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31 Mar 2006
Movie studios and retailers are starting to abandon Sony's Universal Media Disc (UMD) movie format.
UMD is an optical storage device that Sony developed for its PlayStation Portable gaming computers. The tiny disks are primarily designed to store games, but consumers can also purchase movies on the format.
The Hollywood Reporter, a sister publication of vnunet.com, reported that Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the US, has drastically cut back the shelf space for UMD movies and may stop selling them altogether.
Universal Studios and Paramount Pictures have ceased to offer movies on the small storage disks, and even Sony has cut the number of titles that it releases on UMD.
Michael Gartenberg, research director at Jupiter Research, told vnunet.com that the UMD movies have always had a difficult value proposition because they cost as much as a DVD, but can only be played on Sony's PlayStation Portable.
"Sony has to build on that as a platform and get more ways for UMD to be viewed on different devices," he said.
Gartenberg stressed that UMD will stick around for PSP games. But for the device to succeed as a movie player, Sony will have to introduce additional accessories that allow consumers to hook up the devices to a television, for instance.
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Do you agree?
Mini-DVD-Rs
They need to open up the UMD medium to writeable content. Let us make our own movies, music and photo slide-shows on the UMD cartridges.
Posted by: Tim 13 Apr 2006
UMD the failure is the pricing!
Hi, I am an avid user of the PSP system, a field person by profession, i travel the globe and honestly i sought for solutions like what Sony's have come up with with their PSP. Mobile entertaintment. Honestly DVD's have it's merit to be a collectors item. But the UMD movie formats provides someone with the option(s) of creating a more personal transportable and more enjoyable moments anywhere, which is limited on DVD's solution. Honestly, UMD movies is an ultimate choice for personal movie collectors, much like having a small library of good books, vice good movies to carry around. The mistake, UMD's half the quality of DVD's. Why not halve the price? This is a good example of conglomorates miss-understanding the consumers need. Well SONY's and the rest. You're BIG enough to tell.
Posted by: R Rahim 10 Apr 2006
Rip-off Movie Studios
The reason for the UMD failure has been obvious from the launch - who in their right mind would play full price for a movie which they can ONLY watch on a minute screen? The solution was also obvious - produce a pack which contains both the UMD AND a DVD. The studios are probably worried that you would get people buying the pack between them, so that one gets the DVD and one the UMD... but hey, those people would probably pirate the movie anyhow so there is not much loss there. There is probably some Sony Studios exec reading this now and thinking "Hey, that's a good idea. We could charge double for a pack like that!" :(
Posted by: Adam Hill 03 Apr 2006
Marketing Strategy
Sony's PSP has been a huge hit. The same is not the case with the UMD. Unlike the PS2 which can play movies on a television a PSP does not play movies on televisions. Since the UMDs cannot be attached to anything else...there cost price must be decreased drastically. If cost of production is more than it has to be cut down. Also technology has to be developed to attach a PSP to the Television Directly. People using PSPs should be made to feel that they are getting full value for there money.
Posted by: Atul Tripathi 31 Mar 2006
Blue Ray is next.....
Sony just dosn`t learn, give the customer what they want and they will buy it, otherwise it will crash and burn ... Blue Ray & HD-DVD will be the next formats to flop.
Posted by: Dario 31 Mar 2006