Fat Ninja

There Can Be Only One

I dislike Sony for a number of reasons, but with respect to the PS3, I hate that Sony has foisted their new media format on to their loyal fanbase. The Blu-Ray trojan horse is largely responsible for the exorbitant MSRP that the PS3 commands. I realize that it’s the most reasonably priced Blu-Ray player on the market, and on the surface it seems like Sony is actually doing its fans a service by including the experimental media format. But I’m wary of any kind of “commercial benevolence” coming from Sony’s camp.They dress it up as giving consumers access to a Blu-Ray player at wholesale, but I have to wonder who’s really doing who the favor.

When I look at the installed user-base that the PS2 held, the numbers tell me one thing. Sony was banking on its previous success to establish Blu-Ray. Much as the PS2 helped to vault the DVD format into the forefront of the media formats, Sony held to hope that the PS3 would do the same for Blu-Ray. But the fact is, DVD didn’t have any competing formats that offered the same experience when it came upon the scene. As such, it was the logical choice.

But Blu-Ray doesn’t have the luxury of being uncontested and winning the current format war comes down to a number of factors. Obviously, price is a big consideration, and HD-DVD has had a leg-up in that department, offering far more affordability in their stand-alone players. The PS3 was, in part, an answer to that argument. The next factor is quality, and thus far HD-DVD has been showing up the competition in most side-by-side comparisons. The one area that Sony has managed to beat Toshiba out in has been capacity, but Toshiba has already fired back by beating out Blu-Ray’s 50GB capacity by announcing their triple-layer, 51GB HD-DVD.

So, Sony’s definitely facing an uphill battle in the format wars, and keeping up with the competition is costly. However, if you can eliminate choice from the equation, then you don’t have to concern yourself with the competition.The truth is, Sony is trying to secure a victory for their untested and mix-reviewed Blu-Ray by forcing their loyal fans to buy-in, thereby eliminating choice from the equation. As a consumer, choice is the only voice that I have.

I’m pretty sure that Sony used their market dominance with the PS2 to leverage support from the various film studios that have hopped on board with Blu-Ray. But first Sony has to make good on their promises to the Blu-Ray consortium by selling PS3s; a task which they seem to be struggling to do at this point.

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