Target joins Best Buy and discontinues sales of DVD's and Blurays

Good. It'll funnel the remaining demand to specialty companies like Arrow and Kino Lorber, as well as sites like DeepDiscount and, lately, Gruv.
 
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I have a huge Blu-ray and DVD library but in the past few years I've been adding to my digital collection. So much more convenient IMO. I regularly look for $5 deals for my favorite movies on slickdeals and I'm almost to the point where most of what I physically own is digitally owned.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Amazon, Walmart and streaming services will be the winners here.

I understand the convenience of streaming, but having the tech giants control what you see and hear is very short-sighted.
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I mean are those formats just dying? Or is the place where you are buying them just what is changing? I feel like back in the day Target was simply that place to impulse by a movie that I see was released, but something like the Harry Potter collection I'm looking for that sweet deal that maybe I'm buying from England and the first is called The Philosopher's Stone instead of Sorcerer's Stone
 
While Target exclusive deal for Taylor Swift vinyl is a nice deal for them... who would have predicted this 20 years ago...

The industry tried very hard for very long to cling to what was the most ridiculously profitable era of Hollywood the Dvd Bubbles of 2003-2007, but you cannot force people to buy them.
 
The last movie I've bought--disc or digital--was Frozen 2. It's a space thing for me right now. Just don't have the room to keep on buying them. I have hundreds and hundreds of DVDs across several large boxes in the attic just taking up space. I get several different streaming services bundled with other things so it has become easier just to find stuff on those to watch, or wait until whatever new movie is released on them. Or go without watching said movie or show.

I do see a future probably not too far away that the physical media sales go the way of physical computer games and software though. And it's not going to be for good reasons.
 
I never bought into DVD or Blu-Ray because they seemed to be dead-end formats that would eventually be obsolete. Now that we have 4K, nearly equivalent to the source material, with little to be gained by going to 8K, I can finally buy something and not expect to replace it. Just in time for retailers to drop out of the market.

Hopefully it's only the end of physical retailers, not physical media itself. Pricing every new title at $30+ because 'physical media is dying', thus ensuring hardly anyone buys new titles, is not a good sign though.

I'm sure there is a market for digital media in a standard format (i.e. MKV). Most of the people I know that buy phyisical media do it to rip it to their digital collection, but it seems that the powers that be are only interested in selling digital copies in a proprietary format, if they'll sell you a download at all.
 
mullet said:
People will regret the day they cheered for the physical media's demise.
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PC gamers have yet to regret going to steam and destroying that industry.

Spaghetti said:
but it seems that the powers that be are only interested in selling digital copies in a proprietary format, if they'll sell you a download at all.
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Straight digital sales were biggest margin ever in that industry (90%), they absolutely loved them, that a case of the customer forcing their hands like the music industry.

I am not sure how many movies are not available to buy on Microsoft and other digital store, studio did try to sell on youtube episodes like iTunes song for a while, they made Fandago at home, many platform had to close by lack of popularity (Google play movie,e tc....).
 
mullet said:
That's true you do speak for the entire PC gaming community.
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We are obviously talk about the vast majority, I am sure someone regretting not buying their game at Bestbuy 10 years ago do exist, some part in a statement are strongly implied.

There was a wide window were pc gamers could have simply went back to buy the big games at bestbuys-walmart-amazon, etc... and they did not, showing with their action they preferred digital store (specially once dvd became serial number for a download anyway, literally or by how much patch needed to be downloaded).

There a big difference between popular broadband Internet existing or not, but once it is general and vastly used the mixed existence of physical game vs steam become thin, how many game virtually need to be updated anyway from what the binary looked like 4-6 weeks before release when the physical medias would have been made....
 
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That's OK. My library will still be stocked with the latest titles on optical media. Well as many titles not widely available in streaming sites, if at all.
 
Yeah it's a combination of the mainstream adopting streaming and also shopping in person isn't really necessary anymore.

