There's potentially big news in blowing in today, and it comes straight from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Apparently, Sony's been demonstrating the "next level of disc copying" to a curious audience and successfully transferred an entire Blu-ray movie as a lower-res version to a PlayStation Portable's memory stick. More on that at the full story.

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (SPHE) has recently announced that they have sold over 250,000 Blu-ray disks in Europe, and are close to hitting the one million  markin North America. The President of SPHE World Wide David Bishop spoke about the strong surge of their sales and how their upcoming titles should further solidify their bid to win the format war:

These sales milestones across the world illuminate the positive reception from retailers and consumers alike for Blu-ray. Our strong fourth quarter line-up will underscore the confidence in this format.

The aforementioned line-up is pretty solid, with titles ranging from classics to cartoons. Among them are Spider-Man 3, Spider-Man HD Trilogy, Surf's Up, Memoirs of a Geisha, Underworld, Bram Stoker's Dracula, 20 Million Miles to Earth: 50th Anniversary Edition, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind: 30th Anniversary Ultimate Edition. 

The Senior Vice President of Europe's SPHE Simon McDowell gave a few words on their success in the European market saying that Blu-Ray disks have been out-selling HD-DVD by a ratio of 2 to 1. He then mentions that the immediate fourth quarter "has a strong slate on deck and support from retailers, which should further propel momentum for Blu-ray."

If the press release is any indication, Sony's preferred format is doing very well. Their success with marketing the Blu-Ray format will undoubtedly pay off in spades if they can keep the momentum going.

When you combine a blockbuster movie and a hot new high-definition movie player, you will definitely get chart-breaking sales. "Casino Royale," the James Bond movie starring 007 newbie Daniel Craig has hit the 100,000 units shipped marked. The movie has set the record for the most number of high definition copies sold in one day.

So what's the point of getting a Blu-ray copy of "Casino Royale?" Director Martin Campbell says, "It’s just unbelievable. Clearly, it’s fantastic. The comparison between standard def DVD and Blu-ray is quite stunning and quite transparent to the master. It’s precisely what would make me want to buy a copy."

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment President David Bishop says that the Blu-ray company is committed to bring consumers the best picture and sound quality available. If you haven't tried watching a Blu-ray movie, maybe now is the time to. Sony Pictures has a great lineup of movies still to come.

In an effort to extend the campaign of amassing a wider acceptance for Sony's high-definition format, Sony Corp.'s film studio has announced that it will be adding a feature to its Blu-ray discs that will allow copies of movies to be moved to laptops and other devices.

Says David Bishop, head of Sony's home entertainment unit, on Sony Pictures Entertainment including portable files on Blu-ray discs that can be transferred without a download, "It's not currently part of anything on our current release schedule, but we'll probably roll it out sometime this year."

This new strategy will hopefully further boost Sony's edge in the Blu-ray- HD-DVD format war. Back in 2006, Sony was recognized as the highest-grossing film studio at the U. S. box office. Now, it aims to also be number one in terms of home-video sales.

We're not quite sure how this one would exactly work but it sure is sounding sweet and heavenly. In this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, a Sony official was quoted saying they are planning to include portable files on Blu-Ray discs that will in turn allow users to copy movies to laptops and other portable electronics.

When he mentioned portable, we're pretty sure (or kind of hoping) he was referring to the PSP. It is no secret that they've always wanted to boost software sales for their handheld, and the Blu-Ray format is in a deadlock with Microsoft's HD DVD. So when you really think about it, this move is genius.

The Sony official we're talking about is actually David Bishop, the head of the company's Home Entertainment Unit. His exact words read:

Sony Pictures Entertainment will include portable files on Blu-Ray DVDs that can be transferred without a download. Sony may add the feature this year. It's not currently part of anything on our current release schedule, but we'll probably roll it out sometime this year.

Sony, our dear, feel free to take all the time you want and you need perfecting this one. But please make sure that the PSP is well in your heads whenever you think about the word portable.