A long time ago, I wrote about why Betamax lost. 2 months ago, Phil Edwards made a video on why VHS won which you can watch above. I also recommend that you read the video description as Phil has added a list of links to follow, examining the difference between VHS and Betamax which might explain further why VHS won out in the end.
VHS related: Farside: the Toronto bar turning into a VHS rental store and 5 retro videos from The VHS Vault