Monday, April 3, 2006
Sony's Universal Media Disc Facing Last Rites
Posted by Suhit Gupta in "NEWS" @ 05:00 AM
"Exactly a year after it was launched in the United States, the Sony PlayStation Portable's days as a hand-held movie-viewing device might be numbered. Disappointing sales have slowed the flow of movies on the proprietary Universal Media Disc to a mere trickle. At least two major studios have completely stopped releasing movies on UMD, while others are either toying with the idea or drastically cutting back. And retailers also are cutting the amount of shelf space they've been devoting to UMD movies, amid talk that Wal-Mart is about to dump the category entirely."
Completely unsurprising and I think we have discussed this already too. When UMDs were first announced, I already had doubts that the movie would fill a user's entire field of vision in order to ultimately make for a good experience. But then with the pricing model and how one would have to buy UMDs for the same price DVDs and that they were not interoperable, it was definitely doomed. Letter to Sony - you can still salvage the operation. Give them away for free (or a very nominal charge) with the purchase of DVDs. I believe that this will really popularize UMDs.
Completely unsurprising and I think we have discussed this already too. When UMDs were first announced, I already had doubts that the movie would fill a user's entire field of vision in order to ultimately make for a good experience. But then with the pricing model and how one would have to buy UMDs for the same price DVDs and that they were not interoperable, it was definitely doomed. Letter to Sony - you can still salvage the operation. Give them away for free (or a very nominal charge) with the purchase of DVDs. I believe that this will really popularize UMDs.
