because 99.9% of consumers don’t choose; they buy what’s out there and have no interest in technical specs - they just wanna watch their movies. For the movie studios: Having only one format available is a lot cheaper for them and minimises investment in new technology (manufacturing the discs). Not to mention inventory and product mix. The last thing they want is multiple formats for the next 10+ years. For the patent holders: Blu-Ray backers and HD-DVD backers are looking for PR points to hurt the competition because stakes are high (royalties for companies involved owning the patents on their respective tech is the ‘prize’ here). For the average movie-buying consumer: Choice of formats will just confuse a significant percentage and make many delay or put off purchase. For other markets (computers, etc) I think the choice of these two (and more) would be fantastic. Computers are long overdue for some higher capacity (reasonably-priced) removables. One thing’s for sure: the ‘fight’ is making both want to outdo each other. Mostly they are blowing hot air, but I bet some real work is being done behind the scenes to improve their offerings purely because there’s this little tiff happening…
