Why There's No iTunes For Movies

theodp writes "Slate's Farhad Manjoo would gladly pay a hefty monthly fee for immediate access to recent movies and TV shows — if someone would just take his money. In reality, he pays nothing because no company sells such a plan, and instead resorts to getting his programming from the friendly BitTorrent network.

Comments

Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Richmeister]

It's under 'Movies' in the iTunes Store.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[meist3r]

It's under 'Movies' in the iTunes Store.

Well but the problem is... it's iTunes. I don't buy Hard- or Software from Apple. Why should I buy my movies from them. Completely neglecting the fact I can't even install their shitty software -of course.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Winckle]

Why do you boycott Apple?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[forgoil]

There is one problem with it, and it is not the fault of Apple. Since the distribution rights are owned by a silly amount of silly people in a silly amount of different countries, those countries won't get movies distributed in iTunes.

Apparently they see some magic gain in *not* making their product available in *preferred* distribution channels. Basically they are assholes twice over. First to their customers (us), and then to their shareholders (why aren't we making money? Oh, because the distributers are assholes who don't want to *sell* our products).

Set the distribution rights free, drop DRM, and make the products available in the preferred way (internet, and no, that do *NOT* mean through some crap IE webbrowser crap solution with sub par quality), yadda, yadda, yadda. Most of you guys on slashdot gets this.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[psychodelicacy]

Technically, you're right. But it doesn't work like iTunes - it has a very limited range of movies on offer and the prices are often not at all competitive. If you're outside the US, the range of stuff on offer is even worse, and the prices are much more prohibitive. So although it runs out of the iTunes store, it's very far from being an iTunes for movies in anything but name.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[mspohr]

If you would RTFA (or had actually used iTunes movies), you would know about the very limited selection and restrictions on use from iTunes (and other 'services') due to the Byzantine industry contracts.

It sounds like a hopeless situation and it looks like the best option is to use the ubiquitous peer to peer sources which offer free convenient downloads of just about anything you could want.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[digitalchinky]

That's a logical solution, though factor in greed and you have 'not in my lifetime'

Next in line to cash in will be the ISP's and backbone providers. (Indeed, they are trying already) They'll claim that each and every single bit actually costs them money to send over the glass, even though they are making a metric crap ton of cash above and beyond the cost to maintain and keep the infrastructure running and in good working order. Paying the electricity bill isn't exactly a struggle for them.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Macrat]

Sounds like a bug with the user.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Spad]

I must have missed that 'iTunes for Linux' release announcement...

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[downix]

for Linux, how about on OpenBSD for SPARC?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Winckle]

Mods on crack, asking him why he doesn't like something is not flamebait.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[maddskillz]

Well but the problem is... it's iTunes.

While iTunes might not be something you want to use, it was the topic of the article.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Nerdfest]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in. I's like a device I can just drop files on and play, without installing some bloated management software. There's people worse than me as well. I have a friend who was car shopping and rejected one car because it had an iPod connector. Having a custom connector is not even that bad if it can be used free by others, but the iPod connector is definitely not like that. I've recently removed QuickTime from my remaining Windows box because of their pushy update strategy.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

It is not Apple's fault that you choose to run an operating system which is not compatible with the most widespread executable and library formats on the planet.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

internet, and no, that do *NOT* mean through some crap IE webbrowser crap solution with sub par quality

It also doesn't mean iTunes. Sorry, iTunes may be great software, but it is not the web, and not everyone has or wants iTunes.

DRM is only part of the problem, and getting rid of it is a great step forward. Now let's see this the rest of the way -- just the Internet, or at most email -- better yet, publish that website as a REST API to allow anyone to develop an iTunes-like client.

HTML and FLAC over HTTP for the win.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in. I's like a device I can just drop files on and play, without installing some bloated management software.

In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive.

There's people worse than me as well. I have a friend who was car shopping and rejected one car because it had an iPod connector.

Well, your friend is going to have a hard time buying a car. Just about all of them have radios with ipod connectors (unless you buy a cheap shitbox vehicle). On the other hand, just buy an aftermarket radio, rip out the stock radio, and sell it on ebay.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tg123]

Itunes is available for windows.

Installing apples "shitty software" is very simple and free.

Download and click install it then upgrades itself to latest version.

The nice part about itunes is it contains a search built-in for movies and tv episodes. Every things "there for you on a plate" and you can subscribe to tv episodes.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

You cannot TEND to boycott something.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Ashriel]

Actually, it is precisely Apple's fault. If they didn't make their formats proprietary, then the choice of operating system would not make a difference.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tg123]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in................

Funny thing is that apples audio formats have to be the easiest to convert to another format . I find putting everything in mp3 works well as itunes drops and plays mp3 files.

apple's hardware is also in my experience very easy to circumvent , its almost as if apple is "just going through the motions."

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

The iTunes formats aren't proprietary. That's a myth. The only truly proprietary format for music is Windows Media. The rest are all open standards, which is what Apple uses.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tepples]

Itunes is available for windows.

Is it also available for Wine?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Jezza]

AAC? My new Nintendo plays that! You don't need iTunes (as others have commented on) but for me at least it's a nice "one stop shop" for media files. As for "hardware lock-in" well there are plenty of after market widgets for iPod; I don't need to get my charger from Apple, I can buy speakers from almost anyone, most iPods work with any headphones (even the new Shuffle if you have a widget to replicate the control buttons).

I see no more "lock-in" than any other popular make of "MP3 Player".

Now the studios are letting Apple remove their DRM I can even convert iTunes bought Music to another format.

On the subject of the "Shuffle" it's not like I'm going to be trapped by my purchase - if I decide I want to use something else in the future I can just convert the music and bin the player (it's cheap enough).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[UnknowingFool]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in. I's like a device I can just drop files on and play, without installing some bloated management software. There's people worse than me as well. I have a friend who was car shopping and rejected one car because it had an iPod connector. Having a custom connector is not even that bad if it can be used free by others, but the iPod connector is definitely not like that. I've recently removed QuickTime from my remaining Windows box because of their pushy update strategy.

You do understand that you can use iPods (as well as many other players) without having to use their proprietary formats, right? iPod will play the standard format MP3s as well its apparent successor, AAC. As for hardware lock-in, you get that with any MP3 player. Wanna use your Sansa case with an iRiver? Nope. Not going to fit. As for managing music goes, I once had a device where I had to drop and drag. Here's the problem with that: It got extremely cumbersome after a dozen songs. You may think you want "control" but when you have to manage 10,000 songs manually, it's a pain.

As for your friend, I think it's rather short-sighted to reject a car worth tens of thousands of dollars because it has an optional feature he didn't want that could be replaced for hundreds of dollars or better yet, simply just not used.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[ciderVisor]

metric crap ton

That's metric crap tonne. Interestingly enough, this weighs precisely the same as a metric My Little Pony tonne.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

In what way is MPEG-4 or AAC Audio proprietary? Their delivery vehicle is proprietary, their data is not.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[VulpesFoxnik]

1 issue: E-mail has a 10MiBi Limit. So this E-Mail you speak of cannot be used.

Lets look at the current means of distribution.

You can A:
Bittorrent it, but there's not much profit in that at the moment.
You can take the Itunes method, the major node of servers, and end up with a sub par'd drm'd copy.
Lastly you can take the streaming approach. Netflicks does this through everyone's favorite program: Sliverlight 2.0. That limits to Windows only machines... maybe mac... honestly I don't give a flying -expletive deleted- about mac. The other streaming methods such as RTMP and MMS are commonly used for free software, and require a web browser to work, but can restrict access by asking a user for a password guarded via front door such as many hentai/porn sites do, mind you these also allow for stream ripping fairly easy. However I think it's perfectly fair for a user to cache the entire movie this way, it does pose some issues with dishonest users.

Flac isn't exactly designed for streaming last time I checked, however it is also my preferred audio format as well.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Jezza]

What about Songbird - looks pretty good? Then you can use an iPod with Linux, probably that a "better" solution than iTunes for Linux (which I'm sure wouldn't be acceptable for a large number of Linux users anyway - being "closed source").

Honestly, is it only me that thinks: "meh" - I mean I put up with a lot worse to get the damn GPU to run under Linux (binary drivers). I'm not sure a music player is worth getting your panties in a bunch over (perhaps I'd feel differently if I were a pro musician, or even an amateur musician)!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[UnknowingFool]

I don't buy Hard- or Software from Apple.

iTunes and Quicktime software is free for Windows and OS X. I think you mean to say that it is not available for Linux.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[aliquis]

Wtf is that Konami code variation in your signature? Just random crap or did it do something in some game?

Or well, google answers:
Game: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game
Platform: NES
Function: When done during the startup screen, gives you 10 lives and level select.

Weird =P

Oh well, at least I learned something from this useless thread ;D

Personally I buy my movies on disc and download them for free, I have no need to be able to pay for downloads =P

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Jezza]

Well iTunes isn't just a client application - it's part WebObjects, part native Application. What Apple have created shouldn't be underestimated, this isn't easy to do.

Also there are a lot of people (me included) who don't see the Internet as "just the browser" there is room for alternate access. Email is of course a classic example, but what about IMs? A "browser-centric" future isn't that attractive. I'm not sure I want my computer to turn into a "dumb terminal" (well actually I am sure; I don't).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tverbeek]

Um... Apple didn't make their formats proprietary. They put some (easily circumvented) DRM on them to placate the publishers, but AAC and MPEG4 are published standards.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Yvan256]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in.

Apple does NOT use "proprietary formats" for its iPod, that's just FUD spread around by people who never even tried one.

The iPods are compatible with MP3, AAC, DRM'ed AAC, Apple Lossless (yes that one is proprietary but since it's lossless nothing would prevent you from converting back to something else later on, such as FLAC), MPEG-4, H.264. I may even have forgotten a few formats (such as Audible, but if that one is proprietary I don't think it's from Apple).

I'd like a device I can just drop files on and play, without installing some bloated management software.

Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand. Let go of this useless obsession and learn to use metadata on your files. You'll probably even like smart playlists once you start using them.

As for your friend, he probably won't be able to buy a car in a decade or so (...just kidding).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[johny42]

I don't know about other formats Apple uses, but AAC has patent problems, although it is an "open standard" by definition. Still, it's way better than Windows Media, I guess.

Too bad the only e-shop that sells OGGs I know is/was allofmp3.com, which is only legal in Russia, and most people doubt that too.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[nine-times]

Well it's not exactly about proprietary formats, is it? They could be using OGG and you'd still have to use their application, and there's no Linux version. They could be using OGG and the movie studios would still require them to wrap the files in DRM.

There's nothing all that proprietary about Apple's MPEG4 files. It's the DRM.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[nine-times]

Yeah, I don't know why their movie catalog isn't bigger.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah but you have to pay 25 bucks for a digital copy. that's not a reasonable fee.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[leon.gandalf]

I see an import CD option... But no Import DVD option.... and no buying ANOTHER copy to use on my Ipod is not an option.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[BitZtream]

Sorry, its not cost effective to support every fringe OS, regardless of how important you think you are.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[rawler]

Vendor lock-in, probably in some areas even worse than MSFT.

Personally, I try to avoid stores that forces me to install their program when all I really want is their content.

Imagine if Microsoft.com were only _at all_ accessible from anything but IE? Or if Google would not admit service unless you're using Chrome. Imagine an uproar? Yet that is pretty much what Itunes is.

I.E. why should we let the dominance of Itunes hinder the coming cheap ARM-based netbooks? They certainly won't run i386 windows OR OSX, but have all basic requirement to download and play music.

