Is HD DVD dead?

A couple of decades ago I read a slim volume called ‘The Limits to Prediction’ (I think, or something like that), which presented half a dozen papers on the art of predicting future events, and the success that was achieved. Sadly, all but one of the papers reported very low levels of correctness in predictions.

So I should have known better than to try my own hand at predicting the future. In the struggle between Blu-ray and HD DVD, I predicted, either both would succeed, or both would fail. I expected hybrid players to make the disc format irrelevant. Despite the recent announcement by Warner Bros that it would be going exclusively to Blu-ray, I expected that the supporters of HD DVD would be stubborn enough to keep it going for quite a bit longer.

But now quite a few news outlets are reporting that Toshiba will be abandoning HD DVD later in the year. I am seeking confirmation from Toshiba, so this is yet to be confirmed.

Still, if it is true, then that would suggest that all my predications were incorrect!

The question of what one does with one’s HD DVDs will require some answering. Will there be a ‘swap’ option to Blu-ray? If the reports are correct and HD DVD will soon be out of the running, this should increase the likelihood of a HD format succeeding, since there will be less consumer confusion. But given my past predictions, perhaps you ought to ignore that last sentence.

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