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A Workable Downloadable Movies Business Model?
sane? writes "Following on from the music industry attempting to push up the cost of iTunes music downloads comes word that Sony is looking take robust control of the pricing for legal movie downloads - to the tune of $8 a movie. What is the maximum acceptable price that slashdot readers would give to different types of downloadable product, taking into account their perception of its true value to them? How can sensible pricing and workable business models be reconciled?"
Well, if Sony is going to be trying to install rootkits onto my computer, they could not pay me to download their movies. Screw-em.
However, barring malware distribution by major corporations, I believe that Apple has showed the industry exactly the business model to follow for media distribution, so, provided a fair and reasonable DRM policy like that of iTunes, I would be more than happy to pay $5/movie, but not more than that. Come on now, the industry has the opportunity here to make far more money off of not just recently released movies, but following a long-tail model, they could make obscene amounts of money off of older movies/content that is no longer available or being distributed. Think about all the old classic Sci-Fi movies or classic movies that are only available on TCM on occasion? What if you really could watch them "on demand" rather than waiting for them to rotate through. How about old TV shows?
Being able to watch movies at home on your computer or on your laptop on the plane is not just a convenience that they should be charging premium costs for. It is a mass market scheme to drive insanely high revenues if the price point is made attractive. If they were smart, these movies would be made available more cheaply and the "premium" experience could still be had at the theatre.
So, for an industry that already is sitting on media that is no longer generating significant income, they have the opportunity to create potential huge revenue streams for media already bought and paid for, so why gouge the customer? It is a surefire recipe for slower adoption, delayed revenue streams and potentially failure.
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FTFA, $8 is the price that Sony is expected to be charging the content distributors. This is not the price that we would be paying as end consumers, which would look more like it would be to the tune of $10, or something along those lines.
Of course, this would probably all be highly compressed, DRMed to hell video files, too. Given that I can go to a local Wal-Mart or Target and get a lot of these old titles for $6 at full quality, and make my backups using something like CloneDVD, I'm not likely to be purchasing a $10 movie download anytime soon.
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For me, the cost would have to be the same or less than a movie rental for me to buy in. $8 is too much. I'd say $2.99 is about right -- and I don't care if the $2.99 movie expires after a certain period of time or anything. Like I said, 99% of the time I just watch a movie once.
Sam
There is not an easy answer. I would pay $5, to answer your question. But I would also want the ability to 1) redownload it again for free 2) watch it anywhere like cell phone using streaming video as well and 3) own the full viewing rights to that movie, so when new formats or display devices come out (such as toasters and refrigerators and cell phones), I get it in a better and newer format. If you are upset you didn't get first post, simply wait until tomorrow when this story will be posted again.
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If I can burn it to a DVD, watch it on ANY DVD player, and treat it as if it were mine (IE, let my friend borrow the disc), then yes, I'll pay 8 dollars/movie. Otherwise, I'll keep my netflix subscription thank you very much.
--sig fault--
It's hard to say where the limit would be, but 8 bucks simply is too much - I can go to a video rental place and get pretty much every movie I want for considerably less than that (the local one in the town where I live charges up to 4,50 per movie, depending on how recent it is; not sure what the big chains take).
Sure, it requires me to walk there first (I don't have to drive, considering that it's pretty much just across the street), and they might not have what I'm looking for; but on the upside, I get the movie within minutes instead of having to wait for a big download first.
So for me at least, an online place would have to be considerably cheaper than a real store in order to be attractive. And considering that a lot of the costs associated with having an actual walk-in store with real DVDs and real employees don't exist here, I'd say that they could still make a comparable amount of money even if they charged less than the offline stores do, too.
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
How much is a bittorrent client again?
-Charlie
P.S. If you think the current rootkitting DRM schemes are bad, wait till you see the next gen ones, like the ones for HD movies. Yikes.
Everyone above me got it right. This idea fails pretty hard. Now, Sony's going to dump more money into a project that -- if anything -- will only take business away from actual DVD sales. Most people that are willing to buy a lesser product because it's finally legal won't be getting the physical disc too, which means less money for Sony. "How do I shot web?" indeed...
If I don't get a seperated backup copy (an actual, physical DVD), I will pay no more than 20% of the DVD price.
This isn't like music where one usually only wants 1-3 tracks from the album. Buying 1-3 tracks from a CD, you're paying... 20%!
I'd want the same discount on a downloaded movie, 20% for what I want, even though that's (usually) the entire thing.
If it ain't broke, it needs more features!
If we are talking new "On at the cinema" movies, I would pay just under what the local cinema charges me; primarily because you get surround sound at the cinema.
If we are talking "Out on DVD" movies, I would pay up to 50% of the cost of the DVD version... I mean with a internet version you get "nothing"; with the DVD version you get higher quality, a box, a disk and perhaps bonus features.
I am from the UK -- And purchased a couple of lost episodes even though the DVD versions of series 2 will be cheaper; but those episodes aren't on in the UK yet, and thus the extra cost was well worth it.
I would also be willing to pay a smaller fee to "rent" an internet movie (one that stops playing after n time limit)... So like $3.50 and you get to watch a new movie for a week wouldn't be all too crazy...
For 8 bucks they better include at least 20 min of previews before the movie
The Digital Couture Collection
If they don't have a wide selection (not just Sony movies), people will get dissuaded and it will fail ..in my opinion.
1) Wide selection
2) Convenience (that includes not instaling a rootkit on my PC, thanks)
3) Price
Of course I havent created a multi billion dollar corporation, so what do I know? I've watched some corps fail though.
Older movies which I can rent for $1 or $2 a pop should be listed for about $5 each. Films new to DVD, I would pay about $10 for a new film, if I could transfer it onto a Sony Memory Stick to watch on the home theatre. Saves gas, postage, plus a trip to Target or the Dollar General. They'd have to pay me $8 to download a Mickey Rourke film. And porno clips should be around $15~20. And none of this iTunes 15 minute short films crap.
At most, I'd be willing to pay half of what it costs to buy the DVD at Wal-Mart. This assumes that the download is of comparable quality and includes any extras that are usually reserved for DVD.
I see little reason to pay more than half, considering how much cheaper it is for the studios to put it out on the internet rather than produce, package and ship DVD's. In fact, even if the internet downloaded movie costs half as much as the store bought DVD, the studio will still make more money from the transaction.
Of course, this is all a pipe-dream. Looking at the track record of greed and abuse by the movie studios and their lackeys, you can be sure that internet downloaded movies will have artificially high prices. They'll intro the service at $8 for all movies, and then after a year or so they'll start demanding $15 for new releases. And, to top it off: you know there is no way in hell that these downloads will be legally transferable. If I buy a DVD, and decide it blows, I can at least take it down to the pawn shop or give it to someone else. Can the same thing be said with these DRM laden downloads? I seriously doubt it.
/dev/random
It all depends on the quality of the video and how restrictive the DRM is. For a full length, DVD quality movie that can be burned to a DVD or compressed for a PVP, I think people would be willing to pay as much as $10. For something like Apple's current model (low res, high DRM), people aren't going to pay very much.
Of course the model changes when looking at other video content, such as television shows. With a TV show people are usually looking for something more disposeable. They're not likely to watch it more than once or twice so they probably won't pay as much. $2 is probably the ceiling here, but the quality probably doesn't need to be as high either.
This is a moot point right now. Until the content providers will allow these things to be burned to standard DVD's, people simply aren't going to buy them in large enough quantities to support the business model.
Not a penney more than $1 which is what I pay now.
Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Considering http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/deucebigaloweur opeangigolo/index.html.
Uhm. Nothing.
That is the usual price of a pay-as-you-go movie {though you will need a picture stabiliser if you want to record it -- they stick Macrovision in the signal because if you chose when you wanted to watch it then you don't need to be able to record it, do you?}; and that is by some bizarre coincidence the same amount as I would pay to download one legally: Three pounds fifty.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
... I'm not paying more than I'd pay for a rental.
Shadus
There is already a model for what people will pay - Pay Per View.
The quality had better be as good as or better than DVD, however (choosable by the user). Unfortunately, the typical internet media is actually lower quality than what it replaces.
LivePhish.com did a great job of offering a choice of either mp3 (lossy) or flac (exact CD quality). flac cost a few bucks extra.
I think that $5 would be reasonable, considering that you ARE spending the time to download the movie... most people don't want to do that, so you've gotta set the price kind of low....sure, that's 1/3 of what you're paying at the stores, but they aren't having to waste money on packaging and a DVD.
Earn a % of cash back from Newegg, Tiger Direct, Walmart.com, and more: http://www.mrrebates.com?refid=458505
The real issue of cost is probably going to be closely tied to bandwidth. Movies (at least of any sort of decent qualtiy), tend to run about 500mb an hour for decent quality. Now, surely $5 will more than cover the cost of the transfer, but still, it's a lot of bandwidth compared with a song which is just a few megs.
If they could manage some sort of P2P style service while retaining their DRM, this could probably help lower the prices a bit.
The thing to keep in mind is that this is almost all, cash in the bank for them, particularly if they go with a P2P model. There's no packaging, no hard media, nothing, except bits. The price should reflect that. I wouldn't pay $5 for a movie unless it's new and high demand. Otherwise I'll wait for it to show up in the bargain bin and get the DVD with all the DVD extras.
As with anything in economics, the trick is to find the sweet spot, which I'm sure they'll research plenty. But the price is probably going to need to be done on a per movie basis. I mean, if you can buy the disc out of the bargain bin at Wal Mart for $5, it's a pretty sure bet that not that many people will pay $5 for it online. On the other hand, if it's $30 for the disc, then $5 for the online version may be more reasonable.
iTunes has latest releases pretty much instantly.
99% surely this 8$/movie means, at best, 'just out on DVD' movies. As DRM-crippled, crap resolution, no extras...
Nope, won't fly.
Now if it's 8$/movie for full DVD image (2 images, if needed with all extras etc), burnable to completely normal DVD+R disc for later viewing. Maybe with slight compromise in quality to fit 4.7GB. Basically what bittorrent is offering right now, I think I might bite.
Will never happen tho. It would make them too much money. They want to offer you 320x200 crap with DRM out of the wazoo.
Only reason iTunes flies is because it's basically a legal option vs. torrents. You get the same thing in the end (good quality, no DRM if you recycle it via CD). No *way* sony would ever put out anything that would actually seem FAIR to the paying customer. So they are doomed to fail. Miserably. Nobody will pay money for a lesser version when the free version is better quality, no DRM crap.