Personally, I usually try to take it a step further though, and also avoid purchasing Music in patent-covered and/or crappy formats (including MP3). That leaves pretty much Vorbis/FLAC, which sometimes makes it damn hard to find music, so of course I sidestep every now and then, but then more usually to a good ol' plastic CD than other downloadable formats.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[dsoltesz]

Actually, iTunes is barely mentioned in the article. iTunes was inaccurately mentioned in the story headline, apparently to start a flame war among the various flaming fanboys. I'm outta here - apparently someone's letting the new intern approve stories.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[supernova_hq]

Ok, all you guys out there bitching about iTunes not working in linux, consider yourselves lucky. Not only is iTunes a piece of shit, but linux has some of the best music applications ever made. The following are IMHO way better than iTunes, and handles iPods just fine.

• Amarok (1.x and 2.0)
• Rhythmbox
• SongBird
• many more

Come one guys, if you can get online without having to insert you telus installation disk, I'm sure you can get songs on and off of an iPod...

Note: Yes, I know the iPod touch and iPhone are currently unsupported, but believe me, they are working on it!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[BitZtream]

1 issue: E-mail has a 10MiBi Limit. So this E-Mail you speak of cannot be used.

No, YOUR mail server has a 10MB limit. I set mine to just under the 2GB value of a signed int. In reality that means the sending limit is practically unlimited. I could raise it higher if I felt like it, we have the space to support it on the various queue mounts and our IMAP store has plenty of space to deal with larger attachments but its impractical of to even get a 1GB attachment. The only reason the limit is set at all is a precaution to slow down some weird exploits that could exist due to wrap around at 2GB point or bounds checking flaws in other apps. Its just another 'to be safe' kind of thing with the least amount of restriction imposed on my users.

Seems like your just pissed off that your the odd man out cause you use some fringe setup that no one bothers to support because its not worth the money to get all 3 of you with that setup, since you're likely just going to whine and bitch and not pay for some other reason at that point anyway.

Don't confuse your shitty email provider with a limitation of the SMTP, IMAP or even POP protocols.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Joce640k]

I boycott mov files because:

a) They're proprietary and need special players to play.

b) Said player is the worst media player in history.

c) Said player also tries to take over my entire machine. It installs an iPod sync service even though I haven't got an iPod. It replaces all the multimedia mime types in all my browsers and refuses to let go - reconfiguring the browsers on every reboot (does Firefox really need itunes plugin to display a JPG file?)

d) All that just to watch a video file? Seriously? No thanks.

PS: Any digital camera makers who think .mov is a good video format, take note. Also any webmaster who thinks .mov is a good format for web page viewing because "it works on a Mac".

PPS: Yes, I've heard of quicktimealt but I want the .mov format to die (see above).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[BitZtream]

Because there are FAR more audio tracks in existence than movies?

If apple has 10% of all audio tracks made in the last 50 years, and 10% of all movies made in the last 50 years ...

Well, you'll have thousands of times more audio than movies. I'm gonna make the numbers up here to illustrate the point, they are probably no where near accurate ... but ...

An audio track may require 30 people total to go from writing to performing/recording to mixing to mp3.

A movie of the same level of quality will probably require 300 people and a budget hundreds of times larger.

There are simply fewer movies produced than songs, regardless of the period of time you use to compare.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Timothy Brownawell]

Apple does NOT use "proprietary formats" for its iPod, that's just FUD spread around by people who never even tried one.

New iPods reengineered to block synching with Linux (2007), although I think this has been mostly (ipod touch / iphone require jailbreaking?) fixed.

Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand. Let go of this useless obsession and learn to use metadata on your files. You'll probably even like smart playlists once you start using them.

What about how itunes won't run on linux?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[meist3r]

I don't "boycott" Apple. I just don't like their (overpriced) hardware and can't get myself to use Mac OS. Also, I run Linux so iTunes is out of the question and I also don't like their strange media distribution policies and DRM measures and so forth. Only a personal matter of choice, I guess. Love the iPhone design, but it's way too expensive for something I need to illegaly pry open. Carrier dependency is also a no-no. I'd rather live in a 1.5G world than go with a mandatory Apple restriction AND an overpriced restrictive carrier contract. Actually, both won't do seperately either :)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

How is AAC proprietary? Last time I checked you could play AACs on Lunix.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[teg]

If you're outside the US, the range of stuff on offer is even worse, and the prices are much more prohibitive.

And in many countries (e.g. here in Norway), movies just aren't there at all. I've got money, I'd like to use them on movies from iTunes - but they won't even let me. And they wonder there is piracy....

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Millennium]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in.

Hardware lock-in I'll give you, but their formats are no more proprietary than MP3, WMA, or the other formats used by current online music stores.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Dogtanian]

That's metric crap tonne.

The "tonne" spelling is specific to the metric ton, and thus useful if you want to make clear that the metric ton/tonne is being used without further qualification. However, you can still say "metric ton", or even just "ton", assuming it's already clear (or not that big a deal) which one is being used.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[v1]

Imagine if Microsoft.com were only _at all_ accessible from anything but IE?

Obviously you've never tried to download a windows update? "Windows Genuine Advantage" ring a bell?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Millennium]

Apparently they see some magic gain in *not* making their product available in *preferred* distribution channels.

I think it's more because your "preferred distribution channels" are known-failing paths for anyone trying to make money. For all that you claim you wouldn't steal music if it were sold in an unsustainable commercial model, there is no reason whatsoever to believe you, and even if there were, no one could sustain a market on the tiny proportion of those who claim they'd go honest that would actually do so.

Basically they are assholes twice over. First to their customers (us), and then to their shareholders (why aren't we making money? Oh, because the distributers are assholes who don't want to *sell* our products).

Just one problem with this: iTunes is making money hand over fist, so your shareholder question is moot.

As for being an asshole to the customers, the actual customers don't seem to agree with you if the continued rampant success of iTunes is any indication. The only ones who seem to call Apple assholes over this are people who think they are entitled to some specific sales model.

Set the distribution rights free, drop DRM, and make the products available in the preferred way (internet, and no, that do *NOT* mean through some crap IE webbrowser crap solution with sub par quality), yadda, yadda, yadda.

iTunes has already dropped DRM. The software is irrelevant.

Most of you guys on slashdot gets this.

Most of understand this perversion of the idea of information freedom: namely, a warped sense of entitlement. We simply don't agree with it.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[andymadigan]

Their search function sucks. It has no ability to say "search for The Simpsons in TV Shows" so you get the shows, and the sountracks. If I remember correctly the label for both of them in the results is just "Comedy". I have Windows, I don't use iTunes because I can't watch the videos on my TV and I can't find anything I'm looking for anyway.

Apple takes the whole "the user is stupid give them a simple interface" way too far.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[TheSunborn]

The problem is the protocol used to communicate between ITunes and the server. If it was open it would be possible for third party users to implement their own linux interface. I don't se why Apple would have a problem with that. You would still buy the music from them, and it would not cost them anything.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[v1]

1 issue: E-mail has a 10MiBi Limit. So this E-Mail you speak of cannot be used.

I'd like to point out that's your problem, it's far from a universal one.

My mailserver takes 50mb emails, mostly because several of one of my user's clients insist on continually emailing her 20-40mb emails of attached pictures for design specs. ("whats jpeg? our camera only makes tiff files, what's the problem? we can take our business elsewhere if you can't receive our emails?")

Talk with your ISP. The good ones can raise your mailbox and message limits.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[icebraining]

"In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive."

But then you can't play the mp3's you copy to it. He depends on a "internal database" which is generated by iTunes.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive.

BULLSHIT.

Yes, you can use the iphone as a drive to store files, but you can't drop songs there and then play them on the ipod.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously you've never tried to download a windows update? "Windows Genuine Advantage" ring a bell?

I did even download security updates from Microsoft from a Linux box running lynx. And for WGA there is a tool to compute some WGA code offline on a Windows box not connected to the internet. With this code you can download WGA protected updates from a Linux box.

But what I can't do is buy a song from Apple with my Linux box. And if I could I wouldn't be allowed to download it to my iPod if I had one. If a vendor calls me an asshole I sure as hell won't buy from him.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Kabuthunk]

I just hate iTunes with a blinding rage. Sorry... I'm not about to use annoying (and yes, I've actually used it, and it annoys me) software to move MP3's to a portable player, when every other goddamn mp3 player in the history of existance supports friggin' drag-and-drop!

Also, I hate the iPod as a whole too (seriously, why do people rave about that circle movement thing?), and I'm not about to attempt to use iTunes to upload files to my non-iPod player.

But someone else in this thread was saying that hatred for iTunes or iPod is baseless flamebait (or something to that effect) is clearly not talking to the right people. Get me on the subject, and I'll rant for a good half-hour on the specific aspects of why I hate iTunes and iPods, and why I prefer my current player in those regards.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[v1]

I see an import CD option... But no Import DVD option...

Learn to drive your iTunes. Use your Handbrake

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

iTunes blows becasue of fairplay and quicktime. Apple and its DRM fetish can suck the internet's collective balls.

nthx k bye

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Kabuthunk]

This is, of course, provided I WANT to have iTunes, and it's file-type associating, browser-affecting programming filling my computer.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[KeX3]

I have no "Movies" in my iTunes.

Oooooohhhhh, that must be because I'm not part of the world, but of those minor landmasses outside of the borders of the U.S.A.

If I switch iTunes to the american store, I get "Movies", but I sure as hell can't buy anything, because that's not available in the spanish store.
In fact, not even TV-series are available there. I can follow links to the other stores to (for example) the Dr Who-selection they have there, but I sure as hell can't buy anything.

And I bet you that if I _COULD_ buy it, it'd surely be dubbed in spanish, because the languages you speak are apparently defined by the credit cards you currently possess.

(And on the subject of itunes store, the app store is a joke. I can't even get _free_ applications from a store that's not spanish. Which is a shame, since I'm swedish and there are some interesting swedish things I would like, but I can't get them - regardless of them being free apps.)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

How about buying something else than an iPod then?

You don't see me complaining on slashdot that Nintendo won't make Metroid Prime for the Playstation 3.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Polumna]

with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand. Let go of this useless obsession and learn to use metadata on your files.

I'm sorry, but that is a completely impractical solution. I don't listen to music on one computer on one operating system, or out of one media player. With varying versions of RHEL at work, I have to use either Rhythmbox (and different versions of it!) or Amarok depending on the individual machine. If I'm spending the day in the server room, I may only have a CLI player option when I forget my hardware media player. At home I dual boot XP and LFS. At my girlfriend's place, I'm in a mostly mac zone.

The only reasonable solution here, is to manage by filenames. Also, it is not "practically insane" it's very easy. I could just as easily tell you to get over your useless obsession and learn to use regular expressions on your files (I promise, it even takes a lot less time than manually going through ID3 tags or whichever metadata you use). If metadata works for you, and you want iTunes or something like it to handle your file management transparently, that's great. I just suggest that you consider that not everyone uses the same computers the same ways before calling people's "obsessions" useless, when there may actually be practical usability issues that necessitate different thinking.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

MOV files are just containers, no different than AVI. They're fully documented, and anyone can write a player for them.

What you're complaining about is the CODEC situation, which Apple has no (or very little) control over.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jedidiah]

> You do understand that you can use iPods (as well as many other players) without having to use their proprietary formats, right?

This isn't about someone complaining about music. This is someone complaining about Movies.

iPods are very picky about what they will play when compared to other devices.

This leads to the consumer needing a special purpose app just to deal
with it rather than taking a generic converter and using it's defaults.

If iPods were as picky about Music as they are about Movies, most people
would conclude that they were proprietary.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Zakabog]

I boycott mov files because:

a) They're proprietary and need special players to play.

Yeah, like VLC, or mplayer

b) Said player is the worst media player in history.

I happen to like VLC and mplayer very much.

c) Said player also tries to take over my entire machine. It installs an iPod sync service even though I haven't got an iPod. It replaces all the multimedia mime types in all my browsers and refuses to let go - reconfiguring the browsers on every reboot (does Firefox really need itunes plugin to display a JPG file?)

Ah you're talking about quicktime, just get the standalone version without itunes and it won't install any services. Or download VLC or mplayer.

d) All that just to watch a video file? Seriously? No thanks.