I order all my physical media (4k bluray) from online vendors why waste time and gas going to the store
 
LukeTbk said:
PC gamers have yet to regret going to steam and destroying that industry.
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False equivalency. Movies don't need regular software updates to keep playing and to fix new compatibility issues. And while a game may leave the Steam Store, it doesn't leave My Library if I own it. The same cannot be said for digitally purchased movies and music.
 
philb2 said:
Why???
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Because once you buy it, it's yours and cant be changed or modified. Better visuals, sound, extras, no data usage. Not to mention, I cut the cord over 12 years ago and I was paying 130.00 a month. I took that money and bought a blu-ray library over the years that is now 650+ blu-rays.

130.00 x 12 years = $18,720
650 (blu-rays) x $15.00 (average price of sales and full retail) = $9,750

I would say a pretty good savings and I still have 9k more to spend.
 
Dreamerbydesign said:
Yes, because streaming services don’t exist.
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Streaming services don't have everything and streaming services also only have movies and TV shows temporarily and either get passed around from streaming service to streaming service (The Office comes to mind) or get removed from all streaming platforms entirely. If physical copies aren't available for purchase and the movies or shows aren't on streaming services, then pirating would literally be the only option.
 
Shoganai said:
Streaming services don't have everything and streaming services also only have movies and TV shows temporarily and either get passed around from streaming service to streaming service (The Office comes to mind) or get removed from all streaming platforms entirely. If physical copies aren't available for purchase and the movies or shows aren't on streaming services, then pirating would literally be the only option.
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And with that I entirely agree. There are times that is the only option if you can’t find the media elsewhere
 
mullet said:
130.00 x 12 years = $18,720
650 (blu-rays) x $15.00 (average price of sales and full retail) = $9,750
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Similar boat here. Stopped paying for cable TV about 11 years ago.

$92 a month for basic x 11 years = $12,144. Still pay for same internet access with one streaming service - Paramount plus. Only because I'm a Trek junkie. Used to have Netflix for same reason but switched when the franchise did.

One aspect I really like about optical media over most streaming is the included extras. Some series like Breaking Bad (which I watched entirely from the Library not cable) have a plethora of them. Often hours. Which to me adds a lot to appreciating the art and effort going into their creation.
 
Centauri said:
False equivalency. Movies don't need regular software updates to keep playing and to fix new compatibility issues. And while a game may leave the Steam Store, it doesn't leave My Library if I own it. The same cannot be said for digitally purchased movies and music.
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Fair enough, I should have read it as a non general statement about physical and to be just about movies considering the title of the thread, but I really did read to me as being a generic statement about physical media.

Movies don't have too, but can, think about VHS to 4k UHD remaster how some movie got updated.
 
TrevorR said:
I have a huge Blu-ray and DVD library but in the past few years I've been adding to my digital collection. So much more convenient IMO. I regularly look for $5 deals for my favorite movies on slickdeals and I'm almost to the point where most of what I physically own is digitally owned.
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Are you actually downloading the media to your own personal storages?
 
LukeTbk said:
PC gamers have yet to regret going to steam and destroying that industry.
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It's not apples to apples. With migration from physical games to online-bought games the actual content hasn't changed/degraded, it's still lossless (that is, from the disc to online only the content hasn't has changed).

Music was able to similarly make the transition while maintaining lossless content, where available from lossless stores (some artists aren't available losslessly from any store though). That said the threshold for 'transparent' sounding music (per public listening ABX tests) is actually much lower than audiophiles will admit, so high enough quality lossy is usually sufficient (I still prefer to buy lossless out of principle and for transcoding purposes though).

With films/TV series it's a very different scenario. Physical has always had the best quality encodes, assuming latest generation media. The medium of physical is practically irrelevant, if just to carry large filesizes, however what people are sacrificing—importantly long-term—is the availability at all of highest quality encodes if streaming-level quality encodes push everything else out of the market. Also unlike having to do double blind comparisons for audio to detect any differences in a less subjective manner with video the encodes are objectively trivial to compare.

Those who boast they pirate Ultra HD Blu-Rays are frustrating as they're just contributing to the loss of the market and thus loss of studios willing to release the higher quality encodes, given unlike games or music the market hasn't normalized distribution of physical-equivalent quality encodes. Streaming-tier encodes (which for 4K releases have been benchmarked to be literally only 1080p Blu-Ray level bitrates at best, far under UHD BD bitrates) will be the future if this continues.
 
