With all due respect to your acknowledged prior experience in the
movie business, your reply isn't entirely correct.
Not only was Sony willing to license its Betamax technology as early
as 1974 (before the public had even heard of VHS), Akio Morita (Sony's
co-founder and CEO) was personally leading their efforts to license
Beta to none other than Matsushita/Panasonic and JVC. They weren't
aware of JVC's nascent rival VHS program at this point, nor of their
campaign to put together their own video format alliance of companies
beginning around the summer of 1975. When Sony realized what was
going on they tried to get MITI to persuade JVC to drop VHS and
license Betamax (with Sony paying for VHS's development costs in
compensation) but JVC refused. Sony was able to license Zenith in
early 1977, before JVC added RCA to the VHS camp. This might not seem
very significant now, but people with long memories will recall how
big Zenith and RCA were in the North American TV business 30 years
ago. So, your argument that Sony wouldn't license Beta at the
beginning is completely untrue.
I don't know what Sony or JVC charged to license their respective
formats, but my memory is that the prices at retail were roughly
similar. Just to check I looked out a copy of Video magazine (March
1987 to be exact) and the cheapest VHS I could find was a Magnavox
VR9512 for $269 vs. a Sanyo VHR500 for $279, hardly the "much higher"
cost you state. In fact Sanyo's Beta VCRs were consistently the
cheapest machines, or close to it, of either camp until the Korean VHS
models long after VHS had won out over Beta. Looking throughout the
rest of the magazine, I came across VHS and Betamax VCRs at all price
levels, topping out at $800 for the highest end models from Sony and
Panasonic.
Regarding copy protection, I think you are confusing Copyguard (a very
early system which messed with the video synch track strength) with
Macrovision. Macrovision puts five squares in the vertical interval
bar of the video image. Those five squares do two things. First they
come on at full brightness, tricking the recording VCR's automatic
video gain circuit into thinking that the picture is "too bright" and
to "turn it down", thus you end up with a VERY dark image. Then after
30 seconds or so of that, the Macrovision signal takes those 5 squares
and starts flashing them on/off/on/off/on/off for another 30 seconds
or so and then repeats. This tricks the AGC circuit into constantly
and quickly turning the video level up and down and up and down,
resulting in the alternating light/dark video. The theory here is that
ONE of these two evils will prevent a useable copy being made. With
VHS, the AGC circuit is before the recording and the playback is
without any form of video control. This is what Macrovision was based
around. This is why Betamax could never use Macrovision, for their AGC
circuits were placed AFTER the playback circuit. It was nothing to do
with Betamax being a higher quality format (which it was), but purely
because the designers happened to put the AGC circuit in a different
location than where the VHS designers chose.
I know you have deep, inside knowledge of the studios and their fears,
but history does not back up your claims. Personally, I don't
remember any difference in the price between VHS and Beta prerecorded
cassettes and sure enough a quick glance through my trusty March 1987
Video shows not a single VHS title costing any less or more than the
same Beta title. Typical examples for that month were "Big Trouble in
Little China" from CBS/Fox ($79.98 for Beta or VHS), "Flight of the
Navigator" from Disney ($79.95 for Beta or VHS) and "The Abbott and
Costello Show" Volumes 1-2 from Fox ($19.95 each for Beta or VHS). I
could go on and on as there were a lot of titles released that month
on VHS, Beta, 8mm (yes, 8mm) and LD, but in every case the title's
cost was exactly the same for both VHS and Beta.
Lastly, Betacam (what I believe you really meant to when you mentioned
"Beta" which is the same as Betamax) had no relation to Betamax other
than using the same sized tape width and cassette shell. Betacam's
true parent was U-Matic, with which it shared a great many more
similarities than it ever did to Betamax. At 30 minutes per cassette,
Betacam was used almost entirely in electronic new gathering and was
never intended to be used by consumers, nor ever marketed to them. It
had nothing to do with the studio's wishes - everybody knew that the
public would have absolutely no use for a 30-minute format no matter
how good the quality.
I could go on, but I suspect I've already lost almost everybody to
boredom by now, and besides this is a movie poster list, not a history
of home video technology list.
Colin (who never represented any studios during this period but has a
better memory and a big stack of Video magazines)
On Mar 2, 2008, at 11:34 AM, Craig Miller wrote:
It wasn't that Sony wouldn't license the technology. They wouldn't,
at
first, but then they made it expensive, so few others were willing
to pay
for the privilege of making the machines. It kept the cost of Betamax
format machines high; much higher than for VHS equipment.
Licensing of the technology was but one reason Betamax failed. In
some
ways a more important factor is that Betamax was a superior recording
format. That superiority was a problem for the studios. Worried
about
piracy, commercial video tape producers used "Copyguard" to prevent
tapes from being duplicated. This process, in essence, recorded a
very
bright light in the spaces between "frames" (there aren't actually
frames on
video tape the way we think of them on film but there were "effective
frames", to more or less match the original). VHS, being an
inferior format,
was completely flummoxed by this area of bright light. VHS machines
were unable to deal with it and it overbalanced the images that you
wanted
to see (the images from the movie). It made for an almost unwatchable
viewing experience. Betamax, on the other hand, was quite capable of
recording those bright lights and not interfering with the main
image. So
studios aggressively supported VHS and worked to get rid of Betamax as
a format. They more heavily produced VHS copies, gave preferential
pricing on VHS, etc.
It was the combination of expensive equipment (because Sony wouldn't
license out the technology) and the studios supporting the other
format that
doomed Betamax. (It should also be noted that Beta, the commercial
format used by TV crews continued to be used for many, many years. It
was a variant of Betamax and because it was superior -- it kept the
color
components separate, for example, for better balancing and mixing --
the
studios and networks wanted it. They just didn't want the public to
have it.)
Craig.
Who represented several studios during this period.
At 12:46 PM 3/1/2008, Patrick Michael Tupy wrote:
Exactly, Doug, and that's why they allow licensing of the format
unlike the proprietary ownership they held with the Betamax format.
No one made Betamax but Sony. VHS was inferior to Betamax but
available for any manufacturer to make.
Ipods from Apple are a glaring exception...for every rule, there is
an exception...or two.
Patrick
On Mar 1, 2008, at 12:24 PM, Doug Taylor wrote:
Profile
MoPo List [ mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Saul
H. Chapman, Ph.D
Sent: Saturday, March 01, 2008 2:06 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [MOPO] DVD RECORDERS -- BLUE RAY
http://my.earthlink.net/article/tec?guid=20080219/47ba6250_3ca6_15526200802191110856345
----- Original Message -----
Franc
[email protected]
Saturday, March 01, 2008 12:42 PM
Re: [MOPO] DVD RECORDERS -- BLUE RAY
i want to buy a DVD recorder. my first.
they are cheaper than 100.00 BUT the Blue Ray technology is closer
to 700.00
since i would be recording primarily the classics of the 40s and
50s off TMC channel etc...... is the extra blue technology worth
it????
of course, i really do want that HI DEF and GREAT SURROUND when i
record the habdful of current stuff.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Craig Miller Wolfmill Entertainment [EMAIL PROTECTED]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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