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DVD and 4K are becoming the new vinyl

March 24, 2026 by usatoday24

Arrow Video and Netflix have just announced the complete edition of ‘Stranger Things’ on Blu-ray and 4K UHDwith two variants and a launch date scheduled for July 2026 in the United Kingdom. It is the first time that the series reaches physical support, and here possibly we will not taste it (at least not in such a luxurious edition), but what really matters is that Netflix, which for years treated Blu-ray with some hostility, fully stands behind this edition. Following the money is easy when Netflix looks right in that direction. The edition. Arrow Video, the British label specialized in cult editions, launches ‘Stranger Things: The Complete Series’ in two editions: Special Edition and Deluxe Edition, both already on pre-sale. He box set brings together the 42 episodes of the five seasons distributed on 25 discs. The Deluxe Edition is where Arrow has concentrated its efforts for a deluxe release: 148-page artbook, exclusive postcards, a Hellfire Club patch, double posters for each season and, as usual for the label, exclusive artwork for the occasion. What is Arrow? Arrow It’s not just any stamp. The company has a history of careful editions of both successes mainstream as well as cult titles: its catalog ranges from remasterings of more or less known films, such as David Lynch’s ‘Dune’ in 4K or John Carpenter’s ‘The Thing’ to insane rarities for very coffee lovers such as its box set on the films of the Brazilian horror master Mojica Marins or the succession of incredible armatures on classic martial arts cinema Shawscope, which this one he signed treasures on its shelves. That Netflix has turned to them, and not to a majority distributor, indicates the market this edition is aimed at: discerning collectors, not occasional buyers. Dean Lawson, Director of Sales and Marketing at Arrow Films, he put it bluntly in the announcement: “Working with the team at Netflix and the Duffer Brothers to bring the definitive physical edition of ‘Stranger Things’ to fans has been a phenomenal project for Arrow. The series is colossal in influence and scale, it is globally beloved, has transcended generations, and has been part of the cultural conversation for almost ten years.” Netflix on the go. What makes this news striking is not the box set itself, but who publishes it. Netflix (despite its origins as a virtual video store) and unlike HBO Max or Disney+, streamers built on pre-existing studios, it does not have a physical film distribution chain. If you want to publish a title on DVD and Blu-Ray, you need to go to external distributors. For years, the only exceptions came through the prestige edition: ‘The Irishman’, ‘Roma’ or ‘Marriage Story’ reached the album through the prestigious Criterion Collection. Mike Flanagan already expressed in his day that he tried without success for years to get Netflix to publish his series, such as ‘Midnight Mass’ or ‘The Haunting of Hill House’, on Blu-ray and DVD, without success. “Netflix refused again and again. It was very clear to me that their only priority was subscriptions and that they were actively hostile to the idea of physical support,” stated. Flanagan stated that he considered this position to be a direct harm to film preservation. The turn numbers. As we have said latelythe physical support market has been in decline for a decade, but data from 2025 shows a change in the curve. 4K Blu-ray sales in the United States grew 12% in 2025 compared to the previous year, the first year of growth since 2018, and the global physical decline moderated from a drop of 23.4% in 2024 to a drop of 9.3% in 2025. Significantly, that increase comes from where it was least expected: an increasingly younger demographic of buyers. The premium segment is the one that drives, and not just 4K: the steelbooksFor example, recorded an increase of 25% in sales between 2023 and 2024. They are not passive purchases: they are deliberate acquisitions by people who want to own something permanent. The parallel with vinyl is obvious: it represented nearly three-quarters of physical music revenue in the US in 2024. Physical media has stopped competing with streaming and has found its niche in the collecting and preservation category. The figures that justify it. It’s obvious why ‘Stranger Things’ has had the honor of being Netflix’s first big physical bet. Seasons 1-4 racked up over 1.2 billion views. The fifth and final one, released in 2025, had the most-watched opening week for an English-language series in the history of the platform, and boosted previous seasons back to the Top 10 global for eight consecutive weeks. The question, perhaps, is what comes next. Netflix has more than a thousand originals without any physical presence, including series that in some cases are no longer available or streaming. If Arrow and Netflix’s bet with ‘Stranger Things’ turns out to be a success, we could see the operation repeated with other properties on the platform. And thus provide the digital environment with the characteristic it lacks: survival over time. In Xataka | Despite streaming, I still buy Blu-Rays and DVDs. But the reason has nothing to do with image quality.

