Sony May Sell HD-DVDs

MarkRH writes "Although many sites posted the Reuters story on Sony merging its optical storage operations with NEC, people forget that NEC is one of the four senior members of the HD-DVD Promotion Group. What this means is that by next year the merged unit could sell CD drives, DVD drives, Blu-Ray, and 'perhaps even that other format,' a Sony spokesman told eWEEK. A bit shocking, given the acrimonious nature of the rivalry so far."

Some rootkit with that optical drive sir?

[greyfeld]

Really though, you just know that they are going to put some kind of serious DRM crap on these. You'll be able to burn a disc of data (mp3's) but not copy your own data or play it in a different burner I imagine. What a crock. Sony sucks!

A Suggestion

[MightyMartian]

Perhaps Sony could take this revenue and buy some ethics.

Nothing to see here...

[guitaristx]

How appropriate, "Nothing to see here, please move along." This would be the caption for my mental associations with sony whenever I'm out shopping for Christmas gifts. Sony producing new technology isn't terribly interesting to me if I know they might be installing rootkits on my boxen.

DRM

[Sefert]

Given Sony's ethics lately, I think I can safely say that I won't be buying anything with the Sony brand name stamped on it for a long time to come, especially if the device stores any data. Frankly, I won't even buy any CD's with the Sony label any more. I really hope the class action lawsuit against them cripples them pretty seriously, though I suspect it'll be more of the slap-on-the-hand variety of justice. If only the courts could take a division of a company as punishment, sell it off, and prohibit them from playing ball in that field in the future.

Yeah, good luck with that.

[Kris_J]

Anyone developing a new media format that doesn't have anything to do with Sony? DVDs are nice and all, but I no longer like the fact that a small part of every DVD and DVD player sale goes to Sony.

Re:More goodies from Sony!

[macaulay805]

Quite possibly, have you ever seen Cops? People get 0wned all the time!

Blu-Ray vs HD-DVD

[SpinJaunt]

hmmm.. didn't RTFA.. maybe a cheap, easy way to get out of the Blu-Ray vs HD-DVD mess??

Strange

[GotenXiao]

...that Microsoft are talking about adding a layer of complete vendor control and lock in to modern PCs, but Sony does one thing and suddenly everyone is up in arms about them.

Somehow I doubt the top people at Sony had anything to do with the rootkit debacle. I find it more likely it was someone in Sony BMG being told to protect Sony's interests and they took it a step too far. That, or it was a rogue manager in Sony.

Re:More goodies from Sony!

[tomcres]

yeah.. seriously, I almost wasn't even going to comment on this.. but.. someone at Sony should probably realize that no matter what they do right now, it's going to be colored by the whole XCP scandal.. they might just want to stay out of the press for a while until things aren't so hot...

Blu-ray will fail..

[tomcres]

Sony is like King Midas, except that everything they touch turns to shit instead of gold...

Come on, now. What has Sony done that wasn't a flop? The only thing I can think of is the compact disc. The CD did not have any real alternatives, so it was a safe bet. However, look at Beta... VHS killed it. MiniDisc? Couldn't overtake the CD. Memory stick.. this one's a real laugher.. :-) The point is, that Sony is an innovative company, you have to give them credit for that. The problem is that they aren't good at getting others to share in their vision and then they try to be the only player in the game. They overprice their merch and offer to license their tech for exorbitant fees. In the meantime, their competitors develop cheaper, more user-friendly alternatives which consumers see as a better value, and the Sony product fails. We've seen this time and again. Blu-ray vs. HD-DVD is just the same thing all over again. Blu-ray may very well be technically superior to HD-DVD, but it will be more expensive, and HD-DVD will be good enough for consumers that they won't pay the Sony tax for Blu-ray. Add to that that HD-DVD guarantees at least some possibility of making backups, which is a big step towards user friendliness. Anyone who has kids who watch DVDs knows this already!

Re:Yeah, good luck with that.

[Anonymous Coward]

Associating happy kids with Intellectual Property [philips.com]. This image almost made me vomit.

Re:DRM

[VGR]

Then they'll stop making things stamped with the Sony brand name.

If Sears can call itself Kenmore, I'm sure Sony can manage to label its products Trustworthytronics or something.

They may not fool you the first few times, but do you really have time to keep up with every front company they'll create? They'll sneak it in eventually.