Nielsen VideoScan High-Def market share for week ending December 9th, 2007

by Ben Drawbaugh posted Dec 14th 2007 at 12:53PM

While we expect for a blockbuster title to kill when it's the only big one that week, Pirates not only outsold Superbad by almost 3:1, but it helped lead Blu-ray to the biggest win (76/24 or 3.17:1) since we've been following the Nielsen VideoScan numbers, courtesy of Home Media Magazine. Although, not even other Blu-ray titles could compete with the end of the world, HD DVD did once again manage to keep Planet Earth as it's number one title (third overall) which indicates that all the new HD DVD owners don't have it yet. Assuming that the 160k Pirates number yesterday is correct, Superbad sold 60k copies, (not too bad) and HD DVD's Earth, sold 20k copies -- some legs for a six month old title. While the blu camp will certainly be touting their dominance this week, next week will be the real indicator in the format war when both versions of the latest version of Harry Potter go head to head.

Filed under: Blu-ray, HD DVD

Tags: formatwar, Nielsen, Nielsen VideoScan, NielsenVideoscan, VideoScan

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)

Neutral

Devils Advocate @ Dec 14th 2007 1:00PM

Word is that Bourne has been selling REALLY well and could end up being the top HDM selling title for December, so dont be at all surprised if the numbers next week are VERY close.

76:24 is a nice win, but dont sleep on Bourne.

Neutral

mcrexx @ Dec 14th 2007 1:01PM

8 out of the top 10 titles are blu-ray titles. 300 is still on the list! I find this to be a good indication that blu-ray is winning the format war. HOWEVER, I want to see the Harry Potter numbers next week before I make any conclusions for myself regarding this format war.

Neutral

marco @ Dec 14th 2007 6:23PM

@mcrexx

You do realize 300 is being packaged with some HD DVD players? This would explain why its on BD's list and usually never on HD.

Just thought I'd throw that in there.

Neutral

Mike @ Dec 14th 2007 7:15PM

Being so close to Christmas...not sure how much we can tell from HP sales...I asked for Harry for Christmas so my present may not be sold till next week. I did go ahead and buy the 3 bourne movie...could wait for those.

Neutral

Bill @ Dec 14th 2007 1:09PM

As expected. No big titles came out for HD-DVD that week, the graph will probably look similar on the Simpsons release week. But expect next week to look a bit different, with Bourne and Harry Potter out.

Next week's report will tell us a lot. If Harry Potter Blu doesn't outsell the Harry Potter HD-DVD by more than 2:1, I see Warner sticking with HD-DVD. As a direct comparison of a single title is probably the greatest indicator we have as to where this format war is headed.

Current Amazon HD-DVD vs Blu-ray stats: http://amazon.highdefdigest.com/rank.aspx

Highly Ranked

Juice @ Dec 14th 2007 1:13PM

Yeah the Warner titles give the best indication of what format people want, hard to say what will happen, though Warner always denies reports, you can bet both camps are probably throwing the bank at them, they may stick around with both long enough to take the potter sales and leave after that. Warner will most certainly make the most out of the position they are in, whether it be keeping both or switching to one. I am more interested to see the sales of the players over the month, movie sales only tell us what is happening now, but player sales give a good indication of the future sales.
Cheers

Low Ranked

jay @ Dec 14th 2007 1:17PM

here come the blu ray fans to say blue ray is better and hd dividy fans saying it aint all that and blu ray sucks... goddamn it

Neutral

kj719 @ Dec 14th 2007 1:37PM

Well, the NPD numbers yesterday showed that 466K PS3s were sold in Nov. (yes, I know that not everyone uses their PS3 for Blu-Ray movies, but a good percentage do), so I highly doubt that the number of dedicated HD DVD players can even come close to that

Neutral

Iridium @ Dec 14th 2007 1:23PM

SO how does a format with no players sell so many movies. Guess there are a lot of people that buy movies to play on thier kids game machine.

Amazon has Bourne on top of the chart but the HP BluRay box set is way ahead of the HD-DVD box set. I couldn't find any BluRay box sets in Best Buy but they had the HD-DVD. What I couldn't believe is that the DVD box set was $100 and the HD version was $129. Most notable is that hardly any DVD box sets were sold since most people probably have the first movies on DVD already.

