My So-Called Format War
I’m disappointed in the end of the Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD format war.
It’s not that the format is largely owned by Sony at the moment, to whom I have an adversion after buying a My Morning Jacket CD and finding it came with a bonus rootkit. And it’s not because I own an HD-DVD player - regardless of format, I am the proud owner of a high-definition version of Blazing Saddles, which is, like, the greatest movie ever, and that pretty much fulfills my life’s expectations right there, even if I won’t be able to play it in 5 years. I didn’t really care who won - I just want low prices, high movie transfer quality, and a massive selection.
It’s that the so-called format war wasn’t really a war. I’ll admit, over the past couple of weeks I have been reading people’s posts about this whole thing on various forums, just to see where things were going. Now, reading forums for opinions (not for technical info or research) is like the lowest form of entertainment possible to me. It makes me feel like a nerd, geek, and loser to read forums, and not participate in them. But hey, as Toby Cheung says, as you get older you start caring less about what others think about you, so fuck it - I was reading forums anyway.
I was surprised by the amount of vitriol that’s out there. I guess part of it has to do with being on the Internet - the whole being able to say whatever you want without fear of reprisal. You can jackass it up all you want on the Internet, and if you get banned, you can always just create another account or something.
So what do I mean by it not being really a war? There was a lot of name-calling, exhortations to various formats and the companies behind them, lots of animated GIFs depicting HD-DVD or Blu-Ray in various subservient positions, and the like, but there wasn’t really any war. Nobody really pushed it to the limit like General Patton, or Rambo, or even Chuck Norris.
Here’s what I would have liked to have seen:
New countries being formed. Toshiba probably would have “won” if they had decided to actually form a new country or invade an existing one, solely for the purpose of promoting the HD-DVD format. They could have called it something like HD-DVDlandia and offered free players and popcorn if people moved there.
Combat. That means guns. Lots of them. If people get all hot and bothered about which format their “war-is-hell” movie is going to be sold on, they should be passionate enough to carry it out in real life. At the very least, I would have liked to have seen two people - one in favor of Blu-Ray, and one in favor of HD-DVD - meet in Real Life and duke it out. I mean, in real life, calling somebody a loser would probably result in an actual physical altercation. So why not have it on here? You could even have it sponsored by some of the major companies and broadcast live over the net on a pay-per-view basis.
Villages burned, raped, and pillaged. This doesn’t really need an explanation - it’s what people do in war.
Prisoners taken. I would have liked to have seen Blu-Ray owners invade an HD-DVD owner’s house, smash their player, and take the owner hostage, all while shouting “SONY! SONY! SONY!” Or vice versa. Maybe somebody takes over a Best Buy, or goes on a hunger strike, until the format of their choice won. That’s real commitment right there.
In short….this format war sucked, regardless of which “side” you were on, because people on each side were a bunch of pussies who just resorted to calling each other names. That’s not a real war, that’s just people being Internet tough guys, and that just plain sucks.