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Posted by bobukcat on 04/06/06 01:16
"Richard" <rfeirste@nycap.rr.com> wrote in message
news:1237jina8eg7pc8@corp.supernews.com...
>
> I have informally talked to people as well. They note Sony lost betamax
> because it did not license it out.
>
> Sony licensed Beta to Zenith. VHS was licensed to RCA. At the time Sony
> priced its units very high and Zenith was starting its decline as a force
in
> the retail market. RCA was a much stronger distributor offering dealer
> incentives, etc. Sony did a poor job promoting Beta's advantages, smaller
> case size designed to fit on a book shelf, standard 720 tapes holding more
> than 120 tapes at Beta II speed, superior mechanical design and superior
> video quality.
>
> Poor marketing and higher prices when thrown against a far more aggressive
> marketing force that understood our market is what did Beta in. This may
not
> be the case with blu-ray.
>
> Richard.
>
I personally believe that Sony lost the video cassette war because of the
longer available recording time that VHS provided with a long tape and the
slowest speed (8 hours versus 6 for Beta if IIRC). People didn't seem to
compare and notice that it looked like CRAP compared to Beta at ANY speed!
Part of me wants at least one of the HD optical disk formats to win (if I
were a betting man I'd go with Blu-Ray because of PS3) so that prices will
drop and titles will become readily available for rent and purchase. I must
admit that I would not be surprised though if both formats croaked kind of
like DVD-audio or SCD, people are not yet ready to pitch their DVD
collections like they were VHS tapes because too many people still don't
have the HD TV to take advantage of it.
bobukcat
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