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Originally posted by Ian:
I think this is a prime example why a format war can benefit the customer. Competition between the two formats would appear to be driving down some of the costs. I don't think that we would have seen such a drop had blue-ray been 'allowed' to go it alone.
I agree as it puts pressure on the format backers to drive prices down to win the war... But I think it's even more efficient (benecfial to the customer), when the format itself is established by all parties so the consumer decides who implements it best (cheapest for quality). I think you get there faster because most consumers will not engage at all when doubting the future of the committment.

Formats are are not an efficient use of consumer decision making factors, which are pretty much no deeper than price, quality, ease of use...

Certainly if a development group or company chooses a format that creates substantial end-differences in the product it can produce a consumer difference; but in most cases and certainly this one, I don't think there's enough difference between the two on end-customer experience to drive one or the other to a victory - It will boil down to content available and if one or the other doesn't have all major content available, neither will fly.

I wonder, if all studios put out content in both, and all manufacturers produced players on both, with equal marketing, truly letting the consumer 'decide', what would they pick?


ken