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It boggles the mind how much economic rent and inefficiency is gotten through pointlessly proprietary formats.

And Sony in particular has tried it many, many times, and usually failed.

Beta, 3.5" floppies, Minidisc, Blu-Ray, Digital8, MS...any others?

Proprietary ATRAC music file format, as used with MiniDisc and their other portable music players.

however, if they get traction they can win big time in profits and vendor lock-in.

i agree with you, however.

Vendor lock-in is a form of economic rent.