Apple to Offer MGM Movies

UnknowingFool writes "Apple announced today that it will be adding MGM movies to its movie catalog. With Apple already selling Disney and Paramount movies, how long will it be before the other studios work out a deal with Apple?"

Comments

Follow or die

[BrowserCapsGuy]

It seems to me the other studios will eventually have no choice but to accept this new method of distribution. Man that sounds dumb. But it's true. Good for Apple for forcing a change that I think most honest, paying customers have been demanding.

say no to blogs

[timmarhy]

am i the only person that's grateful to the poster for NOT linking to a stupid apple fan boy blog?

no hd?

[timmarhy]

one thing i'd like to point out - these movies aren't even dvd quality. not sure what the point of that is? seriously if people ripping captures from hd tv can manage dvd quality, you'd think apple with all it's resources could do better.

oh and wake up and smell the codecs - h264 can do dvd quality at 200megs per hour, you can't tell me peopel with adsl wouldn't be able to download that.

Re:no hd?

[timmarhy]

with a decent codec like h264, a 720p movie only comes out at 750megs or so. whats so hard about that?

Re:no hd?

[BiggerIsBetter]

When the majority of people seem perfectly happy with YouTube quality, why invest in more bandwidth/storage/quality?
Because YouTube is free, and Apple wants use to pay. Because DVDs are cheap to rent. And because the pirated copies we can download are generally top quality rips. If I'm paying for movies from Apple, I want something of competitive quality that gives me a reason to spend my dollars (including bandwidth costs, which are significant in some markets).

Besides, Apple wants to sell these movies to play on their users' iPods, whose screens dont't even have NTSC resolution.
Then they're missing an enormous chunk of their market.

Re:no hd?

[hcdejong]

At 750 Mb, it won't be DVD quality, let alone the quality expected when you say 'HD'. It may be 720p, but it'll be compressed all to hell.

only USA

[Riquez]

It's good to see the Video content of iTunes progressing, obviously a must for Apple TV's success. Still, I have to say, it's only in the USA.
The rest of the world are still have no Movie/TV content whatsoever (other than Music Vids & Pixar short films). Effectively making Apple TV a USA only device.

Shall we...

[paulthomas]

Shall we tag this oldnews? I mean... who doesn't subscribe to the Apple Hot News RSS Feed?

Classic Movies

[Anonymous Coward]

So, does this mean we will finally have access to all those classic movies which never made it to DVD?

MGM started in the 1920s. That is a lot of movies that have not seen the light of day in may years. And, will the silent movies (which I don't believe for a second we'll ever get) sell for as much as the modern movies?

The article says they "own" 4,000 (which would be about 50 per year since the 20s). Where is the list of those movies?

How about the UA collection? MGM bought UA in 1981. That means all the Bond movies, and the Mary Pickford, Charles Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, etc. What of that will we see?
And who knows what rights got suffled around int he whole Turner buyout.

Gotta say: "Who Cares?"

[OverlordQ]

I for one would rather go buy a more expensive DVD then get a crappy quality video from iTunes.

Re:Gotta say: "Who Cares?"

[Mr2001]

You've been modded down, but you're right. In most cases, the DVD doesn't cost more than $5 over Apple's price, and you get slightly higher video quality, bonus features and commentary, and you can play it anywhere. There's no PlayFair or QTFairUse for iTunes's video DRM, so the movies you buy there will only play on a computer, an iPod, or the stillborn Apple TV.