WEBVTT - Blu-ray vs HD DVD 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios, 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:13.880 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tex Stuff. 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:16.920 I am your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer 0:00:16.960 --> 0:00:18.720 with How Stuff Works and I heart radio and I 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:22.320 love all things tech and you know what, guys, Originally 0:00:22.360 --> 0:00:24.720 I thought this was going to be the last in 0:00:24.840 --> 0:00:29.840 an epic six part series about the history of the 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:34.239 evolution of entertainment media and our relationship with it. But 0:00:34.360 --> 0:00:38.000 as it turns out, that was being uh optimistic. This 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:41.120 is going to be part six of I think seven 0:00:41.159 --> 0:00:45.239 episodes now because there's just so much to say, and 0:00:45.280 --> 0:00:47.360 there's so much that goes into this and that that 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:51.400 is reflective of our relationship with media and also the 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:54.720 business of media. This is a really complicated, deep topic, 0:00:55.120 --> 0:00:59.800 and obviously I could have looked at launching a full podcast, 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:03.480 not just an episode, but a full series around the 0:01:03.520 --> 0:01:07.559 technology of media and its evolution and our our relationship 0:01:07.600 --> 0:01:10.720 with it. That could have been, you know, a mini series, 0:01:10.800 --> 0:01:13.880 like a fifteen part mini series or something. But I 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:17.880 do want to continue this and conclude it, so I'm 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:20.520 hoping that in this episode of the next one, I'll 0:01:20.520 --> 0:01:22.959 be able to do that. We'll see how that goes. 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:25.959 But in our last episode, I ended by talking about 0:01:26.000 --> 0:01:30.280 how DVDs rose up to take the torch from VHS, 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:34.399 the VHS video cassette tapes, and how the DVD became 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:38.080 the dominant form of media in the home theater space. 0:01:38.360 --> 0:01:40.000 But I ran out of time to talk about a 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:43.160 few other interesting points about DVDs, such as why some 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:47.039 entertainment companies were excited about the DVD format and some 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:50.720 were reluctant to support it. Now, to understand all this, 0:01:51.240 --> 0:01:55.480 we need to think about the television industry at the 0:01:55.560 --> 0:01:58.880 time that the DVD was starting to to come about. 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:01.840 And it's been a while since I've talked about television 0:02:02.000 --> 0:02:05.120 in this series, and in a much earlier episode, I 0:02:05.280 --> 0:02:08.760 talked about the birth of cable and also the transition 0:02:08.880 --> 0:02:12.280 that happened between black and white to color television, which 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:15.040 was actually pretty early in the days of TV, but 0:02:15.160 --> 0:02:18.160 it took more than a decade for color TV to 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:21.200 become kind of the norm in households across the world. 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.480 But besides cable delivery, you also had the rise of 0:02:25.560 --> 0:02:30.119 satellite television, and with that customers could access more channels 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:34.520 than what over the air broad broadcast could support in 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:38.880 those days. So if you had rabbitier antenna or you know, 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:41.200 an antenna up on the roof and you're using that 0:02:41.240 --> 0:02:44.079 to pull down signals to watch on TV, you had 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:47.240 a certain number of channels at your disposal, but cable 0:02:47.320 --> 0:02:51.840 customers and satellite TV customers had access to far more channels. 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:55.320 Some of them were premium cable channels like HBO or 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:59.280 pay per view services, and it meant that customers had 0:02:59.320 --> 0:03:01.919 way more options than they would if they just got 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:05.960 their their television over the air. And it also meant 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:10.240 that some of the control for media was leaving the 0:03:10.280 --> 0:03:13.560 hands of the entertainment studios that were producing it and 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:17.000 going more toward the companies that were distributing it, so 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:20.560 cable companies, satellite companies, that sort of thing. So that 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:23.840 