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Okatis said:
With films/TV series it's a very different scenario. Physical has always had the best quality encodes, assuming latest generation media. The medium of physical is practically irrelevant, if just to carry large filesizes, however what people are sacrificing—importantly long-term—is the availability at all of highest quality encodes if streaming-level quality encodes push everything else out of the market. Also unlike having to do double blind comparisons for audio to detect any differences in a less subjective manner with video the encodes are objectively trivial to compare.
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With how fast it goes it can be hard to keep up in that regard, streaming has the latest AV1, bluray is .264, UHD bluray is x265 I think.

Okatis said:
Also unlike having to do double blind comparisons for audio to detect any differences in a less subjective manner with video the encodes are objectively trivial to compare.
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Dolby disney versus UHD bluray will often have each their advantage over the other, streaming can always give you the best HDR your system can play:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbN00Sm0Bsg

Has for the size of the stream vs the bluray many people have an internet more than fast enough to stream more data than what you read on a UDH bluray (144 Mbit/s maximum), it is not inherent for any difference to exist here and it is easy to imagine with AI compression-decompression for the latest Av2 or vvc to beat the x265 bluray at much lower bitrate and enough people with 80mbits or more internet to be worth it:

1*9X8ujjt7aALlAHBUanNTFw.png
 
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Okatis said:
It's not apples to apples. With migration from physical games to online-bought games the actual content hasn't changed/degraded, it's still lossless (that is, from the disc to online only the content hasn't has changed).

Music was able to similarly make the transition while maintaining lossless content, where available from lossless stores (some artists aren't available losslessly from any store though). That said the threshold for 'transparent' sounding music (per public listening ABX tests) is actually much lower than audiophiles will admit, so high enough quality lossy is usually sufficient (I still prefer to buy lossless out of principle and for transcoding purposes though).

With films/TV series it's a very scenario. Physical has always had the best quality encodes. The medium of physical is practically irrelevant, if just to carry large filesizes, however what people are sacrificing—importantly long-term—is the availability at all of highest quality encodes if streaming-level quality encodes push everything else out of the market.

Those who boast they pirate Ultra HD Blu-Rays are frustrating as they're just contributing to the loss of the market and thus loss of studios willing to release the higher quality encodes, given unlike games or music the market hasn't normalized distribution of physical-equivalent quality encodes. Streaming-tier encodes (which have been benchmarked to be literally only 1080p Blu-Ray level bitrates at best) will be the future if this continues.
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I’m not sure what the quality is on the PlayStation’s Sony Pictures Core, but Bravia Core on TVs was at least pushing out up to 80Mbps on 4k titles.
 
LukeTbk said:
With how fast it goes it can be hard to keep up in that regard, streaming has the latest AV1, bluray is .264, UHD bluray is x265 I think.
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AV1 wasn't feasible at a comparable quality playback on consumer devices for the longest time during UHD's presence. Only until hardware acceleration was baked in to chips did it become a feasible alternative (not unlike HEVC but it was ready well before). A key motivation behind AV1 (and its predecessors) was to hedge against licensing fees (primarily led by Google) and it had the result of the HEVC licensors eventually waiving all non-physical license fees.

LukeTbk said:
Dolby disney versus UHD bluray will often have each their advantage over the other, streaming can always give you the best HDR your system can play
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Dolby Vision is similarly available on various UHD physical releases as an alternative to the standard HDR10. However Disney have famously cut back on their physical releases with their emphasis on streaming so if some lacked DV it wouldn't suprise me. Would I take a disc-quality encode over DV though? Yes.


LukeTbk said:
Has for the size of the stream vs the bluray many people have an internet more than fast enough to stream more data than what you read on a UDH bluray (144 Mbit/s maximum), it is not inherent for any difference to exist here
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What matters though isn't a theoretical limitation but the reality: the peak bitrates measured on streaming platforms when I looked into multi-service comparisons a few years ago were:

<Average>/<Peak>
- Disney+: 17/29Mbps
- Netflix: Average: 17/25Mps
- iTunes: 25/31Mbps
- Amazon Prime: 10/13Mbps

None of these qualify as even low end Ultra HD bitrates on physical releases and HEVC (h.265) is still the primary UHD codec so these bitrates actually are directly comparable. So while various consumers have had gigabit connections for many years (even now multi-gig) companies have shown they still will max out at well below physical encode quality.