PS: Any digital camera makers who think .mov is a good video format, take note. Also any webmaster who thinks .mov is a good format for web page viewing because "it works on a Mac".

PPS: Yes, I've heard of quicktimealt but I want the .mov format to die (see above).

Well I edited videos in imovie, and now Final Cut Express, .mov is perfect for me and my videos play for anyone I know. Most of those people use linux computers and with windows it's even easier.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Laxori666]

1) You can play the files, they just won't have any tag data, and the filenames are all four letters long.
2) You can download a program which will copy the files, and fill in the tag data based on this "internal database", which is in a simple format.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

http://theonlydevice.com
http://hulu.com

Why pay when you can get it for free?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jedidiah]

> Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity
> it would be practically insane to manage files by hand. Let go of this useless
> obsession and learn to use metadata on your files. You'll probably even like smart
> playlists once you start using them.

I don't want my devices to try to tell me what to do. I rather prefer it the
other way around. Although those too are a red herring (smart playlists).
Just what do you think you are going to do with a smart playlist on an iPod
that's larger than the 16-32G that an average Music collection might be?

You really don't have idea how SMALL something like 160G actually is once
you put Video into the picture.

It's actually pretty easy to manage a 250G personal media device when you
don't strive to intimidate yourself all the time. Ultimately, it's just
another disk. There's nothing really to be intimidated and nothing to be
gained in general by fear mongering.

This fear mongering nonsense is why people are too "helpless" to back
up their own files with the simple tools they've already had at their
disposal for the last 20 years.

The ipod takes something fundementally simple and turns it into something unecessarily complicated.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm.. no

I have no problem playing any non-drm material form iTunes on linux.

For that matter the aac tracks will play on my PSP or cellphone just fine as well.

The only issue you describe is the fact the the interface to iTunes store requires the iTunes client.. This may be considered a mistake form just a web interface.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jedidiah]

I don't care about iTunes. Infact it's not so bad that this is something
we can't use as Linux users. HOWEVER, it is something that Apple uses as
a means to lock people out of their hardware and out of their online
store.

That is a scummy as any vendorlock stunt Microsoft has ever pulled.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cthellis]

I did just that. Right now. (Classic. Not sure about Touch.)

Just so long as you put them in the right place, the iPod can read off the ID3 tags. Not all features will work without the internal databasing (like playlists, favorite tracking, Genius listing and whatnot; things that are iTunes-specific features), but general song playing works.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Otto]

Both Amarok and Rhythmbox support standard metadata in files. Even the metadata that iTunes uses in all its supported formats are standards (mostly, all programs tend to throw in one or two extra fields that only they use).

Ordering by filenames are nice if you only want to store the song names and artist, but many people prefer to have more information than that.

Also, if you're manually tagging songs, then you're doing it wrong. We have this amazing thing called "the internet" now, and it has massive amounts of useful and searchable information on it. Many programs connect to this "internet" and retrieve information from it automatically.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cthellis]

Put files in the music storage directories (which are hidden, so you have to show those first) and you can. iPods support drag-and-drop in that fashion, as they read generic data off the ID3 tags.

Some features will be broken without the iTunes link, but obviously since some other programs like Winamp can be made to sync to your iPod, there are more options. And for anyone just looking for "generic song playing," they'll work just fine. (I'm pretty sure drag-and-drop playlist management would be a PITA to do, though, so you're likely still going to need a control program for that. Unless you're satisfied doing it the "on the fly" way on the iPod itself, which tends to be irritating.)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless you put rockbox on it.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Repossessed]

Apple's software breaks PCs (makes the CD drive go poof, requires a registry edit to fix).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Otto]

a) MOV is not a video format. It's a standard container format. Specs for it are available and free.

b) No argument there, but opinion is not fact.

c) Having certain options turned on by default in the installation program is not the same thing as forcing you to leave them enabled. Also, Quicktime is available without iTunes, which prevents it from installing anything even vaguely iPod related.

d) Installing software to watch videos? Madness!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cthellis]

They are. Also, their formats are not "proprietary," just the Fairplay DRM. (While, amusingly, MP3 is a proprietary format. Just the de-facto standard.) And since Apple was basically instrumental in getting the RIAA to back off music DRM everywhere (short of subscription rentals, of course), I'm not sure why people continue to have a stick up their butt on what was inherently RIAA-demanded DRM, and the problems that surrounded that and their licensing and distribution model.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[RichardJenkins]

http://blog.adaniels.nl/articles/iphone-amarok/ would appear to indicate otherwise.

Unless the information there has become obsolete, you need to manipulate the device (at least the 'touch' generation of iPods) in a way Apple has taken steps to prevent you from doing. Generally I'd feel uncomfortable buying a device which has been designed to restrict how I can use it (even if the cost of the device is subsidised because of those restrictions).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[MouseR]

I believe the whole point refers to the fact that the offering of movies and TV shows on iTunes is really abysmal.

The selection is next to nothing and as far as TV shows are concerned, they only appear once the season is over. If at all.

Compare that to MiniNova where you can generally find an episode the night it actually aired.

I only bought one movie off iTunes, mostly to try out the work flow of the buying experience. Paid 9$ for it, and wouldn't have spent a dime over that because I didn't get an HD format, no extras, no locales (my kids dont watch TV/Movies in english yet) so the whole exercise is pretty crappy compared to buying a DVD.

In the mean time, I refuse to buy new Sony releases in their new combo DVD/BlueRay boxes. I refuse to pay for a format I dont intend to use.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[thebigbadme]

the generic converter that I use, for video and audio, is MediaCoder, and it has default settings for converting video into the proper format and formatting for both iPod and iTouch. It will also do the same for PSP, and other such and such.

It supports a lot of different file types, and can be used for a wide variety of circumstances for which I have a need.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cthellis]

Apple's a lot worse a programming for Windows, and you want them to start screwing up on LINUX too? ;-)

Universal problem with Linux, though... Just aren't enough people willing to support it right now. It would certainly be nice for Apple to "officially license" one Linux developer and let that app function at the very least for proper media syncing duties.

They've complicated the iTunes platform more and more, though, so I don't see them adopting that option at this point. Should really swallow up some teams to start moving a few pertinent apps Linux-a-ways, though. What better way to continue to erode the omnipresence of Windows than by being able to point at how many platforms can use your devices and software?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[MistrBlank]

Hey hey hey. Get in line, I want my AIX release first.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[speedtux]

I once had a device where I had to drop and drag. Here's the problem with that: It got extremely cumbersome after a dozen songs. You may think you want "control" but when you have to manage 10,000 songs manually, it's a pain.

That's not the issue. The issue is that there is no way people can write iTunes alternatives for the iPod players because the iPod doesn't use standard protocols, tries to restrict access cryptographically, and prohibits the creation of applications for syncing. And iTunes really sucks badly for managing large numbers of songs; it needs a replacement.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[nine-times]

My point was more that, as far as I know, you can't buy stuff from the iTunes store without iTunes, and that the file format itself is a secondary concern if you're not able to buy it anyway. But then that beyond that, the problem is DRM more than "proprietary file formats".

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[RedK]

Wait, I used an iPod without iTunes and never bought anything off the iTMS. When did iPods stop supporting MP3s ?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[westlake]

Well, your friend is going to have a hard time buying a car. Just about all of them have radios with ipod connectors (unless you buy a cheap shitbox vehicle).

His friend will have a tough time finding an after-market radio without an iPod connector.

He'd have a tough time trying to find anything in home audio that doesn't have an iPod docking port.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

someone else in this thread was saying that hatred for iTunes or iPod is baseless flamebait (or something to that effect) is clearly not talking to the right people. Get me on the subject, and I'll rant for a good half-hour

hence the whole use of the phrase flamebait in the first place

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Tweenk]

HTML and FLAC over HTTP for the win

The lossless audio compression worship happening on Slashdot is weird. I can understand it if you are supposed to edit or remix the material, where you'll be decompressing and compressing again several times, but for simple listening / watching, lossless formats are just a waste of bits. Anything above 256 kbps MP3 or 192 kbps Vorbis is a waste of bits too.

I'd substantially cut bandwidth costs by using 128 kbps OGG Vorbis.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[speedtux]

Apple does NOT use "proprietary formats" for its iPod, that's just FUD spread around by people who never even tried one.

All the formats you list are proprietary. But the bigger problem is the restrictions on what can connect to the iPod and what applications can run on it.

Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand.

For small players, like the shuffle, drag-and-drop is fine. For large players, disk support and/or MTP support allows a wide range of management apps to work with them.

With iPod, you're stuck with iTunes, which is pretty lousy.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cthellis]

...because ripping DVD's is deemed illegal (now defended by DMCA provisions), and the MPAA goes after any major player who's offered that by default? (CD's don't have such copy protection measures.)

They can't at all STOP it, of course, and it's perfectly easy to pick up the apps you need to rip your DVD's how you like, but the MPAA gets testy if major software allows it out of the box. (Nero used to, for instance.) They destroyed DVD X Copy's studio back in 2004.

You'll have to take it up with them.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[nine-times]

That explains why their movie catalog isn't bigger than their music catalog, but not really why their movie catalog isn't bigger than it is. I'm not sure why there are so many modern movies readily available on DVD that aren't available on iTunes.

Maybe they just haven't gotten around to them all. Maybe Apple is trying to keep their catalog small for some reason. Maybe movie studios are purposefully trying to limit the scope of online sales. But there's some kind of reason.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[MistrBlank]

Uh, how about you click Movies and then do your search.

PEBKAC

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[darpo]

What does FLAC have to do with movies?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[speedtux]

In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive.

Not in any way that's useful for managing music. On the iPod Touch, Apple has succeeded in making the music inaccessible.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[DrgnDancer]

Actually, you're pretty much the odd man out when it comes to e-mailng large files. People that use e-mail services provided by someone else or use shared hosting for their web sites and e-mail server have no real flexibility in the matter. I could up the attachment sizes on my e-mail, but I have a hosting company imposed 2 GB limit on my e-mail storage. HD video would eat that before I had time to think about the problem. I would venture to guess that 99% or greater of Internet users would find some reason that that could not receive large video files via e-mail. I doubt anybody is going to setup an "e-mail you videos" service when only people who happen to run their own e-mail servers out of a well connected office or collocation facility can receive them. While saying the there is a 10MB limit on e-mail attachments is technically inaccurate, saying that the vast majority of people have a reasonably small limit on the size of their e-mail attachments is not.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, you can use the iphone as a drive to store files, but you can't drop songs there and then play them on the ipod.

Wait a minute. You're complaining that when you drop songs in your iphone, these songs won't play on your ipod?

Iphone and ipod are separate devices. You want your songs to magically get transferred from your iphone to your ipod? For that you will need some synchronization software, like itunes.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Haeleth]

Apparently some recent movies have started to include something called a "sound track". Bad idea, if you ask me, taking away jobs from hard-working organists.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Lossless is nice if the service does not have the lossy format you want (ex. your media player is limited to only certain lossy formats).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[DrgnDancer]

Except I think they have a much greater percentage of music than movies. Pretty much everything release by a major label in the last 20 years or so is on iTunes, as is a lot of older stuff released by major labels. Pretty much anything released by minor and indy labels in the last 5 years or so is on iTunes, and a lot of them are making efforts to release their older catalogs. A good bit of stuff released completely independently (no label at all) is even available on iTunes assuming the band has a least one member savvy enough to realize it's a way to make a few extra bucks and motivated enough to learn how to use the system.