meant that some of the studios were starting to get 0:03:23.840 --> 0:03:28.280 a little antsy, because every player in a game wants 0:03:28.320 --> 0:03:31.200 to be in the lead. You don't want to see 0:03:31.240 --> 0:03:35.360 another element in that game start to outperform you. And 0:03:35.440 --> 0:03:39.040 that was sort of the feeling that these studios were 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:42.440 getting at the time. And meanwhile, you had another player 0:03:42.480 --> 0:03:44.800 on the field that was also causing issue. That would 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:48.640 be blockbuster video. It had ascended to a position of 0:03:48.760 --> 0:03:53.080 dominance in the video rental market. It controlled almost half 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:56.800 of the market share of all video rentals across the 0:03:56.880 --> 0:03:59.920 United States, and that gave Blockbuster a lot of power 0:04:00.000 --> 0:04:04.360 at the negotiating table when working with studios. Blockbusters gain 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:08.320 meant lower profits for those studios that were actually producing 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:12.160 the content, and the entertainment world is a cutthroat environment. 0:04:12.600 --> 0:04:16.120 The various entities are constantly maneuvering to get a better 0:04:16.200 --> 0:04:19.480 deal than the other guy has. And also during this time, 0:04:19.520 --> 0:04:23.840 we saw entertainment companies began the process of consolidation with 0:04:23.920 --> 0:04:29.000 other big, big companies like providers and building towards what 0:04:29.000 --> 0:04:31.920 we would see today with these movie and television studios 0:04:31.960 --> 0:04:37.359 being part of gigantic telecommunications companies. So you could argue 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:41.560 that these days, these mega giants are setting all the rules. 0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:43.880 But this was still in a time where everyone was 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:46.200 kind of maneuvering. It was sort of a game of thrones, 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:50.080 but in the entertainment industry, not in a sword and 0:04:50.160 --> 0:04:54.000 sorcery kind of way. Anyway, back to why this matters 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:58.520 for DVD, the studios preferred selling copies of movies to 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:03.080 customers rather than the rental model. Because the studio has 0:05:03.080 --> 0:05:06.799 got a larger share of the sales revenue for sold 0:05:06.880 --> 0:05:11.400 movies than they would get from a rental royalty. It 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:14.040 would take time for Blockbuster to make the switch from 0:05:14.120 --> 0:05:18.480 VHS to DVD. In fact, the lack of speed on Blockbusters. 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:21.520 Part of this is frequently cited as one of the 0:05:21.560 --> 0:05:24.960 many reasons that company eventually went bankrupt. But I did 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:27.279 full episodes on Blockbuster already, so I'm not gonna go 0:05:27.320 --> 0:05:31.280 back into that. Warner Brothers in particular, was really jazzed 0:05:31.320 --> 0:05:37.320 about developing the DVD technology. Meanwhile, Disney, Paramount, and Fox 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:40.880 were less enthusiastic. There was a fear that the copy 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:44.920 protection on DVDs wouldn't be sufficient to keep piracy at bay, 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:49.159 so these companies really wanted stronger DRM put on two 0:05:49.240 --> 0:05:53.800 DVDs and for DVD players. Plus to use the DVD technology, 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:56.320 the companies would have to pay a royalty fee to 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:59.520 Warner Brothers. Because Warner Brothers was one of the entities 0:05:59.800 --> 0:06:03.560 that it was involved in the development of the DVD format. 0:06:04.200 --> 0:06:06.960 So if you wanted to put your movies on DVD, 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:09.559 it meant that you had to pay a small, well 0:06:10.240 --> 0:06:13.200 not that small, but a licensing via Royalty v to 0:06:13.320 --> 0:06:16.880 Warner Brothers, and as it turns out, entertainment companies are 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:21.080 rarely keen to send cash to their direct competitors. Funny 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:24.320 thing that getting those studios on board ended up taking 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:28.920 a lot of negotiations and deals. For example, Fox agreed 0:06:29.000 --> 0:06:33.000 to jump on board the DVD wagon when Warner Brothers 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:36.960 president Warren liber Fab was able to negotiate for Time 0:06:36.960 --> 0:06:41.160 Warner to carry Fox News on its cable package. Time 0:06:41.160 --> 0:06:45.560 Warner had previously refused to carry Fox News because the 0:06:45.560 --> 0:06:49.440 company had been in a pretty public spat with Rupert Murdoch, 0:06:49.720 --> 0:06:53.600 the owner of Fox News, so liber Fat was able 0:06:53.640 --> 0:06:56.200 to smooth