about it.

And any of those who bought an iphone
yet never payed attention to the very clear
advertising informing you that it was for the
AT&T network only, really should consider
actually reading adds, turn up the volume on
the tv or something.

Apple made a business deal with AT&T
much like the studios have with blu-ray
or HD-DVD for a contractual length of time.

I think it's pretty common practice.

The point of all these companies is to make
money no hard feelings, none taken.

As long as there are choices it's not a monopoly
Competition brings out the best in all industries.

Monopoly is XM merging with Sirius

and for bricking it, it never actually bricks it can
be brought back through itunes, unlike the psp.
In most cases this was just hooplah

blu-rayfan101

Jan 17, 2008

Hells Yeah!

Hayashi

Jan 17, 2008

You guys do know Steve Jobs helped start pixar right?

Top reviewer

hc666

Jan 17, 2008

I will NEVER download a movie. May as well just get the regular DVD, they have better audio.

Barulez2k7

Jan 17, 2008

I'm not getting a iMac period.

Top reviewer

mugupo

Jan 17, 2008

Steve Job only right about is digital download movie is the future, actually many country is aleady big in this, especially those use torrent and other source to illegal download, is nothing new for them. But to download a HD movie require a very very fast internet since most of HD movie can easily over 20GB. Also require a nice PC that can run, which often cost more than a home theater system. Netflicks is gonna bring digital download contente to tv end of this year, but still not gonna solver several issue, many consumer simply don't had enought speed or time for the download HD movie, i had 3MB it still gonna take me 4ever to download. Also most digital download HD movie doesn't contain all the HD audio or PCM, not to mention it lack a menu or other feature.

JT_Designer

Jan 17, 2008

Steve. We don't live in a star trek world yet. We don't have gigabite-terabite per second download speeds over the air with tricorders. Even if a HD movie at 1080p encoded in H.264 was upliaded to iTunes it would still be many gigs worth of data and you would be loosing audio and video quality. Any form of compression basically throws out data and Blu-ray is all about highest quality possibly, not compression for download speed.

U4K61

Jan 17, 2008

I think downloads can coexist. Apple can do a service for movie makers outside the big studios - that would be cool. But 1080P on BD50, no download is going to replace that.

kaliraver

Jan 17, 2008

Steve Jobs needs to wake up & start loading BD-rom drives onto his Macs since they are already overpriced. I want a Mac but won't be getting one till they put in a BD drive on it!

Fusionaes

Jan 17, 2008

I find it funny that everyone that has posted a comment (negative or positive) including the administrator Josh, failed to see and or realize that Mr Jobs was specifically discussing "online movie rentals". in that sense, format is indeed irrelevant.

Top reviewer

aiman04

Jan 17, 2008

Steve Jobs didn't start PIXAR, George Lucas did.

He bought it from Lucasfilm in 1986.

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/technologies/h264/
I don't think you would be getting blu encoded files here.

Darkzen

Jan 17, 2008

People are jumping the gun here. Gotta take what he said into context. "Clearly, Blu-ray won, but in the new world order of instant online movie rentals, in HD, no one will care about what format is where." We, of course, disagree with the "Mac Daddy" about the second part"

He is saying in terms of the format war and physical media BD WON! He is promoting online rentals, which do not compete in the same level as movie PURCHASES or even STORE rentals. It's a new ballgame. He isn't promoting online rentals over BD nor physical media.

Next you gotta read the last part carefully. "We, of course, disagree with the "Mac Daddy" about the second part" This is referring to Bill Gates' idea that in the future people will prefer digital downloads over physical media. Jobs and Apple clearly do not believe in Gates' idea and are following a totally different road here. MS wanted to provide movies online arguing that people would stop buying physical media altogether and would rather store their movies in Hard Drives. Jobs, on the other hand, is saying that in the ONLINE movie rental business, iTunes and Apple can provide HD movies to those that want to instantly rent ONLINE.

Everyone here is a loyal BD supporter, but if we stop acting rationally and taking comments in the right context we'll turn into the other guys. The ones that spin anything anyway in order to prove their point.

One last thing, If I remember correctly, Jobs used to own Pixar. He sold it to Disney for a stake in Disney ownership. If that is indeed correct, he is both vested into BD and already knows how good "Ratatouille" looks in full HD.

Let's continue to support BD, but let's not sink into the other camp's level and stop understanding what people are truly sayng.

