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Analyst finds DVD sales down, Blu-ray trends "encouraging"


As the year 2008 draws to a close, we're seeing report after report talking about Blu-ray sales and / or adoption. The latest to focus on the former comes from Pali Research analyst Rich Greenfield, who has reportedly stated that new DVD release sales are down "almost double digits," even despite respectable performance in the first half of the year. Said figure may help explain why the rental business is doing so well, but we digress. Greenfield also notes that DVDs are slowly but surely losing floor space to BDs, and given that not nearly as many folks are buying the high-def format just yet, it's not exactly helping the DVD cause. Beyond all that, he notes that Blu-ray trends are "encouraging," with titles that appeal to gamers (and thus, PS3 owners) doing particularly well. Then again, it's easy to look good during the holidays, but how will things look when everyone's third home equity loan is dried up in March?

[Image courtesy of BusinessWeek]

Shocker: consumers are buying larger screen HDTVs


We've heard some pretty outlandish claims about the recommended screen size for the "average" American den, but a new writeup over at Channel4 is suggesting that even Europeans are gravitating towards larger sets. Reportedly, Sharp is estimating that "the average size of TVs bought across Europe will increase to 60-inches by 2015," and moreover, retailer Comet has stated that the "average size of its TV screens has increased to 30-inches from 25-inches two years ago." Of course, it's not like this is all that surprising -- after all, the general rule of thumb (for better or worse) in TV buying is that bigger is always better. Couple that with the tanking prices across the HDTV board and you've got a recipe for big-screen upgrade fever. Notably, Comet also proclaimed that it had seen a 7,000-percent (yes, that's correct) uptick in sales of 50-inch sets over the past two years, and needless to say, that category has become the outfit's fastest growing. Hey, who needs 32-inches when that 80-incher is within budget?




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