A Lack of Blu-ray

I wish I could remember where I read it, but a few years ago, during the peak of the HD DVD/Blu-ray kerfuffle, someone made the point that it was likely Microsoft was supporting the less popular HD DVD because ultimately it was betting on digital video delivery and a format war that left consumers wary of physical media would buy some more time until that sort of thing was a reality. Anyway, it's stuck with me and I was reminded of it today reading John Gruber's response to what apple should do with Apple TV, which includes a suggestion to add Blu-ray. Gruber replies:

That would be nice. (I bought a PS3 just for use as a Blu-ray player; I would have bought a new Blu-ray equipped Apple TV instead if there were one.) But: Apple seems to have made a decision to ignore Blu-ray across the board, at least for now. Apple's answer for HD movies is the iTunes Store.

Which is funny, because when I read the specs for the new widescreen iMac I was very surprised it didn't include one, but this makes sense. Not that it's a nice thing, mind you. This is likely one of those examples of Apple being evil and getting away with it, which is fine, I get how business works, but let's at least call a spade, a spade.