In a move that many expected, Warner Brothers has announced that they will support the Blu-ray Disc format (BD) for high definition content distribution. Warner was accepted into the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) Wednesday night and announced software support the next day. Warner had been one of the last holdouts for HD-DVD, and in fact, Warner, like Paramount last week, has made no statement that they will not continue to support HD-DVD as well. At this point, of the major studios, only Universal Pictures remains committed to HD-DVD only. The rest have pledged support to BD or to both disc formats until the dispute has been decided.

Meanwhile PC giant and prospective Blu-ray supporter HP has publically requested that the BDA enhance the Blu-ray disc format to include a couple of key features which are already in the HD-DVD spec: mandatory Serial Copy Management and interactivity ("iHD"). Copy Management is the big one as it could enable consumers to make limited back-up copies of their original purchased content, distribute this content to other devices in the home network and promote the use of BD as a recordable format. The lack of a well-defined copy management or digital rights management (DRM) scheme is what led Bill Gates to label BD as "anti-consumer" in a recent interview with the Daily Princetonian.

And on the heels of Warner's announcement of BD support, Toshiba issued a press release restating that Warner is also still dedicated to cooperating with Toshiba for the launch of the HD-DVD format in North America, planned for Q1, 2006. But with 5 out of 6 of the major studios now on-board with BD, momentum seems to be gaining for the Sony-backed contender.

Analyst group Forrester Research, predicts that Blu-ray disc will eventually triumph over HD-DVD, but believes that a scenario where both formats go to market will cause lengthy delays in adoption of any high def disc format by consumers. If the Sony camp does indeed embrace HP's suggestion to include a mandatory copy management system into the BD specs, it's possible this format war will be over before a single shot is fired. But so far Sony and the BDA have not responded to HP's pleas.

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