that out to get Time Warner to say, 0:06:56.240 --> 0:07:00.000 all right, we will carry Fox News on our cable 0:07:00.160 --> 0:07:04.560 subscription packages if, in turn, twentieth century Fox agrees to 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:08.000 support the DVD standard. Now, while the first DVD players 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:10.760 on the market cost around eight hundred dollars, that was 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:14.200 still cheaper than the first VCRs, particularly if you take 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:18.840 into account inflation, and that price dropped fairly quickly. In fact, 0:07:18.840 --> 0:07:21.840 the DVD player would become one of the fastest adopted 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:27.560 consumer electronics gadgets ever. It debuted in and by two 0:07:27.600 --> 0:07:32.160 thousand three, DVD rentals were outperforming VHS rentals, but it 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:36.600 was in sales where you really saw the big difference. 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:40.520 Not only were studios making lots of moolah from the business, 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:44.120 but also lead to big companies like Target and Walmart 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:48.520 getting truly enormous by selling DVDs in their stores. Big 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:52.200 retailers were carrying DVDs and it was a profitable business. 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:55.320 And it was because of a change in consumer behavior 0:07:55.640 --> 0:07:58.920 ce DVDs managed to do something that vhs had largely 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:03.760 failed to do. It made buying movies a fairly mainstream activity. 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:07.600 There were a few people out there who had impressive 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:11.560 libraries of movies on VHS tape, but most people were 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:14.960 buying blank tapes and copying stuff off television. They might 0:08:15.040 --> 0:08:19.440 own one or two prerecorded movies. Often they were family films, 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:23.040 things that were appropriate for families, in other words, but 0:08:23.280 --> 0:08:26.640 most people were just renting VHS video cassettes. They weren't 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:29.120 going out and buying a copy. But DVDs were a 0:08:29.120 --> 0:08:33.040 different story. Average consumers were more likely to purchase a DVD, 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.240 and so we see how a change in technology changed 0:08:37.360 --> 0:08:41.760 our consumption of the media. On that technology, rather than 0:08:41.840 --> 0:08:44.440 rent something so that we could watch it. We would 0:08:44.440 --> 0:08:46.560 actually go out and purchase something so we could own 0:08:46.600 --> 0:08:49.760 a copy, and DVD became a place where a film 0:08:49.840 --> 0:08:53.240 that performed poorly at the box office could thrive in 0:08:53.280 --> 0:08:56.600 the home market. Fight Club is one of the most 0:08:56.760 --> 0:09:00.400 cited examples of this particular phenomena because in the movie 0:09:00.440 --> 0:09:04.240 came out in nine it made a paltry thirty seven 0:09:04.240 --> 0:09:07.320 million dollars at the U S box office against a 0:09:07.360 --> 0:09:10.600 budget that was estimated at sixty seven million, so it 0:09:10.679 --> 0:09:14.840 was by all definitions a box office flop. But then 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:17.160 it came out on DVD. It was stacked to the 0:09:17.160 --> 0:09:19.880 brim with special features, which helped to kind of define 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:23.360 what special features would be for DVDs, and it flourished 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:26.360 on in the home market. It became a best seller. 0:09:27.040 --> 0:09:30.760 There was another film that had a similar story, Office Space. 0:09:31.360 --> 0:09:34.200 It made a measly ten point eight million dollars at 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:36.720 the box office, but it would go on to become 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:40.319 a big success on home video, particularly after the cable 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:43.760 channel Comedy Central aired the film in two thousand one. 0:09:44.160 --> 0:09:47.560 Now I could get into some armchair psychology to talk 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:52.080 about the implications of renting versus owning, but Frankly, I'm 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:55.920 not qualified as a psychologist, so I'm not gonna really 0:09:55.920 --> 0:09:58.240 do that. However, it does seem interesting to me that 0:09:58.280 --> 0:10:01.880 we saw a shift from renting a film, so we 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:04.760 might say I never got around to seeing that movie, 0:10:04.800 --> 0:10:06.640 I want to rent it and watch it, and then 0:10:06.640 --> 0:10:09.920 we shift over to purchasing a copy of a film 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:13.200 that we can watch whenever we want. And DVDs began 0:10:13.240 --> 0:10:17.199 to really appeal to collectors, particularly if those collectors were 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:22.040 interested in special features that were available on many DVDs. 0:10:22.120 --> 0:10:24.360 And I'm one of those people. I certainly fell into 0:10:24.360 --> 0:10:28.200 the trap of collecting DVDs. I probably own a dozen 0:10:28.520 --> 0:10:30.720 that I've never even taken out of the shrink wrap. 0:10:31.080 --> 0:10:34.199 But it has been years since I bought a DVD, 0:10:34.400 --> 0:10:36.920 so I'd say I'm mostly over it until the next 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:41.520 Uber Super Definitive edition of Evil Dead comes out, anyway. 