Why? Because it costs them almost nothing to put more songs on the store, so even if a given title only sells 500 copies to a few enthusiasts that's probably $400 in the pockets of the label, band, or whoever. I'd venture to guess that iTunes has more like 30% of the songs recorded and released in the last 50 years, and if you changed that to the last 5 years the number probably jumps to 50% or 60%. Make it recorded and released by a label (even a really small indy label) and I bet the number is more like 80% or higher. By contrast they probably have less than 10% of movies released by a major production house in the last 5 years. It took the labels a while to realize that iTunes was a runaway success that they needed to support, but once they did they've filled out the catalogs available nicely. The question is why video production houses haven't realized that iTunes is a license to print money the way that music production companies have.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

So you are saying, rather than buying an MP3 player that does all this properly without installing bloatware (such as my Zen or my Sansa), we should cripple ourselves to satisfy the apple fanboys on /.?

This place is always against proprietary, unless its apple proprietary and then BEND OVER BABY!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[andymadigan]

Just to note, that doesn't work. I clicked movies, typed "The Simpsons" into the search box and got everything back. However, it seems they finally added a "Power Search" feature that fixes this in the latest update. Of course, I had to install the update twice. The first time, I opened iTunes, clicked "OK" to have it update, unchecked Safari and MobileMe (good to know Apple is still trying to sneak stuff in through "updates"), clicked install. It downloaded, and started installing, then mysteriously went back to the update screen without an error message.

It turns out you need to close iTunes before updating, which they never tell you nor do they attempt to close it for you. The update just fails without error and without updating. Of course, when I restarted iTunes after the first failure it also didn't tell me that it still needed to be updated, I had to check the version number to see that it failed.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

Its restricting but pretty easy. I wont buy something with an iPod port. More are coming out with USB ports which is fine.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

allofmp3.com is now mp3sparks.com

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

I sort my music based on its Windows-based file name, and create playlists on my PC based on this. For example, I have 40 gigs of trance music alone, downloaded through various p2p, web-based file share sites, and torrents. Not too many of those have the ID3 tags filled in with the title, artist, album, etc., and if they do, it's filled with garbage like "**RIPPED BY TEHMASTORHAXXOR**" and shit.

I used to have a Nano, gosh this was probably two or three years ago now, and back then I couldn't even find the music I wanted to listen to on the iPod after I let iTunes sort it out. So I sold the Nano. Unless this has changed, I would still be screwed, since iTunes refused to sort based on the file name. Either that, or I would have to go through the tedious task of labeling 4,500+ songs. Fantastic.

In conclusion, I'd by an iPod if they would stop jewing us out of a "sorting based on the file name" option. Until then, I guess they don't want my money. The end.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

m4a is proprietary to Apple? Since when?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

I have a "stick up my butt" because i find it ridiculous that ANY company should be the defacto standard. The crowd here gets pissed off that Microsoft pukes all over the OS world but is okay that apple does the same thing with MP3 players and that's perfectly okay because "its Apple!"

Fuck that, Apple is just another Microsoft, and the reason people don't see it is this weird blindness people get when the "in-thing" is around. Don't look at it for what it is, essentially an MP3 player with bloated management software (for which Sony is repeatedly trashed for, but then, they are Sony and not Apple).

People pick their Presidents and their cars the same way now.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Polumna]

Both Amarok and Rhythmbox support standard metadata in files. Even the metadata that iTunes uses in all its supported formats are standards (mostly, all programs tend to throw in one or two extra fields that only they use).

Yes, of course. That doesn't really argue against my point, though. If I have to take a laptop home to work on it just for a weekend, why import a library into some monstrous media player I'll have to install or configure when I already have nice, neat file management? I have more than one hardware media player for different purposes. I could use all of their proprietary softwares independently to manage their playlists and such, but again... why, when I already have nice, neat file management? My point was simply this: if you use lots of computers (especially if it's not necessarily even a static set) and/or have multiple media players, file management (especially if you have even a basic grasp of regex) is a much easier solution than relying on metadata. I'm only talking about management here: playlists and relative uniformity across machines and devices.

Ordering by filenames are nice if you only want to store the song names and artist, but many people prefer to have more information than that.

First, my directory structures have as much or more data than an iPod displays. Artist -> Year - Album Title -> Track # - Title. Do the full sized ipods display album information? I honestly don't recall, but I want to say they even do album covers... My girlfriend's iPod nano certainly does not. Second, I'm not losing anything. I can still use metadata. I get all that extra information just like everybody else, in the software players I use that support it. I just don't rely on it to manage, because in my circumstances it absolutely cannot do it effectively. That's all I was saying.

PS. I know about this internet thing. I even used cddb-tool in a ripping script (yet again, I lose nothing and gain complete portability). Still, your last sentence genuinely had me laughing.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Or how about he just doesn't like Apple, dunno where you live, maybe some gestapo-esque nanny state, but still in America, we have the right to choose not to buy from someone because we don't like them.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[GuloGulo2]

" I just don't rely on it to manage, because in my circumstances it absolutely cannot do it effectively."

Yeah, we saw that. Did you see where it was explained why you're wrong? I have to assume you didn't or else you wouldn't have repeated the same stupid ass argument that got shredded already.

None of the points you make are valid.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

http://blog.adaniels.nl/articles/iphone-amarok/ [adaniels.nl] would appear to indicate otherwise.

That applies to the iPhone not the iPod. Well, technically it applies to the iPod touch, but that's not a normal iPod it's really just a crippled iPhone. Here is Amarok's supported iPods list. You'll notice they're all listed as working, except the iPhone and iPod touch, which work partially.

Unless the information there has become obsolete, you need to manipulate the device (at least the 'touch' generation of iPods) in a way Apple has taken steps to prevent you from doing. Generally I'd feel uncomfortable buying a device which has been designed to restrict how I can use it (even if the cost of the device is subsidised because of those restrictions).

Wait you want to buy a locked phone, restricted to one network by the demands of the network provider. You further want to buy a device that plays video and works with mainstream offerings of that video, but you don't want the provider to implement the DRM required by those selling the mainstream offerings?

The facts of doing business in the US are simple. If you're going to do business with the MPAA and cellphone providers you're going to have your device locked down and that will cause problems for people who want to use it in ways most people don't (installing music without using the software designed to interact with the device). What's interesting is this used to be the case with music and the RIAA as well, but that is no longer true, largely because of Apple's ability to leverage their market influence to that end. (Mind you this was also in their own financial best interest, I have no illusions they did this out of altruism).

My answer for you is simple. If you want a device without restrictions, buy a simple MP3 player like all the models of iPods except the Touch. If you want something that is more capable of other functions, lobby the government to rein in the corporations that require restrictions on devices. Apple sure doesn't want them, since they're making money selling hardware and every restriction means some people wont buy said hardware or will buy it then cost extra money with support calls trying to get it to work because of the unnecessary complexity caused by the restrictions.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

So you are saying, rather than buying an MP3 player that does all this properly without installing bloatware (such as my Zen or my Sansa)

1) Your Zen or Sansa lacks a lot of features iPods have. Last play time/date, skip count, play count, and so on, that all two-way sync back to itunes. And I use this meta data heavily to generate smart playlists that automatically rotate tracks to the ipod etc.

Some of that stuff needs a separate database.

Sure it would be better if that database were open instead of proprietary. But quite bluntly, until someone defines an open standard, and Creative and Sansa step up and implement it, the iPod will remain my mp3 player of choice.

2) I don't -want- to manage my music library by dragging dropping files around. I do -want- to manage it by creating smart self-updating playlists based on meta data including play history, song ratings, and so on, and to have that automatically sync to the device. So installing a piece of software to handle the sync is something I'd be doing even if I didn't have to.

we should cripple ourselves to satisfy the apple fanboys on /.?

Using a Zen or Sansa is crippling yourself.

This place is always against proprietary, unless its apple proprietary and then BEND OVER BABY!

There are a lot of things I don't like about apple. I don't currently own a Mac because they refuse to release a tower with anywhere near the specs or price I want. There even a lot of things I don't like about itunes. But I've had other mp3 players... Sansa, Yepp -- the iPod is, for me at least, the best device hands down.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[phreakincool]

You'll get it. As soon as the space aliens deliver it. Bunch of sado-masochists.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

We have this amazing thing called "the internet" now, and it has massive amounts of useful and searchable information on it. Many programs connect to this "internet" and retrieve information from it automatically.

That would require that they put down their Apple blinders and see that unrestricted options are available. Many of these fanboys have been iPod exclusive for aeons and may not know that there are things other than pr0n on the interwebs.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[gbarules2999]

My iPod Nano, 4th Gen, works fine out of the box with Ubuntu 9.04. 8.10 has cover art issues, but the new one is fine.

Keep iTunes off of Linux, thanks. Yuck.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

because, apple downloads the content (ok only movies now) unencrypted and then encrypts it. It would have been a big "security" hole to let other apps access the protocol directly because they could just "forget" to encrypt the files once they were on the user's pc.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[GigG]

Not running on Linux is a business decision. Hey, It doesn't run on an an Atari64 or under Apple OS either. There was a time when it didn't run on Windows. WHile it not running on your system is certainly areason for you not to use it it doesn't mean there is anything wrong with the program.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Toonol]

While I'm not boycotting Apple, I completely understand avoiding their software, at least their Windows versions. All the iTunes/QTime stuff I've seen for Windows has been absolutely terrible. iPods and other product lines they offer are nice, if a little overpriced, though. I wonder... are they bad at programming on windows, or is that some sort of strategem?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[colinrichardday]

So Mac OS X is compatible with Windows? I guess that means that BSD is also compatible.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Toonol]

Using a Zen or Sansa is crippling yourself.

I would recommend Zen or Sansa to anybody over an iPod. I don't hate iPods, they're decent players, but the other two companies just build better-working players. I've never had to do TECH SUPPORT for a friend to get their Sansa working, or move their music to a new machine, etc; I have had to to that with an iPod.

You can have your favorites, and if you like the iPod better, that's fine; but you're blatantly wrong if you try to can claim as a fact that those other players are "crippling yourself". Reasonable people can disagree.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[colinrichardday]

Yeah, because making a BSD-compatible client from a Mac OS X executable would be too much work.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

we dont talk about that.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Those would be examples of proprietary software and hardware, not formats as the GP was arguing.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[loufoque]

The reason people want FLAC for audio is simply to be on par with the CD version.

Really, if you've got the choice between acquiring the best quality there is and some "good enough" quality, for an insignificant price difference, what would you choose?
Especially since acquiring a digital version means perpetual storage. People who care about what they are buying want the best there is, that's all there is to it.

As of today, you pay the same price, sometimes more, for a digital version than for a CD.
There are many problems to this:
- quality of digital version is lower, because it's compressed using a lossy codec
- the rights you have on the copyrighted material are fewer than that of the CD version
- DRM is used to enforce usage restrictions, and leads to a lot of problems
- the mean of distribution is not open, you have to install dedicated proprietary software. On the other hand ordering a CD online or going to a store doesn't require anything out of you
- you don't get the box, covers, pressed CD (that lives longer than custom burned CDs) etc.

Cost of a sale is virtually zero for the virtual store, while for a CD in a store it costs much more to produce and distribute.
So they're reducing costs without reflecting it on price, making a huge margin.

So basically, you pay more for something that's worth much less.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jonaskoelker]

I don't see why Apple would have a problem with that.

But then the developers wouldn't be drinking their mocca-latte-$COFFEE-$COFFEE-$COFFEE in Cupertino!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[perryizgr8]

yeah, and when i just want to transfer my new cd to my shuffle, i have to download a 60mb installer and agree to run that bloated crap on my already windows encumbered pc.
i threw down my shuffle in a rage out of the seventh floor window. just got my new sony ericsson w595 with 4gb memory. i can just copy all of my wmplayer-ripped library and paste it on the phone over bluetooth. no extra software.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Aranykai]

I do pretty much all of that via winamp and my zen. Winamp generates my playlists based on listening habits, automatically syncs new content to my zen every time its connected(via a usb mini cable you can obtain anywhere for a few dollars instead of a proprietary POS connector, I might add).