The submitter's grammer is unacceptable. I usually don't complain, but this summary is nearly unreadable.
Maybe there is some small market for segments of movies...
The topless scene in "Swordfish" comes to mind. There is really only one reason to watch this movie (well, actually two short scenes).
Niche market for certain, but super hot actors nekkid will make a buck per "hot scene" download millions of times over, I am certain of it. Britney Spears could dispense with the formality of making "music" and we would all be better off with her sticking to what she does best, like making perfume commercials or something.
For those of us who live on the outskirts of Far South BFE, such an offering means very little. I have exactly two options for 'Net connectivity: satellite (cost-prohibitive at this point, and unreliable in winter), and dialup (too slow to be workable; I typically get data rates of *gasp* 26.4k on the copper). BPL is an available option for some, but limited deployment and reportedly poor performance, not to mention the uproar from the amateur radio sector, restricts that option as well. So marketing such things to us is a waste of advertising dollars.
In short...I'd pay exactly zero, since that's how much use I would get out of such an offering. YMMV.
All the world's an analog stage, and digital circuits play only bit parts.
Since i would be using my resources to _download_ a movie I wouldn't any more than $2.50 USD per movie. ...and in general I wouldn't pay for crappy movies or actors.
I personally would not pay more than $5, and this seems a little steep to me. The whole attraction to the download a movie thing is that it's spur of the moment, it's an impulse buy. I am not gonna spend $10+ on a movie unless I really like it. And if I really like it, I might as well drive to Target and buy the DVD (or HD-DVD?) with the box and all too for an extra couple bucks.
If they were asking for a couple dollars for a movie though, I am more likely to grab Friday the 13th on Halloween and It's a Wonderfdul Life on Christmas, purely on impulse.
If I were interested in buying such movies, I'd probably pay no more than 4 or 5 € each. And that is, if I can get high-quality downloads with no restrictions what-so-ever. Otherwise it's just more convenient to stick to pirated DivXs (sp?).
But I'd actually be much more interested in a kind of monthly fee. Much like Netflix but with downloads instead of boxed DVDs. I'd pay 15-20 for unlimited downloads. However I understand that this kind of setup only works when a certain scarcity of DVDs exists - which is obviously a moot point in the case of digital media.
Global warming is a cube.
If we are talking about a limited time, DRM'ed download, I would pay just slightly less than renting(which is $1.50 canadian for old releases or $3.00 for new where I rent) But that is only IF it does not touch my system, or make me use some trusted computing platform that takes away my control. If it was a ISO that could be burnt to a DVD, the answer is still the same. A little less than purchase price at the store. The case and silkscreening on the DVD are works of art that I cannot duplicate. If it is a DRM'ed movie, that I have problems moving around, backing up, etc? It is not worth my time and worry. I will not even let it on my system.
Why don't they vary the price according to demand? i.e., the movies most in demand would be more expensive. They could then drop the price as demand tails over time. There are mathematic models they could use to maximise revenues this way.
A big benefit of this type of pricing is that it maxmimises revenues, whilst at the same time feels fair to the consumer.
Does it allow me to burn a DVD-quality video once and maybe a few more times for backup?
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
They can charge about as much as DVD rental, if they manage to make it as convenient as P2P (or more convenient), people would pay for it.
People don't use file sharing software for the thrill of breaking the law, but because it is so much more convenient than going to the video store, browsing the many rows of plastic objects by hand, picking out the ones you like, then paying and taking them home, and then returning them to the video store after watching them.
Another reason to use P2P is to obtain TV shows that are not available where you live. It would be nice to be able to buy South Park when it airs, rather than a few years later when the current events they make fun of are not so current anymore.
If their availability was to coincide with the day that a movie gets released to the cinema (opening day), then I'd be willing to pay the price of two movie tickets. Somewhere around 15 - 20 bucks. After opening weeekend, that would have to drop though. My reasoning is b/c it is still equal to or less than the current outing with the significant other on opening night and there aren't any 15 year old girls hopping seats or theatre rooms talking on their cellphones the entire time.
Assuming it is like the rules that gouvern iTunes Music Store maybe it would work. If it is play once then pay again it won't work, at least not for me. I personally visit cinemas a lot, the ticket prices here are 4.5 to 9 euros. In the cinema you get superior projection and sound so 8 dollars is too much for movies that you can play only once on a PC. If you could buy hard to find movies (there's quite a few movies that I cannot find on DVD) then maybe I would use it (though I propably would not because I think iTunes is already too restrictive, I just buy regular audio CDs and rip them to iTunes).
Given that Sony is already installing rootkits I don't think I'm going to like their solution.
There's a used DVD shop near me. Most new movies cost around £5 (~USD$9). I think the most I ever paid was was £7.50 (~USD$14) for the Extended Special Edition of Fellowship of the Rings.
And, I can sell back any of the discs I no longer want. New releases are usually there a few days after they're released.
Screw putting money into the movie studios' paws - give it to local businesses instead!
If a square is really a rhombus, why aren't all triangles purple?
Sony has it all wrong. I don't want to pay a per-download fee. I want to pay a monthly fee, like I do for my satellite, internet, and Netflix subscription.
With my Netflix sub, I pay a flat fee, and I can basically have any movie I'd like to watch practically the day after tomorrow. This flattens the revenue stream for the company, which I'm sure pleases them immensely. I can get my copy of LOTR from Netflix, invite my friends over, watch it on my projector, and have a ball - there's no "per use" fee, no extra money because I had friends over, no "oversize image" charge.
It continually blows me away how clueless and out of touch Big Media is. Look, here's what we want: movies, on demand, on a subscription basis. The revenue potential is immense. We want to watch our first run movies in the theatre, with the option of watching them at home a week or two later. We want them at full DVD quality or better, and we want to be able to save them to our hard drives for convenient watching at a later date.
to the tune of $8 a movie.
That's how much a lot of films go for at the local Best Buy. Now they want to use my media and my bandwidth and not give me a price break? Please. No one would agree to this in the business world, why should I agree to it as a consumer?
I don't even know if I'd pay for something online that I really wanted to own, the packaging and pressed disc makes it worth a few bucks more to me. I guess if it was more of a spur of the moment type of thing I'd say 3 USD or maybe 4 USD for a newer film. In all honesty, I probably wouldn't watch a film I download more than 2 or 3 times.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
I use an existing model - Netflix - to determine reasonable pricing. It's about $1 per DVD (including any extras). For that dollar, Netflix is able to pay round-trip postage (i.e., network transport) and give the movie industry their cut.
Movie downloads should cost no more that $1.
Music downloads, compared to other media downloads (movies, above), should cost no more than 10 cents per track or $1 per album.
After all, I can go to my local library and get the DVDs/CDs for zero dollars.
Can You Say Linux? I Knew That You Could.
Chris
"You can drive out Nature with a pitchfork, but It always comes roaring back again." - Tom Waits
At least with paid media, customers know what they're getting, and it's guaranteed to be what they're getting. With BT, it's totally up to the person who's creating the .torrent file to give it a name (I know, I'm taking this to the extreme), so, in one word, simplicity.
Depending on the quality and delivery mechanism I might be persuaded to pay out 6 dollars per movie. There are a number of caveats in that though. I'd have to be able to watch the movie anywhere I wanted anyway, I wanted. It would have to have a fast delivery mechanism, and It would have to be a new release. Older releases I wouldn't pay that much for. For your standard movie that's not a new release I'd pay about 4 dollars for maybe 5. The cost of distribution if they do it right(ie bittorrent or similar) will be minimal so that shouldn't enter into it. And the demand will be high so I can't see them having a volume problem. I don't believe that 8 dollars a movie is an accurate reflection of their costs vs market demand to pay. They need to keep in mind that they are competing with the illegal download market. It's not a market vacuum.
If you see spelling or grammatical errors don't blame me. I tried to preview but IE here at work borked the CSS
Sony can kiss my ass and pay me!
I will never buy another Sony product after their DRM bullshit.
"I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
It would also depend on the speed of the download they host, the file size, and picture quality if it would be worth it. Otherwise a DVD would far outweigh the slight extra cost. -- Get your Free MacMini's here
I very rarley watch a movie more than once. I listen to music a lot more. I can not watch a movie when I am on my mountian bike, driving my car, are programing. I can listen to music.
What I would really like to see is old TV and radio shows available for free download! How? really simple leave in the old commercials or of the company doesn't exist anymore try to find a commercial from that time for an existing company. I would love to see the Jack Benny Show or any number of old tv shows from the 40s, 50s, 60s, or 70s.
To me the logical progression for TV is a DVR with a built in Bit torrent like system. The cost of distributing the content would plumet and the profits from the commercials could actually increase. To start a network would cost next to nothing. Realtime events like news and sports would have to be streamed or left to regular TV. Now if Google or Apple could just by TCM and TBS to get those movie and television show archives.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
If there's a truly serious problem going on, go and inform the manager. Now, if two people are talking a bit loud before the movie starts, suck it up. But if there are punks and beatniks throwing popcorn, the manager will usually kick such people out. After all, he already has their money. He doesn't necessarily want them to come back in the future, either.
Germany had very serious problems at cinemas in the late 1970s and early 1980s. With the punk movement raging there, it was often the case that feces and urine were thrown at other viewers. Eventually the viewers formed coalitions, and they went to the managers each time troublemakers were active. Soon enough the theatres kicked out the punks, and stopped admitting them in the future. The cinematic experience ended up improving for many people, and in the end the cinema managers gained from extra legitimate traffic.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
TV networks charge advertisers about $15,000 to show a 30-second ad one time while one million viewers watch. (actually alot of the viewers are probably changing the channel or off in the kitchen getting a snack.)
A typical hour of TV has 17 minutes of ads or about 34 30-second ad spots.
So a one-million-viewer TV-hour brings in about $500,000 in advertising revenue.
Thus TV ads bring in about $0.50 per viewer per hour for broadcasters. (I'm amazed they are paying so much. If I channel surf for four hours without watching any ads, I've kindof ripped off the advertisers $2!)
Since a typical movie lasts two hours, advertisers in total are paying about one dollar per viewer.
Network overhead eats alot of that dollar, so it seems sensible to me that movie downloads should cost less than a dollar.
There are several ways to price anything. One approach comes from a notion of Right Livihood. How much would you charge your best friend for the product/service?
If I'm going to actually own the movie after download, then I'd accept paying close to what I pay off the shelf for. (About $12-15) If it's for rent, like netflix, where you don't actually own the film and eventually have to give it back, then something along the lines of current rentals would be fine ($2-5).
