DvdSales
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Analyst: Blu-ray can't stop video sales slump, sees modest growth in 2010
As frequently predicted, Blu-ray hasn't been enough to make up for sagging DVD sales, as a new Screen Digest report indicates a 4.8 percent slide worldwide last year, falling more than $2.6 billion. After plateauing approaching 2007, disc sales have been falling ever since and even Blu-ray's $482 million contribution can't hold up the slack. Still, it's looking at online rentals like Lovefilm and Quickflix to make up for some of the rental losses internationally, but don't expect Blu-ray to help grow the market at all until at least 2010. Of course, the company did also predict the format war would remain stalemated just weeks before Warner ended the whole thing, so we'd keep a grain of salt handy while reading.[Via Financial Times]
DVD sales eroding thanks to HD DVD / Blu-ray emergence
You could probably see this one coming a mile or two away, but analysts are now suggesting that 2007 DVD sales will be "flat compared to the year prior, at best," and it's (mostly) due to HD DVD and Blu-ray. It was also noted that the less than spectacular DVD sales could also be attributed to the saturation of DVD hardware in American homes, insinuating that far fewer families are dashing out to snap up new titles for their shiny new players. More interesting, however, was the realization that consumers are jumping ship from vanilla DVDs to high-definition films far slower than the VHS-to-DVD transition, but it's not like having two similar formats to choose from is really helping the general public to decide. Still, it's not surprising to see DVD sales begin to slide as it reaches maturity in the market, but only time will tell if HD flicks will pick up the slack.
