[Ti] Re: Blueray in Macs [was 10.5.3]

[Carter Lawson]

 at 5:16 PM (EDT) on 5/30/08 Dennis Fazio wrote:

>There is speculation that Steve Jobs is thinking further ahead than  
>BlueRay and that the format war caused enough delay to effectively  
>kill off both options. He's moving on to Internet-based content; the  
>need for physical media distribution of music and movies is coming to  
>an end. No need for a BlueRay device in all the Macs. Those who want  
>or need them badly enough can get firewire/USB externals. Most others  
>will just go the AppleTV route.

 It's a real stretch to claim that forcing Mac buyers to accept an older
DVD technology is evidence of thinking ahead. 

  The speculation with which I'm familiar puts a somewhat less favorable
face on this decision.  It is that Jobs wants to push the Mac faithful
to have no other HD viewing option other than AppleTV and thus boost
sales of HD movies that way.  After all, isn't this kind of behavior
more like the Apple we all know where decisions aren't to benefit the
end user so much as to benefit the bottom line, like any corporation?  

  With broadband penetration still woefully low in the US compared to
many other countries and with some forms of broadband imposing bandwidth
limitations, internet distribution of HD movies for many is a long long
way from being a reality and thus physical distribution will be here for
many more years.  Widespread adoption such a new distributional paradigm
is likely to be much slower than many would hope given that it requires
infrastructure that, as yet, is still not fully and reliably available.

  A more limited technology is never for our own good.  Limiting our
choices is not doing us any favors.  Even if many would choose not to
pay for it, having BluRay drives as an option on new Macs would benefit
everyone but AppleTV HD sales.

CL