Another feature Zen's have over the competition is recording from FM radio. I attend conventions regularly and I can record a clean copy off their FM transmission, avoiding any noise/gain issues with a mic. Lets see an iPod pull that off.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

iTunes may be great software

Wait. What? iTunes is bloated and buggy. It steals focus when its closing, hangs on I/O, and purposely leaves out important functionality like copying songs off your iPod.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

but the other two companies just build better-working players.

No. They don't.

I've never had to do TECH SUPPORT for a friend to get their Sansa working, or move their music to a new machine, etc; I have had to to that with an iPod.

My Sansa died the first week I owned it, and had to be exchanged for a new one.

As for moving music to a new machine; that's a cop out. The only time that's ever an issue is if you have DRM'd tracks. And having trouble moving DRM tracks between computers is a DRM issue not an ipod issue. And having an ipod doesn't require that you have DRM'd tracks.

but you're blatantly wrong if you try to can claim as a fact that those other players are "crippling yourself".

I responded with the same rhetoric that was fired at the ipod by daath93 who said using was 'crippling yourself' to make a point.

Reasonable people can disagree.

Sure. I bought my 4 year old an inexpensive Sansa. Its the right device for him. (Not saying sansa's are ONLY good for 4 year old, but for him I valued 'low price' over 'advanced playlist management features' because there are good odds he'll drop it, and poor odds he'll be defining or caring about smart playlists in the near future.) And it has a (tinny) external speaker instead of requiring headphones... because I don't really want him wearing headphones yet. In other words, it had the features I wanted for him.

That said, while you might recommend a Zen or Sansa to most people, I would recommend an ipod. The itunes playlist management features, and library management features are excellent compared to the other devices, especially for non-technical people, in my opinion. Now that itms is drm free, I can recommend that too... although there are other sources for music that I think are even better.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[hairyfeet]

And for the iPod guy who "didn't want to manage his tunes by drag and drop" say hello to my friend Mediamonkey who is quite good at that job. Sure you could use WMP11 for the job as well, but the monkey just has IMHO a much nicer layout and experience. And with both WMP11 and the monkey it really isn't hard to cook up playlists like "Songs I haven't heard in a month" or "songs I like on weekends". After dealing with some of my customers headaches with iPods I have my whole family on the Sandisk M series. They are built like tanks, run on a single AAA battery so if I run out of juice while I am out I can pop into any gas station and be jamming again in under 3 minutes, and if a family member wants to get a bigger player or needs a copy of the songs they have on their Sandisk it is just Ctrl-A Ctrl-C Ctrl-V, can't get much simpler than that.

If you want an iPod because they are pretty or you like the GUI that is fine, but after dealing with just about every kind of MP3 player known to man I'll stick with the Sandisk or if I want a HDD based the Cowon. Because I do enough tech support at work without dealing with it at home.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[silverkniveshotmail.]

Well, if you're not interested in having ID3 tags I don't think iTunes could even serve a purpose to you, and I'm getting the impression that you're not buying much music anyway so I'm not sure what you mean by your money.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Runaway1956]

Maybe this is part of the reason all of our auto manufacturers are going bankrupt? An auto is supposed to be a means of transportation, not an entertainment center. They have no business putting stupid crap like ipod connectors in the vehicle. And, people who think they NEED an ipod connector in the car are probably spending WAY TO MUCH TIME IN THEIR CAR! Park the damned thing, and walk some of that lard ass off. Stop polluting, stop wasting fossil fuels, and save the frigging planet, alright?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Chabo]

You do need another piece of software to do that, but it doesn't necessarily have to be iTunes.

I have a Rockbox'd Sansa myself, so I don't know that much about it, but I know at the very least that Winamp is also capable of putting songs on to an ipod.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

This leads to the consumer needing a special purpose app just to deal with it rather than taking a generic converter and using it's defaults.

You don't understand iTunes or why it's important to the iPod. (Hint: the phrase, "It just works.")

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[ottothecow]

I dunno...apple MP3 players are the defacto standard because they are the best. With the removal of DRM from the itunes store, you are free to transcode and move shit elsewhere (and there was never any restriction on putting non-apple tracks on an ipod).

I also dislike itunes but there are a lot of suitable replacements. I have been syncing my ipod to winamp since I got my first one (4g color)...I don't even have itunes installed anymore. I've also used amarok on linux to interface with my ipod and it seemed to work fine.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

Winamp generates my playlists based on listening habits,

Based on your listening habits on your PC. itunes incorporates your listening habits ON YOUR IPOD.

  automatically syncs new content to my zen every time its connected(via a usb mini cable you can obtain anywhere for a few dollars instead of a proprietary POS connector, I might add).

You can buy a 3rd party dock-usb cable for a few bucks all over the place.

As for whether the dock connector is justified... hard to say. It was introduced at a time when ipods supported both firewire and usb, when a pure usb solution wasn't an option, so it was justified a few years ago for sure. But even today, it has a higher insertion rating than mini-usb, so it'll last longer. It locks better and supports the ipods weight, which is handy for docks, clock radios, etc.

However, being non-standard -is- a minor hassle. Although, to be fair, the odds of a person having a mini-usb cable handy where-ever I go isn't much better. Full size usb, sure... but not mini usb or micro usb.

Another feature Zen's have over the competition is recording from FM radio.

Different strokes and all that. I listen to FM radio in my car when I forget my ipod. It helps motivate me not to ever forget my ipod. On the flip-side my sister bought a sony precisely because it had an fm tuner. I grok that people want different things.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[thebigbadme]

I'm not going to say that what I do is any good (I like it, but that's irrelevant), but I can go from basic idea to writing, arranging, performing, recording, producing, mixing, mastering, and even converting to mp3/aac/whatever, all by myself. tricky thing about making movies is that you can't easily play all parts by yourself... actually, you probably could, but it would show more than if you did the same as with music (which I do).

I'm going to submit my first album to iTunes in the near future through a company called Tunecore... I only wish they'd let me lower the offering price.
Maybe 2 or 3 other people will have anything to do with my music getting all the way into the iTunes store...

but you're right, so far as current, that it takes a lot more to put together a movie, plus the software to do it is much more expensive (at least if you roll legal, which I do for music recording, I don't do much in movies anymore... made 3, had to have other actors to get it right)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

nd with both WMP11 and the monkey it really isn't hard to cook up playlists like "Songs I haven't heard in a month" or "songs I like on weekends".

Is that "songs I haven't heard in a month on my pc"? Does it sync back meta data from the device? After all, songs I haven't heard in a month on my PC, but listened to 10 minutes ago on my mp3 player should not be in a "Songs I haven't heard in a month" playlist.

This is why I've defended the proprietary ipod 'database' system. It tracks and syncs all the meta data on the -device- back to the PC, so when you say "how many times have I listened to this song", it incorporates the times you listened to it on the device instead of just the PC. To me that is useful because, for me, 90% of the time I'm listening from -the device-. So if the media management programs play count, skip count, last played date, etc, etc, isn't pulling the information from the device then its worthless to me.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Timothy Brownawell]

Those would be examples of proprietary software and hardware, not formats as the GP was arguing.

It's actually proprietary interfaces, where they make sure that nobody except itunes can talk to the ipod. Which might be file formats on the ipod, or communication protocols, depending on how exactly it works.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[NeverVotedBush]

You can also rent or purchase from Amazon. They are already set up on the Roku player and I'm sure a number of other platforms as well.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[felix_stegerman]

Yes and no. While iTunes is indeed barely mentioned in the article,
the title of the page (though not the article) is: "Why there is no
iTunes for movies. - By Farhad Manjoo - Slate Magazine". Thus the
fault does not lie with /. (alone).

- Felix

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[spire3661]

THey most certainly are not the 'best' on many levels. THe ONLY real advantage Apple had this late inthe game was the Itunes DRM. Now thats gone, ther eis no reason not to pick up a MUCH more user friendly pplayer. Ipods only allow you to do things in VERY presrcibed ways and its utter bullshit. Ill list a few

Cant use it cross platform, if you want to transfer songs from a PC and your ipod is mac formatted you are fucked, which is jsut plain retarded.

Cant just drag and drop files on it like almost any other good MP3 player. The battery is non removable and expensive to have the OEM replace it. ( i know there are after market kits but they take a level of technical knowledge)

Its expensive. It costs quite a bit more then most of the players out there and does less for MY usage.

Ipod is a decent product and it has its place, but it most certainly not the 'best' from both a technical and universal access point of view.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

AAC? My new Nintendo plays that! You don't need iTunes (as others have commented on) but for me at least it's a nice "one stop shop" for media files. As for "hardware lock-in" well there are plenty of after market widgets for iPod; I don't need to get my charger from Apple, I can buy speakers from almost anyone, most iPods work with any headphones (even the new Shuffle if you have a widget to replicate the control buttons).

I see no more "lock-in" than any other popular make of "MP3 Player".

Now the studios are letting Apple remove their DRM I can even convert iTunes bought Music to another format.

On the subject of the "Shuffle" it's not like I'm going to be trapped by my purchase - if I decide I want to use something else in the future I can just convert the music and bin the player (it's cheap enough).

You can't convert to another format without losing quality, though...But then again, what's the point of changing formats if it's compatible with everything, as you say?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[AceofSpades19]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in. I's like a device I can just drop files on and play, without installing some bloated management software. There's people worse than me as well. I have a friend who was car shopping and rejected one car because it had an iPod connector. Having a custom connector is not even that bad if it can be used free by others, but the iPod connector is definitely not like that. I've recently removed QuickTime from my remaining Windows box because of their pushy update strategy.

You do understand that you can use iPods (as well as many other players) without having to use their proprietary formats, right? iPod will play the standard format MP3s as well its apparent successor, AAC. As for hardware lock-in, you get that with any MP3 player. Wanna use your Sansa case with an iRiver? Nope. Not going to fit. As for managing music goes, I once had a device where I had to drop and drag. Here's the problem with that: It got extremely cumbersome after a dozen songs. You may think you want "control" but when you have to manage 10,000 songs manually, it's a pain.

but you can use any program you want to manage it and even write your own program to manage it

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[fluffman86]

"In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive."

But then you can't play the mp3's you copy to it. He depends on a "internal database" which is generated by iTunes.

Generated by iTunes...or Banshee or Rhythmbox or AmaroK or any of a dozen other music players available on Windows.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cuantar]

Why does it have to be either/or? I like my music to have useful filenames so that I can find what I'm looking for with standard tools. I also like to have metadata, so that I can find what I'm looking for from within any music player that understands tags. My girlfriend has an iPod. Every music file she's copied to it through iTunes has had its filename corrupted, so that I'm left wondering, "what the hell is AYQZ.mp3?" Yes, these files still have their metadata, but ultimately, that's not very useful to me until I open some kind of music catalog program. What's the point of scrambling my filenames and throwing out some useful information? All it does is make using my files difficult.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not. I have searched everywhere. I then tried changing to the US store and voilÃ, there was the Movies. I tried purchasing a movie and it said "Your account is only valid for purchases in the Finnish iTunes store"... which lacks the Movie option!
Weak dude.... weak....

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

When I look under "Movies" in the iTunes store most of the movies I want to see are not there. For instance, it was pretty obvious the last time I was flipping through the big animated list of iTunes movies that apparently "Jumper" is the only SciFi movie anyone would want to see. Not that I dislike Jumper, it's just that I've seen it a few times.

I think the point of the article is absolutely true. In theory a market system makes everything available for a price. However, the Hollywood system is so tremendously byzantine that most content isn't available at ANY price.

Just look at video stores. Ever wonder why most of the movies at the video rental store are crummy? The truth is that really good movies are usually either stolen or not returned at some point. The only ones you see at the store are the ones that were second-rate enough to get returned. For instance, my video store used to rent an entire season of Star Trek DS 9 DVDs, and EVERY SINGLE ONE of them has been stolen and/or not returned at some point. And, of course, the iTunes store (nor any other online download store) will ever ever let you download them. Period.

