A darker shade of Blu-Ray

Posted by T3 Online on Fri 10 Aug 2007

Hi-def porn wars hot up. Please be upstanding.

Porn. The very stiff, sorry, stuff of life. It's always been the most searched-for thing online (and that goes double for the T3 office, but only for research purposes, obviously), and it's going to sort the priapic men from the limp boys when it comes to the battle for blue-laser DVD supremacy.

Back in spring 2006 industry commentators were gearing up for a Betamax vs VHS-style cage match between Blu-ray and HD-DVD, and observing that the huge throbbing market in pure rude sex filth visuals was bound to be a deciding factor. Soon after the launch of Blu-ray Sony appeared to get tough by blocking the porn industry from distributing their smut on the unimpeachably moral new format, although it was actually a boring old manufacturing issue. Still, it was a touchy subject - no company wants to be known as a peddler of primo naked lady viewing muck, unless that company is owned by Richard Desmond.

Now it looks like Sony are sorting it out - in Japan for now, but that's a start. The big boys are apparently offering sexy favours (OK, extensive technical support, but it's more or less the same thing) to the adult entertainment industry there. Replication of discs on such a huge scale is a problem, but there's been a reacharound, sorry, workaround allowing Taiwanese replicators to press up the good stuff on Blu-ray and send it back to Japan.

There's still a long way to go, and the US is going to take some er, penetrating, but Sony seem mustard keen to facilitate the viewing pleasure of the world's hairy-palmed population. As for what HD are going to do about this, well, it could get messy.