Now here's the kind of of re-release I think we can all get behind. It's no secret at all that longtime DVD demo favorite, Luc Besson's <I>Fifth Element</I>, was released early on Blu-ray in a transfer that was shockingly poor. Sony is essentially admitting it was wrong (excuse me, I think I just saw a pig fly by my window), and is re-releasing <I>Fifth Element</I> on Blu-ray on July 17th and is offering an replacement program for people who bought the original Blu-ray Disc.

What a difference a single dollar makes in the online DVD rental business. Blockbuster decided to take aggressive action to gain traction in the online DVD rental business, which "projections" show as increasing 43% during the 2007 according to Blockbuster's Shane Evangelist (how's that for a cool name?!). So, it is now offering a subscription plan called Blockbuster by Mail that's a whole $1 cheaper than its existing Blockbuster Total Access plans. The Blockbuster by Mail plan will be online only as opposed to the Total Access plans which is comprised of both online and in-store rentals.

Watching three-chip 1080p front projection become something of a commodity is just weird. The inexorable march of progress has made this inevitable, of course. While I've been at the home theater game long enough to go into cautionary tale about how many tens of thousands of dollars even decent front projection used to cost back in the day, I'm only going back three years to put this thing in perspective.

Sony's BDP-S300 second-gen Blu-ray Disc player started shipping to retailers this week at a list price of $499, a full $100 cheaper than its previously announced price. With the $499 20GB PlayStation3 no longer in production, the BDP-S300 is now the cheapest Blu-ray Disc player available.