Bottom Line: I don't torrent, but I sure understand its popularity.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Jezza]

The future - we have no idea what new formats will be available. And nobody said EVERYTHING could play AAC, but my point was it's playable by more than just iPod.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Darkness404]

Being a touch owner (and testing it on a friend's iPhone) I can assure you that it does not work on either the touch or the iPhone.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[greyhueofdoubt]

>>Fuck that, Apple is just another Microsoft, and the reason people don't see it is this weird blindness people get when the "in-thing" is around

Gosh, I really am tired of this argument. I think it's annoying because when you say that someone bought something just because it's the 'in thing', you are telling that person that they are so stupid that they don't know what they want, don't know why they want what they want, and in fact want stupid things.

My iPod is not a slap bracelet or zubaz or a mullet. It's a tool that I use to get something done (it plays music for me). I don't use it in public. Only one of my friends owns an iPod besides me. In addition, it comes with tools for managing and aquiring music, videos, podcasts, games, and other stuff.

Maybe, just maybe, you could get off your high horse and admit that some people aren't fucking idiots and consciously chose iPod over something else for good reasons. You want a car, I want a truck, and I don't need to hear your theories about why owning a truck makes me a trendy redneck asshat. Some people buy trucks because they're remodeling their house and can't fit lumber and sheetrock in their geo prizm.

Sorry to pick on your post but I am pretty sick of pretentious trolls considering anything popular to be crap.

-b

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Darkness404]

iPods/iTunes are crippled by design. For example, I own an iPod touch, I bought it with the full knowledge that it wouldn't work with Linux (excluding getting iTunes to work with WINE or sudden improvements in various iPod libraries), not a problem, I had a laptop that had a Vista partition. So I installed iTunes, didn't really mind it (save for the fact it enjoyed sucking up system resources like crazy), but then the laptop's HD managed to crash. I had a bunch of MP3s that I either ripped off of CDs or downloaded from other sites such as Amazon MP3 along with a handful of iTunes bought content such as apps and the odd song or two. So after I resized a partition on my desktop to put Windows XP on there and installed it, and then put on iTunes and after "authorizing" my account (DRM sucks) I thought I would be ready to sync music off there and with no problem get it all on the computer with no problem, after all none of the files (minus applications) were DRM-free. So I plugged in my iPod and transfered purchases off of it... and all the apps synced perfectly and so did the iTunes downloaded songs.... But the MP3s I had gotten elsewhere did not transfer! Now, assuming that the iPod worked about as well as the other 2 generic MP3 players I had, I didn't feel the need to back up my entire music collection, after all, it was all on my iPod (and it being new and using flash memory I didn't have to worry about a HD crash), yet it didn't retrieve my songs something that every, single, other MP3 play could! So after a forum post in the Apple support forums, someone gave me a link to an application that worked for it and so I didn't have to re-rip CDs, but this is an obvious, easy, fix for iTunes.

I didn't mind using iTunes except for that fact. Fix that clear limitation and all will be good, but its things like that, features that are so obvious to anyone who has ever had that problem that could be added.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

You retard, Apple doesn't own AAC or anything. ITS A STANDARD. Educate yourself moron. Also Apple has removed all DRM from its music. WAKE THE FUCK UP.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Clay Pigeon -TPF-VS-]

Isn't annecdotal evidence wonderful?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[WCguru42]

Their search function sucks. It has no ability to say "search for The Simpsons in TV Shows" so you get the shows, and the soundtracks.

I know this is asking a lot, but you could do a ctrl-A on all of your movies/shows and edit the info to include "movie" or "tv show" in the information setting. Then you could search for "simpson tv show" and only get the tv show.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[WCguru42]

yeah, and when i just want to transfer my new cd to my shuffle, i have to download a 60mb installer and agree to run that bloated crap on my already windows encumbered pc. i threw down my shuffle in a rage out of the seventh floor window. just got my new sony ericsson w595 with 4gb memory. i can just copy all of my wmplayer-ripped library and paste it on the phone over bluetooth. no extra software.

So, let's get this straight, you bought a player that is well known to require iTunes to put music onto and then complain about having to download iTunes. I don't buy a playstation and complain about it not playing XBox games.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

People pick their Presidents and their cars the same way now.

How did you know I just bought a black car?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[RpiMatty]

Yeah, using firefox it asks you to download a small exe that will give you a code.
Then you paste that code into the ms website and it gives you the update.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[dontmakemethink]

Which should you resent more, people's stupidity, or Apple/Microsoft's ability to profit from it?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cibyr]

apple's hardware is also in my experience very easy to circumvent , its almost as if apple is "just going through the motions."

Please tell me how to get music onto an iPhone without using iTunes. This is pretty much the only reason I haven't bought one - I can't stand iTunes and it's inability to work with anything but MP3, WMA, or AAC.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[maztuhblastah]

Fuck that, Apple is just another Microsoft, and the reason people don't see it is this weird blindness people get when the "in-thing" is around.

Not quite. MS is known for avoiding interoperable standards at all costs. Apple is not 100% open, but they're a hell of a lot better than MS when it comes to formats.

Examples:

MS sells music in WMA format. Apple sells it in AAC.

MS's browsers... 'nough said. Apple makes Safari and sponsors the development of the open-source WebKit engine.

MS's web solutions usually feature a closed-source httpd and a proprietary server-side language. Apple ships Apache and PHP.

MS ships Monad. Apple ships bash, tcsh, and others.

See a pattern?

Now that's not to say that Apple is entirely open. They've still got their own bizarre connectors, the iPod still requires iTunes, and the iPhone team seems to have a pathological compulsion to reinvent the wheel as many times as possible (ignoring IDLE, SyncML, CalDAV, etc in the process.) Still, (at least in my experience) Apple tends to be a lot more open than MS when it comes to data formats.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[hairyfeet]

Uuuhhh...if that is all you are worried about simply get any of the models of Cown that support Rockbox. The problem with iTunes is not only the proprietary nature of the thing(as I use Windows I can't really bitch about that) it is the fact that iTunes is a MAC app. Which is just fine if you have a Mac, and from using friends Macs I can see why they like it as it "just works". Not so much in Windows though. I don't know how many weird bugs and app crashes I've had dealing with my customers iTunes. It has gotten to the point that if I am writing out a support ticket and a customer tries to bring up iTunes problems I just hold up my hand and say "I can give you Songbird, WMP11, or Mediamonkey but I do NOT deal with iTunes. You have a problem with iTunes talk to Apple." and most after trying Songbird are quite happy with the switch.

That is why we need to point out when talking about iTunes or Safari that we are talking about the Windows or OSX version, since they really are two different beasts. Saying that iTunes works for you on your Mac is like saying the iPod works really great in your Ferrari. Since most of us don't actually HAVE a Ferrari that doesn't really help us now, does it?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

It's under 'Movies' in the iTunes Store.

Well I live in Denmark Europa. And the "Movies" area is not in iTunes here.

Same as If you don't like to buy music true iTunes then use Amazon. Well I can't do that either.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

I would recommend Zen or Sansa to anybody over an iPod. I don't hate iPods, they're decent players, but the other two companies just build better-working players.

"Better working" is a vague term. It could refer to hardware/software reliability or it could refer to usability. So far, most of the independent reviews I've seen favor the iPod in both categories. Note, I don't care. I don't even own an MP3 player. I just think this argument is weak and just a vague opinion.

I've never had to do TECH SUPPORT for a friend to get their Sansa working, or move their music to a new machine, etc; I have had to to that with an iPod.

I have had to do tech support for a friend to get their music collections onto their Zen. But hey, that's just another anecdote. They don't make for much of an argument either way.

You can have your favorites, and if you like the iPod better, that's fine; but you're blatantly wrong if you try to can claim as a fact that those other players are "crippling yourself".

The previous poster made a cogent argument. He included features of the iPod working with iTunes that are not available for either the Sansa or Zen. If you choose a Sansa or a Zen you are indeed "crippling yourself" with regard to those features. On could just as easily argue that one is "crippling oneself" by choosing an iPod that can't tune into FM radio and that is reasonable argument... but neither does it make the previous poster blatantly wrong.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[soren202]

Not that he deserves +3 interesting either.

It's not that hard to figure out why somebody would boycott apple - itunes is filled with bloat, macs and ipods are too expensive and difficult to mod, and apple has the tendency to make their products not play nice with other products or formats.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[soren202]

How is that a troll?

Damn mods need to learn that troll != disagrees with you.

If anything it should be modded overrated, which would still be wrong because it's currently modded to 1.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

I have a "stick up my butt" because i find it ridiculous that ANY company should be the defacto standard.

Umm, so you object to companies succeeding?

The crowd here gets pissed off that Microsoft pukes all over the OS world but is okay that apple does the same thing with MP3 players and that's perfectly okay because "its Apple!"

MS uses their monopoly influence on desktop OS's to ruin other markets and to lock people into proprietary formats. We complain about MS's use of proprietary formats to leverage their overwhelming share of the Office market, for example. If MS made ODF their default format for MS Office and complied with the standard, we wouldn't complain about it because others could compete fairly and interoperability would not be an issue. Apple is using an open standard for their music player and other companies can and do implement players that use that standard just as Apple does. With regard to file formats, Apple has done the right thing.

With regard to other items, like tying to the iTunes store and to the iTunes software, Apple is not behaving well, but then they don't have monopoly influence yet, so until they do they are legally in the clear. Understand?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Draek]

Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand.

It isn't. Yours truly, someone with actual on-hands experience.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[FrkyD]

try http://www.podtomac.com/ or http://www.podtopc.com/

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

It is quite simple why I 'boycott' them. There are better alternatives out there.

Apple Macs have always 'been easy to use'. That is its strength and weakness.

This mantra is spread throughout its entire line of products.

I have used them on and off again for years. I like them when I use them, even own a couple of iPods (they were best at what they did at the time I got them). No real problems with them. But my biggest 'bang for the buck' has always been other products. My next one will probably be a Samsung as the iPhone is where everything is going and the iPod is fading away in new features added.

However Apple has a serious problem with its software. It is not written for Windows. It is written for MacOSX. The have always had this problem (even all the way back to the MacOS6 days). Crushingly awesome software on the mac, mediocre crashy bloaty software on Windows. Install iTunes and you end up with 3 services running. Even if you never even plug in a iPod. Maybe not the end all be all of what is wrong. But it shows a more systemic problem in the way they write windows software. They can not make up their minds that they want to write windows software but still want to do it the mac way. It takes a different mindset. I know I have written software for both.

You can see this in order of buttons. The way windows pop open. The way they do not integrate into the OS. The way the title bar looks. They integrate into MacOSX because they have that look and feel already there. But on windows its like they 'bolted it on'. It is as if they care only about the Mac crowd and could give a flip about the rest of us who also buy their other products. It feels like a rush job.

From a dev point of view I gave up writing software for them. Their API changes to often. Sometimes it seems the change is just for change sake. Windows has similar issues but I can at least make a shot at what I write for this version of windows will work for the next 3 or 4 of them. Even if the API is deprecated it will at least run. I can *not* say that for Mac. The iPhone dudes will find this out in about 2-3 years. WHEN not IF Apple decides the API/hardware they are all using is junk and they all need to be using the new wizzy awesome API/hardware.

If you do not have a huge library of software you like to use. Like ease of use. Do not mind totally throwing out how you work every few years. Then get a Apple. The rest of us buy a PC.

Others probably have a different opinion on this and I will be modded troll. But honestly I just gave up on them. I really wanted to use their stuff it is just that cool.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Draek]

Using a Zen or Sansa is crippling yourself.

Now, I respect the rest of your post since you explain both the features you like *and* the fact that its only your wants and not something that applies to everyone, but the above statement is pure fanboy flamebait. Both the Zen and the iPod have features the other does not have so neither is 'crippling' oneself but rather simply purchasing based on different needs and criteria.