Highest Ranked

seanc @ Dec 14th 2007 1:48PM

"SO how does a format with no players sell so many movies. Guess there are a lot of people that buy movies to play on thier kids game machine."

I'm surrounded by adults who bought their wii or ps3 or xbox for themselves, I wouldn't be surprised if the biggest market for consoles is the 18-35 age range. They stopped being kids machines when the kids who started the market all grew up.

Highly Ranked

Godfa7h3r @ Dec 14th 2007 1:30PM

Ben I must say, that was a pretty unbiased post for such a victory. I'm impressed.

I am also very curious to see what next week looks like for numbers. We will have the Harry Potter flicks and of course Bourne. Along with a few BOGO sales thrown in, there's going to be a lot of high def media being sold. It's definitely going to be interesting.

Speaking of BOGO sales, Best Buy will be having one next week for both formats.
http://forum.dvdtalk.com/showthread.php?t=519706
Check about halfway through that first post for the list.

Neutral

domerdel @ Dec 14th 2007 1:32PM

Nice for Blu. Bourne was a good movie, but I don't think it will have the "Transformers" impact on closing the gap that close. Blu will lead, but it won't be 3:1. maybe 1.8:1. As for Warner, I would agree that the sales would have to be very dramatic to influence a change. If it's not, Warner will keep bleeding purple.

Go Blu! :)

Neutral

BBG @ Dec 14th 2007 1:34PM

Blu-ray owns ... again ... for the 49th week in a row this year.

Awesome.

Neutral

h4ldol @ Dec 14th 2007 1:39PM

Yawn. Another embarrassingly lopsided HDM sales deficit of HD DVD to blu-ray. Another bevy of posts by HD DVD apologists crying about the "blu-ray bias" on EngadgetHD. What else is new.

Neutral

zargon @ Dec 14th 2007 2:03PM

*Yawn*

Another trolling post by one of our resident Blu-ray zealots...

Highly Ranked

WhoCaresWhoWins? @ Dec 14th 2007 2:04PM

@h4Idol

Do you actually read the other posts before commenting on them? Not one of the posts in this particular article complains of a Engadget "blu-bias". The only post that even references bias says that the article is unbiased.

Please, do yourself a favor and do some reading before you attempt to fan the flames.

Neutral

wysiwyg @ Dec 14th 2007 2:49PM

Nice sales number at 160k if you don't look at anything else. But considering there are "2.7 million blu-ray players sold", that number is very pathetic in that context. Even if transformers sold the lower speculated amount of 115, out of even say 400k dedicated players, that's almost 29% sales to hardware ratio compared to less than 6% for pirates 3.

Neutral

rg23 @ Dec 14th 2007 9:16PM

I don't blame PS3 owners for having such emotional ties with their hardware. Blu-ray movies are their last hope because the PS3 lost the game console war. Last place on hardware and software sales plus Sony is still losing money on every PS3 sold.

Neutral

Kevin Murphy @ Dec 14th 2007 11:13PM

"I'm surrounded by adults who bought their wii or ps3 or xbox for themselves, I wouldn't be surprised if the biggest market for consoles is the 18-35 age range. They stopped being kids machines when the kids who started the market all grew up."

And, of course this means MALES 18-35. Many of whom are single if they bought the PS3 for themselves. Which brings up Warner's complaint about blu-ray (and Paramount's stated reason for going Red): The blu-ray demographics suck, being mostly PS3 owners.

You cannot base a business on a single market segment, even if it is a large one. HD DVD asserts that it supports the entire market, families, women, men, children of all ages.

Which is why the sales of the Harry Potter set and things like Planet Earth are of great interest to them. Either Planet Earth has much better penetration in Red-land, or its sales mark new player owners (which implies Red is doing better there) or some combination of above.

I note that Amazon is selling more HP sets and discs to Red than BLue, by a slight margin. I'd hate to bet that blu was going to win this one by anything like 2-1.

The other test case will be Blade Runner which could go either way: SF, sure, but very much an intellectual film. Gamers may find it boring.

Time will tell. I think that Warner has always inclined towards HD DVD, but a strong showing by blu on non-gamer material could change that.

