Please allow me to add to the above:

Most budget-conscientious consumers have a magic price barrier at around $300. They will never be attaching an external mic. They well never control audio through headphones. They will never be attaching filters. They don't care about manual features because they know nothing about how camcorder optics works and they don't want to learn. It is very unlikely they will be using a tripod (ever noticed that many cheap camcorders do not have a hole for the locking pin)? They are more likely to use LCD than a viewfinder. They are likely to use autofocus all the time.

So what would a camera manufacturer prefer: to sell a feature-packed camcorder for $300 or to sell a simple point-and-shooter for the same $300? Their ultimate goal is making money, not promoting technical progress. They still make good (and expensive) camcorders for pros who demand certain features and would not settle for less. But ordinary consumers, geez, they are glad that they see moving pictures. I think the only improvement that can be done to a point-and-shooter is bigger lens and chip, because consumer cameras are purchased to shoot indoors without proper lightning.

When consumer camcorders were priced at about $2000 not many could afford one. These people usually knew what they wanted. They were amateurs in the best sense of the word, they liked the technology and the new possibilities. Modern camcorder consumers do not want to educate themselves, they just want to press a button.

The HD is still considered upscale, so HD cameras are being purchased by more demanding, more educated customers. The price is sort of high, but at ~$1000 for HV20 it is not THAT high. But I am afraid that in a year or two we will see an HD-capable camera in the ZR body. The price for HD cameras will drop below $500, and an aspiring amateur would have to shop for a $3000 camera again to get something decent.

I was pretty ignorant half a year ago, I got a camcorder to make family videos, and it wasn't my idea But somehow I got into it, I am trying to learn now. I really like my Elura 100, lots of features for the price and it is so compact. A real technical feat.

But some things are very hard or impossible with a cheap camera. Built-in mic is useless indoors (too much noise) so I am using an external mic anyway. Shallow DOF works only for extreme closeups and a tiny sensor requires a lot of light, so indoor shooting is limited. I bought a 1200W work light and attached a sort of self-made softbox to it, but my wife is not keen about bringing this contraption into the living room. Bulky and lots of heat. So why not getting a camera that already has the needed features? It may even be less expensive in the long run when you count all accessories you've got for a cheap camera.

---
Michael, Canon Elura User Pages

Personally I suspect more nefarious reasons that feature laden consumer cameras have gone the way of the do do bird. It just seems too much to be a coincidence that all the major camera makers started dropping features like mad at the same exact time. Within 2 years there wasn't a single camera being made that included the features that pretty much all camera makers had on upscale consumer models earlier. No more focus rings, no more mic input jacks, no more headphone jacks, and only mininal use of mini-dv technology - all of these things happened at the same time with Panasonic, Canon, Sony and AFAIK all other camera lines.

We saw a big push for hard drive based, flash drive based and mini-DVD based cameras all at once too. It's like the camera makers just decided to kill off the upscale consumer market.

I don't think it was coincidence that these things happened at the same time Vista was being pushed by MS. And if you don't know already Vista includes some serious limitations on the quality of media it can work with. MS described it as a push to kill off the piracy market. The music industry feels like they lost the vast majority of their market because of the readily available MP3 technology. Since most of the music industry is closely aligned with the movie and tv industry I think MS was pressured into cutting back on the ability of consumer equipment to copy movies. One of the biggest ways movies are pirated is that someone sets up a quality camera in a theater and essentially tapes the entire movie and then posts it online. I think MS faced a pitched battle with the content industry over this. MS has lost lawsuits before and they knew this one could hurt them bad. So they caved in.

MS also has asked the computer industry hardware makers to limit the quality their devices will support. And MS calls the shots for the computer industry. I think one of the main hardware devices to face big pressure from MS was the camera industry. So the great cameras for under $700 just all went away instantly almost.

