Poll: Are discs dead?

[Talshere]

No. I always buy discs if I can.

I dont have to wait on a DL with potentially dodgy internet speeds (Im a student it happens)

If steam ever goes under or crashes, I will be sitting here laughing my head off at all of you who have 200 odd steam games. I dont trust these DD systems that rely on a connection all the time. I use em but I want a disc should the worst happen. Noone can deny I own a game when I wave the disc in their face. This goes doubly when Play.com is 99% of the time cheaper for a disc than any digital distribution company's.

 

[RollForInitiative]

I much prefer physical mediums for a number of reasons. Given that I take good care of my materials, the usual complaints about wear and tear or loss just don't apply to me.

 

[Iron Mal]

I personally prefer the satisfaction of having a solid copy in my hands that is undeniably mine (backed up by a solid receipt if things go bad).

Sure, it's an inconveinience going out to the store to buy games but so is noticing that everything online is non-refundable.

 

[Irony's Acolyte]

It's not dead yet!

Seriously it isn't. And even if CD's die out I think that there will still be a market for some type of hardcopy of games or music or movies. Some people like having a physical copy of a game. Plus I'd rather have a CD version of a game for my consoles as that allows me more room on the hardrive for memory.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

Why are there so many threads about this? I say no. I'll always prefer to buy the physical copy.

 

[Shadeovblack]

No, Because while digital distribution may become the main form of selling data, some people will like to have a hard copy. However, I think that hard copies will become more of a luxury item. For example, I own a considerable collection of vinyl records, even though I don't buy CDs anymore. Physical copies will become like a collectors edition, something you only get if you really like the product.

 

[Anarchemitis]

It's only a matter of time, kind of.

 

[Krantos]

I don't think it will happen. People like having physical copies. As long as people want and are willing to pay for something, someone will provide it.

 

[tomtom94]

Not yet but it can't be long.

(Red Dwarf said we'd have videos again in the future, so it must be true!)

 

[Hap2]

Definitely not dead at all. Digital distribution doesn't have the capability to provide the highest quality sound in music, because of its medium, the Internet. I can choose which format and the quality levels for the music I transfer to my Samsung P3 when I rip from a disc, but I cannot do the same for digital distribution, since it often only comes in one choice of format and quality, to keep downloading times to a minimum.

People still buy and listen to vinyl records because of their unique sound offerings, so I doubt CDs will be on their way out anytime soon.

 

[Dexiro]

Well for PC's the disc format is pretty much dead.

Console games, DVDs and CDs aren't doing too badly though. I like all of my console games on disc.

 

[zfactor]

Well for PC's the disc format is pretty much dead.

Console games, DVDs and CDs aren't doing too badly though. I like all of my console games on disc.

I agree with your stance on consoles, but all my friends buy PC disks. So it won't be dead for some time because people (like me) are materialistic and like to have physical copies of stuff to hoard. Plus it takes less time to reinstall from a CD than to re-download.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

This seems to be a repeat thread OP...

In anycase, we'll never outgrow physical mediums IMO. And if we do, I will cry.

 

[Naheal]

We may outgrow discs, but we'll move to something else along the road. Physical copies will never die.

 

[Stormwaltz]

Physical media will only die when the manufacturers decide they don't want to support it anymore.

 

[RatRace123]

For music, yes with the prominence if ipods.
For games and movies, I say no. As long as there are still people out there who need the physical presence in their hands.

I spend 60 bucks on a game, I want the case, the instruction book and the disc too.

 

[Blemontea]

Well im holding a disk right now, and its very much alive. The simple fact is if we download a game it not only going to take up a huge maonut of space but its going to take up a HUGE amount of space, the main game, the save file, the preference, DLC, anything else will take up massive data space. The Easy thing about disk is that they already contain most of that data already. Most of which is the big stuff, and all the hard rive has to worry about it holding the saves and DLC. The way i see it, it is going to be a looooooooooooooooooooong time before we move away from physical media, but im not saying its impossible.

 

[fullbleed]

For PC games digital distrubution is deffinately taking over, while I ussually just buy what ever is the cheapest regardless of format I'm finding more now that I'm buying things on steam because they do such great offers.

For music as well I'm hardly ever buying CDs because in the vast majority of cases its cheaper to buy download.

The DVD market seems to be the only one so far not hit significantly buy digital sales. I know in America they have things like Netflix but there's nothing really like that in the UK, and looking at my shelves bursting with DVDs I frankly can't wait until we get a film download service the equivilent of iTunes in the UK.

 

[DanDeFool]

Yes and no.

Yes, because digital distribution is faster, more convenient, and has much less overhead than physical distribution.

No, because even if you do distribute content through the internet, you're still going to want to store most of it locally. Bandwidth is expensive, internet access is somewhat unreliable (can I get an amen from Comcast subscribers?), and most people aren't comfortable with the reality that they'll lose access to the content they've purchased if the content provider ever goes out of business. Eliminating DRM would resolve the latter issue, but most distributors aren't ready to do that just yet.

Also, some customers would like to be able to resell content they've gotten tired of on the second-hand market. With DRM, there's no way to resell content. Without DRM, there's no reason to resell content.

So no, we're never going to outgrow physical media. Even with all-digital distribution, you still need, or at least want physical media for some things.

 

[AvsJoe]

Required reading for this thread: http://www.cracked.com/article_16518_tech-zombies-6-technologies-that-dont-know-theyre-dead.html

(specifically #4 and #2)

I fully agree with this article BTW.