Audio Video News

Last week, <A HREF="http://www.cthv.com/">Columbia TriStar Home Video</A> (CTHV) and <A HREF="http://www.universalstudios.com">Universal Studios Home Video</A> (USHV) jointly announced an agreement to distribute USHV DVDs outside North America. According to the companies, the agreement represents a milestone in the international expansion of DVD. CTHV, the first major Hollywood studio to release films on DVD outside the US (i.e., in Europe, Latin America, and Japan), is now joined by USHV as one of the few major studios releasing its movies on a consistent basis internationally.

Universal is boldly going where no studio has gone with its HD DVD web interactivity. In addition to allowing users to access and download content and share favorite scenes with other HD DVD users on their "Best Buddies" lists, the U-Shop feature will expose users to movie-related online purchases.

Lately, the movie business has been nothing but trouble for <A HREF="http://www.seagram.com/">Seagram, Ltd.</A> The Montreal-based liquor and entertainment conglomerate reported losses totaling $199 million on a net income of $461 million for its third fiscal quarter, ending March 31.

<A HREF="http://www.universalstudios.com">Universal Pictures</A> is among the first Hollywood studios to announce its support for HD DVD, the high-definition optical disc format backed by a coalition of technology companies led by Toshiba. The studio made its announcement in a press release dated November 29.

Reports have circulated the web that engineers from Warner have filed for a patent application for a triple format disc that would have DVD on one side of the disc and both Blu-ray and HD DVD layers on the other side. Whatever player you put it into, it just plays. Goodbye, triple inventory releases!