iPod Video Coming to a Car Near You

_am99_ writes "In the "one more thing" media event today, an iPod that can play Video was announced. The initial content seems to be music videos that can be purchased from the iTunes Music Store." In related news aquachannel writes "Apple has just updated their iPodYourCar page to include a slew of new car companies. This means that there'll be a lot of cars that you can buy off the showroom floor and use your iPod with your car - right off the floor and out of the box."

Comments

Finally...

[rovingeyes]

This would be a big hit if they can stick to that price of $1.99 per video and have variety in the content provided. Already they have a winner with music videos and Pixar offerring six short films. MTV has turned in to a channel that has nothing to do with music. Also I don't have to put up with all the crappy vidoes with MTV stupid logos and artwork, assuming Apple is going to just give me a clean video. Along with that it'd be nice if they can provide other content like stand-up routines or I'd love if Jon Stewart could force comedy central to provide it's videos for video ipod.

Re:Finally...

[calibanDNS]

Does anybody know if this video content is HD?
According to Steve the video availabe through iTMS is all 320 x 240, which is the native resolution of the new iPod. Far from Hi-Def, but probably just right for the screen size that it's intended for.

I doubt this will have much if any impact on the HD DVD format wars since most people won't see this as a device for watching video on their TV. Apple is marketing it is as a portable video device, and if it works then that's what it will work as. I expect in the next year or so that we'll see them introduce a product similar to AirTunes Express, but with video capabilities. That's what would really get me excited.

No Divx support?

[tommers]

Even though Apple seems to be doing great with DRMed AAC files on iPods, iPods would have totally failed if they didn't support mp3s to begin with. I wonder if the video iPod will be able to gain traction without supporting the large collections of TV episodes, music videos, and movies that users already have in their collection in Divx format.

Not just videos

[That's Unpossible!]

TV shows (like Lost) one day after they air, and you know damn well what's next... movies.

A video airtunes device didn't materialize, but a dock with video out and remote control did.

Amazing...

[NewbieV]

From the report in the New York Times:

Citing a groundbreaking deal with ABC, owned by The Walt Disney Co., a longtime partner of chief executive Steve Jobs' Pixar Animation Studios Inc., Apple's online iTunes store will sell episodes of hit shows "Desperate Housewives" and "Lost" for $1.99 apiece, making them available the day after they air on television.

Yes, it's a tiny video screen, but you can attach the iPod to a monitor using S-Video plus audio cabling. How can an organization like the RIAA justify wanting more than 99 cents per song when you can purchase 44 minutes of audio and video for two dollars?

Re:Amazing...

[shark72]

"How can an organization like the RIAA justify wanting more than 99 cents per song when you can purchase 44 minutes of audio and video for two dollars?"

Because people are buying millions and millions of them at $0.99. They have likely done the research to show that they'll sell millions at $1.49 as well.

The fundamental thing here is value to the customer. It makes absolutely no difference what else is available for a similar price. If you want that CD for $13, you'll likely buy it despite the fact that a DVD costs $20 or a movie ticket costs $9 or a Urban Outfitters t-shirt costs $16 or a Jhane Barnes t-shirt costs $100 or a cheeseburger costs $4 or a concert ticket costs $40 -- because you want a CD, not a DVD, a cheeseburger or a t-shirt.

Likewise, if you want a particular song, but you don't happen to want a particular episode of Lost, then the price of the two items relative to each other -- or the price of the item you want relative to anything else on the planet -- makes little difference.

If anybody reading this is not a fan of the luxury of charging what the market will bear, then great -- figure out how much it would cost you to barely scrape by for a year without vacations or other discretionary spending, and then talk to your boss on Thursday about reducing your salary.

Re:Amazing...

[hackstraw]

How can an organization like the RIAA justify wanting more than 99 cents per song when you can purchase 44 minutes of audio and video for two dollars?

For one, the 44 minute program was pretty much paid for the night before by advertising dollars.

But in general, I've noticed this trend as well. Compare the prices for the latest Led Zeppelin releases on CD and DVD. The DVD has about 2x the content (over 300 minutes vs an estimated 180 minutes) in 3 different sound encodings but the CD costs _more_.

Link for DVD http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000 08PX8P/qid=1129144470/sr=8-11/ref=pd_bbs_11/104-09 63173-9088738?v=glance&s=dvd&n=507846

Link for CD http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000 08OWZC/qid=1129144470/sr=8-12/ref=pd_bbs_12/104-09 63173-9088738?v=glance&s=music&n=507846

Oh, people still buy the CDs at the higher prices or via iTunes. Now I know why they are more expensive.

No Divx...No Problem

[BancBoy]

My PSP doesn't play Divx (or XVID, or WMV, etc.) But that doesn't stop me from watching a lot of my weekly video content on it. With an app like PSPWare to do the conversion from a myriad of formats to the quality setting of my choice, I don't have a problem. As the iPod with Video plays H.264 and MPEG4, I would imagine a similiar application will work just fine to do the conversion and loading for you.

FrontRow Question

[pmike_bauer]

Does anyone know if FrontRow (and remote) will be available for anything other than the new iMac?

I can't find any info about this on Apple's site.

Disney, of all companies

[mblase]

What amazes me is that Disney (owner of ABC), which was the last major media company to start selling DVDs, was the first company to provide downloadable video to Apple this way.

Granted their partnership with Jobs' Pixar Animation Studios was probably a big reason they agreed, but nevertheless -- this is a big switch (IMO) from the Disney I used to know. Hopefully it won't be long before other studios and networks see the download numbers for "Lost" and jump in. I bet if HBO can be persuaded to offer their shows on the iTMS (iTunes Media Store, now, I suppose), sales at the Store would skyrocket.

Re:Finally... Just downloaded Lost... some info..

[Altima(BoB)]

One thing I noted was that I couldn't find a way to get the video to full screen from within iTunes. I opened the file from my paid copy of Quicktime to go full screen.

Anyway, as you say, the compression is impressive. For 100mb less than what you'll find on bittorrent (albiet not in 16:9) you get the whole program without ads, and also (and this is in my opinion pretty big) no intrusive messages along the bottom or top of the screen placed by the television network. It's one of the most obnoxious and annoying practices on U.S. TV (a network bloated with advertising places MORE advertising along the screen's margins during programming? No thanks.) If you were to download what is basically a TV rip from Bittorrent, these advertisements are unavoidable even if the normal ads are cut.

The quality looks just as good as what you're likely to find on BT, as is the sound. I even put it on fullscreen on my 23" cinema display, it still looks great. I give this a thumbs up. Not having seen more than a couple epsidoes of the original Lost, I'm tempted by the $34 download of season 1, a little cheaper than the DVD, but no extra features and lower res... Decisions decisions...