I know MS has made a big deal of fighting piracy and I know the content industry is totally ticked because of the ease of copying their material and distributing it worldwide. I know congress has been looking for a way to curb piracy too. So IMO they all decided to fight it by limiting quality. There have been a lot of news reports that point this direction especially the ones about the limitations of Vista.

Then there's the issue of independent producers using consumer grade equipment to produce video nearly equal to the best Hollywood can produce. I think Hollywood is scared of that too and they have always fought tooth and nail to protect their hold on the market. I've seen lots of Hollywood types complain about consumers having too much power to create quality content. They think a person should have to invest millions to create top quality products. I have a friend who has worked for a tv station for 15 years as a cameraman and he told me that consumer equipment made it impossible for him to compete for event videos (which he did on the side). He just had to charge too much because he had too much invested in his equipment. Hollywood doesn't want us producing independent films that can threaten their hold on production. I think the Blair Witch Project was a real wake up call for them on this issue.

I hope I'm wrong about this and the push for HD is the real reason the Opturas and the 3CCD Panasonics and others have been picked clean of their features. maybe we'll see HD cameras that have the same features we don't see now in the near future. Maybe people will stay away from Vista so they can edit HD video. Maybe consumer pressure will force hardware makers to keep giving us better stuff. But even the HD stuff has lacked features so far.

Let's face it. The one thing about technology is that it improves at a huge rate if consumers want it. How long will it be before we can create video just as well as Hollywood can if nothing interferes with the market? I think Hollywood knows this and they are throwing their weight around and MS has backed down. And what MS wants in the computer industry they generally get. I guess we'll see how things shake out in the near future. But I think we are not going to be seeing the things we want to see any time soon.

Copy-protection, piracy fighting -- these are sort of orthogonal things to removal of features from consumer camcorders. One can install and use WinXP without registering it, I believe that same works with Vista. Copying DVDs is much simpler than copying tapes, so this works even better for a pirate. Watching a screen copy is passe even in countries where software/video piracy is not frowned upon nor really procecuted. Come on, a dignified person would rather wait for a proper DVD release and then would buy a nice shiny pirated DVD copy.

While we are bashing Vista, do you know that HDMI requires HDCP for full HD? And that some HDTV makers claim that they can verify the validity of an input signal, and if it is not legit they can simply shut down the TV? Even MS does not do this for Vista-based machines.

In regards to DV, it is a standard. So despite removal of camcorder features the video itself stays the same. Unless, of course, the camera circuitry deliberately screw up encoding.

Simplifying consumer cams was inevitable. Same happens with still cameras, but if you want you can get say Nikon D80 for about $700 and a VR zoom lens for about $800. Will a normal consumer pay $800 for a piece of glass? Focus ring does not make sense with fast autofocus and without mechanical linkage, so it was rightfully removed. A feature in a new Sony camera allows to define two settings and gracefully move from one to another, say to execute an automatic rack focus between two points. This is what I wanted since I bought my camera, this is what I expect to trickle down to consumer cams.

External mics are not used by those who shoot their kids' first steps. Headphones? Are you kidding?

No actual aperture/shutter info? Again a step in the right direction. A tiny camera has such a small imager that you really cannot play with nuances of DOF, so either you want shallow DOF or you want all in focus, nothing in between, because the shallowest DOF will only barely look dreamy. So who cares about aperture-shmaperture? If my camera had a Movie mode (1/60 shutter, as wide iris as possible) and Documentary mode (1/60 shutter, as sharp picture as possible) I would never have cared for reading aperture info. Hey Canon et all, this is an idea I am giving you, take it. To enable the Movie mode you will obviosly need to install automatic ND filters to keep iris wide open.

