BETWEEN THE LINES   

At the ESCA conference here in Los Angeles last week, I moderated a panel on 3D in home entertainment out of which (I thought) there were two interesting and provocative bits. One was the consensus that if standards on advanced home 3D were not adopted soon, meaning by early 2010, DVD and Blu-ray marketers will take things into their own hands, releasing titles in 3D without an industry standard. 

The other was the idea that many of the 3D box-office hits of this year will be released on home entertainment formats in the fourth quarter in 2D only, with the studios unwilling to risk putting out discs that provide an anaglyph 3D experience inferior to theaters. 

The first evidence of that is in, with Lionsgate announcing ...Read More

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I moderated a panel about BD Live at the ESCA conference this week in which we talked about the potential for BD Live to drive consumer  marketing information back to the studios. There was some evidence that this is happening, via information collected in the registration process, through direct surveys, and in part by simple observation of what features people are using. 
But perhaps the best example of marketing information flowing to the studios was related to Digital Copy. In a presentation by Warner Home Video senior VP Dorinda Marticorena, it was revealed that 440,000 users activated the Digital Copy on the Blu-ray version of The Dark Knight, representing 22% of the 2 million copies sold. 
Marticorena said she had never seen as high a redemption rate on anything. A Sunday fsi coupon, for instance, might get a redemptin rate of 1% to 2%. &quo...Read More

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It’s widely accepted that moms are the key decision makers in many large household spending decisions. This is a huge opportunity and a big challenge for Blu-ray marketers, who still largely need to get women on board with the format.

Solution Research Group just released findings from its Women & Digital Life study that show while moms are still highly engaged with DVD, they are behind the curve on Blu-ray adoption.

According to SRG, 57% of all women bought a DVD in the last six months, down four percentage points from a year earlier. Among mothers with children under 12, however, 66% bought DVD. Hispanic and African-American women were heavier than average DVD buyers.

BUT--When it comes to Blu-ray, only 5% of women said they had it in their homes, with another 28% likely to buy within six months and a whopping 67% saying they found an upgrade ...Read More

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I'm at ESCA today, and there's lots of good stuff coming out of the conference. You can get all the details at www.twitter.com/videobusiness or by searching Twitter for #ESCA.

This year's Entertainment Supply Chain Academy conference is entitled "Maximizing Home Entertainment Sales & Profits in Turbulent Times."

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SAN FRANCISCO—This might be the beginning of something big for Blu-ray Disc.

While attending Sony Pictures Home Entertainment’s Blu-ray and BD Live press briefing here this week, I overheard some conversations among analyst and journalist attendees about BD Live functioning as a new format launch of sorts.

Think about it: In the Blu-ray format’s short life, there was the format war with HD DVD, and an overlapping period where Blu-ray players with various levels of functionality were bowing, making for one consumer confusion after another.

Now, in mid-2009, there are 11 million Blu-ray devices in homes, according to Adams Media Research; an estimated 1,500 software titles on the market; and a proliferation of richly interactive BD Live applications, such as Sony’s MovieIQ and Cinechat features, Warner Home ...Read More

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The Entertainment AIDS Alliance will hold its seventh annual Wine & Wisdom fundraiser at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles on June 23, and it is shaping up as an event not to be missed.

If the lovely Skirball, nestled up against the Santa Monica Mountains, and the lure of friends, food, jazz, good wine and the even more intoxicating evening air aren’t enough to lure you out of your office, consider this: EAA’s event committee has lined up its biggest and best collection of auction items (live and silent) since Wine & Wisdom began in 2003.

Among the items available to the highest bidder will be five-star hotel packages at Peninsula and Fairmont Hotel locations worldwide (including Manila, Acapulco, Quebec, Vancouver, Bangkok, Hong Kong); s...Read More

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There's good news for non-public rentailers in a new report from Adams Media Research.

 Adams shows the sector gaining some market share vs. the public chains. Traditional bricks-and-mortar rental stores saw their share of the total rental pie (including kiosks and subscription, but not VOD) fall to 69% in 2008, from 76% a year earlier, as kiosks and subscriptions gained share. Subscription plans like Netflix now represent a full quarter of the rental market. 

Non-public chains increased their share of the bricks-and-mortar slice to nearly 49%, though, from 46% in 2007.

Check out all of Adams' latest research at http:/...Read More

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The videogame industry's E3 Expo happens this year to coincide with Entertainment Ratings & Labeling Awareness Month, which is marking its fifth anniversary.
Sponsored by the Coalition of Entertainment Retail Trade Associations (including EMA, NARM and NATO), the purpose of ERLA month is to  increase awareness and use of the music labeling and motion picture and video game rating systems by parents.
As you may recall, retailers have tangled  -- and continue to tangle -- with local, state and federal regulators over entertainment content marketed to children and their enforcement (or lack thereof) of the voluntary ratings systems of each industry.
The Entertainment Software Assn., producer of E3, every year puts out a barrage of industry statistics also designed to show the responsibility of the game industry. This year, they tell...Read More

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Would you trade a dollar for a quarter? How about a dime? Nickel? Penny?

Probably not, but such are the economics of digital media distribution, as discussed by some of the country’s biggest media executives at last week’s All Things Digital conference produced by The Wall Street Journal in Carlsbad, Calif.NBC Universal president and CEO Jeff Zucker, known far and wide for a comment he made some time ago that studios are replacing analog dollars with digital pennies as they move content online, said at the conference that the industry is now up to digital dimes. (See related story, page 3). He predicts that in another year or two, that will grow to quarters.

A gap of only 75¢ sure is progress, but with traditional media revenue in many cases declining faster than online reve...Read More

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In the course of a week, we heard from execs from three separate studios who were shaking their heads over the sad state of ... not the industry, but the press about the industry.

Stories in the consumer business press about the recent drop in DVD sales and what that means for studios have given home entertainment PR honchos a pretty much chronic case of heartburn since last year. The latest adjada was unleashed by the L.A. Times in a column headlined "DVD downturn panics film industry."

(Maybe. But not as much as headlines like that do...)

No one argues with the fact that DVD sales are down. VB reported the year-over-year decline was 15% at the end of the first quarter.

But what’s missing in many report...Read More

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Standards, schmandards, says my colleague Scott Hettrick on his blog at Hollywoodinhighdef.com: There will be advanced 3D in homes by next year.
My instinct is that it will be later rather than sooner for advnaced 3D viewing in homes, but Hettrick makes a good point about companies with $ in their sites not necessarily waiting for industry standard to push ahead. Think Betamax and VHS, DVD and Divx, HD-DVD and Blu-ray, says Hettrick (who formerly edited VB.) 
Forget the slow progress being made toward home 3D standards, as reported on by Susanne Ault in VB last week. Think Panasonic in 2010.
Whether you agree or not, he does make a good case.

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New horizons are opening up for Internet video as an increasing number of airlines add in-flight broadband connections for passengers. 

In-Stat, a sister company to Video Business, forecasts that the number of broadband enabled planes will grow exponentially this year, to 800 planes across commercial carriers, from just 25 planes in 2008. Passenger revenues from the service will hit $47 million this year, on the way to $1 billion by 2012, according to In-Stat analyst Daryl Schoolar. 

"The market is clearly gaining momentum, with deployments escalating in number,” says  Schoolar. "However, in-flight broadband faces challenges, however, by the struggling economy and competing non-traditional [in-flight entertainment] solut...Read More

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