A recent survey conducted by the Seattle-based Tech Trends Research Institute (TTRI) found that a surprisingly high two percent of US consumers give a crap about Blu-ray high-definition video discs.
The results come as something of a blow to the Blu-ray Disc Association, a thinly-veiled front operation run by Sony Corporation, who had hoped consumers would jump at the chance to replace their perfectly functional DVDs with incrementally better Blu-ray discs priced twice as high.
“It doesn’t make sense,” said Jorge McManus, a representative for Sony Corporation of America. “We beat HD-DVD like, five months ago. Why aren’t people lining up to give us money?”
TTRI CEO Tom Granville was surprised by the results as well. “We were shocked that this many people are even aware of Blu-ray at all,” he said. “We were expecting maybe half a percent, tops.”
The depth of the ignorance of and apathy toward Blu-ray demonstrated in the survey results was impressive. When asked whether they knew the difference between Blu-ray Profile 1.0, Profile 1.1, and Profile 2.0, thirty-seven percent of survey respondents stared slack-jawed at the interviewer, forty-one percent uncomfortably changed the subject, and twenty-one percent slapped the interviewer for “talking dirty to me.”
Blu-ray discs offer an impressive array of minor feature improvements over DVDs. Sony representatives claim that this should easily justify their $30 price tag, but according to the survey, consumers remain unconvinced.
“The superiority of Blu-ray is readily apparent to anyone that bothers to closely inspect the picture on their 100-inch television,” said McManus. “Clearly we just need to crank up our marketing efforts to help the public see Blu-ray’s advantages.”
Granville sees things a bit differently. “According to our survey, the only way the majority of consumers will make the switch to Blu-ray is if stores stop selling DVDs, armed government agents storm their homes and remove their DVD collections by force, and free Blu-ray discs are given away with the purchase of every $5 worth of groceries,” he said. “Even then, only about 55% say they would switch.”
Other interesting survey results:
- 22% of those polled insisted that they had ordered Blu-ray at a restaurant in the past.
- 8% of survey respondents correctly identified the nature of Blu-ray, but “couldn’t possibly care less about it.”
- 10% said they were hoping to get Blu-ray for Christmas this year, even though they don’t have a clue what it is.
- 17% of respondents thought Blu-ray was “one of those things that killed Steve Irwin.”
- 34% accused the interviewer of racism.
Well that’s why everyone is still using Beta VCR recorders/playback units made by Sony instead of those old VHS tapes and player/recorders!
Blue Ray–that’s the thing that makes it possible to talk hands-free on a cell phone, right?
And yet HD-DVDs were no cheaper; and I’m sure that format would have a much stronger showing in your survey. Hell, you’d be singing its praises.
I truly miss HD-DVD. I haven’t and don’t intend to give a dime to Sony/BDA.
I plan on keeping my regular dvds until they wear out AND ONLY when this new-fangled technolosmartogee becomes affordable.
Blu-Rays, as opposed to Red-Rays, are used by the Martian invading forces to stun, while the Red-Rays blast the sh*t outa everything. Know your rays, know the dosages. Flee, while you still have a chan…. -disconnect-