Porn industry may be decider in Blu-ray, HD-DVD battle

The co-founder of Los Angeles-based Digital Playground, who goes by the one-word name 'Joone,' said the fact that Sony chose Blu-ray guarantees his studio an instant home audience.

'PlayStation 3 is going to be the Trojan horse that will get a lot of numbers into the home theater systems -- the living rooms,' said Joone, who is also a movie director. 'Technology-wise we've chosen Blu-ray, which doesn't mean we won't support both formats ... but as far as having really cool technology and a lot of storage for future proof, Blu-ray is a good format.'

Blu-ray Disc and HD-DVD are the new optical-disc formats that are positioned as replacements for DVDs with high-definition content.

Blu-ray is not only backed by entertainment giant Sony, but Panasonic, LG Electronics, Philips Electronics and movie studios Disney and Fox. Blu-ray offers storage up to 50GB capacity, or up to nine hours of high-definition content. In contrast, HD-DVD has 30GB capacity and is supported by companies like Toshiba, NEC and Warner Home Video.

Paul O'Donovan, an analyst with Gartner Inc., said pornography's support of either DVD format will be a 'strong factor' to the uptake of the technology by the general marketplace, but even more critical is Sony's adoption of the technology.