But fear not, data hoarders. Two companies have stepped up to reassure the Japanese market that they'll keep producing high-quality optical media: Verbatim and I-O Data.

Verbatim has pledged to continue supporting the recordable optical media market in Japan after Sony's manufacturing closure.

Redbox was a company with a moderately interesting business model—it let you rent DVDs from automated kiosks. It’s an idea so ...