However what's missing from a bandwidth-only discussion is the fact that the devices actually doing the streaming necessitate modern GPUs/hardware acceleration to support consistent performance and any tonemapping required for higher bitrates.

One reason why low bitrate reigns in that space is many devices streaming the video can't handle high bitrate 4K HDR (particularly if tonemapping is needed in the mix). There's a reason that for example a GTX 1080 Ti is a suggested minimum for PC playback by the developer of MadVR (which enables HDR passthrough and tonemapping on PC and who now sell their own standalone units for enthusiasts).

High quality 4K HDR encodes can stutter/hitch without a decent GPU, something that phones, tablets and smart TVs per se lack, which make up the bulk of streaming audience hardware. Since streaming bitrates remain low and manageable such devices can handle them. Some films even on disc are denoised (DNR'd) enough that playback is suitable for even underpowered devices due to low perf requirements.
 
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TheGardenTool said:
I’m not sure what the quality is on the PlayStation’s Sony Pictures Core, but Bravia Core on TVs was at least pushing out up to 80Mbps on 4k titles.
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This is highly unusual and honestly great to hear. The only digital-only service I'm aware of that had literally disc quality encodes was Kaleidescape but it required DRM hardware in the tens of thousands so it's extremely niche and occupies a unique place in the market.
 
mullet said:
People will regret the day they cheered for the physical media's demise.
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Just like when music went entirely digital like 15-20 years ago, CDs are practically dead. Everyone is regretting supporting that decision since music giants have been revoking access left and right.

Oh wait....
 
TrevorR said:
Just like when music went entirely digital like 15-20 years ago, CDs are practically dead. Everyone is regretting supporting that decision since music giants have been revoking access left and right.

Oh wait....
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Music has a backstop of mechanical licensing for certain uses (radio style play, covers) which means, worst case you listen to a radio style stream customized to be related songs to what you want to hear or even worse but possible, you listen to covers of your favorite songs by the streaming servicd house band. There's no provision for anything like that in movies and tv; it takes a long time for things to make it into the public domain and I don't know if streaming only niche content that the distributor stops distributing is going to make it into the public domain anyway.
 
If they aren't selling, they aren't selling. It's not like retailers want to maintain a product that they have to organize for the 2-3 people that still buy disks. Especially when they can fill that space with something that will sell. My local grocery stores have killed off their Red Box because the machines were constantly requiring maintenance and almost nobody was using them.
 
Domingo said:
If they aren't selling, they aren't selling. It's not like retailers want to maintain a product that they have to organize for the 2-3 people that still buy disks. Especially when they can fill that space with something that will sell. My local grocery stores have killed off their Red Box because the machines were constantly requiring maintenance and almost nobody was using them.
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People like to jump on the "control" bandwagon when things change. Target and best buy don't care what you stream or not. They only care if that square area of the store is making enough money to keep a product there. They kick products off shelves all the time for not moving enough. Sometimes it's an entire category of a product.

Even when i do buy blurays, they tend to come from amazon sales. Last time I was in a target was because starbucks drive thru was wrapped out into the street blocking traffic, no one inside target starbucks though haha.
 
Darunion said:
People like to jump on the "control" bandwagon when things change. Target and best buy don't care what you stream or not. They only care if that square area of the store is making enough money to keep a product there. They kick products off shelves all the time for not moving enough. Sometimes it's an entire category of a product.

Even when i do buy blurays, they tend to come from amazon sales. Last time I was in a target was because starbucks drive thru was wrapped out into the street blocking traffic, no one inside target starbucks though haha.
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My BB made great use of the area. It is just sectioned off storing random stuff. Since they took it out the store looks empty.
 
It's weird cause I'm sad about this and think it's a shame but then I remember I haven't bought or watched a DVD in over 10 years.

I've got a pretty sizeable library so if the apocalypse ever dies come I'll be able to watch several older movies.
 
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