"Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (SPHE) now says it will release its first Blu-ray high-definition discs on May 23 -- the same day the first Blu-ray player goes on sale," reports Sound & Vision Online.
In an important aside, Don Eklund, SPHE's senior vice president for advanced technologies, said that Sony's initial Blu-ray discs -- and all of its Blu-ray titles for the forseeable future -- will be free of the "Image Constraint Token" that's built into the Blu-ray and HD DVD standards. This controversial digital flag instructs the player to down-res the video signal from its analog component-video outputs to a standard-definition image to prevent high-resolution recordings -- but at the same time prevents viewing of HDTV images on any TV or device not equipped with a copyright-protected HDMI digital input. That would eliminate any gain in image quality for HDTV early-adopters who bought displays prior to two or three years ago, when DVI and HDMI digital inputs were introduced.
Comment: So if you've spent $2,500 on an HDTV and spend another $1,000 on a Blu-ray player, they will be really kind and actually let you see the high definition image you have paid for. How kind.
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