To be honest, $5-10 for a movie, is perfectly fine. It's a movie, not just a 3 minute song. Complaining about $10 is pathetic. If the industry decides to go forward with this, and they charge $10 a movie, I'll be happy. The only thing I can see them doing wrong is charging more than the physical store copy.
No.
I can rent it for 3 dollars or wait until it hits the bargain bin at the Wal-Marte' for the same price.
Sony used to be a great company, now they're just a greedy, pathetic corporate troll. The Gollum of the entertainment industry. They wants to copy me preccccioussssssses. Nasty, stinky customers!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I'd be willing to pay more for the movie if it came with the source code to the root kit that they wanted to intall on my machine to enforce DRM in order for me to watch it...
Randy.Flood@RHCE2B.COM
With all of the crappy movies out there, I'd rather pay per-minute so I can save face after 30 minutes of watching a piece of crap movie and turn it off. That said, I wouldn't pay more than $3.99 for a movie, and I'd hope it's in Quicktime HD fullscreen format (check out the new King Kong trailer). If someone starts a service like this and it's in .rm Realplayer format I'll be laughing my way over to bittorrent.com.
My list of multiplex gripes:
Why would anyone pay more for this than they pay for PPV now?
Oddly enough, although PPV has a broadband pipe and "eliminates the need to go to the store", it has yet to eliminate video rental stores, much less video purchase.
I'd accept .0c / min / DL of advertising heavy, DRM filled, recordable once and scheduled by me on demand data, with a subscription service of say around $5 / month.
On the other hand, I would accept a DL purchasable system that can have DRM, would be advertising free and allow me to copy, own and schedule for myself on demand to be used in any device I want for the following at no subscription.
Book: Approximately .1c per 10 pages.
Music: About .5c / min
Video: About .25c / 2 hours
I say $8 is too much because for most things I don't need or want to keep it after watching. For $1 I can rent it for an evening from a Red Box. There are a few that I've bought the DVD before watching and been quite disappointed, but I was dumb enough to buy instead of rent. Or if what I want isn't at a Red Box, I can go to Blockbuster and still pay less than $8 to watch it.
Now, if I want to keep something, $8 might be a fair price, assuming the quality compares well with a DVD. They can leave out the special features and commentary from this $8 download, I rarely watch those things anyway.
But in the end it might still not be worth it, if it's too heavily DRMed then my MythTV box connected to my TV won't play it back, and if so then it's worth exactly zero to me.
I have a hard time comparing a movie download to a DVD....how about comparing it to the UMDs of the PSP instead? This, of course, is because they still charge a premium price for the movie and skip out on the presentation completely. Downloadable movies would have no interactive menus, deleted scenes, interviews, etc - just like UMD movies. I just love Sony's marketing schemes...
The thing is that there will allways be people that will prefer to own a box they can display in the bookshelf.
I am portuguese. If you think my written english is bad, try posting in portuguese!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Bittorrent already works well, and is very economical.
-Alex. http://bit.ly/1iVPtfA
Aren't movies a candidate for a more napster like approach? Given that a lot of movies will only get watched once and that people tend to get hard copy of their favourites.
That's what the rental costs. And I think it would also make it not worthwhile to copy the movie from a friend, because burning a CD and giving it to him would be more hassle than the equivalent of $3.
I also think they shouldn't bother with DRM or worry about erasing the movie from my HD or whatever. If I get a DVD as a rental I can also copy it - nevertheless the system works and people are still renting DVDs. Weird, huh? I think the price has to be low enough to make breaking the law, wasting a raw DVD, wasting time with ripping are not worth it. And that's 3$. About those people for whom 3$ makes it still worthwhile to copy it - they must be very poor, so why not give it to them. There is not much money to be made from them anyway.
Too bad for those DVDs they sell for 20$ these days. I have no idea how to justify those, but then again, no idea who buys those, either. Except I also bought a few, but only because they are really, really my all-time favourite movies. I suspect people would continue to buy their favourite music, just to say thanks.
For $8 I think I can accept a resolution about 30% less than DVD, but I can place onto a portable unit, or 720p quality but computer-playable only.
Well, i pay *2.50 (not sure what this is in dollars) when i go to the cinema with my girlfriend, we get one ticket free (indicating the LOW) price, so i wouldn't really pay more than this.
- http://www.milkme.co.uk
I would like to cut through the phony unrealistic responses.
I keep seeing posts saying "I won't pay $8 for a movie" even though that is what 4 million people do every day. Today you pay $8 to go to a theater, wait in line, watch 20 minutes of previews, watch 10 minutes of commercials, listen to cell phones and annoying people... Yet suddenly $8 is too much to pay. Oh, right: I post on Slashdot, so nobody must know that I once bought a Brittany Spears CD or that I watch anything other than the Sci Fi channel. Oh the horror!
Another poster said that they would only pay $2.99 because they would rather rent. That makes some sense. Except that the very same poster points out that they currently pay more than $2.99 and that they must also include the price of gas, the chance of the rental store being out of stock, and the time involved in finding the movie.
Maybe asking people what they would pay for a product is just not a realistic way to determine what it is really worth. People say $8 isn't worth it, then the go buy it anyway.
I can get a DTV pay per view for $3.99.
Factor in my extra effort for doing a download, I'd say $2.99, and a defninte buy at $2.00
And it has to be of adequate quality to burn well to a DVD.
*And* i have to be able to burn it to a DVD easily- and I mean drag the file into Toast Titanium and click the burn button easy.
I might pay $8-$10 for a movie I want to own (precious few) rather than just watch once or twice; I define ownership as being able to watch it anywhere I want (laptop, DVD players, Buffalo LT in hidef) in at least DVD quality -- in other words, competetive to buying a physical DVD. My personal issue with this as a business model is I've already filled my DVD changers with all the old movies I'm interested in owning, and its a rare new release that is worth buying given the alternative option of renting (1 view). Since I can rent DVD's for new releases at Redbox for $1/night (an honest $1, w/o any of the traditional blockbuster/hollywood hassles or tricks) that covers most of my families DVD appetite. I would pay $1 to d/l a DVD quality (in terms of bitrate and DRM) movie for a 1 day use rather than have to physically go out to RedBox, but given how easy Redbox is I wouldn't pay even a modest premium ($2/night) unless there was a blizzard on or something similarly drastic. I sure wouldn't trust any DRM scheme that dicks with any of my h/w or s/w. Perhaps they could distribute a standalone 'network' DVD burner/player that would d/l and burn a normal DVD (or HD-DVD); its hard to imagine any rube goldberg crap running on a normal system that would be worth anything long term to them w/o having total locked down control of the PC hardware (which isn't an option I would be interested in).
While offering more pricing options increases service costs, I think that pricing should be variable based on:
1. resolution: 320x240, 500x300, 640x480, 1200x1024, etc. resolutions should be priced differently both because of bandwidth cost differentials and also value of being able to view on larger displays for more people to comfortably watch.
2. DRM timeout period: I would expect to pay different amounts for a 24 hour, 2 day, 1 week, etc. viewing period.
And, the cost should be much lower than purchasing a DVD. A purchased DVD will likely to be viewable for many years, can be loaned to friends, etc..
I wrote a web blob on Sony early this week: I bought my wife a Sony MP3 player without doing sufficient pre-purchasing research: this device seems purposefully crippled for playing free MP3 files (specifically any that are not sampled at 44KHz). Sony needs to get a clue, and I am not even going to get into their root kit stupidity.
For me it would depend on a few things: ;-)
1) Date of the internet release (if it's around the cinema premiere, I would be willing to pay a bit more than an average cinema ticket)
2) Can it be viewed multiple times? (if no, can I still view it on my linux pc?)
3) How about subtitles? can I get a reduction of price if I leave them out?
4) Can I "Cam" it?
For a move with a price of around a cinema ticket will be worth it.
If the movie isn't runnig in theaters anymore, I would say 50% off of the cinema price.
What is the maximum acceptable price that slashdot readers would give to different types of downloadable product, taking into account their perception of its true value to them?
$4 for me. That is $1 more than I pay for a typical rental, which is what it would be worth to not leave the house.
-- yawn. --
If Sony realise that there's no point putting DRM on any movie that's available on DVD, given how easily DVDs can be ripped, then they could clean up by selling their back catalogue in a DRM-free open format that can be easily transcoded for use on portable devices, streamed around the house, lent to your friends, and so on.
Unless it was something I *could* burn to DVD, any amount of money is too much. I'm just not in the market to watch something on a computer screen when I could rent it for 2.99 (or 'free' with Netflix) and watch it on my home theater system.
Now, if they offered new releases for download, 8 bucks is *close* to what I'd spend on a download....close, but not really what I'd pay. I'd pay around $5 for a new release download.
--pete
Apples-for-apples, I'll pay the same for downloadable content as I would for in-store or mail-order content.
I might pay a little more if it were more convenient. I might pay a little less if it were less convenient.
Apples-for-apples means the same copy-restrictions, usage-restrictions, and time-bomb restrictions.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Do you buy many movies on DVD, or is $20 for a movie on DVD too much in your opinion? The price you're offering is 1/4 the going rate for most movies, and so it seems like a pretty lowball offer to me. It would cost you nearly $4 to rent the movie, and that means you have to return it.
A DVD is more flexible (at the moment) than a downloaded movie. It can play on any computer or DVD player, which is a cheap device. Your downloaded movie would be considerably harder to play on your TV or portable device, and even if they were to incorporate the DRM code to allow you to authorize that device it would be inconveninent and jack up the price of that object.
So, let's say that DRM'ed downloads would be of less general utility than the DVD. The downloads would have some advantages (e.g. the ability to back them up), but that's relatively minor.
Still, it sounds like you're really lowballing them on the price at a mere five bucks. Can I then infer that you think that $20 for a DVD as it is now is too much, and that you don't buy many DVDs?
$0.07USD for a tune
$0.40USD for a movie.
Interestingly enough, 5 bucks is my personal cutoff point for durable "entetainment" media, vhs tape or CD/DVD, and has been for many years now. I just got disgusted with the predatory pricing and obvious control-freakism of the **AAs. I do yard sales or like the bargain bins, etc. Picked up a VHS tape yesterday in fact from blockbuster in the "previously viewed rack", 4.99$. That's it, won't pay more than that for those things, so downloading would have to be cheaper than that by some amount, as it is more work and requires you to provide the storage media, whether reburnt to optical disk or placed on your hard drive.
