Despite the general lameness of the economy at large, Blu-ray seems to be faring at least decently well overseas. We already heard that Blu-ray Disc sales were up 396% in the UK year-to-date, and we're getting even more positive vibes from a BDA European Promotions Group seminar held in Amsterdam this month. According to Frank Simonis, chairman of the aforesaid group, [Blu-ray] is "experiencing strong and solid growth in every national territory [in Europe]," even with the economic situation taken into consideration. Also in attendance was FutureSource Consulting's Jim Bottoms, who boldly predicted that "in Europe, by 2012, about one-quarter of homes will have a standalone Blu-ray Disc player." 'Course, that's just wild speculation at this point, but at least we've a target to look back on and see just how accurate this fellow was / wasn't. [Warning: PDF read link]

Blu-ray Disc sales may be up a staggering 396% in the UK, and the BDA may be bullish about BD's success in Europe as a whole, but Europeans looking to buy in cheap as we Americans have recently been able to do may be out of luck (for now, at least). According to a new report from Reuters, "a scarcity of cheap Blu-ray players combined with the effects of a recession are expected to delay take-up of the Blu-ray format in Europe." It's suggested that supply issues earlier in the year could mean that those relatively cheap BD decks in the US may not make their way to Europe before the big holiday shopping season. Screen Digest analyst Richard Cooper even went so far as to say that these factors "[could mean that] the format is unlikely to move much beyond the early adopter market this year." Granted, no one really anticipated BD going from niche to mainstream by the time CES 2009 got going, but a scarcity of affordable players sure won't help matters.

While Sony's Jay Vandenbree is over in one corner griping about HDTV price drops, the outfit's Stan Glasgow is off in another making a bit of sense. In a recent interview with Reuters, the bigwig stated that he understood that movie studios "needed to make money, and [that] packaged media (discs) is a critical way for them to [do so]," but he continued on to say that he would "love to see those prices come down, as well as the price of Blu-ray players to drive adoption." These absolutely laudable comments come on the heels of him admitting that Blu-ray sales overall would fall around 10% short this holiday season of prior expectations, despite the fact that BD deck prices are apt to hit record lows on Black Friday. It's actually pretty astounding to hear a higher-up such as Stan uttering such logical statements, and if you're looking for more of his take on the industry, you know where to head.

It's hard to know what to believe these days. Just weeks ago, we heard that the worldwide economic situation would actually increase at-home entertainment sales; now, we're hearing that overall home entertainment spending will likely decline 3% to 4%. Regardless of what actually happens, Blu-ray backers are still scaling back their expectations for the format, with Warner Home Video president Ron Sanders and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment president David Bishop each estimating that total BD software sales in 2008 will reach $750 million. That's compared to earlier forecasts of around $1 billion, though it was noted that Paramount Home Entertainment president Kelley Avery nailed the revamped estimate a few months back. As it stands, year-to-date Blu-ray sales have surpassed $500 million, which means BD still needs a big holiday season to hit the fresh figures -- do see you it happening?

Right, so the obvious answer here is: "No, you don't need a Blu-ray player." But, you know -- do you need a Blu-ray player? At its core, the latest argument put forth by an Orlando Sentinel editor is yet another debate over the viability of the format in comparison to upscaled DVD and in the wake of surging support for HD streaming, but there are certainly a lot of points made that we vehemently disagree with. According to the editor, the "difference between DVD and Blu-ray is nowhere near as striking [as VHS and DVD], despite what the consumer electronics retailers and manufacturers might tell you." He goes on to assert that a BD player simply isn't worth purchasing if you've already got a stout DVD library, particularly if you own an upconverting DVD player. Ruining any shot at anyone taking his view seriously were the remarks by his colleague, who watched Planet of the Apes on a BD deck and a $40 DVD player; according to him: "The features are fancier, but the picture? No improvement. Investing in a [Blu-ray] player... is a needless expense. Downloads are the future, not discs in a cute blue box." Let the firefight begin.

[Thanks, Anthony]

Despite the weakening economy, video game sales across the board have remained impressively high. Now that each of the big three have reported their Q3 figures, we found Sony's report in particular worthy of critique. Sure, Nintendo moved more Wiis last quarter than Sony did PS3s, and Microsoft sold about twice as many Xbox 360s, but that's beside the point. The most expensive console on the market (by far) still managed to see a 56% sales increase year-over-year, which is pretty remarkable in and of itself. We've no hard evidence suggesting that Blu-ray's victory in the format war helped escalate its sales, but would you be willing to bet that it did? C'mon, the PS3 was widely regarded as the best Blu-ray player in its price range for a solid while there, surely that helped out Sony somewhat -- no? Chime in with your analysis below.

What do you know, more number games with Blu-ray. The latest report asserts that Blu-ray players, in general, aren't moving any quicker of late even after dropping between $200 and $300. For instance, Texas superstore Bjorn's and Pennsylvania-based Gerhard Appliances "saw no sales change after Sony and Samsung cut $100 off their respective BDP-S350 and BD-P1500 models to $299 at the end of September." Granted, year-to-date BD sales in the aforesaid price range comprised 17% of all BD decks compared to just 9% for that same window through July. Also (and probably more importantly), it's suggested that consumers will finally move in a big way once the bulk of players sink below $200. Of course, we've been hearing similar for quite some time, but now that Black Friday is but days away, we're finally close to finding out who's right in all of this.

