For another take on this (from the business end, primarily,) see Sean
M. Dugan's article in this week's InfoWorld:

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xml/00/02/14/000214opprophet.xml

On Wed, 16 Feb 2000 00:56:57 -0500, Glenn Cole <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Wondering what will come after DVD?
>Perhaps "FMD-ROM," and maybe even sooner than you think.
>
>I read a convincing (to me) argument recently about why the DVD format
>is dead.  Sure, it's nice that it stores 4GB of data instead of 660MB,
>but the business model for the format is based on selling licenses for
>DVD players.  (The discs themselves are not copy-protected, but the blank
>media is more expensive than a disc of your favourite movie.)  With the
>reverse-engineering of the Content Scrambling System (since Linux people
>wanted to play DVDs on their systems), this model just about gets thrown
>out the window.
>
>Enter FMD-ROM, from Constellation 3D
>
>   < http://www.c-3d.net/ >
>
>Rather than the "paltry" 4GB capacity, this thing can store *140*GB!
>And they've done it by preserving the CD/DVD form factor.  In fact, they
>claim that FMD-ROM readers can read CD and DVD media as well.
>
>But wait -- there's more!
>
>How about data transfer speeds?  Funny you should ask. ;)
>How about up to one Gigabit per second?!
>
>As for when this whizzy technology will become available?  Well, who knows.
>The company "hopes" to have the standards ready by the end of this year,
>but these things always seem to take longer than anticipated.
>
>For more details, see
>
>   < http://www.3dhardware.net/features/dvdead/ >
>
>--Glenn
>