These big companies should buy a clue, reproduction at high numbers level would allow even lower cost production, which could mean lower end user price structure, with more volume sales and, IMO, potentially higher profit margins. At 20$ and up a pop I buy *no* movies, they make nothing from me directly. They want all the economic benefits of better technology for themselves, but simply refuse to grant customers the same deal, which lead, again, IMO, in large part to the wide acceptance of file sharing. I don't do file sharing, but I understand the mindset of dealing with large scale ripoff cartels. Basic human psychology, people lose any sort of respect for companies (or governments for that matter), that are obviously acting in an adversarial manner. They piss people off, so the people start to react accordingly and not care about them. It's a natural backlash that was to be expected.
The people at these cartels who make the ultimate decsions on pricing are all millionaires. They are never going to have the same mindset or awareness about cost and money as joe and jane bubba. They may intellectually think and believe they understand, but their actions prove that they don't really "get it".
Or at least 99.99% certain that the answer will be easy, and that being: Nothing. Because they will be using DRM. A DRM'd file (even if it will play on my OS, which is normally not the case) is worse than worthless.
On the off chance someone's smart enough not to, I'd say $5 or so for a movie that's still in theaters, $3 during the new release phase (about the price of a rental), and about $1-$1.50 after that. Otherwise, Netflix is cheaper, and they're paying postage.
I'm not holding my breath, though. If they DRM the stuff, I will find a source for DRM-free versions. If that's them, and they don't charge exorbitant rates (such as $8), they'll get my money. If not, I know plenty of other ways to get them.
I think there -might- be a few movies out there I've watched 4 or 5 times, the rest once or twice (and truly terrible ones, not even once, turn it off before any more of my time gets wasted). This is not by any means unusual, it's the rare person who's seen a large number of movies more then once or twice. Given that, this is a rental, period. And yes, if they offer DRM-free versions, they will get shared. Maybe they haven't noticed, but that already happens, DRM or not. Movies will be "shared" no matter what-if I rent a movie, nothing's stopping me from inviting 6 people over to view it, or loaning it to someone before the rental's up. Rentals can be easily ripped. Given that, what's the difference, why hassle people you're trying to encourage to pay you money for your service?
Use your head, content distributors! The first rule of ANY business is that you must deliver what your customer wants. Your customer wants an easy, hassle-free experience. Your customer doesn't want to worry about what restrictions are placed on what file, he wants to watch a movie! Deliver that at a price reflecting how little it costs to deliver over the net, and watch customers flock to your service. Deliver difficult-to-use stuff that won't burn properly to a DVD, won't transfer to your friend, and is priced exorbitantly, and oh well, at least there'll be plenty of seeds on the torrents!
Those are your options, Sony. There isn't a third one. Whether your competition is legal or not, you're not the only game in town anymore, and you damn well better get that through your heads. And that applies to all the other "content distributors" out there, too. Quit trying to figure out ways to STOP people from using your product, and start thinking up ways to get them to START using your product. You'll find you make a whole lot more sales that way.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
Just because it's a new means of distibution doesn't mean it should cost, ala the ATM.
With music, for example, a reasonable cost would be $0.10/minute of unencumbered music. That way us classical lovers and you 3-minute music lovers get charged the same amount, i.e. $8.00 for 80 minutes worth of music with should then be copyable to a CD. Or it could even be bumped up to $0.12/minute.
A movie should be treated the same way. I get to download it and watch it at my convenience, not theirs. A time-bombed file could be charged much less.
If the media companies would pull their heads out and stop thinking instant profit, I think in the long run they would make much more profit if they treated us as customers, not as criminals.
If I could download for reasonable costs, I would be more apt to be legal. But when I'm charged an arm and a leg so they can make huge profits, I look for my entertainment elsewhere.
I'd pay $20 for a movie that is free of "DRM", has no "platform dependencies", has no region locking, and can be conveniently backed up / transcoded / burned to the prevailing media format of the day.
I'd fully expect the movie to contain watermarks that contained transaction information (i.e., showing I'm the licensee of the content).
However, for each nuisance "feature", I would deduct 90% of the value of the product. A movie with DRM: $2, that is dependent on a codec that I can't license for my "VideoWidget 6000", $0.20, that I can't watch at my in-laws house in Western Europe, $0.02... You get the idea.
As a consumer, the Fair-Use Circumvention Kits and and Digital Restricted Media really torpedo the value of media products. I don't deny the right of vendors to ship their products with it -- but if in the process they spend millions of dollars on developing and implementing technology that is functionally obsolete / cracked days after release and then expect me to pay for the reduced quality and utility of the product through higher costs, well, I won't.
My kids get DVDs as gifts from people all the time (many from family overseas, so I had to modify the firmware in my player to let me kids watch foreign-language cartoons and puppet shows), but I don't buy them.
Heck, nowadays you almost have to RIP DVDs to make them watchable. Anyone buy "Robots" for their kids? There's a 5 minute propaganda film at the beginning blaring house music and showing this filthy alleyway with a seedy "pirate" selling bootlegs of a table and showing people shoplifting from a store. It scares the hell out of the kids -- the images themselves, they don't understand the meaning. One of my kids asked what it was supposed to mean, and what am I to say? Ever try to explain propaganda to a little kid? These people are lying to you, but they hope if they lie long enough people will accept it as truth? To top it off, there are previews for 4 movies that you can't skip over.
Solution? RIP and burn a "consumer edition" DVD that has the propaganda film and offending ads removed. Now, I've got a homespun DVD and a backup that the kids can toss in their and the movie starts right away, just like I would expect it to if I was the one that bought it for the kids.
MPAA member companies -- get a clue!
Well personally I wouldn't even pay the .99 for iTunes...get it into .49 a song and $5 for an entire album and perhaps we can talk.
As for movies....$2 for anything up to a two hour movie, perhaps another $1 for each additional two hours...
If you want to get into TV series $10 a season...
Power Corrupts,Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, leaving one person(group)in charge is absolutely corrupt.
....the price will be determined by the standard of quality of the download. If say the quality of the download is EXACTLY the same as a DVD, then you could charge about 75% of the full price of the DVD since you are not getting the case and the cover, nor are you incurring storage, shipping, and handling costs.
So a $16.00 DVD would be $12.00 to download if it indeed was an exact digital copy. If the quality is degraded/compressed by a certain percentage, then you would apply the percentage of compression to the price, thereby lowering the cost even further.
Of course, once you own it, YOU OWN IT....meaning you are allowed to copy it as many times as you like for backup purposes.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Sounds like a good business model, but will I be able to put said movies onto a DVD and watch them on my TV? That would be the most important feature, if it does not have that, then no I would continue to purchase normal DVDs.
-- Josh
"Whoopie! Man, that may have been a small one for Neil, but that's a long one for me!" - Pete Conrad
(which are about 80% of an American dollar right now!)
I'd pay $1 for a previously unheard (by me) song. Another if I like it and keep it.
$2 for a "hit" or a "classic" song
$10 for a whole album of 10+ songs.
and $ for a movie (maximum of $10).
Me.
--- Zhez
I would pay this amount (or slightly more) depending on the circumstances.
1) DRM - Can't be more intrusive than iTunes
2) Movies are hi-def. 720p.
3) there is an easy to use option (other than a HTPC) to display these movies in my entertainment center.
4) The download method does not involve peer to peer. If I'm paying for it, I'm not donating my bandwith to the company.
--ST
http://www.theMediaBunker.com
Price is not an issue. As long as downloads are less than or equal to store bought DVDs its cool with me.
What is an issue is DRM. I understand we can't get away from it and most likely some form of copy protection will be included However I don't want another iTunes crap, where an iTunes song only works with an iPod. This sucks and is the #1 reason I got no songs from iTunes (even the free ones I was eligible for from the Pepsi deal).
If you're going to have DRM then have it be standard across all devices. If I purchase a movie, I don't even want to notice it. I don't want to crack my own movies (as it is the case currently with DVDs) so that they i can watch them on a device that the original supplier does not offer.
Why would I spend 8 bucks per movie when I can get them for less than a buck from Netflix and rip them in any format I want?!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
A Brilliant Mind An interesting movie. About a very smart man with a brain disorder that enabled (forced) him into creating a parallel reality that simply wasn't there. All his energy and brilliance went into coping with this imaginary world.
He was able to regain his senses and apply his intelligence to real-world problems. For this he was acclaimed and honored. But for the rest of his life, he was never sure whether the people that he met or even his interaction with daily routine was real or part of his unbalanced imagination.
Such an apt metaphor for the movie industry. $8 downloads per title is fantasy, and all the financial projections based on such a figure are fantasies. Maybe, just maybe, for some excellent movies, for some wealthy people, $1 per download might work.
Movies are simply too available now for there to be any vast difference in price between what is there and what is new. Blank DVD ROMs are about 25 cents each. This is the current 'swap meet-water cooler exchange' rock-bottom price for a movie. Anything above this price is the utility that is added by the MPAA companies. Store prices of last years theater releases are $15. That's the max upper price for a physical disk, box, packaging, and resellable legal license. Older movies go for $5 for the same deal, regardless of quality.
So what Sony is saying is that their new movies are so good, so special that they are worth far more than any of the titles of the 20th century. And this is so without the disk and packaging. And you have to pay for the downloading and storage costs.
Such incredible arrogance.
I give them about 10 years before they're gone. And that's because they are such an integrated hardware-software company and have a lot of built-up good will from the 20th century to squander on madness.
Someday, someone will point out to them that the era of 200 million dollar movies with $30 theater tickets-popcorn-baby sitter costs are over. Whether the fantasy infected minds of the top executives will be able to separate reality from fantasy will determine the fate of their company and the people who work for them.
If it weren't Sony I would probably be willing to pay $5 or so to download a movie that was already available on DVD. Possibly a little bit more ($6 or $7) if it was out just after the theater release.
But since it is Sony that is looking at this with their rootkit DRM and their general disdain for their customer, I will not be buying anything of theirs. I personnaly am boycotting anything Sony. And in this day of P2P it is all that much easier. If there is something that you want badly enough, you don't even have to quit your boycott to get it. Ha, take that Sony.
note: The part about the P2P is in jest. I don't use P2P very much. I prefer to just copy the DVD directly.
-- ssoorrrryy,, dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh oonn.. -Quote found on actual fortune cookie.
I agree with others above, $5 is the most I'd pay to download AND *own* a movie. This would have to include the ability to burn a DVD.
For $10/month I get all of HBO's content and all HBO's moves on demand. There are typically 30-50 movies available.
So you work out the price.