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:45.440 But like the VHS tape, the DVD craze also followed 0:10:45.480 --> 0:10:48.480 a peak and a decline. The early to mid two 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:52.560 thousand's would mark the height of the DVD's dominance in 0:10:52.640 --> 0:10:56.520 home theater media. It was king, but by two thousand 0:10:56.600 --> 0:11:00.160 seven those numbers were starting to dip. In the United States, 0:11:00.280 --> 0:11:03.319 In other places, the sales would continue to climb a 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:06.320 little bit longer. For example, in the United Kingdom, two 0:11:06.320 --> 0:11:09.000 thousand nine would mark the first year that would see 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:13.640 a decline in sales. So why we're DVD sales on 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.160 the decline by two thousand seven to two thousand nine. Well, 0:11:17.160 --> 0:11:20.120 one big reason for the decline was the next generation 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:23.960 of home video media was emerging at that time. The 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:26.720 media would be able to take advantage of another advance 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:29.480 in technology that would affect our consumption, and that was 0:11:29.520 --> 0:11:33.959 the development of high definition television. The history of HDTV 0:11:34.720 --> 0:11:38.200 is a surprisingly long one, and it could merit a 0:11:38.280 --> 0:11:41.600 full episode on its own, but I'll give a short 0:11:41.840 --> 0:11:46.080 overview all the way back in nineteen seventy, a Japanese 0:11:46.080 --> 0:11:49.319 company called the Japan Broadcasting Corporation or n h K, 0:11:50.000 --> 0:11:54.240 began researching how to develop high resolution televisions along with 0:11:54.320 --> 0:11:58.120 the formats that those televisions would rely upon. By nine 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:02.079 seventy seven, the Society of Ocean Picture and Television Engineers 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:05.120 would form a committee called the Study Group on High 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:09.480 Definition Television. That group worked on recommendations for standards, including 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:13.760 a recommendation to shift away from the four by three 0:12:13.920 --> 0:12:17.439 aspect ratio of television at the time to the widescreen 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:22.079 format or the sixteen by nine format. The group published 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:26.840 their recommendations in nineteen eighty. Now work was continuing on 0:12:26.920 --> 0:12:31.080 developing the technology for HD, but progress was slow, and 0:12:31.120 --> 0:12:34.840 that wasn't just because of technological limitations, but also the 0:12:34.880 --> 0:12:39.240 need to establish agreed upon standards and regulations. So in 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:43.080 the United States, the FCC formed an Advisory Committee on 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:48.240 Advanced Television Service UH and they stacked it with people 0:12:48.280 --> 0:12:51.760 from the private industry to kind of talk about, argue 0:12:51.800 --> 0:12:55.360 over and and hash out the proposals for a high 0:12:55.360 --> 0:13:00.839 definition television standard. The initial versions would rely on analog 0:13:01.040 --> 0:13:05.440 technology analog signals in high definition format, but by nine 0:13:06.000 --> 0:13:09.520 the committee had largely abandoned those ideas to consider an 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:13.880 all digital approach. Eventually, a confederation of companies proposed an 0:13:13.880 --> 0:13:16.240 all digital format for h D t V to the 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:20.760 f c C in nineteen and after some additional tweaks, 0:13:21.000 --> 0:13:24.920 the FCC established the standard for digital TV and hd 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:28.560 TV prodcasting at the end of nineteen ninety six in 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:32.600 the United States. The standard definition resolution in the US 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:35.719 ends up essentially being six forty by four a d 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:38.719 pixels we usually refer to it just as four A D. 0:13:39.679 --> 0:13:43.040 H D is a little more confusing because you could 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:45.760 get a h D screen that was twelve e d 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.559 by seven twenty pixels in wide screen. Uh, there were 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:53.120 some that were sold that were nine sixty by seven twenty, 0:13:53.200 --> 0:13:57.240 which you could argue as not really HD, but is 0:13:57.320 --> 0:14:01.000 better as a higher resolution than standard mission. It was 0:14:01.000 --> 0:14:04.400 also in the old four by three aspect ratio. And also, 0:14:04.559 --> 0:14:07.280 just in case you are wondering what I mean by resolution, 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:10.040 think of your Your image that you're seeing on a 0:14:10.040 --> 0:14:13.360 television is a collection of pixels, little points of light. 