Seeing DV rebels as a thread to Hollywood is dowright hilarious. I am all for indies, I got a DV Rebel handbook, interesting read, but come on. I haven't watched one indie film and I don't think I ever will. At least, I will never watch it only because it is indie. I haven't watched Blair Witch Project and I don't want to. The equipment does not really matter. An indie cannot afford good lighting, good effects (well, screw effects), good actors, good screenplay, good dialogs, funky camera movement and so forth. Indie stuff is sort of jackass movies done by adults and with better attention to the process. Maybe the only thing where an indie can rival Hollywood is takling issues that Hollywood is afraid to tackle. But watching Syriana or Blood Diamond tells me that Hollywood is not full of conformists.

If Hollywood or TV are afraid of something, it is online video services like YouTube. I don't care for amateur or kiddie junk, I don't talk about copies of copyrighted work either. But there are some authors that try to make a difference, like TheRealNews, for example. These guys are a threat. I watched an interview with Gore Vidal split into mini series, he is a pleasant and intelligent person to listen to. They even showed their set and it is very simple: two chairs, two lights and two simple backdrops, no stupid green screen. Inexpensive but interesting because of the people and of the information. But the funny thing is that this sort of setup can be done with a cheapest $250-ish ZR camera. Well, one might add couple more lamps to light up a tiny 1/6 sensor. For this kind of show it is the material that matters, not the equipment.

---
Michael, Canon Elura User Pages

If you want to play this way I can too. I'll tell you what is hilarious. Thinking that getting rid of a whole class of cameras that obviously were profitable just because they sell more of a cheaper brand is hilarious. That's like saying Mercedes is going to shut down and start building VW's instead because they sell more of them. There is plenty of room for both and obviously no company was limited by having a single line of cameras before. So when they all abandon a market segment at the same time it's just a coincidence. Now that's hilarious.

I also find it hilarious that someone thinks getting rid of focus rings is a good idea because of fast adjusting auto-focus. Fast adjusting auto-focus is precisely the reason I want a focus ring. If you're interviewing a person and they shift their head to the side and your camera instantly focuses on the background which may be a quarter of a mile away is downright hilarious for sure. If you don't understand why people want manual control over focus I find that hilarious too.

It makes absolutely no sense to completely abandon a thriving market just because you think more people want a cheaper camera. That's beyond hilarious. Why not build both types because you would certainly sell more cameras that way? You can please the point and shoot, family video types and you can please the serious hobbyist, semi-pro who does event video for profit.

And what you describe about the distribution of content is making my argument for me. Hollywood is scared stiff of distribution over the net but first you must have content to distribute. And there is a world of video genres that don't fit into the feature film category. I have a publisher lined up for a documentary. I also have strong connections to the public television market in my area and there are new channels being added to satellite sytems all the time. So not only is there a chance to sell video to content starved tv networks like PBS and the whole series of Sky Angel Christian television networks but there is also YouTube and countless clones that are a serious threat to tv networks and Hollywood.

Maybe you didn't see the Blair Witch project but lots of other people did. And in case you missed it the Michael Moore films are independent films.

You seem to have an hilarious lack of imagination about the future of technology. Things can change very quickly in that arena. With the widespread adoption of broadband there is the capacity for limitless video distribution. And if Hollywood has such a lock on production and distribution why have there been so many articles talking about how much Hollywood fears the loss of control over distribution and production?

And if it's so hard for a shoe string budget film maker to make money producing video how did I manage to land an offer for one of the largest regional publishers in the country to distribute my documentary? My only problem is that I want to do it right so I'm spending a LOT of time on it. But I expect it to be done before much longer.

If you knew anything of the history of Hollywood you would know that they have fought very hard to control distribution which in turn gave them control over production. Now we see an emerging market that can threaten Hollywood in many ways. I don't think it will ever be easy to compete with Hollywood in terms of blockbuster scale movies. But the inflated amounts of money that it takes to produce those movies might make them vulnerable someday also. But I can see a threat to Hollywood in the production of everything from commercials to sitcoms to documentaries right now. The fact you don't see that is just hilarious especially since I'm doing it right now.

Just look at the payola scandals on the airwaves and you'll understand how Hollywood operates. The fact you don't see that independent productions are a threat is just hilarious. And as technology increases so does the threat to Hollywood from independent producers.