Neutral

FreeRange @ Dec 14th 2007 2:04PM

I know if I refresh long enough I will learn this but are the Amazon numbers included here? I only ask because Amazon has the best offer on the Bourne set ($50 for all three) and I'm wondering if those will appear on the scan for next week. If they do appear, will that "bundle" count as three movies? I imagine it will as they appear to be soft-bundled rather than sharing a box... Any ideas?

Neutral

Mike @ Dec 14th 2007 7:06PM

"I know if I refresh long enough I will learn this but are the Amazon numbers included here? I only ask because Amazon has the best offer on the Bourne set ($50 for all three) and I'm wondering if those will appear on the scan for next week. If they do appear, will that "bundle" count as three movies? I imagine it will as they appear to be soft-bundled rather than sharing a box... Any ideas?"

Amazon def counts...Since the bundle is Amazons doing..I would guess 3 sales.

Neutral

MI @ Dec 14th 2007 2:16PM

NEXT WEEK!! Honest Next week! THAT's when HDVD is going to be the winner!!!

Nothing new here... I agree that Bourne won't have the effect that the HDVD crew is expecting, because NOTHING has so far. Domerdel mentions that it's not going to have the 'Transformers' effect, but forgets to note that Transformers, didn't really even have the 'transformers effect' :)

Neutral

domerdel @ Dec 14th 2007 2:22PM

MI: and thats what I mean exactly. Transformers was a smash, have a larger demographic. Bourne has an older demographic... it's not going to be that impactful IMO.

I'll humor you. maybe as an x-mas gift, I'll give the red camp 1 victory week vs. the majority leading blu-ray software sales :)

Neutral

Kadillac @ Dec 14th 2007 2:17PM

You guys put up the same arguments every time these numbers come out. Very boring..

Neutral

MAK42868 @ Dec 14th 2007 2:19PM

This is what I pulled from Nielsen VideoScan's website:

"Sell-through POS (consumer purchase) sales data are collected weekly from traditional channels of video distribution including mass merchants, audio/video and video specialty retailers, electronics outlets, grocery stores, drug stores, and some Internet sites. Nielsen VideoScan maintains this weekly POS data in one of the largest databases of VHS and DVD products in the country. Data is collected on more than 40,000 VHS items and 12,000 DVD items. Virtually every UPC code in sell-through release since 1993 can be found in our extensive database. Complete sales data in all retail channels are available as far back as January 1999 (however Wal*Mart data is included only through 7/28/01). Prior to January 1999, limited information is available in most channels going back to 1993"

It sounds to me that WalMart IS included? Am I correct? Is there any way to find out what they actually DO include?

Highest Ranked

Dave @ Dec 14th 2007 2:22PM

Waaahahahaahaha 76% for the win!

You see, in the PC market is even more... i personally burn a 50GB flick every week or so at my downloading/backup rate :)

Low Ranked

Kadillac @ Dec 14th 2007 2:23PM

Why did you guys decide to go to bed with Sony/Blu-Ray? Isn't Sony a company with garbage business practices and failed formats (Beta, Minidisc, etc.)?

Don't respond by trashing HD-DVD, because I don't favor one over the other.

You guys are nothing but tools. And that's being kind.

Neutral

domerdel @ Dec 14th 2007 2:33PM

Kadillac: we put up the same arguments because you keep bringing up that lame propaganda about Sony's business methodology and their "failed" formats, thus adding fuel to the fire. M$ isn't the holy grail of business practices either. Both are strong companies, unfortunately, this is the Ford. vs. Chevy debate.

Neutral

A1 @ Dec 14th 2007 2:34PM

No, your thinking of Toshiba, they constantly receive the "F" grade from the " Better business Bureau". (If you haven't heard of them then you obviously don't know what your on about.) Spanner.

Highly Ranked

Vidikron (FU) @ Dec 14th 2007 2:49PM

As opposed to going to bed with any other corp? Don't delude yourself. Besides, it's not even exclusively Sony's format. Also, I love how everyone loves to point out failed formats Sony backed while ignoring their successes... I believe you've heard of the CD? Yeah, Sony and Philips created and back that format. Sony was also one of the main driving forces being the success of the cassette tape. But whatever, keep pretending other megacorps are different and that Sony only backs failing formats.

