Remember all those HD DVDs you spent the last 8 months buying, because everyone said that HD DVD would win the format war with Blu Ray?  Yeah, they’re basically worthless now. 

Okay, maybe not worthless.  But definitely worth less.  Cue the violins.

Blue Ray is now the king.  BlueRay has killed HD DVD dead.  First degree murder.  Blue Ray is the big winner, as Toshiba has announced they will cease production on the HD DVD players.  Toshiba was the major backer of the HD DVD format, with Sony backing Blu Ray.  Over the last couple months, more and more battles went Blu Ray’s way.  Movie studios like Warner Brothers announced they would only produce their films on Blu Ray and retailers like Wal-Mart decided to only carry the Blu Ray format. 

Most consumers had held off buying either, choosing to wait for the dust to settle and a real winner to be declared in the format war before jumping on board the high definition DVD bandwagon.

Now the choice is simple. 

Expect the $5 bin at Wal-Mart to soon be filled with any remaining HD DVD titles they have yet to burn off.  Blu Ray disks, though, will likely continue to be expensive for now. 

From the article:

“We concluded that a swift decision would be best,” Toshiba President Atsutoshi Nishida told reporters at his company’s Tokyo offices. “If we had continued, that would have created problems for consumers, and we simply had no chance to win.”

I can’t claim any insider knowledge on this one.  I haven’t waded out into the high definition DVD waters just yet.  Hey, I’m old enough to remember how Betamax owners felt when VHS won out.  And I definitely had a few friends get burned in the whole Laser Disc fiasco.  So I will forever be a cautious and patient embracer of technology. 

That being said, I’m pretty pumped about this news.  Not that Blue Ray won, but simply that one of the two formats won.  Now, with a clear victor, we the consumers can breathe a bit easier.  Prices will slowly begin to fall for Blu Ray stuff, and the format itself will probably get even better.  And you know Sony has to feel good right now–they were behind the infamously failed Betamax format back in the 1980s. 

Of course, this win by BlueRay will have an impact in the video game console battle as well.  Sony put the BlueRay player in their Playstation 3, while Microsoft went with the HD DVD player in the XBox 360.  Oh well.  Something tells me that Microsoft has enough going for them that they’ll weather the storm.

Of course, in just a short time, most everything is going to go digital.  And we won’t buy our movies in any physical format whatsoever.  We’ll buy them in the form of downloads.  It’s already happening, actually.  While Blu Ray may have scored a victory today, it will sadly be a temporary one.  Soon enough, all formats will lose out to the digital download.  And frankly, I’m alright with that. 

Anyway, go buy your Blu Ray players, people.  It’s safe now.