Adrien:
I agree with you; I don't have time to watch the extras and many of these discs have 5 hours of extras to the two-hour movie!
An argument that I've never actually read or heard anyone say is this:
What if these formats end up like SACD or DVD-Audio? At least for the first few years? I mean, the type of people that frequent these forums are excited about the technology, but how many of the "masses" are excited or even understand the discs?
What percentages of "the masses" have an HD-capable set? If they have several TVs in the home, do they have more than one that's HD capable? If they buy either flavor of an HD disc, are they going to be able to play it in the bedroom or in the kids' playroom or on their portable 7" LCD player?
If they currently own a selection of DVDs, are they going to replace them with an HD disc unless it's really one of their all-time favorite movies? Will the discs play in their current computers or even in the next one they pick up at Staples?
Even if they HAVE an HD television, and they HAVE put out a decent amount of coin on a new HD-player, will they always buy the HD disc over the SD disc if it only plays on that one player and that one TV?
Believe it or not, I'm really not negative on the format. I've been stalling in bringing my video production business up to HD because there is currently no medium to deliver those productions. A recordable HD disc will enable me to move to higher-quality acquisition and editing…it's not feasible at the moment when I have no real way of delivering the end product.
But, playing devil's advocate here…. Look what happened to SACD and DVD-Audio. These two competing formats offered higher quality and the benefits of 5.1 remastering. Yet, they tanked. The average guy who is picking up the latest Brooks & Dunn release wants to play it in his pickup and his boombox. We, as audiophiles, loved the format…but it didn't take off with "the masses". And because it didn't take off immediately, marketing money wasn't put behind it, slowing growth even more and causing an ever-increasing downward spiral in the formats.
I'm not saying the new HD discs will fail; certainly there's lots of money that will be thrown into the marketing and of course, no one will be buying SD in ten years. But I think those of us that are "into" this whole hobby forget that Joe and Betty Schmoe aren't drooling over these coming discs, and likely don't understand them or are even completely unfamiliar with them.
Yes, whoever wins the format will have the format of choice down the road. But I really don't think it'll happen as quick as us audiophiles and videophiles expect it to happen.