Highest Ranked

seanc @ Dec 14th 2007 2:51PM

Haha, so you're basically calling yourself a tool Kadillac for being a 'staunch blu ray supporter'?

http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/11/26/nielsen-videoscan-high-def-market-share-for-week-ending-november/comments/8980677/

Neutral

MI @ Dec 15th 2007 12:45AM

"Why did you guys decide to go to bed with Sony/Blu-Ray? Isn't Sony a company with garbage business practices and failed formats (Beta, Minidisc, etc.)?"

You're right, sony's never done anything right. That silly format "CD" if you can remember that one. Boy what a looser that was. And what was that other one... Oh yea, DVD. Another dud. You're right.

Feel stupid yet? Sony had one loss in a format war (VHS vs Beta), because they wanted to go it alone. They wanted to hold the licensing close to the vest and get everyone to buy direct form them. That was dumb. Because of it they lost the lead, and the better product lost. At this point, you have Sony licensing BD to several other vendors (panasonic, LG, sharp, samsung, pioneer, philips etc) who are making product. On the other hand, HDVD has one major manufacturer. Minidisc was actually quite successful, just not as much in the US. I'm curious what the 'etc' is.

I'll say it a hundred times, ignorance is the best friend of HDVD.

Neutral

Geoff @ Dec 14th 2007 2:24PM

Based on what I read I would say sales information for Wal-Mart can be obtained from 1999 to 2001 -- but nothing since. It looks like this time next week will be very interesting!

Low Ranked

Kadillac @ Dec 14th 2007 2:26PM

I feel bad for the folks that bought Pirates 3...it's a piece of crap. I could barely sit through it once...

Highest Ranked

Agathos @ Dec 14th 2007 2:48PM

First, don't be sad that I bought Pirates 3, I was impressed enough with it to enjoy it once but definitely not a fave. Throwing stupid ass opinions like this statement, from either side, make the poster sound like a 5 year old and yes you are now guilty of this Kadillac.

To your first post: "Why did you guys decide to go to bed with Sony/Blu-Ray? Isn't Sony a company with garbage business practices and failed formats (Beta, Minidisc, etc.)?"

This same argument can be made for MS, Toshiba, or any other company involved in this along with the Movie companies.

We're tools? This is a forum for discussing exactly this topic, and although 4 out of 5 posts are along the lines of yours it's really interesting to read the intelligent poster's comments oon this topic. You're a sore loser. Be gone child.

Highly Ranked

JayHDDVD @ Dec 14th 2007 2:44PM

Yeah Pirates 3 does suck but impressive numbers non the less.

With 2.7 million players out there, I don't think 160K is all that impressive. Only shows that most don't use their PS3 to watch movies.

If Bourne sells close to this, it makes more sense.

Neutral

domerdel @ Dec 14th 2007 2:48PM

Jay: I know what you're trying to get at, but your statistic logic is off-base. Although I want blu-ray to win, i'm not going to buy every blockbuster out there to support the VOLUME of my library, i'm buying movies that I enjoy, and pirates was not one of them. Most people dont BUY pirates to watch on their PS3.... it's because we're buying other movies! ;)

The same thing can be said about Bourne in the realm of the red camp.

Highly Ranked

JimC @ Dec 14th 2007 3:14PM

@wysiwyg

400K dedicated players? I thought it was 750K (including the dedicated xbox360 add on) So which is it 400K or 750K, because you can't discard/include the add-ons when it suits you [HDDVD crowd]...

You really made a mess of the spin in this comment. First you use the 2+ million number which includes the "controversial" PS3 boxes as blu-ray players to make the percentages look really bad for blu-ray and then you exclude the xbox360 addons from the HDDVD counts to bolster its percentages.

If you're gonna try to fool someone, better step it up....

Neutral

Chris @ Dec 14th 2007 5:07PM

Sounds like you are the kind of guy that would take 70% of $100.00 over 10% of $1000.00
More blu players, more blu disc sales.. but still you try to make some sort of victory out of it. lol.... Just the same old stuff on a different Friday..... You guys need to come up with something new to make beleive over.

Neutral

Truth Teller @ Dec 14th 2007 2:56PM

Hmmmm, at least some of the word must be starting to leak out.