0:14:14.120 --> 0:14:16.760 The more points of light you have, the smaller they 0:14:17.160 --> 0:14:19.640 each have to be to fit on the screen. Uh. 0:14:19.680 --> 0:14:23.000 The higher your resolution is, the sharper the image, the 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:25.720 more clear the details are. So if you have a 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:30.040 higher resolution image, it just it typically looks better up 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:32.360 to a point. You start to reach a level of 0:14:32.400 --> 0:14:37.440 resolution that ends up being greater than what the eye 0:14:37.440 --> 0:14:39.840 can detect. And at that point it doesn't really matter 0:14:40.080 --> 0:14:41.920 if you have higher resolution because you wouldn't be able 0:14:41.960 --> 0:14:46.120 to tell the difference that ranges from person to person. Personally, 0:14:46.560 --> 0:14:50.200 I find it very challenging to tell the difference between say, 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:53.160 an eight K set and a four K set. To me, 0:14:53.240 --> 0:14:57.480 they look practically the same unless I'm really close to 0:14:57.520 --> 0:15:00.000 the screen and in some cases have a magnifying glass 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:02.880 in my hand. Anyway, back to resolutions, So you had 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:08.080 the seven twenty version, that's one version of HD, but 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:12.200 you also had a nineteen twenty by ten eight HD screens, 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:15.080 so we usually referred to that as seven twenty versus 0:15:15.080 --> 0:15:18.800 ten eight. In addition, there were other little letters that 0:15:18.840 --> 0:15:22.240 were attached to these, like P or I. P means 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:26.160 progressive scan, I means interlaced, which made it a bit 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:28.600 of a head scratcher for consumers. They were a little 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:31.800 confused as to what that actually meant. But the message 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:35.800 was that these televisions and broadcast standards would provide much 0:15:35.880 --> 0:15:39.600 higher resolution images than standard television was able to do, 0:15:39.920 --> 0:15:42.920 and the next generation home video systems would likewise be 0:15:43.000 --> 0:15:47.640 able to deliver high resolution video because a DVD has 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:50.760 a limit to the resolution it could deliver, and that 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:54.720 limit was seven twenty by four eight d pixels for 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:57.880 the n t SC format or seven twenty by five 0:15:57.960 --> 0:16:01.560 seventies six for PAL, and that doesn't really qualify for 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:06.000 HD standard. So even with a DVD with the best 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:09.360 picture you could get. It was not the same as 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:13.400 high definition, so the next generation of home media would 0:16:13.480 --> 0:16:17.120 change that. And before I jump into that hornet's nest, 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:20.040 I should also mention that the FCC would eventually rule 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:23.960 that all United States based TV signals would have to 0:16:24.040 --> 0:16:27.360 switch over to digital transmission. They made that decision in 0:16:27.520 --> 0:16:32.040 June of two thousand nine. That caused an enormous amount 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:35.280 of confusion in the United States, largely based off ignorance. 0:16:35.560 --> 0:16:37.720 People were worried about whether or not they'd be able 0:16:37.760 --> 0:16:40.600 to get anything on their televisions once the switch happened, 0:16:40.920 --> 0:16:44.440 and despite numerous efforts to communicate what this all meant, 0:16:44.920 --> 0:16:48.480 people were really confused, and it turned out that the 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:51.640 people who needed to worry about this represented only a 0:16:51.720 --> 0:16:55.760 small percentage of the overall population. Those were people who 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:59.400 are getting their television broadcasts over the air, as opposed 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:02.560 to people who are getting their broadcast through satellite or cable. 