Windows 7 Media player will not play back BluRay disc's

Agree with skymanGTW. If your OEM (your PC manufacturer) included a Blu-ray disc drive, then they would definitely include the software for Blu-ray playback (PowerDVD / Arcsoft TotalMedia, etc.). No need to blame Microsoft over this. Besides currently you don't see Blu-ray playback support as a native feature on any other OS either. You will just have to wait till it does one day.

<:)

Actually the last time I priced out the codecs for BD playback/burning on a PC it was in the $24 range (in added charges - about 2 years ago). You have to remember that this isn't a single codec and it's not to a single company. MPEG-LA gets their piece, the audio guys get their piece, the disc format guys get a piece.  I know that sounds insane but just look at the current license for something old and busted like MP3. Under a standard license as is publicly available on the Thomson web site it's $0.75 for playback rights (per application on a PC) to playback MP3 (it's not a PC-wide license, it is literally per application) and Thomson wants $2.50 per application for the right to rip something into MP3. Now some people get by this by using the COM interface to WMP so that the license Microsoft paid covers it, but if they just called the APIs directly - they owe a license...

So next question is would any OEM want to pay Microsoft and extra $20+ per copy of Home Premium if BD wasn't being used across the board?

I don't think people would appreciate every PC going up $50 (that $20 license fee would then be subjected to the OEM and Best Buy's margin markup) for questionable value to everyone that didn't get a BD drive. When you think about HP or Acer's volume, $20/unit is serious money so no one is just going to include it out of the goodness of their heart. 

If they include a BD drive, an OEM should include the software to use it. If you added a BD drive on your own - you're on your own. That's just the model. Whether you like it our not, that's how your PC got configured, priced and sold.

@The Sad Truth - In my post I only asked to include Blu-ray into the media editions such as Ultimate, or as an option, for the people who want to pay extra for it, just like Vista Ultimate included SD DVD playback. I of course agree "millions of people" don't have to pay for it if they don't need it.

BD sales progressed 74% last quarter, please acknowledge there are also "millions of people" who need better Blu-ray support today even if you don't. They won't be able to find all the goodies such as bonus, languages and subtitles on a highly compressed digital download, or store these downloads into their media library for keeps. My District 9 BD takes 44GB, for instance, and, like many BDs, also includes a digital copy that I don't have to download.

I agree that the $4.50 license fee is not the whole picture, you apparently also need to fork out $9.50 for a separate BD license fee from One-Blue, 2 others for AACS and MPEG-2 and what nots, all from different licensing companies. :(  Still, many editors or manufacturers manage it just fine.

But I think you're wrong about flash, a 64GB SDXC card costs well over $100 wholesale, $200 retail, compared to less than a dollar or 2 for pressing a BD. The companies you don't mention (Apple with its iTunes?) are probably using the lame excuse of online movies, not flash.

Like you, I don't see much future for Blu-ray, at least until they fix their licensing mess and until Sony who currently presses 95% of all worldwide BDs opens up the market to competitors. But they still sell or rent by the millions every day, Avatar alone sold 3 millions BDs in just 5 days!

Chimel -

Do you even know how Sony is associated with Blu-Ray? Do you know who owns the rights and sets the fees? You don't know what you're talking about. 

The license is not "so cheap" and, in addition, why should millions of people pay for a bluray license they don't use? Because a bunch of spoiled brats feel that they should? 

To further explain you don't know what you're talking about, some companies and studios aren't even going the blu-ray route because they believe that the technology has a limited life span. Given the cheaper price of flash media, they do not believe that spinning media like bluray will be around long.

Windows 7 is superb. It's far better than the Mac OS and, quite frankly, Vista worked very well for me. It didn't need to be "fixed." Windows 7 happens to work better, at least everything but search. You're just another complainer.