Thanks

yensid

Jan 17, 2008

I think all of you are missing the point. Although Blu-Ray is gorgeous there is a movement on
satellite and set-top boxes moving towards video on demand. I mean really how many times can you
watch one movie when there are sooo many gorgeous HD movies coming out.

Eventually we will be moving to a on-demand type service, but not anytime soon. Especially not
720p.

squirrelprophet

Jan 17, 2008

Exactly how much would it cost to have my entire movie collection on my computer in High Def anyway? I'd need a new computer- a couple zillion hard drives? And what happnes when that crashes? What happnes if I don't like a movie I bought? i can't resell it! What about special features- VHS used to just have moives- every now and then something exrra- but DVD introduced the special feature- and Blu Ray and even the inferior HD DVD's big stink is all about Spcecial features and specifications to handle though- anyone could make a player that just plays the move- movie studios would love ti cause it would be SO much easier, faster and cheaper- but I prefer to e ale to hold my moive. I like being able to selel a movie if I don't like it. i also like the fact atht if my computer crashes and melts into a puddle- I can still watch my movies because their in a nice little case on asome shelves in my living room.

MP3's and Music downloads are a big thing- but people STILl buy CD's- but a 3-5 MB music file is something different than the 1-10 GB it would take for a high Quality mvoie.

Why does Microsoft and Apple seemt o feel that people are so easy to sway and that people are so ready for an inconvenient way to ge their movies. Wal Mart is like 5 minutes from my house- I can go there- geta DVD- as low as 5 bucks- come home and sitck it in the DVD player and watch it- watch teh special features. if I'm lucky- half my Movie will have downloaded by then.

BRILLIANT idea!! A bunch of Jackasses - honestly

RaVeN

Jan 17, 2008

they are rentals, your rant about losing them off your hard drive
makes no sense. like the part you said MP3's and Music downloads are
a big thing- but people STILl buy CD's"
it depends on peoples preferences. 1.25 gb for a near 2 hour movie,
you can rent or buy that file. Again goes to personal preferences, as
most of us here would prefer hard copy blu, doesn't change that it can
be nice to have some of these for your travels.

BLU RULES ALL

Jan 17, 2008

I love my mac computers. There the only computers in my house. I think eventually Jobs will get
smart, and add a Blu-ray drive to his computers. But Jobs admitting the Blu-ray as won the format
war, I think that is a big jump for blu. DIE HD-DUD

ERPGURU

Jan 18, 2008

Hiya..longtime lurker on here, first post. First, had to admit, I am a blu fan since its introduction and have both a BDP-1200 and a PS3, so have been rooting for blu from the start.

That said, there has been a lot of discussion about HD downloads being the possible next 'medium' for videos. One thing I think a lot of people are overlooking is that although people use broadband connections at home now, there is a limited amount of bandwidth for their provider. Providers are getting crunched because users are now downloading gigabytes of information at a time - even if you have a OCT12 switch, bandwidth does run out.

As such, many providers (Time Warner just announced it as a 'pilot' for new customers) that they are now going to charge based on the volume of data that people download rather than a flat charge. There was mention of either doing it through a tiered system - cost for the highest tier, and what that volume of data is, was not stated.

In short - if service providers start charging for the volume of data downloaded, I think it will kill Video on demand at least from the internet - at least in the high def arena. I don't know of any codec that can place a two hour 1080p movie into 100mb...

Thoughts?

John

Top contributor

crystal_sun

Jan 18, 2008

because of his remarks, screw Apple...I'll boycott his stuff. Take that Jobs....

CraigWB

Jan 18, 2008

If you think about the question they asked him It's not surprising the response he made. He just
announced a product after all he's not about to start saying it's not the best option for consumers.
If anything they should have asked why apple hasn't done anything with Blu-ray there's a clear
market for this and Apple is dropping the ball completely in the pro sector by not offering an amazing
cheap authoring solution. Blu-print is $50 000 and only works on a specific version of Windows XP
come on Apple HD rentals for Apple TV isn't the only thing out there.

mustang750r

Jan 18, 2008

do they even realise the amount of memory it takes when downloading something in hd, heck I download 1 minute game trailers on my PS3 and they take up close to 200 mb and the video is in 720p. that reason alone is why blu-ray is superior to anything on the market because of memory capacity. i rather have hundreds of discs than having to pay for a whole bunch of external hard drives, and let's not forget blu is an awsome 1080p movie vessel. so mmmmmnn (sticking tongue out)

Arttkan

Jan 18, 2008

I hope Mac will soon realize that they need Blu-Ray drives in their upcoming Macs.
They've put so much effort in saying that their MacBook/MacBookPro/iMac had HD screens.
Useless if you have no player to play THE media, BLU-RAY!!!

