Sony and Panasonic have announced plans for a successor to Blu-ray discs.

The firms say they want to develop an optical disc capable of holding at least 300 gigabytes of data by the END of 2015.

By contrast, normal dual-layer Blu-rays can only hold up to 50GB.

Sony has previously said that 4K ultra-high-definition movies - which offer four times the resolution of 1080p video - were likely to take up more than 100GB of space.

It recently launched a device that allows 4K films to be streamed over the internet, but that will be impractical for people with slow internet access or accounts with data-use limits.
4k camcorders

The tech firms do not directly refer to 4K movie SALES in their press release, but rather talk of the wider "archive market".

"Optical discs have excellent properties to protect them against the environment, such as dust resistance and water resistance, and can also withstand changes in temperature and humidity when stored," they say.

"They also allow inter-generational compatibility between different formats, ensuring that data can continue to be read even as formats evolve. This makes them a robust medium for long-term storage of content."

Full story: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23492609Will be interesting to see how they catch on!

At the moment it seems as though optical media is dying out in favour of digital distribution methods, but if internet connection speeds don't keep up enough to be able to stream 4K content or if HDD technology doesn't allow drives to be MADE big enough to hold large NUMBERS of 4K films, optical media MAY grow in popularity again.