As an early adopter, I’ve always been surprised at how long it takes the rest of society to catch up. Whether it’s that even today, less then 20% of the US uses a PVR or that even five years ago, less then a third of the US had a DVD player, it’s always a bit discouraging to see technology catch up only after it’s been left behind. Nowhere has this been more evident then in the current HDTV format wars. Because the studios cannot agree upon which format to support, they’ve put consumers at risk of owning an obsolete box or in delaying adoption of the technology. One solution proposed by LG Electronics and by Samsung was to create a box that could play Bluray and HD-DVD. I find this solution laughable and I think it’s a terrible idea to make early adopters pay for similar technology twice, just because the studios can’t agree to support both formats (or even a single format for that matter).
While I’m sad to see LG Electronics move away from support of HD-DVD, I am pleased that they are now backing away from the hybrid solution proposed to end the format wars. Backing away from the device could be a political move or could be a smart business strategy to not create an expensive soon to be obsolete piece of equipment, but frankly I’d rather see LG not produce anything then to come out with a Frankenstein HDTV box. I might continue to be disappointed at the slow pace of the HDTV format wars, but I’m glad that LG thought better then to create such a monstrousity.