For specific movies that are already out of theaters, the acceptable price would be around $2.50 for a movie that is not quite released on DVD to basically $1 for a 1-5 year old movie to free for anything older than 5 years.
Folks there is so much free content out there, and content that is inexpensive that most content really isn't worth much, particularly movies which in general are something you watch once. Let me say it again... there is tons and tons of content. You can't watch all the content out there if you tried, if you spend every hour of the day... there's too much. When there's too much of something, the price inevitably falls. Always.
($8? Did sony forget they're competing with netflix and hbo?)
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
I'd pay relative to the IMDB score of the movie. This means that I wont' buy for at least 1 week for recent releases, and might pay less/more at a later date, but that's what a movie is worth to me. $5.50 for a 5.5/10 ro $9+ for something like The Godfather.
Plus it might encourage them to make more "good" movies. This however assumes that there is no way to tamper with a ranking on IMDB (which is not true ATM IRRC).
DRM: I'd also want to be able to copy it to my laptop for car-rides and have it on my PVR so that I can watch it as frequently as I want. Basically, so long as my "play-key" can be installed (and re-installed) on up to 4 computers, burned 2-3 times, and the play key is no longer required 10 years after purchase (it opens itself up), then I'd be happy. Though I doubt any studio would be happy with this "DRM".
--- Zhez
Okay, here is my take on the whole music and video download thing.
The studios and **AA dumbasses are trying to sell a product at a premium price that is of far less value than the free alternatives. (legal or otherwise.)
Music
I can live with the itunes model, it allows for decent usage rights and the quality is about the same as what you would find on a p2p network. At the current pricing scheme the ease of use usually makes it worth just clicking a couple times to get what I want to hear.
TV
I was originally pretty excited to see tv shows added to the itunes faire, until the details came out. The companies behind this masterpiece expect viewers to be happy with paying $1.99 for a product that is far below the quality of the product available on the p2p networks. I can live with some simple DRM, but give me decent quality. I think most early adopters are geeks and such that have HDTVs or at least a quality monitor which will not look too hot with a 320x240 encoded clip. Why should I pay for a clip with that resolution, when I can get something with 4x the pixels for free on most tv sites?
Movies
Here we go again... I wouldn't have a problem paying sony $8 for a movie, if it was in HD with at least 5.1 channel audio. However, I don't expect that to be the case. I have tried the movielink service as well, and the banding and compression artifacts made the movie almost unwatchable. Why should I pay good money for a product that is of far less quality than what is readily available.
Come on studios, your getting beaten on a technical level by high school kids playing in their basements on their parents PCs. Hell, just hire a couple of these kids to do your encoding work for you.
Their movies are $1.99-$4.99 for a "rental", which means you must watch it within 30 days of downloading and you have 24 hours to finish the movie once it's started. The software is pretty decent and takes care of queueing the downloads and deleting them once you've watched them. There are no monthly fees etc, so it's easy enough just to try it out.
Whether the Register's original 2003 story was (or remains) accurate or not about the "loss leader" status of the iTMS, the store at least isn't the hugely profitable cash engine in that mix. It's the end-to-end experience Apple is selling, and a huge part of that is the iPod, which is where the big profits come in. They make their money on the players.
From the POV of a movie studio, an analogous model would be one where they distributed the movie itself at something like cost, and made their big profits by selling tiVos or something to watch it with in a seamless, easy-to-use way. I'm not seeing how Sony, which does make TVs, is going to particularly win iPod-like market share in the arena of the TV market or even the digital recorder market. That's leaving alone the other studios that don't have any analog to the iPod at all.
I'm a big movie buff. Oddly, I love the pay-per-track model of the iTMS and was amazed how long it took someone to offer it for real -- but for movies I'm more inclined to do the subscription thing. We have the 3-films-at-a-time Netflix subscription, paying a monthly fee. It's going to be dang hard for a studio that's siloed into its own library of Warner or Miramax films to compete with that, even if the online distribution's easier than Netflix's (very well-done) mail system. For my modest fee I get any DVD released, across them all, from Netflix.
Another response gets it dead-on: Will we pay $5 apiece to watch "Roman Holiday"s? Well, once in a blue moon, from Blockbuster when we used to do it that way. (Actually I own that DVD, but leave that.) But when we're paying by the month, I do find those old titles and TV shows in collections and stuff I'll take a chance on just to see. Just got into the BBC "The Office" that way.
What I'd suggest is a modest subscription fee per month for "channels" independent of studio source and gathered by subject just like some of today's basic cable channels. That matches up with the way people are used to seeing TV; you sort of know what Lifetime or Hallmark is going to show you. Pay $10 a month for the "Independents" channel and you can get as many indie movies as you want, point to point, from the available library. That's about what people pay for the HBO or Cinemax packages, and they get more control over the programming. It'd be the baby step away from the current system that gives us a lot more power as point-to-point consumers.
As far as DRM, I personally would accept a transient copies model if I'd paid for Showtime or HBO, which a lot of people do. Buying by subject type ("The Adventure Channel") and being able to choose the movies on the fly still offers me a ton more; if it was available at around the same price people would jump.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
You are comparing renting to buying, of course they don't work out. If you compare the $8 to buy a movie online vs the cost of buying a DVD, then it could be quite competitive depending on the relative quality of the video, and the amount DRM.
Furthermore, the $1/DVD Netflix estimate is unreasonable. Most people with Netflix do not cycle through movies that fast and if they did, then Netflix would have to raise the price to cover the additional costs. Looking at the plans, a typical cost/DVD is more around $1.50 to $3.50, and I would guess that the Netflix average is about $2.50 per DVD which is only slightly less than a brick-and-mortar rental store. Unless you are a huge film junkie, the main advantage of Netflix over Blockbuster is the selection and convienience, not the price.
Music downloads, compared to other media downloads (movies, above), should cost no more than 10 cents per track or $1 per album.
What argument do you have for that? It costs that much just to run iTMS. I think that $10 for a CD is very reasonable given the amount of enjoyment I will get out of it over my life - far more than I will out of a movie. Millions of other people happen to agree that the current prices for CD's are reasonable, hence the buy them.
After all, I can go to my local library and get the DVDs/CDs for zero dollars.
Yes, you can also get books - they even have bigger selection of those. However, that hasn't done anything to devalue books you can purchase new/used from book stores. Why would music and video be any different?
Why not Priceline or Ebay models? "I will pay $2 for this movie." Seller takes it or leaves it.
I watch movies more than i listen to music, so paying a monthly fee for music seems a waste to me as there are days i do not listen to music and therefore would be a waste to pay monthly. But i watch TV and movies everyday, so paying a monthly fee for a service that would let me choose my viewing pleasure, and had a large enough selection to satisfy my daily viewing habits then that would be worth a monthly fee as long as the fee would not be more than what i pay for cable + movie tickets + rental fees.
Buy a AAA title opening week and you'll get it for $15. After that it's ~$20. That's for a non-DRM'd, I OWN this movie, purchase. Drop down to $10-15 for older or b rated movies.
Renting a movie is usually $1-2 for an older or b rated movie, 2-3 dollars for a new AAA title. I would be willing to pay ~$3 for a DRM'd to all hell 2 day rental of a movie.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
I can get rootkits for free, why would I want to pay $8 for them???
Why do these online stores think they have to have a single price policy! Not all movies are worth the same, this is stupid... it only helps retarded consumers who can't understand anything else. They want to sell movie ! Ok, then price everything at 8$ as a start and tweak the prices independently to maximize your profits, you'll also maximize the global happiness.
\u262D = \u5350
I'm pretty much done with the media companies until they revamp their system to be a micro-payment by use or unlimited subscription system for their content and provide real-time on demand access (I know it's not that easy or more accurately cost effective to do but those are my terms =). Most of what they produce is worthless in terms of artistic content and up until allofmp3.com I hadn't bought any music (i.e. cds) in probably 3+ years (with the exception of an occassional bargain bin blues, jazz, or classical) item. That said I wasn't downloading illegally because to be honest I don't have a problem with those who do steal due to the fact that my hatred of the media companies has compromised my values in this case. I just didn't find their content worth stealing. Until I can get anything from their cataloge in realtime under either a micro-payment or subscription system I'm not interested in any priced download.
Disclaimer: I have been a DVD slut (I love even the worthless movies) but that is coming to an end as I buy fewer and fewer due to increasing distaste with the media houses love of DRM and use of legal maneuvering to try and squeeze blood from a turnip. The concept that I have to use my DVDs in certain approved ways (i.e. playing in certain devices, leasing the content rather than truly owning it, etc.) really pisses me off and has led to me buying MUCH fewer DVDs in the past year. But hey that's me and I'm sure they'll never learn until they're not profitable anymore and that's a few years off at least.
Whenever people make comments like this I really have to wonder what they're thinking. People aren't going to crowd the family in front of the PC instead of the TV, or huddle around the cellphone with a 3" screen. They're going to take it on the bus, or to a hotel. The 'cinematic experience' is fine when you're going to be at home, but I doubt you're going to carry around your surround-sound system and projection TV.
Personally I'd prefer to have a book, but not everyone's big into reading so I can understand the desire for convenience devices.
When digitally distributed content matches the quality and usability of its retail counterpart I am willing to pay the same amount as I would for that retail counterpart. I want it at full quality and I want to own what I am paying for. A good example is hl-2 on Steam. Same content, same quality, same price.
About $1.00 for a CD quality audio track with no DRM.
About $2.00 for an temporary movie rental at full DVD quality (Netflix price).
About $15.00 -$20.00 for a movie purchased at full DVD quality with no DRM.
About $45.00 - $60.00 for a video game with full content.
Now if they want to offer their content at a lesser quality with more restrictions that's fine so long as it is at a discounted price. Then I have an option.
But why would they do that when the perceived value of the degraded content is equal to that of the actual media?
After all, I can go to my local library and get the DVDs/CDs for zero dollars.
So why don't you? If all this content is legitimately available through your local library, why are we having this discussion in the first place?
Regardless of the actual cost of movies, how will our ISP's recoup the cost of our excessive downloads? Providers like Comcast have been known to halt accounts due to excessive bandwidth without notice. When movies are downloaded on a commodity basis, providers might be looking to recoup bandwith cost by increasing their rates, which in turn raises the total cost of the movie.