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:06.439 If they had older analog TV sets, they would have 0:17:06.480 --> 0:17:10.159 to purchase a digital converter box and that would allow 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:14.359 them to accept incoming digital transmissions. It would go through 0:17:14.400 --> 0:17:16.840 this converter box, which would then convert that to an 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:20.639 analog signal and then pass that analog signal on to 0:17:20.760 --> 0:17:23.760 the television. So it's just just a converter, that's all 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:26.840 it was. And for months there were stories about people 0:17:26.880 --> 0:17:30.400 buying converters even though they didn't really need one because 0:17:30.480 --> 0:17:34.040 they weren't getting their television over the air, or they 0:17:34.080 --> 0:17:36.159 had a newer television that didn't need it in the 0:17:36.200 --> 0:17:39.520 first place. We even did a classic Tech Stuff episode 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:41.920 about that to explain what was going on. I've thought 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:45.280 about doing a classic rerun of that episode just for fun, 0:17:45.880 --> 0:17:48.680 but ultimately decided not to do it because it's it's 0:17:48.680 --> 0:17:52.000 completely obsolete. It doesn't it doesn't have any bearing on 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:55.520 anything anymore, so it really is just a footnote. No. 0:17:56.080 --> 0:17:58.280 What I really wanted to do, though, is get into 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:01.439 a really big format war, one that was similar in 0:18:01.480 --> 0:18:05.120 some ways to the Beta Max versus VHS fight back 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:07.879 in the nineteen seventies. So I'm going to talk about 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:12.840 Blu Ray versus h D DVD, but first let's take 0:18:13.080 --> 0:18:23.560 a quick break. High definition televisions began to enter the 0:18:23.600 --> 0:18:27.080 consumer market in the early to mid two thousand's. Like 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:31.720 most technologies, they're really freaking expensive when they first came out, 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:35.000 so there was a limited market at the very early days. 0:18:35.359 --> 0:18:38.360 There were also there's limited content. There wasn't a whole 0:18:38.359 --> 0:18:40.840 lot you could watch on them. DVDs couldn't match the 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:43.879 resolution of even a seven twenty P h d t 0:18:44.040 --> 0:18:47.119 V set, let alone the ten A d P and 0:18:47.240 --> 0:18:51.159 ten A d I models. There were very few channels 0:18:51.160 --> 0:18:55.679 that offered h d t V format, so it was 0:18:55.920 --> 0:18:58.600 kind of hard to sell these. However, it was clear 0:18:58.680 --> 0:19:01.280 the demand was there. People wanted to be able to 0:19:01.320 --> 0:19:05.359 see this higher resolution television at home, and eventually there 0:19:05.359 --> 0:19:09.360 were enough early adopters to allow prices to gradually fall 0:19:09.480 --> 0:19:12.280 enough so that more consumers could jump on board. And 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:15.200 so this created the incentive to develop a high resolution 0:19:15.280 --> 0:19:19.720 optical media disc format. Now, unlike the DVD, which evolved 0:19:19.760 --> 0:19:23.040 as a standard thanks to a unified effort among numerous 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.240 companies to avoid another format war, the next generation of 0:19:26.280 --> 0:19:30.840 technologies coagulated into two opposing camps. So on one side 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:33.440 you had Sony and Pioneer, and they were showing off 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:37.119 a prototype system that at the time was called DVR Blue. 0:19:37.359 --> 0:19:39.840 This would be around two thousand. This is what would 0:19:39.920 --> 0:19:43.920 evolve into Blu Ray. Sony had also explored an alternative 0:19:44.160 --> 0:19:48.240 called ultra density optical, but ultimately that technology would be 0:19:48.240 --> 0:19:50.800 reserved for professional use and not really make its way 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:54.200 into the consumer video market. It did exist in parallel, 0:19:54.359 --> 0:19:57.119 but for other uses. Now on the other side, the 0:19:57.160 --> 0:20:01.400 other camp was being led by Toshiba. The company initially 0:20:01.440 --> 0:20:06.600 resisted Sony's approach because the early version of Sony's DVR 0:20:06.600 --> 0:20:11.159 Blue was expensive. Sony was proposing an optical disc reader 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:14.040 that used a blue laser rather than the red one 0:20:14.080 --> 0:20:16.960 that DVD players used. So why do that? Why switch 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:20.119 to blue once? Because a blue laser can detect smaller 0:20:20.119 --> 0:20:23.639 objects than a red laser can. And it's all because 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.040 of the wavelength of light. So if you look at 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:29.399 a rainbow, you can see the spectrum the roy G BIV. 0:20:30.400 --> 0:20:33.720 Those colors