Geek vs Life

Many years ago, in the dark ages of magnetic media, there was once a battle to bring the silver screen home. The battle raged between VHS, created by JVC, and Betamax, created by Sony. Many reasons why VHS became the standard are arguable, be it slick marketing, recording length, or price, but once VHS took over the rental market, the final nail was put into Betamax’s coffin. And what industry thrives on video rental more than any other? The adult film industry.

This year, after having claimed the previous year to go with Blu-Ray, Digital Playground (porn producer) has set to release several titles on HD-DVD. The producer went on to say that Sony will not let XXX content be put on to their Blu-Ray disks, and any manufacturer of the format could lose their license if they did. Other sources at the Adult Entertainment Expo stated that, though Blu-Ray’s quality is higher, cost of manufacturing and reproducing HD-DVDs is far cheaper.

It seems that history is repeating itself. The higher technical quality of Sony’s product is being beaten by the availability of the lesser product. The pornography industry, having chosen VHS last time correctly, has chosen HD-DVD this time around. I suspect that, once again, they’ve chosen wisely.