ANY content-only oriented scheme for media distribution (meaning any scheme that reduces the market frictions between media content producers and media content consumers) will ultimately fall short of expectations as long as the legacy distributors (your Warner Bros., your Paramounts, etc.) are involved. Much like the airline industry, a new, more efficient and ultimately more profitable model has emerged for distributing all forms of media: the download. The problem is, the new model relies less and less upon distributors, and more and more upon any system that reduces the barriers between content producers (artists, journalists, musicians, etc.) and consumers. The legacy distributors, much like legacy air carriers, have entirely too much invested in what is an ultimately doomed infrastructure. And, like the airline industry, we will not see the "new reality" come to complete fruition until those legacy distributors begin "reorganizing" (read: going bankrupt). Their hold on power is still great, and it will be a while before they go completely tits up, but the time is coming. Web portals like Google and Yahoo are the media distributors of tomorrow. And the successful ones will be those that figure out how to monetize a smaller and more frictionless interaction between consumers and their content. Sony has too much to lose. Apple will continue to innovate, but as long as they partner with legacy distributors who are NOT aggressively pursuing the new download-based model (striving for a frictionless market for media), they will ultimately be held back. Still, I think the dismantling of the old distribution regimes are inevitable. Time and pressure... time and pressure.
Kudos to original poster. This discussion is much more valuable than RIAA/MPAA bashing.
All prices in $CDN:
.30. $3.20 per movie (DVD quality).
I am a "gold" member at Blockbuster. One current release movie rented with a "favourites" free. $3 per movie. Every fifth rental is free. Which comes to $2.50 a movie.
Of course, its a pain to drive to the store... add $1 for the convenience. But, no wear and tear on rental media - subtract
But, I have to pay the bandwidth. 60GB costs me $40. Figure around 800MB for a movie. That means each movie costs me 53 cents to download ($40 for 75 movies).
The answer is $2.70 CDN, make it nice and round in US terms - $2.50US per movie.
Remove DRM - which means I would watch a movie (maybe) 2 times (average would be less -- I don't have that much time). Add $1 for the second viewing (note that Blockbuster has no late fees). $3.50US per movie.
Now, notice that Blockbuster was taking a cut in my rentals, which Sony (being the producer AND distributor) isn't. So, this is more profitable for Sony. $8? Good if Sony can get it.
Ratboy
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
The question is: is a movie download worth $8? It isn't clear exactly what a "movie download" is here. Things that would bear on the value would include:
(1) can you copy the download to another computer, such as a laptop, or a portable device?
(2) can you burn it onto a DVD so that you can play it in any DVD player, such as a portable, or in the DVD player in your minivan, etc?
(3) is there any way to transfer/lend the file to someone else, once you've watched it?.
(4) can you download the file again if you lose the first download?
(5) is there any limit on the number of times you can watch it?
The answer is probably no to all of the above. So the question becomes: is a "movie download" that is watchable only on the computer or set-top box to which you downloaded it worth $8? Keep in mind that your computer or set-top box will have to have the SONY-mandated DRM before you can even consider this question.
As most of the answers here suggest, the answer to that question is a matter of looking at the alternatives. You can spend the $8 on the downloadable movie, or you can spend it on something else, or you can save the $8, including (for example) investing it in SONY stock, depending on the opinion you have of SONY after looking at their idea.
What are the alternatives to spending the $8 on a "downloadable movie"? Sticking with just similar entertainment options:
(1) You can buy a DVD. Newly-released DVD's movies can run up to $30, but even recently-released ones can be had for under $20, and older ones are often available for under $10. They don't have any of the limitations above, and it is no problem (at present) to create a digital file from them.
(2) You can buy a VHS tape. Older technology; lower quality; cheaper than DVD's. Older titles can be had for practically nothing if bought used or picked up at yard sales, especially kids' titles. Like physical DVD's, few or none of the DRM restrictions.
(3) Rent a DVD or VHS tape at Blockbuster,etc Under $5.00. Any number of people of can watch it. No device restrictions. You have to pick it up and return it. On the other hand, at present downloading a movie is going to take some time also. In fact, in many parts of the US, driving to the video store and carrying a DVD home is higher bandwidth than downloading the movie.
(4) Join a DVD monthly plan like Netflix. $10 per month for 1 DVD at a time, delivered to your door. If you are efficient, you can probably watch 8 movies per month this way, although that takes work. $20 per month lets you have 3 DVD's at a time. Watch them in any DVD player or computer.
(5) Borrow a DVD from a friend. Free. But you have to have friends, and to watch a lot of DVD's this way, you probably have to buy a few to lend out in return.
(6) Borrow it from the public library. Free. But you might have to wait your turn, and the library probably doesn't even have all the titles that you might be interested in. However, depending on your library, it does have a lot of titles.
(7) Go to a theater. Average 2004 U.S. ticket price: $6.21. Currently the only option for newly-released movies, because of the delayed DVD "window". You have to get yourself to the theater, and there are some additional costs such as parking, popcorn. etc. Most people don't want to go to a movie alone, so you have to buy more than one ticket and find someone else interested in the same movie. Going to a theater is more of a "special event".
(8) Pay-Per-View. $3 to $5. Any number of people can watch. You have to wait for it to be on PPV, but there are always a lot of PPV choices.
(9) Wait for the movie to be on cable or broadcast TV. Free if you have the channel. But movies are available first on premium channels. Premium cable channel packages cost between $20 and $50 per month. On non-premium channels, there will be advertising. Some premium packages include On Demand, or you can purchase a PVR, such as a Tivo. Otherwise you have to wait for any you have to wa
the latter identifiable by the snapping of their fingers when they approve of something, and the plucked double-bass tones they make when they walk.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
well, all this is fine and dandy, :)
but i still enjoy my favorite price; free
Like others, I will not pay anything at all for any Sony content now or ever again. Their DRM rootkit crossed the line. They are the enemy. I would be happy to download a pirated copy of a Sony DVD or CD in the unlikely event they had something I wanted to see or hear. I will continue to pay cash for recordings from independent classical music labels so long as they don't try to shove DRM up my ass.
Netflix has already established what the market will bear. Its a little under $2 per movie (12 movies a month for around $22). Yes, I know that's for rentals, not purchases (wink, nod). Sony is welcome to try for $8 but they're in for a painful learning experience if they do.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
... as soon as they want to compete...
Seriously, they really never wanted to be in the messy business of "distribution" to, what, actual "people", they wanted to deal with middlemen (theater owners, distributors) - middlemen whom they can take advantage of, middlemen who say yes!, middlemen who can be controlled with a paid-for trip to Aruba and to see F-1 racing or sponsored tennis matches.
They see this business as a way to make make more profit, cleanly (computers are clean work), and eliminate the middleman hassle. But until it works, and works well, they will keep the old system.
I would be willing to pay up to about $3 less than buying the DVD in a local store (Target or Walmart). And I would do that only if I got content that was at least as high a resolution as what was on the DVD. I won't paymuch for a movie in iPod format as that wouldn't look too sweet on my HDTV. Patrick
Think Deeply.
No bullshit. No DRM. No malware/rootkits. Just a good quality video I can burn to a DVD. I'd pay 10 bucks. If any bullshit of any kind is required, then I'd rather just stay with the present DVD model. New technology doesn't interest me if it has to be castrated.
Technology is about creating something great for people to use in more flexible, novel ways. If it has to come with a ton of restrictions, the purpose of new technology is half defeated in my eyes.
Here's a new perspective, If they want online sales to be a success world over, they have to consider price thresholds at local markets. I am currently staying in India and 8$ is unheard of, with rampant piracy you really think people would be willing to pay 8$, when they could get it for under a dollar? We pay 150 Rupees at Multiplexes to watch a movie that's 3$ and that is considered expensive cause hey we can get a burger at mc'Ds for 20 Rupees that less than 50 cents. At normal theatres with cheaper seats we could prolly see the same movie for as low as 1.5 $. So for it to work here, It would have to be 3$ or less, considering that you'd get a better experience at a theatre.
I would pay up to $10 for a movie, just the same as I do at the local Movie Theater. My only concern is that I would need to be able to take the movie with me anywhere with any device of my choosing. If like iTunes it's tied into a single proprietary format that won't work on other devices, then screw it. I'll just rent the DVD and rip my own copy.
Of course, that $35 would be for DRM-free, which of course we'll never see from Hollywood.
Ha! Given Sony's latest DRM & PR faux pas with the rootkit, I'd say I'm a little gun shy about pulling the trigger on downloading anything from those dorks.
:-)
Maybe the $8 is going toward their new legal fund?
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
I would be willing to pay quite a bit for a digital download movie... If the movie was something obscure, hard to find, or out of print.
The determiner of success will not be if they get all the new and top movies available, it will be if I can order and download virtually any movie ever made, with no concern for availability, obscurity, or nationality of the movie.
I'd love to see the cost reflect the savings and not be another tax on downloading. I remember the Stephen King novel they set up for download, The Plant. They priced it out so by the end it would cost the same as a novel. Excuse me but downloading text is dirt cheap. Most of the cost in a novel are production and distribution. It was a financial flop but for good reason, most would rather have a printed novel for the same price. To add insult to injury if you wanted multiple formats you had to pay for each one individually. If the costs are 50% lower then the costs should reflect that. Distribution is a massive cost in film and does at times reflect half the costs with advertising and such. Theater owners get roughly 50%, less the first week and gradually more over time. The costs of striking prints or producing DVDs should be roughly equal to the savings so say 50% of the costs of a movie ticket would be reasonable. Unfortunately greed will say yes but if we get the same as a theater ticket we double our take overnight. It's what happened with CD sales. We all bought into the higher cost of production early on and accepted the CD surcharge. Now CDs cost pennies to produce and the costs have continued to go up with artists percentages being fairly flat. It was industry wide price fixing and blatantly illegal.
I do not know how much movies cost in the UK, but in the US I can simply wait and buy a DVD with any movie on it from Wallmart for about this same price permanently or rent it from Netflix for about a dollar. Even then I have to say that I simply do not buy as much as I used to. It is not that I am downloading their content. It is that I despise them what they have become and their are now other fun things to do that do not make me feel like I am selling my soul. The problem is Sony still thinks people still desperately feel they must have their products immediately when in fact they have become the modern squares. Nothing turns off consumers as much as the taint of lawsuits, DRM, pedophilia, greed and visible heavy handiness. They are seeking total DRM control not because of piracy but because they do not want anyone making lower cost options or distribution methods being created they cannot price fix on. Piracy stopped being a real reason for DRM long ago if ever. They know it does not stop people from taking content, what they have discovered was it does give them the power to create automatically monopolies on players, media and software. Using DRM licensing they have total power of any model of distribution and who is allowed to create it something they like very much as they are used to this power from the past. All they have to do is say this model is no secure enough or this group needs to negotiate for this DRM license, or sue anyone creating a model they do no like using the DRM laws even if they really should not apply. They think doing this will allow them to still make huge amounts of money in an era when their services as an intermediary are no longer needed. They are not people no how to work in the commodity business which is what the media is becoming. It requires real work, real value, real talent and products and is much harder to manipulate with their well worn often illegal marketing techniques. They fear change because they feel doomed and unable to cope. The irony is that if they embraced it they would only have to purge a bunch of gluttonous overpaid executives and no talent artist from their system. Any hard working person who has an eye for talent and marketing can make money even in a commodity. Look at orange juice or cereal marketing. How awful for them needing to really try for a change.