BTW since you claim to have never seen an independent film here's a list of a few. I'd be willing to bet you've seen quite a few of them.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Two Lane Blacktop
Pink Flamingos
THX-1138
Grosse Point Blank
The Passion Of The Christ
Being John Malkovich
The Descent
Drugstore Cowboy
Roger And Me
Dark Star
Lost In Translation
In The Company Of Men
Nosferatu
The Evil Dead
Slacker
Lone Star
Eraserhead
Bad Taste
Blood Simple
Monty Python's Life Of Brian
Night Of The Living Dead
Donnie Darko
Reservoir Dogs
The Terminator
Sex, Lies, And Videotape
Mean Streets
The Usual Suspects
Clerks

There are more of course. I'm willing to bet you've seen some of these though. Tell me you've never seen The Terminator. But we haven't even mentioned stuff like Jackass and the avalance of fight films, drunken college girls on spring break films, and, the biggest of all independent film classes, porno. Porno alone dwarfs Hollywood. Porno brings in more money that pro football, basketball and baseball COMBINED and it's all independently produced. I would never do such a thing but there it is. Just don't tell me there's no way independent producers can ever take over the role Hollywood plays now. That would be hilarious.

Well, you turned my words upside down. First off, I was talking about DV rebels, that is, lone DPs/cameramen/scriptwriters with a DV camera and couple of friends as grip and actors. I was not talking about independent cinema. Second, by Hollywood I mean big feature movies that are shown on a big screen. Don't you see the difference between documentaries on PBS and big-screen movies?

On internet distribution and YouTube, haven't I just said the same thing? It IS a threat, but not exactly to Hollywood (again: big-screen big-*** movies), but to news, documentaries, narratives.

A focus ring for a compact camera with autofocus does not make sense because you cannot make it having real mechanical linkage, while being small, fast, precise, energy-efficient (remember: small camcorder) and cheap at the same time. You just cannot. All these old Opturas or some late Panasonics and Sonys that I tried are just like a rubber women, you know. They just look like a real thing. They provide sort of relief, but they are still not a real thing. There are autofocus lenses with focus/zoom rings for still SLR cameras, you can check yourself how fast they are and how expensive the lenses are. Don't forget that autofocus has to react very fast, so the servomotors should be fast, expensive and large. You will be changing batteries every 10 minutes. This will never fly in consumer market. Even pro and prosumer camcorders have zoom/focus rings without mechanical linkage and fixed stops. It is a pity, I agree.

Out of your list I watched these:

Being John Malkovich
Lost In Translation
Donnie Darko
Reservoir Dogs
The Terminator
Sex, Lies, And Videotape
Clerks

They may be independent, but they are by no means DV rebel productions. Well, maybe Clerks. Again, I WAS NOT talking about independent cinema.

And of that list, how many MIGHT have been digital if the technology had been present?

Terminator is ancient... (And THX-1138 even predates the VHS/Beta war so even analog tape would have been rare).

I don't know about the type of documentary shows you watch -- the few I watch are either cobbled together out of archival news footage with some unseen narrator and a few interviews (watch almost anything on the History Channel), or take years longer to obtain footage for than a scripted production (March of the Penguins, or other such nature series), or tend to use CGI with another unseen narrator (Discovery Channel's Dinosaurs and related)

I highly doubt Hollywood is worried about YouTube productions -- with limited time, minuscule quality, and no acting to speak of... And they sure don't have to attack the camera makers if they are threatened... Just sic SAG on everyone filmed in that YouTube video for union dues, maybe hit the camera operator for union dues, etc. <G>

Maybe you guys should read this article entitled Backyard Filmakers Are Hollywood's Greatest Fear. If you don't recognize this as a perfect source for all that I've been saying then you're just being stubborn.

