Paper DVD underlines Blu-Ray, DVD Forum struggle

THE WORLD has got very excited about the possibility of a new DVD design mainly made of paper, and prototyped by Sony and Toppan Printing.

The technology is designed to be more ecologically friendly than conventional DVDs and will cost a lot less to make. It stores more than five times more information than conventional DVDs.

Toppan, which makes colour filters for liquid crystal displays, said the new discs could be more secure, since disposal of used discs can be done easily.

However observers point out that the whole project could be shafted by the fact that the DVD Forum has chosen the HD-DVD format - supported by Toshiba and NEC - over Blu-Ray which is used in the paper CDs.

It might not be a problem though as the DVD Forum has a habit of being ignored by the industry.

Blu-Ray players and recorders are already available, whereas HD-DVD yet to make much impact. Blu-Ray is also backed by Sony, Pioneer, Samsung, Matsushita Electric, Philips and Volesoft.

The DVD Forum on the other hand bought us the failed CSS encryption system in current DVDs and the easily circumventable region control system. µ