This will truly be a sad and momentous CES for many. I’m not looking forward to my excursion in the desert and this will be my first CES. I may throw my glamorous career and life in the trash if nothing groundbreaking is announced or unveiled. Failing that, I may end up in a ditch or roaming the desert hopped up on peyote. I haven’t decided yet.
It’s also Bill Gates’ last CES as the head of MS. I’m sure he’ll want to go out with a bang. So I hope this rumor of an Xbox with and internal HD DVD drive is true. It only makes sense considering the PS3 has an internal Blu-ray drive. The format war isn’t going to end anytime soon and consumers will not want to purchase an external drive, either.
So, Mr. Gates, I hope you bow out of the limelight with something worth announcing on your last go around. If not, I’ll boo and throw stuff at the stage. If I get kicked out then my trip will be worth it.
Visions of Gates’ keynote swan song [Seattle Times]
Personally, I would merge the two routes.
Wander the tradeshow floor hopped up on peyote.
Just days before CES 2008, Warner Home Video has announced that they
are going to stop supporting HD-DVD and support the Blu-Ray format
exclusively. There are rumors that this decision was made after Sony
paid Warner 1.8 billion dollars to sign an exclusive contract, one of
the largest payoffs yet (the second largest being 150 million to
Paramount and Dreamworks to go HD-DVD exclusively.)
Warner’s official response, however, was:
“In response to consumer demand, Warner Bros. Entertainment will
release its high-definition DVD titles exclusively in the Blu-ray disc
format beginning later this year” it was announced today by Barry
Meyer, Chairman & CEO, Warner Bros. and Kevin Tsujihara, President,
Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group.
After August 2007, Sir Howard Stringer, CEO of Sony said that the Blu-
Ray format was in a stalemate. “It’s a difficult fight. We were trying
to win on the merits, which we were doing for a while, until Paramount
changed sides,” Howard Stringer told the AP.
Blu-Ray was winning the HD format war in North America and Asia, but
not Europe, until the Dreamworks/Paramount buyout.
Many consider this new Warner Home Video buyout to be the end of the
format war completely.