How long before we see the death of DVD
With super fast broadband to the home, and even faster on the way many are proclaiming us to be on the verge of DVD doom, where movies are streamed over the net rather than owned and music Cd’s are to be a thing of the past.
I, however, call bullcrap. The problem is, Movies and Music are still very firmly in the hands of the consumer - and that is exactly where they are likely to stay for at least another couple of generations, in the consumers hands. To do that, they need to be presented with a physical item and I’m afraid that the internet doesn’t fill that. People are again failing to realise that simply because the technology is there and is better does not mean that it will be used.
There is one small exception to this, which I can see coming. Software, all types of software. Steam and its various competitors have been around for a long time, and have shown how slightly technical people (gamers) will quite quickly adopt a new delivery model. But what would happen if that delivery model was made even simpler.
What if, you installed a shell of an operating system and all programs, features, updates and service packs were installed on demand as they’re needed? The technology is already there, I use it in the company I work for. It’s transparent to the user too, they click on a program and don’t realise it’s streaming to their desktop, some must be installed locally yes, but all get updates streamed to them without them realising. What if we were to blow this feature out to the cloud for home computing. Suddenly your Windows license doesn’t look too bad value, you get constant updates to all the programs you use, critical updates to the ones you don’t and your machine will be pretty bulletproof (as most virus and security flaws exploited in the wild have had patches available for ages).
So how long before the death of DVD, for software I’d say it’s already on its last legs for home computing, I give it until the end of the next Windows cycle before everyone downloads what they need - th only downside is that you’ll actually need to buy coasters now.
