Original Article Link
Not too technical, not too elementary and informative, that was a nicely written article IMO.
However, when I read about the different profiles and how the older profile machines are forward compatible to the extent of playing the disc only that’s when my goat got got. You can’t tell me that Sony didn’t already have profiles 1.1 and 2.0 on the BD road map from day one. As I understand it these newer profiles allow PIPish behavior and some sort of downloading feature. There’s no technological hurdle to jump for those improvements and there certainly aren’t any hardware limitations that might have prevented profile 2.0 features to be available from day one. BD tech is not that old. It’s simply another example of planned obsolescence, however brazen it is in this example.
The problem, IMO, is when a standard is the property of a sole proprietor and not under the control of some sort of consortium like ISO or some such organization. In this case early adaptors are rewarded with a denial of access to the new whiz-bang goodies profiles 1.1 and 2.0 have to offer…unless you’re a PS3 owner…these units apparently allow the firmware to be flashed. So why aren’t set top players flashable?
I think what we’re seeing here is a case of Betamax’s revenge.
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