Most of the debate these past few months have been over the rivalry between two HD formats known as Blu-ray and HD-DVD, then after nearly 2 years of battling each other for a hold of the market and offering superior quality to the long-standing DVD format, Blu-ray finally put the fork into all of HD-DVD's dreams.
Experts will analyze this situation and offer numbers about many factors including how how Sony made the wise choice of including a Blu-ray player standard inside ALL of their PS3 machines, whereas HD-DVD was only an optional upgrade for the Xbox systems from Microsoft. Others will analyze the various studio supporters for the two formats and draw comparisons from that or from the vendors, but I think the answer comes down to something more basic....color & phonetics.
Blu-ray won because it's blue. What?
Blue is typically a color that is more appealing to the eye and is often used to convey a calmness and appeal factor versus red, which is a much stronger and bolder color by nature. Red was the color of choice for HD-DVD and their packaging. It only makes sense that Blu-ray chose blue, but the packaging of their media helped play a vital part of the win.
The other is simple phonetics. Try saying "H-Dee-Dee-Vee-Dee" a couple times over and over. It's exhausting. "Blooo Ray" on the other hand rolls out naturally and feels more expressive, it also sounds different. HD-DVD no doubt explains what it is...it's a DVD, but with HD capabilities, which is essentially what both formats are in the short of it, but people need to know that they are upgrading to something 'better' than a DVD and a "Blu-ray" sounds different, where HD-DVD still sounds similar.
So that's it...Blu-ray inevitably won because it's easier to say and looks better from an aesthetically pleasing marketing perspective. Crazy eh?
Both Blu-ray and HD-DVD delivered nearly the same thing, but the fact that neither were cross-compatible made it a tricky sale for many, but the fact that HD-DVD players and Blu-ray players can upscale current DVD movies is a huge bonus. Now that Blu-ray is the clear victor and the studio support is quickly moving that direction we will certainly see a drop in price over the next year on the hardware and software and look forward to exciting titles being released!
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