If you think Hollywood doesn't fear MS read the article on this web page where you'll hear about MS's "proprietary code for compressing large media files" which translates into cutting back on consumer's ability to work with large HD files by resizing those HD files into SD formats so that consumers can't produce edited HD video. That's what people complain about in Vista.

Well I'm sorry you guys have no vision but Hollywood does. They have already voiced concerns over backyard productions. And yes union issues have already popped up. It's one of the key ways Hollywood is now fighting the rise of the independent film producer. What you seem to be missing is that the independent films I mentioned were mostly shot with what was considered a very low budget at the time they were made. And the price of admission keeps getting lower and lower.

George Martin, a producer of Beatles albums, complained not long ago that anyone could record a song in their bathtub and make it sound as good as anything that was on the radio a few years ago. He thought it was awful that the individual had his hands on technology that could effectively destroy the music industry because it would no longer be centralized. Elton John said within the last month that the internet should be shut down for 5 years because it hurt the ability of musicians to sell their products and not just because of piracy but because of bands selling directly to the public which means that more bands will share the wealth and there will be no more Elton John's making ridiculous fortunes selling music. He also cites people not getting together socially but the other comments he has made make it clear he's more concerned about keeping the music industry centralized so there will be more "American royalty" as he has referred to rock stars (especially himself).

So don't tell me that independent producers aren't a threat. I've read many articles where Hollywood types said exactly that. I've read many posts on video production boards where Hollywood people said that quality equipment shouldn't be available to the general public.

I'm sorry you guys have missed these things but if you do a Google search you'll be sure to find the things I mention. Do you really think that with HD cameras in the hands of consumers they will be unable to make video that can compete with Hollywood? I've seen lots of video shot by non-pros with non-pro actors that was very interesting and well made. It's a myth that only Hollywood can create worthwhile video. The rise of the independent films have proven that.

BTW despite your apparent low opinion of documentaries they serve a valuable purpose. Yes the History Channel uses archive footage to produce documentaries. So what? Do you think history is useless? I am using some archive footage in my documentary too and it's an historical documentary at that. It's what I like to do. And BTW I've been working on it for 2 years now and the entire first year was practically all research. If you want to do a documentary right you have to read every single tidbit on the subject. That's what they taught me when I was a journalism major. I had a double major actually. The other was history. Go ahead and belittle my work but I've got a publisher lined up. Do you? Again that alone proves that there is a market for video produced with minidv equipment. I could repeat what my camera operator friend told me but obviously you won't bother listening.

I feel sorry for you in your inability to have the imagination to see a different way. If we don't let Hollywood squeeze us out it will happen. Hollywood is fighting YouTube trying to bankrupt them and barring that they will try to take over. The unions are also fighting independent producers. Hollywood will do all it can to stop the independents.

And just for the record some of the best movies I've ever seen were independent films that never were shown on the big screens but rather went straight to DVD. Then there are the great local documentaries that show things you will never see in a Hollywood production because they aren't interested. I'm doing one of those myself. All it takes is to establish a distribution method that works and the true independent film maker will be a big player in the entertainment and education industry. It's no different from books. There are lots of independent book publishers that do very well. They may not make millions but they make a profit and they provide a needed service. I'm just extending that service to video.

Lest you still don't believe what the old time media producers think of the power of technology to make media producers of us all you should read the report on this web page where George Martin complains about the distribution of technology to the masses. If you want another examle of mainstream media types fearing technology read this rant by Elton John.

You guys are really years behind on this issue. I could post a whole lot of links similar to the ones I've already posted but if you don't get the point by now you just don't want to.

I read the article. It says about MS sharing portions of its compressor code. So what? There is nothing in this article that translates to "cutting back on consumer's ability to work with large HD files by resizing those HD files into SD formats". Maybe I need to read it again.