the heir of the DVD to survive streaming

March 19, 2026 by usatoday24

Video StoreAgea distributor founded by former Sundance Festival programmer Ash Cook, sells independent films on encrypted USB drives and splits the revenue 50/50 with the filmmakers. The project arrives at a time when the festival circuit no longer guarantees distribution for the majority of titles and physical support is experiencing a recovery that no one expected. The origin. Ash Cook spent years as a programmer at the Sundance festival, specializing in independent film, always listening to the same conversation. Filmmakers, sales agents, distributors and acquisitions managers agreed on the same diagnosis: independent film distribution was broken. The Cook’s response to these questions was to found Video StoreAge together with Aidan Dick, head of communications for another specialized festival, Frameline, with a specific proposal: to sell indie films on encrypted USB drives. The company launched its first collection in February 2026 and has several presentations planned in Los Angeles on March 18, 19 and 21. The first USB includes, among other titles, ‘Heightened Scrutiny’ by Sam Feder and the extraordinary ‘The People’s Joker’ by Vera Drew (which you can check out on Filmin), a trans autobiographical parody of the Batman universe that has accumulated a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes. The data. In 2025 only 19 films coming from Sundance Distribution was secured in the United States, compared to 30 in 2024 and 38 in 2019. Only 11% of films selected at top-level festivals end up selling rights to the entire world. By 2025, only half of the ten documentaries in competition at Sundance found distribution. They are very weak numbers and some professionals blame the streaminglittle concerned about this independent cinema, by ending an entire sector of medium-sized distributors that absorbed the most risky titles. The third way. Video StoreAge’s proposal is similar in spirit to a DVD: a physical copy of the movies, they can be played on any computer, and it is yours forever, without depending on platforms. Each quarter, the company releases a collection of five feature films and five short films on encrypted USB drives (using patent-pending technology). Files are played using a built-in player and cannot be copied or ripped. They are sold by quarterly subscription, in individual packages, or combined at the buyer’s choice. The short films are free extras. How the money is distributed. Video StoreAge splits the profits 50/50 with the filmmakers and only acquires the physical distribution rights, leaving the filmmaker free to seek distribution in theaters, streaming platforms or any other means. At the moment the scale is modest, around 20 titles in the first year. A partnership with the latest alternative festival Slamdance (perhaps the most notable indie festival outside of Sundance) allowed them to offer two titles as limited editions during the festival itself, ‘Danny Is My Boyfriend’ and ‘The Bulldogs’, before their official release. The return of the physicist. Curiously, this happens in a very peculiar context: DVD, Blu-ray and 4K UHD sales fell just 9% in 2025, compared to declines of more than 20% in the previous two years. The unexpected culprit: Generation Z and for two reasons. First, the fatigue of streaming and second, the unreliability of digital catalogues, with films that disappear without prior notice due to expired contracts or tax reasons. All this while the premium 4K UHD segment grows 12% year-on-year. The parallel with the resurgence of vinyl is inevitable, although at the moment this return of DVD does not have an industrial infrastructure behind it to support it, but it does have many specialized publishing labels such as Criterion or Arrow. What remains to be resolved. There are questions to answer: Video StoreAge has not detailed the technical specifications of the medium or publicly addressed issues of long-term durability of flash memories, a weak point compared to pressed optical discs that, when well preserved, do not suffer data degradation. On the other hand, the target audience for this product, willing to pay for indie films on an alternative physical medium, is small. Enough to be profitable? In Xataka | For years Blu-ray resisted streaming: now Sony has decided to close the chapter on its home recorders