Personally I listen to whole albums, not single songs so the idea of 'smart' playlists is useless to me, and I like being easily able to use my MP3 player on any computer I plug it into and copy my music back and forth so the iPod is not even worth considering. If you like it, go ahead and buy one but please keep the evangelism out when *I* purchase something else.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not true... I don't pick my car based on how tall it is.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jedidiah]

> You don't understand iTunes or why it's important to the iPod. (Hint: the phrase, "It just works.")

I understand it just fine.

Except IT DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY for video.

There's a real question of whether or not it really works that way
for Music either unless you restrict yourself to some sort of "walled
garden". Although iTunes a least handles "original media" when it
comes to Music.

It doesn't "just work". It will "just work" if you do nothing but
drink only Cupertino brand Kool-Aid. Stray off the reservation
just once and "just works" breaks.

iTunes is piss poor when dealing with "alien" video formats.

It doesn't even handle "non compliant" quicktime files acceptably well.

Once you say "Handbrake" you've admitted Apple's failure here.

iTunes simply does not live up to it's hype.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[mdwh2]

Mods on crack, saying why he doesn't like something is not flamebait.

And I do agree - in my humble opinion, Quicktime has a poor interface, doesn't even support basic functionality such as full screen mode (unless you pay, IIRC), and it is more annoying than most other players in terms of having stuff run at startup. I prefer players that Just Work, and have a good UI.

(I remember some time ago on Slashdot someone was claiming that Apple "Just Works" and Windows is always "distracting" him by getting in the way somehow. I said I didn't know what he was on about. Funningly enough, I concede that later that very day I did get distracted by something getting in the way of what I was doing on Windows. What I was trying to do was watch a Quicktime movie in fullscreen...)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[stonedcat]

And I'm sure this program is for either Windows or OSX, making it useless for those who can't use itunes to being with.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[mdwh2]

Fringe? Well in that case, now you see how it looks when Mac users complain that something only runs on Windows. By your logic, there's no point supporting fringe OSs.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[mdwh2]

I'll remember this post for the next time someone complains that a company doesn't release a Mac version. It's not their fault that Mac users choose to run an incompatible OS, right?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[burgeralarm]

Nope. Not with the new iPod touch at any rate.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Nerdfest]

Check the moderation on the parent post, and the one that follows it (mine). Both have been as high as at least +4, and keep being modded down as well. Expressing an opinion is strongly discouraged.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SectoidRandom]

Read the article..

It is actually extremely interesting as it details exactly why iTunes has such a limited selection. Something that I often wondered..

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[metamatic]

If iPods were as picky about Music as they are about Movies, most people
would conclude that they were proprietary.

iPod plays 3 audio formats: MPEG-1 layer III, MPEG-4, and Apple Lossless.

iPod plays 2 video formats: MPEG-4, and MPEG-4 with H.264.

It doesn't get a lot more standard than MPEG-4. I can play MPEG-4 on PSP, BlackBerry, Nokia N800, Mac, Linux, Windows, AppleTV, PS3. It's the industry standard, which makes it the most appropriate choice for the iPod.

Perhaps you should be asking yourself why you have so much video in weird formats like MPEG-4 codecs crammed into obsolete AVI containers.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[ailnlv]

All those you mentioned are propietary. The fact that a certain format is a de facto standard doesn't make it any less propietary.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

iTunes downloads are likely authenticated and encrypted - even if the end-file isn't. This is why iTunes has to thrash the disk and think for a bit after finishing each download - it's decrypting the file.

I highly doubt that Apple would permit anyone to re-engineer that process.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Karlt1]

Cant use it cross platform, if you want to transfer songs from a PC and your ipod is mac formatted you are fucked, which is jsut plain retarded.

Then don't format the iPod using a Mac -- format using a PC. In fact, iPods come formatted by default using FAT. FAT formatted iPods can be used for both. iPod's (except for the Touch/iPhone) are just seen by the OS as a mass storage device. Windows doesn't support HFS natively. If you have a third party HFS driver then you can use a Mac formatted iPod with Windows.

THe ONLY real advantage Apple had this late inthe game was the Itunes DRM.

And we all know that the majority of people get their music from iTunes and not from their own CD's or from p2p networks.....

Cant just drag and drop files on it like almost any other good MP3 player

So exactly how do I subscribe to podcast, automatically sync only unplayed podcasts back and forth between the player, start listening to a track on my computer and finish on my player without losing the spot, set up smart playlist, set up multiple playlist with some of the same songs without the songs being duplicated on the player, etc.. using drag and drop?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[AceofSpades19]

I was referring to drag and drop mp3 players

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[sagematt]

On the subject of the "Shuffle" it's not like I'm going to be trapped by my purchase - if I decide I want to use something else in the future I can just convert the music and bin the player (it's cheap enough).

I can't believe you are recommending that.

Scroll to the Can't I just convert my MP3 files to another format if necessary? part of this article

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Karlt1]

Not in any way that's useful for managing music. On the iPod Touch, Apple has succeeded in making the music inaccessible.

It took me less than three seconds to type "getting music off of iPod Touch" in Google and to find this link.....

http://iphonetouch.blorge.com/2008/05/09/how-to-get-music-off-an-ipod-touch-iphone-in-windows/

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

Funny, my zen tracks most played...

and the point kinda was that without the bloatware, the ipod IS crippled and nearly useless, rendering all those nifty features useless. Are you telling me the ipod touch and the iphone has the processing power to decode compressed video, track motion and GPS but doesnt have the power to run its own onboard tagging database?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Your Zen or Sansa lacks a lot of features iPods have. Last play time/date, skip count, play count, and so on, that all two-way sync back to itunes. And I use this meta data heavily to generate smart playlists that automatically rotate tracks to the ipod etc.

Some of that stuff needs a separate database.

Sure it would be better if that database were open instead of proprietary. But quite bluntly, until someone defines an open standard, and Creative and Sansa step up and implement it, the iPod will remain my mp3 player of choice.

Actually, assuming you use WMP to sync, as most Sansa and Creative owners do, that information is updated by the device and synchronized when you click Sync (or Auto-Sync when connecting the device).

While there's a lot of good reasons to bash Microsoft, comprehensive knowledgebases are not one of them:

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-CA/help/6056f302-58df-4148-94a6-223330a52d981033.mspx

Both "Play Count" and "Time" are synced. "Rating" is, as well.

(Zune users use their own software, but I would be surprised if MS didn't duplicate the functionality in the Zune software.)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

and I don't need to hear your theories about why owning a truck makes me a trendy redneck asshat. Some people buy trucks because they're remodeling their house and can't fit lumber and sheetrock in their geo prizm.

I double checked and I don't believe I mentioned rednecks, trendy or otherwise, asshats, or geo prizms. Perhaps you are confusing myself with the past conversations you've had where people spout such things. Judging from your response, however, I can hardly disagree with the conclusion of you being a trendy redneck asshat.

And yes, most consumers don't know what they are buying, what they want or why they want it. Thank you for understanding the original point of my message.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

This is by far the best response I've seen to the question yet!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[brit74]

Set the distribution rights free, drop DRM, and make the products...

Wait - how does dropping the DRM solve anything in this case? I can understand that you don't want DRM on stuff you buy (so that it continues to work years from now), but since you're only watching a temporary copy anyway what's the difference?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[dirtyhippie]

wow, look at the size of this thread. all about a point that is addressed in TFA -- on the first page no less.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

I modded 2763548 as flamebait. I didn't see a point to his post other than to poke Apple fans in the eye. The whole thread has been modded to hell and back with +1/-1 Agree/Disagree...

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Some things have changed in the decade since you used QuickTime Player. (Since you liked to a QT4 article, I assume that's when you last used QuickTime Player) You no longer need to pay for full screen mode and disabling stuff at startup is a checkbox away. Also, the UI has changed somewhat since back in the bad old days of that silly dial based volume. Other annoyances remain - namely the raft of features that are - still! - grayed out as "pro" features and some of the AV controls are simplistic compared to what QuickTime is capable of (or what other players like VLC offer). Hard to believe in 2009, eh?

10.6 Snow Leopard is supposed to bring a major update to QuickTime (QuickTime X), so let's hope they give everyone a *modern* player.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[The End Of Days]

I gotta tell you, my desire to have the computer manage my music for me is driven less by fear and more by an understanding of the fact that computers are pretty good at tedious shit, whereas I get bored quickly and stop playing.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tg123]

Thanks thats brilliant.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me do the maths.
iTunes has maybe two dozen SF movies for download in NZ, and none of the US/UK TV shows I follow. movies rent for about NZ$7.00 and buy for nz$20 to nz$30 and shifting them to media I an watch on TV in my lounge is difficult and time consuming.
I have a 20GB cap on my dsl line and due to distance from the exchange I only get 2.5Mb/sec. Movies come in at 1 to 1.5GB in MP4 DRM encrusted versions.

Civc video, my Local has 100 times more content, and I can rent for 5 to 7 days, and if I wanted to I could rip easily. A ripped movie in DivX is usually 600-800MB in size. Rentals cost NZ$1-$4 for old stuff through to $7 overnight for new releases. New DVDs sell for NZ$20-40, boxed sets for around $100 or more

Broadcast TV and timeshifted recording/DVR:
MySky, Freview and regular analog broadcast - have to wait for it to be shown, unless recording have to watch it live, and difficult to shift content to other devices. Advantage, especially in the digital channels is much higher quality.
Cable/Sky TV cost is Z$50-$80 per month. Freeview is free, but decoder required.
Some have websites for later viewing, but usually require software or restricted codec for playback.

BitTorrent/USENet: Much more content than either iTunes or local video store as I can also get music, TV shows and current release and many older movies, even stuff just not for sale anywhere in NZ. Cost is only my bandwidth, and file sizes are reasonable (Except for full rip ISOs) Quality can vary, but just like in the real world, you end up looking carefully at reviews and feedback before downloading - if I were ever to do such a thing.) and content can be played on everything.

Now which service offers the best consumer value, and which one is best for the interest of the providors?
Guess which one wins in the boardroom.

Now I thought if torrents can provide all this for free, surely it cant be that hard for a distributer to do the same, and imbed some ads. 90% of down-loaders wouldn't go to the hassel of removing the ads if the content was of good quality and was available quickly, world-wide.

I'd pay cable or Sky prices for this sort of service.

(BTW - now iTunes music is DRM free, I run a virtual machine with tinyXP and iTunes to purchase my music.)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tg123]

In fact, you can do that. Plug the ipod into a PC without itunes and it appears to be a usb drive.

BULLSHIT.

Yes, you can use the iphone as a drive to store files, but you can't drop songs there and then play them on the ipod.

you can, what you need to do is download the programs. Lots available and you can do it with out cracking the phone.

example a program that somebody just listed on slashdot.

(thanks by the way dude, it works great)

pctopod or mactopod

http://www.podtomac.com/
http://www.podtopc.com/

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tg123]

yea this is obsolete info.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[greyhueofdoubt]

LOL. It was an analogy, fella. Sort of like A is to B like C is to D kind of thing.

Sorry my post went a little over your head. But that's OK, I can tell from your other posts on this thread that you are HEAVILY invested in your sansa and your zen. You fanboys can get so emotional :)

-b

take a joke

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[assassinator42]

The Zen Vision:M counts a track as played if you play even under a second of it. I believe it will also randomly add plays to songs.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Golddess]

Exactly. Does anything else even come close to having the same capacities as an iPod Classic? At least back when I was first shopping for a portable music player there wasn't.

Some people buy trucks because they're remodeling their house and can't fit lumber and sheetrock in their geo prizm.

This makes a good analogy for digital music players. Trucks vs cars both have their trade offs. A truck can do more, but typically gets worse performance than a car (MPG comes to mind). Likewise, an iPod can hold more content, but you lack, say, the ability to change out the battery yourself.