I notice a lot less bombast in the Blu-ray fans & trolls this week.

These numbers at this early stage in things are not the big deal the Blu-ray side are desperate to portray them as.
I think even some of them are beginning to understand this.

CES is going to be really good for HD DVD, I can't wait until the news breaks.

Highest Ranked

Vidikron (FU) @ Dec 14th 2007 3:14PM

Perhaps it's because BR beating HD DVD in movies sales is old hat now? It's become the status quo.

Highly Ranked

JimC @ Dec 14th 2007 3:18PM

Truth Teller, What are you talking about? "CES is going to be really good for HD DVD, I can't wait until the news breaks." based on what evidence? HDDVD get's trounced in weekly sales figures so they're going to really shine at CES??? what???

Neutral

Chris @ Dec 14th 2007 3:10PM

Does anyone wanna bet on which side sells more Harry Potter???? Everyone should know the answer to that one.

Neutral

andy @ Dec 14th 2007 3:51PM

I do want to know which side sells more total harry potter discs (boxed sets plus new movie), but since Wal-mart doesn't report data, we'll never have more than a vague guess.

Neutral

Eddie @ Dec 14th 2007 3:04PM

Another lopsided week. You all can quote me, I'll (an HD DVD fan) proclaim the death of HD if next week isn't the biggest upset in the history of sports (er, sales). This week will make next week all the sweeter...

At my local Wal-Mart, had to eat a HP purchase because they sold out of the new one and I bought the goblet one on HD (I don't follow HP, I just bought it to bolster HD sales). Lots of BluRay left. Had to go to Circuit City, where there were noticeably fewer HD HP than BR, and NO Bournes left.

Neutral

Leonardo DiCrapio @ Dec 14th 2007 3:06PM

"Most people dont BUY pirates to watch on their PS3.... it's because we're buying other movies!"

Most people don't buy pirates to watch on their ps3 because there are about 2.5 million ps3's sold in the united states so far, and the average ps3 owner has bought approximately 1.5 blu-ray discs (there have only been a little more than 4 million blu-ray discs sold to date, and about a half million of those blu-ray discs were bought by owners of stand-alone blu-ray players). and some of those discs "sold" to ps3 owners (i.e. open season) were actually bundled with the ps3.

ps3 owners aren't exactly buying blu-ray discs at a torrid pace.

Highest Ranked

Vidikron (FU) @ Dec 14th 2007 3:11PM

Why do you guys argue about the PS3 so much? Really. Obviously quite a few people bought the PS3 to play games, so that drags the average of movies/player down. But on the flip side, given that BR stomps HD-DVD in movies sales most weeks despite having few standalone players on the market it's clear that the PS3 is having a significant impact on the weekly sales number even if the average per player is low. The bottom line is that there is no easy way to cleanly classify the PS3 in terms of BR players, but the impact is very noticeable.

Neutral

domerdel @ Dec 14th 2007 3:47PM

Leo: I think you wanted to chime in and give me the numbers lecture. While your numbers may be accurate or close to that, it's out of context to the point I was making. I do not recall stating this torrid pace for BD movies.

**Shake 8 ball, re-read, and try again**

Highly Ranked

Chris @ Dec 14th 2007 3:10PM

Honestly.. I don't think I would HATE HD-DVD if Para/Dream wasn't exclusive to them. Because they continue to exist (HD-DVD), I can't watch some movies in MY PREFERED HD FORMAT of BLU-RAY. When HD-DVD is GONE (soon I hope) I will be able to watch movies from all of the studios in High Definition. Because of this I blame HD-DVD for trying to hang around and stay in the game as the reason I can't do what I want to do.

That is my personal choice and why I can't wait for HD-DVD to GO AWAY!!

Neutral

wysiwyg @ Dec 14th 2007 6:07PM

Can't you see I am comparing the as of dates? Transformer released in October before all the 90k sold players + A3s for black fridays. Back then, yes, it was 400k, and Transformers sold low-end 115k (numbers still disputable). Why would I compare the first week of transformers to total number of players nearly TWO months later? BDA claimed 2.7Million players just last month. I'm comparing at a point in time when each of the movies were released vs. how many players available at that same timeframe. Try to think ahead and check the facts before saying I'm trying to fool someone.

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