Sony's much-vaunted Universal Media Disc is on it's way out, from all accounts.

Launched about a year ago, it was supposed to give Play Station users a movie experience but, "At least two major studios have completely stopped releasing movies on UMD, while others are either toying with the idea or drastically cutting back," says PC Magazine.

"And retailers also are cutting the amount of shelf space they've been devoting to UMD movies, amid talk that Wal-Mart is about to dump the category entirely."

Jupiter Research's Michael Gartenberg told vnunet.com UMD movies have always had a difficult value proposition because they cost as much as a DVD, but can only be played on Sony's PlayStation Portable.

"Sony has to build on that as a platform and get more ways for UMD to be viewed on different devices," he said, adding that UMD will still be there for PSP games, "But for the device to succeed as a movie player, Sony will have to introduce additional accessories that allow consumers to hook up the devices to a television, for instance."

Also See:
vnunet.com - Sony's UMD Facing Last Rites, March 30, 2006
vnunet.com - Sony's UMD movies on the chopping block, March 30, 2006