[Tig] Is packaged media close to end of life?

[Bob Friesenhahn]

The article at http://tinyurl.com/29m8ga claims that all forms of 
packaged media will be comming to an end soon, to be replaced by 
Internet distribution of music and movies.  The claim is that unless 
HD-DVD or Blu-Ray gets its act together soon, the future of packaged 
media will be over.  Everyone will be using video on demand, or 
scheduled video on demand.  The article also claim that DVDs look as 
good as HD to most people.

While I have no doubt that eventually the Internet can be used for 
mass distribution of movies, it seems to me that it is quite premature 
to claim that this will happen any time soon.  An HD movie takes 
20-30GB of space with "full" quality.  The idea that a hundred million 
people would be transferring 30+ GB per day in the US alone seems 
pretty mind-boggling and unfeasable any time soon.  Dedicated local 
mirroring facilities would be required and the edge networks would 
need quite a boost.

My DISH DVR now offers Internet-based video, but I notice that fully 
half the offerings are porn, at $12 per pop, and even regular movies 
cost about $3.  I have yet to try it.

Does anyone have a different opinion as to the future of packaged 
media?

Bob
======================================
Bob Friesenhahn
bfriesen at simple.dallas.tx.us, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,    http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/