Is there a link to the article? I’m surprised by Sony wanting to stay at Profile 1.0. The PlayStation 3 is already at 1.1 and with the first Profile 2.0 titles arriving in a few days it’ll be Profile 2.0 compatible very soon. Sony Pictures have been talking up the fact that they want network features to be present in their titles released next year. As per:

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=733

And Disney’s network features are coming in April or so. Given this pressure, my bet is most standalones released next year are going to be Profile 2.0. Profile 1.1 titles are apparently working fine in Profile 1.0 players. I imagine the same will be true of Profile 2.0 titles:

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=765

I think when people say they don’t care about PiP or network features they really mean they don’t care about them *yet*. PiP and network features are like everything else: they only become worthwhile when someone puts them to a worthwhile use.

For Picture in Picture I’d say the most compelling use to date has been in Warner’s HD DVD release of 300. While the movie was playing it also showed the movie as it was filmed in green screen. It shows you something of the movie making progress. I’d be interested in seeing this kind of thing side by side with the feature for stuntwork or motion capture or effects work, particularly if I can easily toggle between a large view and a small view of each.

For network features I don’t think anyone has yet builtin a feature that’s at all interesting. Downloading trailers? Pretty pointless. You can do that better on your PC or over PlayStation Network for high definition trailers. Trivia track? Maybe, but why not just put it on the disc? Cast bios and filmography? Again it could be on the disc, but maybe useful if it changes over time to keep up to date with the actor’s latest films.

Warner’s Community Screening feature is probably the most interesting one so far. You can cue up a time to watch the movie together with your friends. The pause, fast forward, rewind, etc actions get distributed to everyone from one player designated as the controller. It overlays text chat over the movie so you can comment on bits you like and everyone sees that.

The drawbacks are 1. You have to go through the hassle of getting everyone ready to go at the same time 2. The biggest drawback is you have to use a separate computer or laptop to enter the text messages that will appear on everyone’s movie player. Seems silly. It’d be much better if you could use a keyboard to type directly to the player . No HD DVD player today supports keyboards (maybe software player do, don’t know). The PS3 supports keyboards for navigation around the disc. My hope is that for network features like Saw IV’s MoLog you’ll be able to use the keyboard for the blog entry.

It’s true that PiP and network features are mostly fluff today. But the possibility is there for them to be great. Title authors have the opportunity to get more creative. I think with BD-J Profile 2.0 on blu-ray being a more powerful authoring environment than HDi on HD DVD, if a studio puts the effort in they could come up with interesting network features for blu-ray.

Random ideas for network features off the top of my head:

1. Weather module. You nominate your location and it gets the current weather. It uses this information to change the display of the title menu, etc. If it’s raining, maybe in the background it’s also raining. Maybe in an interactive, choose-your-own adventure type title this information is used as you play.

2. Online leaderboards for blu-ray disc games. It uploads your high score and you can see everyone else’s.

3. Weekly easter egg finds. Every week a series of ‘easter eggs’ or ‘treasures’ or whatever are hidden throughout the movie. As you playback the movie these treasures will pop up on the display in some semi-surreptitious manner. They could be camouflagued to blend quite closely (but not too closely!) with the movie. You have to notice them and collect them.

4. For DVD games like Scene It they can evolve the content. Maybe use the same scenes but ask different questions.

5. Stronger online chat elements. It’d have to allow text entry directly via keyboard. Maybe it connects you to a server and you can join anyone else in the world who just so happens to be playing back the movie at the same time, i.e. no need to fiddle around getting everyone in sync.

This all depends on the studios being bother to implement them. And again, some of the above could just be on the disc. The people who don’t like them will never use them. But that’s fine, they don’t have to. It’s just another option.

By the way, the comment submission system is a bit flakey. It always seems to take two or three tries to actually get the comment submitted.

Or an even better network feature: a studio partners with the Internet Movie Database (http://www.imdb.com) and provides IMDB integration as a standard feature on all their discs. That’d be pretty cool. I use IMDB quite often to look up details on movies and actors.

Well, I declare the format war over. Warner has just announced they’re going blu-ray exclusive:

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Warner/Breaking:_Warner_Goes_Blu-ray_Exclusive/1325

Overall I think this is good for high definition. It gives people clarity about which format to buy into. I know a few people who have avoided getting into high definition because of concerns about which format would prevail. Now they have the easier decision of blu-ray player to get rather than which format to support.