On the other hand I do know about certain limitations for HD content creation and distribution, including HDCP protocol. This is alarming ideed, and even Linux won't help because this is hardware.
Music is ok, most bands -- excluding Spice Girls and the likes -- came from garages and smoky clubs. But movies are different, they require more than music and voice, they require good plot and good play. A consumer with an HD cam is still a monkey with hand grenade. Right, some aspiring directors may use an HD cam with maybe 35mm adapters bla-bla-bla and maybe something good yields at the end.

Movies require more than good equipment. It is not like one guy decided to become a writer, sat down and started writing a novel. Or three guys decided to become famous and started playing guitars in a garage. Movies require more people, coordination, transportation, all sort of things. I am not saying that it is impossible to pack a small team into two minivans, but it is harder than sitting down to write a novel. Therefore I would not count on quantity and quality of amateur video. And I would definitely not expect something like Shrek. Hollywood has nothing to worry about.
I don't have low opinion on documentaries, I like watching them if they are good. I don't know why you keep getting me wrong. But if you are saying that documentaries pose threat to Hollywood I would laugh in your face, because Hollywood is about feature films.
Can you name at least 10 channels on YouTube that are worth watching? So far youtubbers mostly steal other's work. Does it really hurt Hollywood? Don't think so. I want to watch video on a big screen, with YouTube I cannot. So in the end of the day I go and buy/rend a DVD. What if I cannot find a DVD? Then I might be tempted to download them from Emule/torrent, which IS real threat to Hollywood, as well to "independent" filmmakers.
I don't care about so-called independent movies much because they are still in the business to make money. Some dudes came together and made Blair Witch Project. Then what? They are receiving royalties, they become famous and can attract more investments and shoot a better movie and receive more royalties. How's not Hollywood is that? It is like having NFL and AFL.

If I downloaded your film from the net for free, would you be upset? One just has to decide for himself, why he's doing arts. Is it for profit, or is it for sharing one's passion, vision and ideas with people. Actors, writers, painters, sculptors had been poor since Greek times till X1X century. They were doing their stuff for fun and for others' amusement. Copyrights and such changed that. Now movie stars are wealthier than bank owners. So if you in this business for money and your stuff is any good, then sooner or later you'll join Hollywood, you'll become Hollywood.

