Europe's online source of news, data & analysis for professionals involved in packaged media and new delivery technologies
Features
Networked player - bridging packaged and online worlds
The web connectivity built into the HD DVD players' hi-res format specs is opening the door to a brand new world of interactive co-habitation between packaged and online media, usually seen pitched against each other. JEAN-LUC RENAUD, Editor-in-Chief of www.dvd-intelligence.com. Read More...
The rise of online video
By the end of the next decade, I would not be surprised if over 50% of the video revenues are generated from online services, says MARTIN OLAUSSON, Senior Analyst at Strategy Analytics. Today, they still account for only 8% of total in-store home video entertainment market. Read More...
The art of re-versioning
Subtitling and dubbing are services central to the global distribution of home entertainment. JAMES GARDNER, Operations Director at IMS Group, says that today's new release is tomorrow’s re-release and for every re-release, there is a ‘re-version’ waiting to be done, whatever format. Read More...
The road to holography
Holographic storage has long held promise as a technology with vast capacity and high data rates. However, its commercialization depends on viable storage material, high density recording strategies and high-performance optical components. WLODEK MISCHKE, Director of Research at DaTARIUS, says these challenges have been overcome. Read More...
Video title production 2.0
Inefficiencies in conventional DVD title production are derived in large part from the fact that so much of the work is performed manually. STUART GREEN, CEO of ZOOtech, says why it does not need to be so with new tools that keep creativity up while bringing costs down. Read More...
DVD in a developing country - Morocco
The home entertainment business is flourishing in Morocco, but a complete lack of legitimate products means the market is served totally by the ‘informal’ sector. ANTHONY I P OWEN, an experienced DVD studio manager, has set up operations in Casablanca. He describes the challenges and opportunities. Read More...
Mobile TV: Quo Vadis?
While not imminent, that is no reason for the packaged media industry to be complacent about the threat posed by mobile TV, says BARRY FLYNN, Principal Consultant at Farncombe Technology. Today’s teenagers will grow older, and will bring about sweeping changes in the way handsets are used. Read More...
HD VMD builds momentum
As high definition builds momentum, New Medium Enterprises’ HD VMD format is gaining popularity amongst independent content distributors who recognise the importance of quality and cost effectiveness, says MAHESH JAYANARAYAN, NME’s Chief Executive Officer. Read More...
How producers adapt to a changing marketplace
A mature DVD market, wafer-thin margins and professional tools now accessible to would-be authors are putting the squeeze on established production houses. ROB PINNINGER, an experienced studio manager, talks to heads of top facilities houses on how they cope successfully with change. Read More...
Promoting HD DVD
High definition has finally broken into the consumer market with TV broadcasts, displays and packaged media. In an interview with JEAN-LUC RENAUD, Toshiba’s OLIVIER VAN WYNENDAELE, heading the HD DVD Promotion Group Europe, takes stock of the progress of the hi-def format and looks to the future. Read More...
Bringing QA to the digital distribution chain
In a wide-ranging interview, NEIL GOODALL, CEO of Testronic Laboratories, tells JEAN-LUC RENAUD how he wants anybody with quality problems in any part of the digital industry – packaged media, online, computers, mobile phones, games consoles – to think Testronic as the first port of call. Read More...
Pioneering next-generation discs
Building on its close partnership with the French cinema industry, QOL was Europe’s first independent replicator to manufacture high-definition DVDs. LAURENT VILLAUME, Founder and CEO, explains to JEAN-LUC RENAUD, DVD Intelligence publisher, the challenges and forward strategy. Read More...
Hi-def also means audio
Next-generation HD discs are here now. HDTV is at our doors, HD-ready displays are high street’s hot items. However, high-definition entertainment is about audio as well as video, reminds JASON POWER, Dolby Laboratories’ Director of Market Development. Read More...
An assessment of Europe's DVD market
According to Screen Digest’s just published annual report European Video: Market Assessment and Forecast to 2010, consumer spending on DVD in 2005 (retail and rental) plateaued at €11.48bn and should be falling to €10.71bn by the end of 2006. This year, Europe will total 142m DVD households. JEAN-LUC RENAUD examines the findings. Read More...
The cover-mount DVD phenomenon
In recent years the phenomenon of cover-mounting – distributing a free gift with a newspaper or magazine – has expanded beyond the confines of the specialist press in the UK and has been adopted by national newspapers desperate to increase sales and thus advertising revenues. Screen Digest's RICHARD COOPER examines the impacts of the practice. Read More...
On predicting the future
Predicting the future, let alone the future of packaged media, is a perilous exercise, and possibly counter-productive, as the exercise closes doors rather than keep them open, argues JEAN-LUC RENAUD, DVD Intelligence publisher. Consider that: Apple was left nearly for dead 15 years ago. Today, it became the world's most valuable technology company, topping Microsoft.
Le cinéma est une invention sans avenir (the cinema is an invention without any future) famously claimed the Lumière Brothers some 120 years ago. Well. The cinématographe grew into a big business, even bigger in times of economic crisis when people have little money to spend on any other business.
The advent of radio, then television, was to kill the cinema. With a plethora of digital TV channels, a huge DVD market, a wealth of online delivery options, a massive counterfeit underworld and illegal downloading on a large scale, cinema box office last year broke records!
The telephone was said to have no future when it came about. Today, 5 billion handsets are in use worldwide. People prioritize mobile phones over drinking water in many Third World countries.
No-one predicted the arrival of the iPod only one year before it broke loose in an unsuspecting market. Even fewer predicted it was going to revolutionise the economics of music distribution. Likewise, no-one saw the iPhone coming and even fewer forecast the birth of the developers' industry it ignited. And it changed the concept of mobile phone.
Make no mistake, the iPad will have a profound impact on the publishing world. It will bring new players, and smaller, perhaps more creative content creators.
And who predicted the revival of vinyl?
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