Best Buy's Blu-ray bailout
- TAGS:Best Buy, Blu-ray, early adopters
- IT TOPICS:Hardware, Storage
This must be the season for bailouts. The U.S. rescues Bear Stearns and now Best Buy is going to bailout HD DVD owners. Big mistake.
Blu-ray disc players are overpriced and consumers are going to pay a format war tax on these devices for sometime. Rebates to HD DVD owners will help prolong the high prices on these players.
But I can understand why Best Buy wants to stay on the good side of its HD DVD owners with its $50 rebate.
HD DVD buyers were early adopters. They are coveted consumers and the last people that retail stores want to upset.
Early adopters pay premium and take risks and I’ll bet that their basements, closets and desk draws are stuffed full of discarded electronics and near-dead formats, like my two Minidisc players.
A true early adopter has recovered from the format war and owns a Blu-Ray player, or is at least thinking of buying one. A true early adopter just shrugs his/her shoulders and moves on.
Millions of dollars were spent by this industry to try to convince manufacturers, film and DVD producers and distributors, retailers and not to mention consumers, to adopt one format over the other. Those cost will be recovered.
I am not going to pay the format war tax and spend $400 plus on a DVD player, Blu-ray or otherwise. Until the Blu-ray players decline in price by at least half, I won’t even consider one. The format war has been a wasteful exercise and rebates just keep that waste going.
Best Buy should take the money in its early adopter $10 million gift card bailout fund and use it to cut Blu-ray prices. The only thing this bailout helps is the high price of Blu-ray systems.



