Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger said as much during the media giant's earnings call earlier this week. Disney's fourth quarter earnings took a big hit because of the downturn in DVD sales, and while some of this can be blamed on the weak economy, Iger realizes that even when the economy eventually recovers, "the normal we see is not necessarily going to be the normal we were used to." 

What happened to the DVD business reminds me of what happened to ABC's game show Who Wants to be a Millionaire? It was ten years ago this year that ABC premiered the Regis Philbin hit in the summer and saw it take off. Before too long, it became a regular on the schedule, and since ABC didn't really have many other hits, the network began to run Millionaire on multiple nights, peaking with four in 2000. While the bucks rolled in for awhile, ABC didn't really use that coin to develop other hits, because it thought it had found its "final answer."

We all know the rest of the story. Oversaturation. Millionaire began a quick fade, and less than three years after its premiere, it was dead. New York Times scribe Bill Carter attributed the cause of death to "complete exhaustion, compounded by overexposure to harsh competitive elements" when he wrote of the show's cancellation in 2002.

Those words could be applied to the DVD business, too. The rush to get the DVD out fast kills the anticipation and decreases the value of the product to the consumer. In the era of the VCR, it took a year—if not years—for movies to move from the theatre to Blockbuster. In the DVD era, it became months or, in some cases, weeks. That also doesn't do a whole lot for the box office. Yes, the hits always perform, but mid-level movies have suffered greatly at the theatre since consumers know that in a few weeks, it'll be out on DVD.

If that wasn't enough, the studios decided to jam as much library product as possible onto the shelves, as well. Not just movies, but hundreds of old TV shows. Sure, some took off, but most just took up space. Consumers, who used to gobble up everything, felt overwhelmed and just walked away.

Some will point the finger at piracy or technology, blaming the emerging Blu-ray format or online video downloads from sites like Hulu. And it's true that all of these are putting a stake through the DVD business once and for all, but none of them will have to swing the hammer very hard to finish the job—the studios already did all the heavy hitting.