Initially I saw this and decided it wasn't worth putting up, but a few interesting comments were made at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia Conference on Tuesday.

Disney CEO Bob Iger made the comment "We believe it's a no-brainer ... that the industry should be behind Blu-ray". Referring to the announcement made by Paramount and Dreamworks, Iger commented "I think those studios were likely taking easy money. We haven't taken any money because we believe it".

Fox head honcho Rupert Murdoch offered "Paramount switched out the other day. God knows why". Murdoch also summed up his feelings on the format war "The public is going to want Blu-ray. The public can tell the difference".

On the opposing side, Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman remarked under the cloud of rumours that have director Steven Spielberg leaving Dreamworks next year when his contract expires "..the financial impact to Paramount first and especially to Viacom overall would be completely immaterial". The statement is noteworthy given that Mr. Dauman has a reputation for being very guarded when speaking publicly.

It appears that after the shockwave the Paramount decision sent, we aren't going to see any more major announcements until after the holiday shopping season. We'll see what the two formats are willing to do to advance their cause, and take amusement in comments like these from the two side's talking heads.

According to this thread on AVSForum, the Samsung BDP-1400 is the first Blu Ray or HD DVD player capable of sending compressed audio via bitstream over the HDMI connection.

Previously, all Blu Ray and HD DVD players would decode Dolby Digital+ and Dolby TrueHD and output them as LPCM via the HDMI connection. The only problem with this is that no player as yet decodes DTS-HD or the lossless DTS-HD Master Audio. For the new variants of DTS, Blu Ray and HD DVD players extract the core DTS track only. Now that AV receivers and pre/pros are beginning to appear that feature onboard decoding of these new codecs, Samsung is the first to offer users the option of sending uncompressed Dolby Digital+, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD and DTS-HD Master Audio to a receiver or pre/pro to decode.

The Samsung BDP-1400 Blu Ray player is available now, and has a suggested retail of $499.

In an article posted today on Tech.co.uk, BDA chairman Frank Simonis implies that the HD DVD Promotional Group's recent announcement that 51 gigabyte triple layer discs are on the horizon is merely a publicity stunt.

Simonis is quoted as saying "...we believe they are very much in a reactive mood. Based on their format one would expect that a triple layer disc is three times a HD DVD single layer adding up to 45 GB. Now suddenly they change it to 51GB for promotional reasons." Wait a second Frank, who's in reactive mode? The current production specification for HD DVD is 15 gigabytes per layer, but 17 gigabyte layers were proposed by Toshiba back in January, and were just approved by the DVD Forum. Know your enemy. Frank goes on to cast doubt on Toshiba's ability to produce said discs and talks up Blu Ray a little.

HD DVD has taken the last two rounds of this fight, with the Paramount announcement and news of increased disc capacity. HD DVD is gaining momentum, while Blu Ray is still waiting on Fox and Disney to deliver the long-awaited uppercut.

In a move that isn't much of a surprise, retailer Target is quietly increasing shelf space allocated for Blu Ray discs.

Target announced in July that they would sell Blu Ray players, but not carry rival HD DVD hardware this holiday season. At the time of the announcement they also made it clear that they would continue to offer their customers movies in both formats. The change in shelf space dedicated to Blu Ray makes sense given their holiday alliance with Sony to exclusively carry Blu Ray hardware. Blu Ray has steadily gained marketshare in 2007, spearheaded by Playstation 3 videogame console sales. HD DVD claims the lead over Blu Ray in installed standalone players, and since Paramount announced exclusive HD DVD support, HD DVD sales have been creeping back upwards. Nielsen sales ratio of discs sold since inception stands at 61% Blu Ray 39% HD DVD as of September 9.

The holiday season is overwhelmingly important for both sides, as we wait to see if Toshiba can capitalize on it's current momentum, or if Sony will grind HD DVD down with it's sheer numbers and retail shelf space advantage.