We knew that Warner's decision to pull HD DVD support just ahead of this year's CES smarted, but we didn't have the a way of quantifying said pain until now.

According to the New York Times, Sony's Blu-ray format captured 90 percent of the next-generation hardware market for the week ending January 12--the week after the WB dropped the bomb on HD DVD. It's a marked change from 2007's numbers, which came out in the neighborhood of 50-50 by the end of the year.

So the pertinent question is whether this is a major signpost of things to come, or simply a brief, if sharp, reaction on the part of consumers. The Times asked several prominent players that question and, not surprisingly, the responses split neatly along party lines.

"Consumers have gotten the message loud and clear," the Blu-ray Disc Association's Andy Parsons told the paper. "Lowering prices sends the message that Toshiba is having a fire sale."

"At $149, HD DVD is still a great value," answered Toshiba's vice president for marketing of digital audio/video, Jodi Sally. Nice, but not exactly the sort of response that instills stock holders with confidence...