Posted in: DVD/Blu-ray, Movies, streaming, TV | Tagged: blu-ray, films, sony, television

Blu-Ray Blues: Sony Group Corp. News Hit to Physical Media Releases

Sony Group Corp. reportedly wants to get out of the recordable media business (like Blu-rays) - not good news for physical media releases.

Of all the fallout that's come from "The Streaming Wars," possibly one of the most creatively damaging things has been how films and television series have been pulled and thrown into limbo. If we're lucky, they end up on a FAST channel (like what went down with HBO's Westworld) – but many times, they remain MIA as the studios look to clean up the mess of a streaming battle that none of them were prepared to fight. To keep that from happening to their favorite films and shows, fans have been scooping up physical copies (DVDs, Blu-rays, etc.) whenever and wherever they can find them. In addition, we've seen social media campaigns from fans urging that their favorites also get a physical media release. Unfortunately, the push for more physical media took a hit today, based on reports coming out of Japan.

Sony Group Corp. is reportedly looking to cut approximately 250 jobs from its manufacturing base in Tagajo, Miyagi Prefecture – which would account for approximately 40% of the current 670 positions at the recordable media business' manufacturing facility. The reason? Sony has been seeing a serious decline in demand for storage formats such as Blu-ray discs since streaming has taken on a global dominance in terms of home and mobile viewing. Reportedly, the plan is for the company is to eventually move away from producing optical disc storage media products.

In a blog post from 2023, Mike Flanagan (Midnight Mass, The Fall of the House of Usher) addressed the issue of his work being released on physical media and the resistance he faced from Netflix, sharing why having a Blu-ray or DVD release is such an important option. "In the years I worked at Netflix, I tried very hard to get them to release my work on Blu-ray and DVD. It became clear very fast that their priority was subscriptions and that they were not particularly interested in physical media releases of their originals, with a few exceptions," Flanagan wrote. "While companies like Netflix pride themselves on being disruptors and have proven that they can affect great change in the industry, they sometimes fail to see the difference between disruption and damage. So much that they can find themselves, intentionally or not, doing harm to the concept of film preservation."

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!