What do you call a disc player that performs a varying of entertainment functions, but in which you rarely or ever play a disc?
Someday soon, Blu-ray player makers may be facing this nomenclature conundrum.
Blu-ray is already seated uncomfortably under the streaming sword of Damocles. Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, et al, all are threatening the DVD/Blu-ray home video hegemony. Even Netflix' foot-shooting (price increases, Qwikster, loss of Starz) has failed to staunch the lazy public's growing desire to pull content off the Internet rather than pulling a disc off a shelf.
And now, Hollywood studios seem to be trying to obviate the need for physical discs altogether with UltraViolet.
Last month, I excoriated the whole Wal-Mart/Vudu/UltraViolet idea. I just can't imagine a mass of consumers stomping into Wal-Mart to convert their DVDs into digital versions. (I guess we'll find out April 16, when the initiative begins.)
What makes far more sense is a disc-to-digital function on a Blu-ray player, the first of which was announced by Samsung last month. I suspect we'll see this feature on many new BD models introduced throughout the year.
Plus, I'm told PC software is being developed that would enable consumers to read their existing discs and activate UV digital copies for streaming or downloading access.
But it's UltraViolet-imbued Blu-ray titles that may prove to be Blu-ray's ultimate undoing.
Who needs a disc?
When a consumer buys an UV BD, they get a slip of paper with a 12-digit code. After the code is entered on the UltraViolet Web site (www.uvvu.com), up to six family members/friends can stream or download a digital UV copy to any portable device for free through the Flixster app for iOS or Android, or via the Vudu smart TV/BD/videogame console app.
There are 50 or so UltraViolet titles available now, with "hundreds" due by the end of this year according to UV execs I've spoken to. It's likely most new BD titles from all the major Hollywood studios, except Disney, as well as mini-major Lionsgate (the studio behind the Twilight and Hunger Games blockbusters, which look major to me) will be UV-enabled.
But taken to its logical extreme, you can see why we might never need the Blu-ray disc the code comes with. One day, consumers may simple buy a UV code, with an option to buy the disc if they're really retro.
I will extrapolate.
In the press flurry during the Wal-Mart-Vudu announcement, David Bishop, president of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, noted UV wasn't "just about portable devices. You can watch your collection now on the TV."
After initially making fun on this assertion – if you have the disc, why would need the UV copy to watch at home? – it suddenly makes sense to me.
Rovi, the electronic program guide people, several cable companies including Comcast and Cox, and other TV infrastructure companies are UV Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) consortium partners. Why? Part of the UV roadmap is to incorporate a user's UV library into their cable EPG.
If a consumer could just dial up their video collection as easy as tuning in "Dancing With the Stars" instead of getting up, finding the DVD or Blu-ray jewel box, switching the TV's input to the appropriate HDMI connection, opening the BD player disc drawer, closing the disc drawer, finding the BD player remote control to hit play – well, which would you choose? They don't call us couch potatoes for nothing.
And if you could access your video library from your program guide, why do need to buy a physical disc to begin with? Why not just go online and buy the UV copy directly, with the Blu-ray disc an optional add-on?
The studios must be salivating at this prospect. They could dispose of the whole profit-eating physical disc warehouse/distribution/retail ecosystem, just like what's happening with
e-books. Studios could charge the same price or a little less for the code as they do now for the disc and supercharge their profit margin.
But consumers would still need/want a Blu-ray player. It's cheaper than getting a smart TV to get the streaming options, plus all of us will still have non-UV DVDs or Blu-rays to play.
But given how quickly streaming content is becoming mainstream, one day we'll be using our Blu-ray player for all our home video content access needs – except to play a Blu-ray disc.
And if a Blu-ray player is rarely used to play a Blu-ray disc, do you still call it a Blu-ray player?
Discuss.
