HD DVD region codes could be on their way
By Matt Burns 
posted May 26th 2006 11:09AM
posted May 26th 2006 11:09AM
It was only a matter of time. The DVD Forum is "actively considering" putting those pesky DVD region codes on HD DVDs. They are apparently being pressured by a good friend of ours and yours, the MPAA. The initial HD DVD titles are older movies anyways so they would be exempt from the region codes but all new release would have 'em. The somewhat good news is they are looking to reduce the seven regions down to just three to cover the Americas, Europe/Africa and Asia - but not China. The land of a billion people might get their own region coding. This might be a good reason to pick up a Toshiba HD-A1/AX1 though as they do not even look for the region codes which makes them region free. Don't forget though that Blu-ray had also indicated that they were going to enforce region codes.
LOL there's what 20 titles worlwide and the MPAA is getting worried already. Tools.
The MPAA always seemed to favor Blu-Ray over HD-DVD (more studios signed up originally), so perhaps they originally thought that HD-DVD would be the quick loser and there was no reason to do region codes for the format. Sony stating that they cannot meet Blu-ray demand and then with that one Sony bigwig commenting on the possibility of hybrid players recently, perhaps their perceptions have changed? I still think both formats will survive this, and hybrid players will be the glue. To the consumer, all they will care about is if the content is HD, red or blue stripe on the box, and nothing else. No one will care or ask if the HD movie they just purchased is a single, dual, or triple layer HD-DVD or Blu-Ray, so long as they can watch it in that high-def-capable DVD player. Just as no one asks if that DVD they just rented or bought is a single layer or dual layer. They just want it to work. Consumers stand to win as both formats will be competing and under-cutting each other so movies studios will choose to use their format over the other. Players may cost slightly more because of the royalities paid to both camps initially (my guess is that the cost will be a nominal amount) and the movies themselves will cost less because of the format competition.
"This might be a good reason to pick up a Toshiba HD-A1/AX1 though as they do not even look for the region codes which makes them region free."
It's more likely that they'll simply force a firmware upgrade, or if they're feeling nasty, disallow the 1st-gen players from playing *any* HD DVDs at all.
Yeah, this sucks.
No way am I going to be forced to not only buy the same films in HD, but they want me to buy them for each individual country I want to stay in.
I was all for HD DVD before but its all just getting silly.
Regional encoding for China has only one reason, they want to release cheap HD DVD players and cheap HD DVD's to prevent piracy, but don't want people in teh US or Europe ordering Chinese HD DVD's on teh cheap.
So much for enforcing free trade...
What about region coding T-Shirts while we are at it?
I guess I am going to stick with my original choice unless the Blu-ray camp decides to follow. Region coding is EVIL.