Well, it took about three and a half decades, but Sony has now apparently drawn even in what I like to call the “Brand Wars” - the ongoing techno-dogfight between Toshiba, JVC/Matsushita, and the aforementioned, four-letter Godzilla of the Ginza, Sony.

Those of you old enough to remember Beta versus VHS will likely also recall the incredibly expensive campaigns waged by these and other titans as each vied for commanding market share of what was to become a huge electronic battleground. Sony’s BetaCam and attendant playback hardware (taken as a whole, this was known as BetaMax) was first to market, but not by much.

That market lead … as so often becomes the case, manifested as an albatross around Sony’s metaphorical neck, as it gave them a false sense of security that ultimately resulted in their losing the sense of desperation that is so critically important to both start-ups and product roll-outs in established corporations.

In the case of Beta, Sony moved much more slowly than they would have had they been operating at flank speed. The result of this complacency was a dearth of hardware manufacturing licensee deals, combined with a show-stopping scarcity of Beta format movies.

Hey, if you don’t have the hardware to play ‘em and if the software doesn’t even exist anyway, what are your chances of succeeding?

So, victory went to VHS (JVC/Matsushita) and all of their distributors and manufacturers. Damned near killed the company too; good thing the WalkMan was picking up its pace. (Ouch!)

Fortunately (for the four-letter boys, that is), at least a few guys ‘from the old days’ still work there. Even more fortunately, their memories are unsullied by the eighty-nine ka-jillion products that they have developed, marketed, and distributed over the past couple decades.

And so they DO remember. There ain’t a Sony-ite walking this Earth who doesn’t remember the way that the competition kicked their Bee-hinds all over North America; especially with regard to BetaMax.

Which is why Sony is most likely the victor in the latest winner-take-all contest to determine who will sell six gazillion high-def movies between now and the time that the next “new media” becomes available. Yes, Virginia, it sure looks like game time, with Blu-Ray already in the clubhouse and a format/brand “win” under its formidable belt.

How, why, when, and where did this happen? Well, fortunately for you, it all happened right under your nose. I say “fortunately”, because you didn’t have to read about the techno-nuances of these disparate technologies. Now, all you have to do is purchase your Blu-Ray player (the cheapest way to go is to simply buy a Sony PlayStation and take the “free lunch” --- i.e. the movie player --- that comes with the gaming system) and start enjoying a truly magnificent visual experience.

And for all of you who must know, the High Definition Game ended when NetFlix and BlockBuster opted out of HD-DVD movies in favor of Blu-ray.

So, what’s important in all of this?

Quite simply one word --- Brand --- or, if you prefer, Branding.

Because in today’s speed-of-light marketplaces, consumers only know “Brand”. Really, brand is all that matters!

I again reach out to oldsters to remind you of the seminal book, Future Shock, by Alvin Toffler. When I first read this book (in 1971), I was astounded. Its premises were, well … shocking! Never before had I read a piece of non-fiction that had kept me glued to each page as it turned. I took it to the shore for beach reading, and man was that a huge mistake for while hip hugging, low-riding bikini bottoms were all the rage that summer, all I could think of was what Toffler was saying. Even more important was how he was saying it!

“The pace of technology will increase at an ever-increasing rate.”, quoth he, “and that technology will be so mysterious and complicated that consumers will have no choice but to find acolytes who can not only explain this technology to them, but whom they (the consumers) can also trust with such expensive and yet life-altering products and services.”

In other words, “It’s the brand, stupid.”

Oh, and did I mention how kind “brand” is to one’s margins?

Well, I should have.