Sony Hates Europe Part 1 : Blu-ray Region Coding map of "Fuck You"ism...brilliant!

Sony Hates Europe... Part 1

Sony hates Europe, it really does. I can't quite put my finger on it quite yet but it really does hate us Europeans. Whether it be the long delays on releases to our region, higher prices or just shitting on us all round, Sony just loves to take a dump on us Europeans.

I am presenting evidence that Sony does indeed hate us in part one of my ever growing rally of materials on Sony with the

Blu-ray Region Coding map of "Fuck You"ism...brilliant!

The above genuine Sony map is the new region coding mechanism for Blu-ray discs. The breakdown is as following:

Region A:	Region B:	Region C:
- North America	- Europe	- Russia
- Central America	- Middle East	- India
- South America	- Africa	- China
- Korea	- Australia	- Rest of World
- Japan	- New Zealand
- South East Asia

Now really, this banding makes no sense to me. Unlike the DVD regioning, where you could see some kind of banding, this new scheme sends one big fat message to Europeans and thats Sony hates you!

Ok, ok... let me explain myself a little! First look at that colour scheme; Green, Amber and Red. They could have used any colours for that map, so why a palette that suggests good, ok and bad regions? Well, look at the red countries... the STOP/DANGER countries of Russia, India and China. Producers of probably 90% of the pirated discs so they get a big fuck you. As does anyone thats not deemed as being part of the continent structure.

Next we have the WAIT/WARY continents, those in too much conflict to buy movies, too poor, or just an island full of convicts, bad losers with seriously bad sportsmanship... and then wait, Europe has been lumped in there too! These nations are your average Joe driver nations... those that would normally stop at a yellow light, but could speed through and import if they want to risk it.

Then finally the SAFE go, go, GO continents which includes Central and South America and South East Asia apparently. I mean what the fuck... how does a cinematic masterpiece from Sao Paulo get the same region as Hollywood, yet we get lumped with the Middle East? Holy fuck... even Cuba gets preference over the EU! I wouldn't be so pissed off if Japan was in region B (like region 2 DVDs that are EU and Japan) as thats all I really care about.

Anyway, it hates Europe because it has to add subtitles to its movies in 20+ different languages, then create an advertising campaign for each one of those countries. It hates us because it has to create box art for each one of those regions. It hates us because we dont resemble one big fat cash cow... were a field of little cows that all need feeding in our own unique way. Sony hates our uniqueness costing its precious company much needed dollars and wants us to die.

Region locking sucks balls. Period. It serves no purpose other than allowing us to be subjected to the advertising for that product when its released for our region and this is the reason its there. Why not scrap it and do global releases or use a region coding system that actually makes sense.


I mean an English release region for one. Call this region 1. No other languages, no other subtitles and audio tracks, just an English audience region disc that can be spat out of Hollywoods vagina straight after the cinema. Then start fucking around with your other language releases.


The best solution for both parties would be to follow Microsofts lead on the Xbox 360 and leave the decision up to the producers. I guess the Movie Industry doesnt have enough independent publishers to justify this approach, and those that would probably opted for HD-DVD anyway! :)

(Sorry, this hasn't been one of my best rants, I just wanted people to see that map!)