Galley

Jan 18, 2008

Apple TV is an amazing product, but I don't really see it competing with the experience that BDs can
deliver.

gavomatic57

Jan 18, 2008

I think price may be a factor here - if the likes of HMV continue to sell blu-ray discs in the UK like Con Air for £27 (roughly $54 US at current exchange rate), the UK and I'm sure many other countries may continue to let blu-ray pass them by.

That said, rentals whether they be online or disc will never replace ownership so as usual, Jobs is talking out of the wrong hole.

dea136

Jan 18, 2008

He is clearly not an idiot. There will eventually be no format and all digital downloads (i.e. who actually still buys CD's). But that won't happen for a while (infrastructure not ready) and until then it will be Blu-Ray. I think his statement is dead on.

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prerich

Jan 18, 2008

You may not like my comment - but on some of the high-end boards, this is exactly what they have been waiting on. VUDU will distribute content at 1080p and Apple will follow suit. There are many of us who view our movies on computer screens that are in excess of 32 inches (my largest is 106 inch hdcp compatible projector). I recently went blu by adding a computer drive to my system - loved Ratatouille! But Apple TV has support from All of the major studios and the studios are crossing the picket lines that where held between bluray and hd-dvd. Lionsgate has signed a deal with VUDU along with Paramount and Universal. Studios want a way to protect their content and this is possibly the most secure. Many people like convienence, what's easier than pressing a button? No scratched disc to worry about. And purchasing will be available also (VUDU is already there). Blu-ray won the war, but I believe the prolonged fight has allowed an upstart to take hold. Why do you think neither Microsoft nor Apple put a Hd-dvd nor a Blu-ray in their machines? They are looking at software from a software prospective. Don't look for Sony to pull its support - because with profile 2.0 they will benefit from the web access for the PS3 which helps Sony both ways. Full HD is coming via On-demand and several other outlets. The New World Order is paperless, wireless, and physical medium-less - this way the Studios keep full control. Blu is Beau (as in beautiful) but people in general are lazy - look at the success of the Ipod - it's killing high-end audio. It's just the natural order of things today.

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Top contributor

prerich

Jan 18, 2008

dea136 - You a correct sir, and infrastructure is coming faster than we think -AT&T is installing fiber for residential in my area.

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Top contributor

prerich

Jan 18, 2008

@ERPGURU I hear ya, but what's starting to happen is cable companies and the like will link the movies to the box itself (security and no chance of it getting wiped from the hard drive - can anyone say drm in a new package). But because of ease of use people will live with it. In just 3 days I have heard about Apple TV, VUDU, XstreamHD, and Cox HD On Demand. Two of which will offer the option to "buy" the movie (unlimited usage of the purchased movie). They will be delivered the same way on-demand is delivered now but in full 1080p HD. The fastest internet connection in the world belongs to a little old lady in Amsterdam - she can download 80gb in 4 seconds. Her son put it together to show the world that its easy to do. AT&T (when I switched over) informed me of residential fiber coming to my area (told them I had a cable modem). I was informed that the new connection will be at least 5x to 10 as fast as cable modem - I freaked - I don't know if it was sales pitch or what, but I'm waiting for it (supposed to be ready in the fall of this year). Technologies grow at exponential rates and what use to take 10 years only takes 2 now.
My main thoughts are that the Studios would like to keep the content under control - remember we - the customer - own no content - we just buy the rights to use it. With video on demand - studios get exactly what they want, without really hurting bluray - collectors will still collect, and actually profile 2.0 gets in on the act so Sony (being a studio also) can double dip withouth having the pressing cost of making a physical disc - the studio wins and customers that like instant access (no menus, special features, ect) get what they desire - just the main feature. Everyone should remember - Steve is a software guy like Bill - if they could get everything - they would, as one poster said, rule the world.

6ryph3n

Jan 19, 2008

I agree with dea136. I haven't bought a CD in years because of iTunes, and I dream of the day when the same will be true of movies. That day may not be here yet, but it will come, and Apple will lead the way once again. I love BD, and I think it will have a decent life span, but I think it will be the last of the physical formats. The only thing keeping me from getting an Apple TV right now is that I'm stuck using satellite internet with a 400mb/day bandwidth limit. Aside from that, the digital delivery would be much more convenient for me, and my tv is only 720p anyway.