Content is all that matters. I wouldnt pay the same for a 30min clip of a show as I would for a movie. Furthermore, movies are variable.
I think the older the movie is, the less it should cost. However as to pricing. I would pay no more that 4$ for any type of downloadable media. PRof.
Price is going to have to be approximately video store pricing, especially if they want to include DRM. People renting movies on-line are renting movies to watch once or twice. If it is a "must-own" movie, there's a proven market for the deluxe boxed set with the free toy and "The Making of The Making of..." DVD. Online sales are orthogonal to the "ownership" market.
Back to the subject. Because there is no face to face transaction, online sales are very much trust driven. People trust Apple. They've made their mistakes but, in most battles, they are seen as taking the consumer's side over the MLAAs. Sony on the other hand has proven (not just in the last few days) to be absolutely despicable. If Sony opens a music service, they will be unable to resist the urge to hurt their customers. You can do this when you are a small-time con artist constantly on the move but when you are an international brand, that stuff will kill you.
Microsoft is starting to realize this: their software (particularly their media software) is quite correctly considered to be crippled compared to OSX and Linux because Bill and Steve have been taking turns sucking up to the MLAA. Now they are finding that they are losing the battle for the living room and that the MLAA aren't delivering money, market or media.
That would really depend. First, what types of restrictions are we talking about? Is the license per computer (device) or per person / family?
Will I get to watch it again and again, or will I at some point need to purchase approval to view the content again?
Will it install a rootkit on my computer?!?!
If it is per device, what happens should I want to move (not copy) the content to another device?
The biggest problem here is TRUST, and I DO NOT TRUST THEM!
There are many more questions this bring up. At this point I'm ready to give up on the members of the Motion Picture Assholiation of America and the Recording Industry Assholiation of America. Time and time again they have chosen to disregard common sense and implement an attack on their own consumer base in an effort to not just prolong a failing business model, but to try to make a business model that is completely abhorrent to a free market.
If the member companies of the motion picture industry would really like to mend some fences, they should consider completely dissolving the MPAA. Maybe then I would no longer look at them as a really bad joke.
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
I wouldn't pay more than what I currently pay for Pay-per-View or a rental from BlockBuster.
-Bill
http://gatheredtogether.org/ Christian Ministries
-- http://GatheredTogether.org - Ministries Helping Ministries
The correct answer is: arrest the house burglers, and allow best buy to compete with other forms of entertinment and other retailers to set the price for TVs, and also (and I'm sure this is going to be a really popular opinion here), crack down hard on illegal P2P transferers and allow the movie studios to set their prices in a free market way. If you dont like the cost of the movie, read a book, or make your own movie. That's how the market works. There is no possible reason that you *NEED* to see the latest movie.
I'd pay $5-$7 for a movie that I can copy to my hearts content... They could embed a digital code in the file to link it to me, so that if it get's circulated an the internet they have a chain of ownership. If they want to instill some sort of limitted viewing, though, then I'm only willing to pay about $1, maybe $2... For anything more, though, I'll do like most said and either wait for it to come out on DVD, HBO, et. al. or find a copy on the net.
Isn't it funny how the entertainment industry is quick to forget the basic economic principle, "if you charge to much, then customers will look for alternative ways to get it." Entertainment is not critical to survival, and the economy (atleast in the US) doesn't support their business model. From the looks of it, most of the other countries are in similar situations...
Although I haven't read all of the details (especially the legalese) it looks like Sony might be thinking along the right lines, however, I suspect this is more of a PR move given the backlash from earlier this week. If anyone can pull it off, though, I would think Sony could before most of the others...
In summary, unattractive squares should stick to Linux and Windows. FairPlay is for different thinkers.
At least at $8/pop a downloaded movie would be cheaper than a store-bought one. Which is better than we can say for downloaded CDs (99c per song equals more than most CDs I'm willing to buy).
And $8 is only about twice what it costs to rent a DVD nowadays.
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Whats the time value of a movie? Netflix turnarounf is about two business days after requesting a new DVD and assuming they have ample supply. With downloading I'd want to be almost as fast to start viewing as I selected it.
There was a post previously where the Pay Per View were thinking of sending a DVD copy of the event/movie a couple of days after the PPV event. If this was the same with the DVD purchased online, then I would be willing to pay a little more even, $10-$15 (Canadian) which is a little cheaper than buying the DVD.
I would be willing to pay the $8 if the movie did NOT have DRM or any limitations on how I play/view it. I want to be able to burn my legally purchased copy on to a DVD and watch it anywhere, a portable DVD player, my main player, or even my XBox. Considering it would cost them next to nothing to distribute this movie, $8 is a fair price. The theaters charge that and have all these expenses as well, such as property taxes, building the theater, employees, etc...
If there are restrictions, then I am not interested in buying it period. Also, with Sony's recent RootKit, I am not sure I would trust them not to do that again.
"$20 for a movie on DVD too much in your opinion? "
Yes.
The most I've gone for a movie is $16, and that for something that I thought the whole family would like and it would be watchable 2-3 times.
Most of the DVD's I've purchased have ranged from $5-$13; flea markets are a great source for $5 movies. That's a price that I consider fair for a DVD movie since (a) I own the media and (b) I can resell it again after watching it for $2-3, so the actual price of a movie is pretty close to $2.
As I've said in previous posts, content isn't worth all that much. There's too much of it, and in general, the quality of movies is pretty consistently mediocre. I'm okay with that, but $8 for a less than DVD copy? No thanks.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
I grew up in Boulder, CO, which has a huge video store. You can drop by and rent almost any movie you can think of for $3 ($3.50 for a new release) a night.
I now live in anonymous Suburbia, a few blocks from a Blockbuster Video. I would love to walk up to a kiosk in Blockbuster (or perhaps do it online before I arrive), select almost any movie I can think of, wait for it to download and burn a DVD, pay $3, and take the DVD home for a night. I would then return the DVD the next day, and they would have one more obscure and interesting movie in stock.
Under this system, I don't have to have a fast and reliable connection, I can watch it on my TV without a DVD burner, content owners can be paid for their products, and Blockbuster would have something in stock aside from 300 copies of last month's hit romantic comedy.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
I for one would like to take robust control of my Cajun recipes.
sulli
RTFJ.
So, Sony could price these things at 2 cents and I wouldn't touch them.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
The reality is that exhibitors take about 50% of the cut of a movie playing in their theatres and kick back the rest to the distributor/studio. In fact, the big studios take a greater cut of the ticket price at the beginning of a run and it decreases the longer a movie stays in the theatres. This is one (only one) of the reasons that studios try to open movies on 3000+ screens now and get everyone in to the movie in the first couple of weekends. And it's why theatres like movies like March of the Penguins, because they are taking a good chunk of the ticket price, now that it's been in theatres so long. With all this said, studios shouldn't be negotiating more than cost they would get, per ticket, after the exhibitors have taken their cut. Others will argue they should get even less, feeling movie prices are over-inflated. Fine. But, at minimum, we should start with what the studio gets kicked back, after the exhibitor deducts their fees. $8/USD per movie it ain't! The other issue is that if downloads are that high in price, people will just keep downloading them for free. If the movie industry is okay with that level of piracy and don't want to reduce it by making downloads more affordable, then that's the implicit deal they make. And as much as people love buying music/movies online, remember, folks... as it increases, all those local jobs in movie theatres, video stores and music stores disappear. Some here will discount the value of those jobs, but they're important to people in their local communities.
.... they'd have to pay ME $8.
What is the maximum acceptable price that slashdot readers would give to different types of downloadable product, taking into account their perception of its true value to them?
Personally, if content is DRM-crippled in any way (such that I cannot freely convert it and copy it to all devices I own, etc) then its true value to me is basically zero. I would be willing to pay $8.00 US to download a high-quality (TV-quality or better) movie that was not DRM-crippled. I would be willing to pay no more than about $0.50 US to download the same DRM-crippled content.
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
$8.00 to download? you can buy a movie for $10.00, $20.00 will get you this years release. Why would I want to spend twice what I can rent it for? Go to Netflix to see how badly overpriced this is. This model is going to die, and quickly too.
To make it work, you will probably have to price it at around $2.50. That'd sell.
Sad thing is that Sony is doing this to kill the idea. They don't want to succeed.
>> I would pay the price of a movie ticket or perhaps $10, whichever is cheaper.
...
Comparing the download price to that of a movie ticket is not a fair comparison.
When I go to a movie theater
1) I get to see the movie on a huge screen (compared to the small TV in my home) and the visual experience is way more impressive.
2) I get to hear the movie on a professional surround sound system and the experience is impressive (again compared to the speakers on my TV at home).
Basically when I see a movie in the theater I am also paying a price (included in the cost of the ticket) for using the theater's space and equipment. When I download a movie for home use the cost should be less because I am watching the movie in my own house on my own equipment.
If you want a fair comparison of what the download price should be then try pay-per-view. Typically (on my DirectTV Tivo system) I can get movies for about under $5. So in my mind anything over $5 for the download of a high-quality full-length movie is the entertainment industry being greedy.
Just my $0.02
OS X, Linux, Tivo, Amiga, my fascination with cult-like technologies would intrigue any psychiatrist.
It should be around $1 per hour - in other words, $2 for a long movie, $1.50 for the usual length, $1 for an hour-long TV episode, and $0.50 for a half-hour episode, per viewing. Anything more and it makes more sense to just use Netflix or the video store.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Don't be greedy bastards.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
The problem is that there are two kinds of movies. The ones that suck and feel more like a waste of time then some proper entertainment. And then there are the occasional good movies which are worth some money. For me, there are only a few great movies that I'd like to keep and be able to view more then once. (My girlfriend wouldn't mind watching some movies 50 times ;) )
For those great movies that I'd like to keep, I'm willing to pay a bit more. $8 would be too much for me though. If the quality is exceptional I'd say around $5.
For the movies that I only want to see once. No more then $2.