[Image courtesy of 360East]

Sony's Rick Clancy spared no mercy when bashing claims that Blu-ray would be old hat within five years, but now we're seeing yet another bigwig predict a similar fate. Singulus, a German company responsible for pumping out Blu-ray duplicators and the like, has recently spoken up via its CEO to suggest that Blu-ray will peak (in terms of delivery of Blu-ray machines) within five to six years. Additionally, CEO Stefan Baustert suggested that the BD market will grow somewhat in 2009, and he boldly predicted that 50% of US households will own a Blu-ray player within two years; of note, he said the same level of penetration wouldn't occur in Germany before 2011 or 2012. Oh sure, it's not like this guy's a clairvoyant or anything, but we'd suspect he knows his business pretty well.

[Image courtesy of The Master Shake Signal]

With all this talk about how the current economic situation is hindering / helping at-home entertainment sales, we figured we'd pose the question to our dear readers. Are you currently feeling the squeeze? So much so that you're scaling back your HD-related purchases? With Black Friday just around the bend, we know it'll be mighty hard to keep the plastic holstered, so we're eager to see if you'll be taking advantage of the downturn to snag a good deal or sitting pretty on the sidelines waiting for brighter days.

[Image courtesy of GreenLantern]

Man, what a difference 1.75 months makes. In mid-September, the BDA actually admitted that Blu-ray player prices weren't going to be sinking anytime soon; fast forward to now, and we've already got a smattering of sub-$200 decks to choose from. That being the case, ABI Research has just pushed out a new release that points out the obvious, noting that "competitive pressure from movie download services, and media speculation about the future success of the Blu-ray format itself has resulted in falling Blu-ray player prices across a range of current and older models." Unfortunately, there aren't any hints in there of just how low prices will go on Black Friday and during the run-up to the end of December, but trust us, we looked.

Um, wow? Here's one right out of left field. As the story goes, Plexifilm was intent on re-releasing a 2002 documentary of the band Wilco titled "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" on Blu-ray Disc. After getting wind of this pretty late in the game, Wilco decided to e-mail its fans with new tour dates and to discourage them from buying the BD version. Why? According to the band, the Blu-ray version costs nearly twice as much as the DVD, and given that it was originally shot in "grainy, 16mm black and white," the band doubted the value for this particular project. Additionally, the band never heard that the audio was being remastered, which obviously contributed to their feelings on the matter. Plexifilm has made clear that it's postponing the release until it can "show the band the differences between the HD and standard-definition versions."

[Via LA Times, thanks Anthony]

We hate to point out the obvious, but new "research" from Futuresource over in the UK is bringing to light the fact that many will opt for at-home entertainment versus going out on the town or perishing from boredom during this economic quandary we're currently working through. Amazing, right? According to Sarah Carroll, Director of Strategy & Continuous Services at the aforementioned firm, she reckons that individuals will go out and "purchase hot new electronics items like Blu-ray players, flat-panel TVs or smartphones" rather than dining by candlelight or going on vacation. In somewhat more interesting news, the report projects that the growth of Blu-ray in Europe's top five markets will "more than triple" between 2008 and 2009, reaching in excess of 1.8 million players shipped (Sony's PS3 notwithstanding) next year. As always, only time will tell.

[Image courtesy of AT&T]

We knew Japan was warming to Blu-ray, but apparently those tepid desires have morphed into infernos of passion. According to new statistics loosed by the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association (JEITA), Blu-ray Disc recorder / player shipments hit a level of 138,000, or around 107 times more than the shipments posted a year ago. Moreover, those shipments accounted for 31% of "overall shipments of DVD equipment on a volume basis." Unsurprisingly, BD equipment -- coupled with flat-panel TVs -- were the two biggest drivers of consumer electronics shipments in Japan this year, with visual equipment shipments rising 8.2% year-over-year. Blu-ray and HDTV: a match made in heaven. Or Tokyo.

[Image courtesy of TVSnob]

You know how this game works by now -- someone says one thing, someone else says another. After hearing the Blu-ray Disc Association assert that Blu-ray wares would be flying off of store shelves this holiday season, in steps technology analyst Roger Kay to say otherwise. In fact, he predicts a "dramatic" drop in Blu-ray sales for Q4 and beyond, suggesting that consumers will choose to hold tight to their hard-earned dollars rather than spend it on a format that's still noticeably more expensive than DVD. As if that weren't enough, he also insinuated that the push back in adoption could allow "other forms of video over cable, satellite and the internet to shut the window of opportunity for Blu-ray." Of course, we've heard this whole physical media versus digital downloads debate before, but we don't exactly see a poor sales season (if there is one) as being enough to catapult digital downloads in front of BD. Regardless, we'll be anxious to see the numbers in early 2009, but for now, it certainly provides interesting fodder for discussion.

[Image courtesy of Syracuse]

Looking for candidness? We aren't too sure we believe these numbers, but a new writeup from Hollywood Reporter has it that Blu-ray Disc sales in the United Kingdom are up a mind-melting 396% for the year to date. Yep, 1.5 million units have been moved, which -- if accurate -- gives a clear indication of just how quickly consumers on that side of the pond are siding with Blu in this post-format war world. Purportedly, the figures were derived from the British Video Association, and the report with this nugget also had data regarding the upward trends in both DVD sales and theater attendance. But hey, when there's all of five or so HD channels to watch, it's not too shocking to see citizens get their high-def fix via another method.

[Via GameFocus, image courtesy of WikInvest]