Both CD and DVD offered advantages to consumers that made them a no-brainer to adopt once software became plentiful and hardware prices dropped. With the new DVD formats, the advantages are clearly less but they are more compelling than just "better sound". Through mainstream systems, the better sound of SACD and DVD-A was not better enough. But I think the better picture of the HD DVD formats (on HD displays) will be better enough, and combined with the greater capacity of the discs, you have something that will move consumers to upgrade. And the barriers to adoption are fairly low. The new players will play old DVDs, correct? So you won't replace your old collection necessarily, but you may be motivated to get a new DVD player by the prospect of buying (or renting) an entire season of Deadwood on a single disc.
The improved PQ of 1080p over DVD's current 480p is pretty obvious and most of us who have HD displays, even if not 1080p, will go for an HD player as soon as Netflix starts offering the formats on a good number of new or interesting older releases. Netflix, along with Blockbuster, has some power in how this plays out (which formats do they offer?). The studios probably have more power.
Blu-ray at least promises interactivity, and I imagine that what this really means is you'll be encouraged to buy things directly while watching content. That's a big enough carrot to drive development of some pretty clever promotions, which may suck consumers in.
The next generation of broadband into the home is a wildcard here if HD on-demand begins to materialize.
The improved PQ of 1080p over DVD's current 480p is pretty obvious and most of us who have HD displays, even if not 1080p, will go for an HD player as soon as Netflix starts offering the formats on a good number of new or interesting older releases. Netflix, along with Blockbuster, has some power in how this plays out (which formats do they offer?). The studios probably have more power.
Blu-ray at least promises interactivity, and I imagine that what this really means is you'll be encouraged to buy things directly while watching content. That's a big enough carrot to drive development of some pretty clever promotions, which may suck consumers in.
The next generation of broadband into the home is a wildcard here if HD on-demand begins to materialize.