Digital Playground to Release First Blu-ray TitleThu Dec 20, 2007 at 04:00 PM ET
Tags: Disc Announcements, Industry Trends (all tags) 
Previously HD DVD-exclusive adult distributor Digital Playground will go dual-format with the Blu-ray release of 'Pirates' in early January.
As we've previously reported, Digital Playground
made headlines earlier this year when one-named auteur Joone (the company's founder) was quoted as saying that his company was forced to change HD allegiances after all Blu-ray Disc copying facilities in the United States refused to accept his business.
var federated_media_section = '';
Said Joone at the time, "Sony wants me to publish my films on HD DVD."
Though the Blu-ray Disc Association
denied a coordinated effort to block the release of adult titles on the format (and indeed Vivid Entertainment went on to release
its first Blu-ray title this spring), Digitial Playground has issued more than half a dozen titles on HD DVD exclusively.
All of that will change this January, however, when the distributor will unleash its very first Blu-ray release, the adult extravaganza 'Pirates". (The same title hit HD DVD in February of 2007.)
In explaining his company's move to dual-format support, Joone told CEPro that "A lot of people were emailing that bought a PlayStation and they were basically saying, 'When are you guys going to release Blu-ray?'"
Scheduled to ship in January 4th, the Blu-ray release of 'Pirates' will contain the full-length film and a bucket-load of extras (including behind-the-scenes footage, bloopers, casting videos and trailers), all in high definition. The supplemental package on the previously-released HD DVD was presented in standard-def only.
Digital Playground claims to have an 80% share of the market for HD porn, with HD releases now accounting for about one-third of the publisher’s video shipments.