In 1997 Blockbuster decided that DVD would never replace VHS. With that decision he began to dig his grave

February 22, 2026 by usatoday24

In 1997, Warner Bros. proposed blockbuster an exclusivity agreement to rent DVDs. The deal replicated the model that was already practiced with the VHS format, which gave 60% of income to the video store chain. Blockbuster declined because they were confident that magnetic tape would maintain its dominance for years. Warner responded by drastically cutting the wholesale prices of its records and Walmart was quick to take advantage of the opening: In less than a decade, it overtook Blockbuster as Hollywood’s biggest moneymaker. The DVD arrives. In 1997, this format arrived promising better imaging, more durability, and interactive features (we were so young). But it had a giant before it: in 1988, after defeating Sony’s Betamax format, VHS already controlled 95% of the home video market. And a decade later, in 1997, it was an empire: VHS rentals generated $10 billion annually for movie studios, with Blockbuster pocketing about half of that revenue. VHS had reasons not to be afraid: DVD players were very expensive, between $300 and $500, and VHS devices were very accessible. And they were not wrong: DVD sales would not surpass those of VHS until 2003, six years after its commercial release. Warner’s proposal. Warren Lieberfarb, head of Warner Bros.’s home video division and one of the key figures in the development of the DVD format proposed to Blockbuster a deal that replicated the VHS model: exclusive rights to rent the company’s new DVD releases before they hit stores for sale to the public. Warner would receive 40% of the rental income from those records. John Antioco, CEO of Blockbuster, had just arrived at the company after passing through Taco Bell, and his decision could be key to the company’s future. The rejection. Blockbuster decided to reject the proposal because it believed that VHS would maintain its dominance for years. As we said above, a not unreasonable assumption. Furthermore, creating an inventory of DVD movies was an unnecessary expense under the profitable and peaceful reign of VHS. Some later format releases, before the advent of DVD, possibly made Blockbuster think it had done well: JVC’s D-VHS digital tape, which allowed high-definition recording, was a flop. But Blockbuster didn’t have two things: Hollywood support for DVD and the inevitable drop in player prices. The answer. Warner Bros. responded with a strategy that would transform home cinema: it drastically reduced wholesale prices for its DVDs, in order to compete directly with the rental industry. This allowed businesses to sell records at prices that made purchasing more attractive than renting. The North American giant Walmart detected the opportunity very quickly and began to sell DVDs below the cost price, and in this way, for example, they sold their discs for 15 or 20 dollars when renting a VHS cost between 3 and 5 dollars per day. The power of Walmart. Walmart’s network of stores had power in distribution, covering the entire country, that Blockbuster could not match. In addition, it had privileged deals with suppliers and, in general, a fund and resources that allowed it to absorb the losses from the DVDs. In this way, Walmart replaced Blockbuster as the studios’ main source of income in less than a decade. This led to redefining the balance of power in the industry: the most valuable distribution channel was no longer the video store, but became large commercial stores, where consumers no longer only bought movies. Blockbuster, free fall. As is well known, It was not Blockbuster’s last catastrophic decision: in 2000, when Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph, co-founders of Netflix, approached John Antioco about selling their DVD-by-mail rental service for 50 million dollarsthe executive declined the offer. A decade later Blockbuster declared bankruptcy in 2010 while Netflix reached a valuation of billions. They are not the last. The case has parallels with recent technological transitions where dominant companies have underestimated the speed of the public’s adoption of new formats: the physical media industry believed that Blu-ray would maintain its relevance against streaming. And it is also easy to draw lines that link current technology companies with the adoption of AI: who will be the next giant to fall? Header | Stu pendousmat In Xataka | VCR Virus: the anti-copy system of the VHS era that looked like something out of a B horror movie

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