---
Michael, Canon Elura User Pages

It is pretty much written between the lines in that article but there have been many discussions of this issue on this board. The limitations are built in to Vista and MS is leaning on hardware makers (including camera makers) to limit the quality of the product they can produce. I could spend some time finding evidence for this but it sounds like you know something about it already. I know MS announced plans to "encourage" (i.e. leaned on) hardware makers to cut back on their capacity to produce high quality video. It just makes perfect sense that cameras would be the first place they would start "encouraging".
I think you're selling the talent of the general public short. The thing is there is an ever expanding market for new material. All those nature shows that were shot in SD will be shot again in HD just because people will watch it. Sky Angel has a whole series of networks aimed at family viewing. Someone has to provide them with video products. Commercials have to be shot. Documentaries will be made on historical subjects. The Discovery Channel discovered a whole new genre when they started producing historical documentaries. Plus I think there are many talented writers, actors and producers out there. Look at the number of theater majors coming out of colleges. Look at the videographers who are trained to use the latest and greatest. Hollywood can't hire them all but the market is there. I know because I'm doing it right now. I was a history/journalism major in college so producing historical documentaries is right up my alley. I've also spent many years working in the computer field so I have a good handle on technology. Yes it's hard for me doing it all alone. It's taking a long time to do it right. But it's what I want to do and who knows what it might lead to. I've already had all sorts of offers to do videos for the same foundation that is interested in distributing my documentary. I'm not talking wedding videos. I'm doing interviews of authors and covering military ceremonies. IMO the sky is the limit and if I ever finish my novel that I work on from time to time I'll find actors to make it into a video. I know a guy who does outdoor columns for magazines around the country. I might team up with him to do outdoor programs. The market is there.
I've already said that I didn't think we could compete with the blockbusters but technology marches on and these things get easier to do all the time. I'm doing it now. I don't know how to say it any clearer than that.
It wasn't you that I said had a problem with documentaries. Did you read the other posts in this thread? And you can laugh in my face all you like. I'll do the same to you. The times are changing and as long as technology for the masses keeps getting better the products we produce will keep getting better. Hollywood only makes more money because they control the distribution in theaters. I think their stranglehold is already about to break because of the strength of the independents. This isn't the 1930's where the studios could muscle the competition out of the picture. It might end up being that way if they succeed in pushing MS into taking the technology away from us but I think the genie is out of the bottle. People will find hardware and software to do the job because they know they can do it if MS will get out of the way.
I've seen hilarious works on the net. Right now I'm forced to live with dialup after 8 years of exceptional broadband so I don't even bother with YouTube. But you're wrong that people can't produce their own works. I sold a large number of DVD's of a local band doing a reunion concert. I might try to market those even more sometime soon. So there's a market already that is essentially untouched. Trust me there are people who want to buy these things. I could name you a dozen ways to make big money with the equipment I have but to be honest they're my ideas and I would just as soon not give them away. Will I make millions? No. Will I make a good profit. Very good. It's all about marketing. Right now I'm just doing what I want to do and I'm selling that too.
I don't doubt that Hollywood will try to incorporate much of what makes money. But there are things that Hollywood just won't be able to do because of scale. There are cracks in the walls of those blockbusters. I'm going to crawl in one and make some serious money. I've done things like this before in fact. I was told there wasn't any market for local bulk mail advertising but I proved people dead wrong about that. The Postal Service raised rates so that I couldn't make a profit after a while but I made a lot of money with an original Mac with no hard drive doing bulk rate ads for local businesses. We were just about ready to start doing franchises when the rates went way up. In fact my company name was Bulk Rate Ads. People were begging me to keep doing mailers when we broke up the business because I brought them a ton of business. So don't tell me that there aren't ways to do things a new way. I've done it before.
I never even set the copyright bit on my DVD's that I sold. People could copy them freely and I knew I couldn't stop them. You'd be surprised at how many people are willing to pay especially when they know it isn't some giant Hollywood studio. If they think it's just a regular Joe down the street they will pay 90% of the time. And if they don't pay I really don't care. I'll make money and I'll have fun doing it. You can't stop people from doing what they do so why worry about it. I don't. I have no doubt some of my work has been pirated. I think the effect of piracy is way overblown anyway. The music industry just produces crud. That's why they are losing money. It has nothing to do with mp3's and file sharing.

But as always YMMV. I'm done with this thread. I've stated my opinion and I've shown that others agree with me. There's not much more I can do beyond that. If you miss the gravy train then that's your loss I guess. I'm making money doing what I love right now. I might make a lot of money at it soon. If not I still had fun doing it. What's better than that? Someday soon you'll see that what you say is impossible is very possible and practically inevitable as long as MS doesn't screw up the whole scene.

http://governmentvideo.com/articles...ticle_982.shtml

Seems that AVCHD/H.264 may hurt HDV badly if implemented at full 24Mbps data rate. I don't think we will see this implementation in consumer camcorders despite that HDDs and memory cards getting more capacious. Maybe there will be AVCHD-PRO camcorders starting at $3K and up.

On the other hand:

http://forums.dvdoctor.net/showthre...?t=38087&page=2

---
Michael, Canon Elura User Pages

OTOH, HD DVD lists MPEG2 as an approved encoding, and that is what HDV uses.

From Wikipedia:
According to Wikipedia, BluRay ALSO supports (and the first releases WERE in) MPEG2.

So... the article claiming AVCHD was a ploy to encourage BluRay sales comes across as a bit of FUD, and HDV MPEG2 can probably be used directly...

Where AVCHD gets a boost is in the BluRay variation using a /red/ laser [IE, the format miniDVD camcorders produce]

EDIT: -SORRY IGNORE-