also denote the range of wavelengths of light 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:37.240 and it goes from longest to shortest. Red light has 0:20:37.240 --> 0:20:41.119 a longer wavelength than blue light. The shorter wavelength lights 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:45.400 can detect smaller pits on the surface of an optical disc, 0:20:45.840 --> 0:20:49.159 and pits are what represent information. So if your laser 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:52.359 can detect smaller pets, that means you can pack more 0:20:52.520 --> 0:20:56.240 pits into the same amount of space of an optical 0:20:56.320 --> 0:20:58.480 disc right, you can fit more of them on there 0:20:58.520 --> 0:21:01.879 because they are tinier. So if you make the pits smaller, 0:21:02.119 --> 0:21:04.200 you fit more information on there. You can have a 0:21:04.359 --> 0:21:09.200 high resolution video stored on there. However, blue lasers are 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:13.400 also more expensive than red ones, and Sony's initial design 0:21:13.520 --> 0:21:17.800 required a special protective case around the discs. Uh the 0:21:17.840 --> 0:21:20.440 original one, it was almost like a cartridge that carried 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:22.640 the disc and it was meant to protect it from 0:21:22.680 --> 0:21:26.440 being handled and getting scratched up. And that also meant 0:21:26.480 --> 0:21:28.560 that it was going to cost more to produce those 0:21:28.560 --> 0:21:31.080 discs because you had to produce little case that they 0:21:31.119 --> 0:21:34.240 would come into. And Toshiba wanted to find a different way, 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:39.080 so the company eventually would propose its own blue laser format. 0:21:39.320 --> 0:21:44.000 The DVD Forum adopted to Sheba's proposal as the successor 0:21:44.119 --> 0:21:47.640 to the DVD format and it would be called HD 0:21:47.760 --> 0:21:50.840 d v D. This was around two thousand two. So 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:53.800 now you have the two camps that eventually became known 0:21:53.840 --> 0:21:56.560 as the Blu Ray Disc Association or b d A. 0:21:57.080 --> 0:21:59.800 That's with Sony and its team, and then you have 0:21:59.880 --> 0:22:03.760 the DVD Forum with Tashiba, and each tried to establish 0:22:03.960 --> 0:22:07.520 their technologies as the standard, and it would be a 0:22:07.520 --> 0:22:11.320 few years before either group would produce anything for consumers. 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:15.320 So this is all happening behind closed doors at the 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:18.760 at the time, they tried a few times to agree 0:22:18.880 --> 0:22:23.080 upon a unified standard, but ultimately one side would say, no, 0:22:23.160 --> 0:22:25.040 I don't want to do it your way, you should 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:27.400 do it my way, and the others I would say, 0:22:27.720 --> 0:22:30.080 pound sand, I don't want to do it your way. 0:22:30.240 --> 0:22:32.840 We're gonna do it my way, and so no agreement 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:36.439 was ever reached. They had hoped that they could avoid 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:39.600 the kind of format war that Sony and JVC had 0:22:39.600 --> 0:22:43.720 fought in the nineteen seventies. Sony was backing Beta Max 0:22:44.240 --> 0:22:49.040 and JVC was backing VHS. Sony lost that fight. The 0:22:49.080 --> 0:22:51.520 company was not eager to go into another format war, 0:22:52.840 --> 0:22:54.960 but they were never able to come to any kind 0:22:54.960 --> 0:22:57.520 of agreement. And you can sort of understand why, because 0:22:57.520 --> 0:23:01.720 whichever group was responsible for establishing the technology that everyone 0:23:01.800 --> 0:23:03.880 was going to use could make a ton of money 0:23:03.920 --> 0:23:06.959 off of it in royalties or licensing fees. So no 0:23:07.000 --> 0:23:09.600 one was eager to give that up. No one wanted 0:23:09.640 --> 0:23:12.359 to say, find your idea is good, now, let me 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:15.600 pay you for the privilege of being able to use 0:23:15.640 --> 0:23:19.399 your technology. Now, most of these fights happened well outside 0:23:19.480 --> 0:23:22.639 of the consciousness of the general public. H d t 0:23:22.800 --> 0:23:26.000 V was barely even a thing yet, and most people 0:23:26.000 --> 0:23:29.280 were still marveling over DVDs, so most homes didn't have 0:23:29.320 --> 0:23:32.240 an hd TV at the time. But behind the scenes, 0:23:32.480 --> 0:23:36.280 the DVD form and the Blu Ray Disc Association were 0:23:36.440 --> 0:23:41.080 making deals with entertainment studios to get exclusivity agreements for 0:23:41.160 --> 0:23:44.800 their formats. It's a lot like how video game consoles 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:49.360 will sign an exclusive title for their individual programs, and 0:23:49.720 --> 0:23:52.960 uh game consoles would play a role in this HD 0:23:53.040 --> 0:23:56.880 DVD versus Blu Ray format war as well. The PlayStation three, 0:23:57.160 --> 0:24:02.000 Sony's video game console. Unsurprised Rising Lee would support Blu 0:24:02.160 --> 0:24:04.920 Ray It was a Blu Ray player. In fact, when 0:24:04.960 --> 0:24:07.160 the p S three came out, it would be one 0:24:07.200 --> 0:24:11.280