Movie rentals are great, especially in the form of services like Netflix. But you can't rent music because people listen to the same music often, whereas one viewing is often enough for movies and TV shows.
~CGameProgrammer( );
Sony can kiss my ass. $8 a movie? The quality required for me to pay that much would take way too long to download even on my 1.5mbit DSL connection.
I think iTunes is the way to go, as long as they can somehow get rid of that "no burning" rule they have for their videos.. Of course, understandably this is to keep the scum from the MPAA at bay, so they don't get sued but right now I'm not buying any video content because of that restriction.
I encode everything from dvd's I own.
Personally I think downloadable content is sketchy at best especially if you're paying that much. Look at iTunes, you can ONLY play the content on iTunes, and if you can't burn it, what happens when your HD dies or you reinstall Windows/Mac OS/etc.? iTunes lets you download the songs you've purchased if you lose the files.
Key word there.. "lets you" You're at THEIR whim. and if they choose to not let you then you're sol.
No thanks, I'll buy movies in DVD format, and if my computer gets caught on fire and dies, I will still be able to watch what I paid for.
- Alex
Movies are hitting DVDs within like 3 months of being on the big screen these days. For just under $10 I get 2 movies at a time from Netflix, and can watch as many movies as I want in that time period. $8 a movie for the crap they've been churning out, and I have to use MY bandwidth? Netflix sells used DVDs for as low as $9.99, and you get the packaging and case and everything.
... No thanks. Netflix for me.
Sorry Sony
I pay $4.50 for a Blockbuster rental. It's been more than $3 for years.
"All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke
Don't you just love entertainment cartels...
If the movie publishing/distribution industry would just let the market decide, the problem would take care of itself.
Remember that this is all suplemental to theatres, rentals, tv, and merchandising revenues; and will allow movies to not go out of print. The business model argument is just so much malarkey.
I will pay up to $5.99 for "The Blues Brothers"
BUT WAIT..
if you throw in "Earnest goes to Jail" and "Weekend at Bernie's II" plus a hi-tech microfiber shammy cloth, I will pay up to $7.99
seriously though, I think discounted "bad" movies would be a great way to get a service like this started. I have little interest in owning videos, but great interest in saving time and money - and I think I represent a fairly significant demographic. There are certaintly times where I'd chuck $2.25 to see some older flick or one that isn't netting much in terms of rentals these days than go to the video store or spend twice as long watching something on AMC that is bloated with commercials and edited to a pulp if I could download a hi-res divX easily at >60k/sec.
ôó
I don't know about others here, but I'm stuck with comcast service, and the fastest download speed that I have ever sustained is about 600kbs. Usually, my download speeds are much slower, often well under 100kbs; 30kbs is not unusual.
I don't want to spend all night downloading a movie. I don't want to get 90% of the way through a huge download, and have the download crap out on me.
I'd rather catch the movie on dvd or cable.
JMHO.
Please, don't forget to include the $150 purchase price of Windows XP, since there's no way in hell that this will be available on Linux.
That's pre 7-11 thinking....
OK, I'll take the bait. Tell me how WMP is applying DRM to my ripped file? Where is the license being kept? I don't have my computer plugged into the internet (say) - so what magical DRM server in the sky just issued me my key?
I move WMA files all over the place, never once have I run into a DRM issue, and I can just burn it all back to CDs. Don't get me wrong, I wont buy a DRMd song from ANYONE when I can buy a CD and make as many copies as I want, and have a convenient archive already sitting there labeled in a box. CD comes out once, goes back in, sits in the basement forevermore. And guess what - its less than a buck a track most of the time.
I'm convinced that many many people dig iTunes more for what it CAN do, not because it necessarily does it better, more efficiently, or cheaper than the old way. Renting a movie at Blockbuster is still a vastly more economical model than payign 8 bucks for it, unless I plan on watching it more than 3 times. And I guarantee you they ain't gonna let me burn a DVD (in DVD quality) of my 8 dollar movie, even if they give it to me in DVD quality with all the extras (which they wont).
OK, I'll take the bait. Tell me how WMP is applying DRM to my ripped file?
I believe, by default any CD you rip to WMA with WMP, unless you turn that option off, is issued a key. Not being connected to the internet is a pretty minor issue, since without internet you can't access the online database to add the ID3 tags. It's not a big issue, you just have to turn it off before ripping. The issue is many users don't know it is being applied or that it can be turned off.
I move WMA files all over the place, never once have I run into a DRM issue, and I can just burn it all back to CDs.
I believe it restrict play to only your computer, but I don't recall the specifics. That is what Google is for. I don't have WMP even installed anywhere anymore.
I'm convinced that many many people dig iTunes more for what it CAN do, not because it necessarily does it better, more efficiently, or cheaper than the old way. Renting a movie at Blockbuster is still a vastly more economical model than payign 8 bucks for it, unless I plan on watching it more than 3 times. And I guarantee you they ain't gonna let me burn a DVD (in DVD quality) of my 8 dollar movie, even if they give it to me in DVD quality with all the extras (which they wont).
Umm, it is Sony talking about offering movies for $8 and I doubt they will let you burn a DVD and bandwidth will not really support DVD quality downloads for the masses yet. As for iTunes it is a very nice player, easy to use and powerful, but a bit crippled and slow on Windows.
There are services like this already in existence, such as movielink. They charge $5 for new releases and as little as $2 for less popular titles. Trying to justify how/why a company charges what it does for their product is tricky. Every company probably has a different strategy to how they decide this, and chances are that consumers may not share many of the same motives. As a consumer, the only thing that matters is whether or not the product/service is worth it to you. Would you pay $8 to download a movie that expires after 24 hours and can only be viewed using WMP? If you and enough others say "no", then they'll either lower their prices their prices to something you will swallow or get out of the business altogether. As for the idea of these time-limited, DRM-mangled files, it seems a lot like the old DIVX product (not to be confused with the DivX codec) Circuit City used to carry. You buy a special "DIVX Enhanced" DVD player, which hooks up to a phone line, and you program your credit card information into it. You then buy individual DIVX DVDs for about $5. You can play the file unlimited times for the first 48 hours, but after that, it becomes pay-per-view. Fortunately, that product died a quick and painful (I hope, at least for those who thought up that abomination) death.
do you PAY your ISP 5$ an hour for the high speed connection when your webbrowser does not crawl?
c'mon
In fact, I'll take TWO rootkits. Hell, set me up with a Mitsubishi rootkit, and a load of keyloggers. OH! And some random advertisements from companies that you sold my personal information to.
Thank you, drive-through!
Apple should make iTunes for the XBOX 360 + XBOX LIVE.
Then all those millions could by tunes and movies and then games for their
xbox.
Or is this what MS is planning to do , whammoo, take out itunes direct to the lounge room.
Makes sense, and I BET IT WILL happen come release date.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Ah, you mean that "obtain licenses" box - well, you have to go through that setup screen to rip your CD's at all pretty much, and I can't imagine anyone leaving it checked or checking it. My point is just that I have a 10000 entirely legal, entirely ripped library of CDs I've collected over the years. I can't imagine having bought all that and not having unfettered rights to it. On the whole video front though, I keep getting into arguments with zealots who've told me they're going to get every episode of lost at 2 bucks a pop. They just sort of whimper when I point out you can get 24 episodes on DVD for about 25 bucks on ebay.
Wishful thinking?
If Comcast can give me movies for $2 each, downloads can darn well be downloaded for less than $8. Of course, it's certainly better than the hundred-thousand dollar lawsuits...
I don't buy DVDs movies because I can download them for free. That's the simple truth. Now who WOULD pay for a downloadable movie?
a) Uber-geeks? No
- They can already get dvd quality movies for free (both avi's and dvd-images)
b) Geeks who dont/cant download? Nope
- These guys can rent DVDs for $5 and copy (decrypt) the dvd.
c) People who cant download or decrypt? Maybe
- If they don't mind watching on their computer monitors OR
- they have a tv-out card set up and ready OR
- the file download is in DVD format, ready to burn and watch on tv
d) People with Divx players or PSPs or nextGen consoles? Sure
- If the company works out the compatibility issues AND
- If the company has a great marketing budget
However, most people wouldn't be in any of the above categories. That is, average joes without any computer knowledge or a tv-out card or a PSP or an Xbox360 or PS3 or a Divx player.
Well, if it had the same restrictions as music on iTunes does (very little as mentioned above), then I would say no more than 1/3 the price of the DVD if all of the Bonus Features came wiht the download or 1/4 the price of the DVD if they did not. Cut those prices in 1/2 if restrictions are similar to Music Match and others that only let you burn the stuff three times or other limitiations are imposed.
I know that it might be rude to talk about commercial interests. But some of the posts on movie downloads and DRM made me jump out of my skin. My company, EZTakes, developed a DVD movie download and burn service that is running live now. We are different in that we provide users with the ability to burn movies to DVDs that can play in their living rooms. We have a number of free DVD downloads on the site and a number of others available at a reasonable price. You can check it out for free. In order to discourage piracy, we mark each DVD with the user's identity. We don't use DRM. You can burn backup copies of the DVDs you buy, store a copy on your PC and play it back in your default DVD player software.
While a greatly respect and like Apple, their DRM is a smokescreen that was created to protect Apple, not rights holders. I wrote a white paper on the subject.
Jim Flynn
CEO, EZTakes
Ah, you mean that "obtain licenses" box - well, you have to go through that setup screen to rip your CD's at all pretty much, and I can't imagine anyone leaving it checked or checking it.
90% of people don't ever touch the default settings because they don't know what they do. Hence, the problem and the perception.
On the whole video front though, I keep getting into arguments with zealots who've told me they're going to get every episode of lost at 2 bucks a pop. They just sort of whimper when I point out you can get 24 episodes on DVD for about 25 bucks on ebay.
Why would you argue with zealots? Anyway, the benefits of Apple's iTunes TV show sales have little to do with price. The main benefits are that they play on the iPod which some people want for some wacky reason, they don't require media (no storing/carrying a DVD), they are available right away (thus you can buy one episode you missed before the next one plays), and instant gratification (you can get it now without going to the store). I might buy an episode of something to preview the technology, but none of those value propositions appeal to me, so in general I doubt I'd buy episodes there either.I would not be the first person to jump on this downloadable plan, but I think I would do it for $8 a movie. My only fear would be Sony's nasty little spyware. Once is has been proven to me that no software would be installed on any of my machines, I would sign up. They way I look at it, downloading the movies is the best way to keep me on the couch longer. I personally am all for that.
http://www.bigpudd.com