In the trucking example that you provided, it might be better to rent a truck than own one as a primary mode of transportation. Unfortunately I cannot think of a similar situation for digital music players, maybe something to do with how often one needs to drag all of ones digital content around?

A bit off topic, but it'd be interesting to see how often one would need to do truck-only activities in order for it to make more financial sense to own a truck than it would to own a car and only rent a truck as needed. Though for all I know it could be a low as 1 hour a month.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[nicolas.kassis]

Hum, there are a ton of programs for you opensource OS of choice that will write to an iPod AND some even support encrypted AAC playback.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[perryizgr8]

i thought itunes was just an optional app that would manage music better on bigger ipods and you could buy your music from its interface. i thought shuffle being so small (2gb) would support drag and drop.
also, i think you meant:

I buy a playstation and complain about it not playing XBox games.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[greyhueofdoubt]

>>A bit off topic, but it'd be interesting to see how often one would need to do truck-only activities in order for it to make more financial sense to own a truck than it would to own a car and only rent a truck as needed.

Well to be honest, my last car (the Prizm) didn't really get very good mileage at all. Usually around 20-24 MPG in the city, which is where I do all my driving. The truck is a little worse, and maybe because of that I drive it less. I consolidate trips into town. I'm not paying much more for fuel now than I did in my car.

But in the end it comes down to absolute necessity- there is no compact car with mileage high enough to make it more attractive than a truck for my needs. And to keep this on topic, there is no other MP3 player with features amazing enough to satisfy my needs: removable battery, wireless, big screen, WMA file support, etc.- those are all irrelevant when what I absolutely need is support for a huge library, easy access to new media, and an integrated and simple method of updating and syncing data. Plug in, go to bed, unplug, go to work. Everything does what it's supposed to. I'll take that over a removable battery any day.

-b

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[mabhatter654]

why do we need 300 video formats? Just about anybody using freely available software can create the iPod formats. I admit the Divx stuff on multiple vendor devices looks interesting. But it doesn't have good DRM, so big media will always ignore it for "real" sales.

The REAL problem is that iPods won't play the 200 crap formats people get from TPB. It seems like every leet kid is using their own stuff and tweaking settings to 20 different non-standard screen resolutions trying to one-up each other. Apple picked reasonable specs for iPod and has stuck with them, only adding 1 or 2 per year. Once you get set up properly to generate iPod formats from recorded TV it works quite nicely.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Miseph]

"Using a Zen or Sansa is crippling yourself."

So not having the ability to do something that I think is a complete waste of effort (setting up smart playlists to rotate my music for me), but instead being able to just treat the device how I want and not get boned (no ID3 and 4-char filenames... is that a bad joke?) is crippling myself? Interesting definition you've got there.

Now I'll go back to not buying an MP3 player based on your whims, and you can go back to not buying one based on mine.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[sundog61]

Dude, you're as dumb as a box of rocks.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

When you say something funny, even if I disagree I'll let you know, 'fella'.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[daath93]

way to contribute to my "education"

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

So... to summarize... you feel the ipods are "crippled by design" because they didn't cope with a corrupted hard drive/crash the way you expected it to, and you didn't make or have a proper backup, and you had to use a 3rd party tool to do data recovery...and it worked out? Seriously? that's your complaint?

iTunes was designed on purpose to make the music sync from the PC to the device. Granted full 2-way sync would be nice, but its one of Apple's concessions to the labels its dealing with so it can sell content. Otherwise, when ever your friends came over they'd pop in their ipod and give you their entire 16 or 30 or 160GB library...

Of course, you can still do it, but Apple didn't build it right into the software. Its hardly a 'crippling' blow.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[vux984]

Now, I respect the rest of your post...[snip]...but the above statement is pure fanboy flamebait.

Fair enough, but you've got to put it in context. I (the GP) said "Using a Zen or Sansa is crippling yourself." to echo the GGP who said (to paraphrase) "Using an ipod is crippling yourself." I was just echoing his words to sarcastically make my point.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[anti-pop-frustration]

Good luck with that, with today's portable media players being 1~160GB+ capacity it would be practically insane to manage files by hand. Let go of this useless obsession and learn to use metadata on your files. You'll probably even like smart playlists once you start using them.

In what world is drag and dropping a bunch of mp3 files on a removable device "practically insane"? Do you also need itunes to manage every file on your hard drive?

There are a lot of players (Cowon etc.) out there that *do* use a database and offer modern features (playlists, metadata info etc.) without forcing users to use a piece of shit bloated software to move files around.

Sorry, some of us still cling to that "useless obsession" called doing things our way.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[anti-pop-frustration]

This place is always against proprietary, unless its apple proprietary and then BEND OVER BABY!

You don't understand, when apple are restricting their users, they are doing it for their own good!

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Jezza]

AAC isn't bad - for music you're going to listen to "on the hoof" (ie with lots of external noise). I guess you're also going to use "ear buds" or lightweight headphones, so really is the compression going to be significant after that?

So for a portable music player, AAC isn't a terrible choice. The Shuffle is at least cheap, and for a lot of users the ability to navigate the music without looking will be useful (either because they can't read a little display or are engaged in an activity where they don't want to look at a little display).

Is the Shuffle some engineering marvel? Nope, but it's cheap - and the unusual navigation method might actually turn out to be useful for some users (it's also crappy if you're sat with the thing in your hand).

If quality is important to you - well get lossless audio sampled at a high enough rate (for you) then downgrade them for use with a portable device, use the original format when you're listening to them somewhere that warrants the extra fidelity. Actually iPods can play more than AAC anyway (it's the format Apple use for the music they sell).

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[anti-pop-frustration]

Sure it would be better if that database were open instead of proprietary. But quite bluntly, until someone defines an open standard

Apple doesn't give a shit about open or standard, that's why they keep the ipod firmware and database encrypted and closed. They don't want the users (or the competition) to "mess" with their hardware.

Good for them, in the meantime I'll just buy my mp3 players (and phones) from companies that don't act like paranoid control freaks.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[spire3661]

Regarding your comment about the podcast. That is functionality beyond what i need personally, and also it comes with a steep price of vendor lock in. Im glad that it works for you, but it comes at the cost of having your 'workflow' decided for you by Apple. Ive found Itunes and even Iphoto very hard to work with, partially because most of the time you have to go all in and let the program do everything for you, without much granular control. Itunes likes to take over everything and insists that you do things according to its standards. I realize for some that makes things simpler, but for a technical person with lots of stuff on the local network, its a headache. Im always afraid Itunes is going to go too far and do something I didnt want it to do.

On a final note, and this extends to ALOT of the apple product line. You are expected to do things the apple way in almost EVERYTHING they make.

Disclosure: I own one mac and several PCs

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[YourExperiment]

Leaving aside the contentious issue of whether the difference between high quality MP3/OGG and full quality files is audible (I'd argue the middle ground, that some people can tell, some of the time, with certain source material on good quality equipment) the point here is that lossless compression preserves the original material, unchanged.

If you want to move it into a different format later you can do so, without the loss of quality inherent in another decode/encode cycle. If you encode your whole collection to OGG, then later purchase a new stereo, and only then wish you'd picked a slightly higher bitrate, you're screwed.

With storage so ridiculously cheap these days it hardly seems worthwhile to squish music down into tiny files, when you could preserve the original forever.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[speedtux]

Dig a little deeper and then you'll find that that's not actually useful for managing the music.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[loutr]

As for managing music goes, I once had a device where I had to drop and drag. Here's the problem with that: It got extremely cumbersome after a dozen songs. You may think you want "control" but when you have to manage 10,000 songs manually, it's a pain.

My Samsung YP-P2 supports both UMS and MTP. In UMS mode I just drag&drop audio files anywhere on the player, and when unplugged the player refreshes its library, so the next time I turn it on my new songs have been added to the player library according to their metadata.

So I can copy music to/from the player on any device and any OS that supports USB Mass Storage devices (without the need for a 3rd party program), and I can find and play my songs as easily as on an iPod.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[genki_sushi]

It's under 'Movies' in the iTunes Store.

Movies and TV Shows inside iTunes are only available to users with an American iTunes account.

I live in Ireland and the Irish version of iTunes has only music. The same is true for most versions of iTunes outside the the good old US of A. England or Britain is the only other country I know of that has Movies and TV in it's version of iTunes.

There are ways around this and you can even buy a credit card that is attached to an American address on EBAY.

The card is like a pre-pay credit card you add credit to the card and never really go in debt. You can then use this card with your itunes and gain access to the American movies and television shows. I know loads of people here in Ireland that do just that.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[UnknowingFool]

iPods are very picky about what they will play when compared to other devices.

iPods will play MPEG-4 and H.264 as well as Quicktime. Most other devices play MPEG-4, H.264 and WMV. How is the iPod "more picky" than other devices? You mean to say iPod won't play Windows formats then I agree with you. If you also mean to say that the iPod video formats must be 320 x 240 (to fit the screen) then I agree with you but that's normal for any device.

This leads to the consumer needing a special purpose app just to deal with it rather than taking a generic converter and using it's defaults.

What do you mean about "special converter"? The iPod will play standard MPEG-4 and H.264 so you can use open source software like VideoLAN and HandBrake will work.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Bender Unit 22]

And IF you live in a country they sell to, which I do not. Nor does Microsoft with their Xbox. I have both a (hacked) appletv and a xbox360 on which you can rent movies, just not here.

Idiots. And even discovery and southpark has blocked parts of their site for viewing so I cant see videos. And so are most TV shows that are viewable on the net in the US.

And then they wonder why people still download. I have the money to pay for it and I would be more than happy to but no, no soup for you.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Custard Horse]

Damn that's a fine response.

I resisted getting an ipod as I didn't like the look or feel of itunes but now I have an ipod and use itunes on my PC I honestly can't think of how the system can be improved. Moreover, I don't use full functionality as I have never made a purchase from the itunes store - mostly as I rip my own content from CDs and DVDs.

The ability to synch with podcasts it the abilty I cherish the most. And most of the podcasts are properly free.

To anticipate any accusations of being any type of fanboy I will 'come out' and say that I only ever use Windows, I have never used a mac, I am underwhelmed by Linux, I prefer the 360 over the PS3 but value my chipped XBMC-equipped Xbox1 over the 360 and PS3 as it is my media hub.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[seramar]

That's (kind of) like saying you've never had to do tech support for someone with a sager laptop. You're less likely to see them because you're less likely to encounter them in the wild.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cerberusss]

I only wish they'd let me lower the offering price.
Maybe 2 or 3 other people will have anything to do with my music getting all the way into the iTunes store..

You can send those people iTunes gift certificates.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[goatpunch]

The problem is that the movie studios wouldn't like having their content streamed under an open protocol.

Apple streams movies at two price-points, a 24-hour (or something) rental price and a play as many times as you like price. This 'Linux interface' could easily implement a 'Save Stream' function which would allow the rental movies to be saved permanently. These movies would then show up on bittorrent very quickly.

If Apple doesn't show the studios that it is making enough of an effort to protect their content, then they won't be allowed to sell that content, simple as that.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod this fucker down. Why should everyone give money to Apple?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, they have movies, just like Netflix, but you have to wait months to get a new release. The OP wants movies available via iTunes or some other distributor *IMMEDIATELY* as soon as they're released in theaters, not six months later. Immediately.

So for example, say the next Batman movie is getting released on June 1st (it's not, but humor me here), iTunes, Netflix and the others will be lucky to see a copy of it any sooner than December first, and more likely not until early January. With the OP's idea, the movie hits the theaters on June 1st, as well as iTunes, Netflix, and all the other places dvd's, and downloadable avi files are available for purchase.

They've talked about coinciding DVD and theater release dates many times before (the movie studios anyways), but the idea never seems to get much further than just talking.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Walter Carver]

DRM.

BitTorrent has no DRM, better product.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Walter Carver]

Yeah but you need special software to transfer the files. Isn't that right?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[tamird]

I've never had to do TECH SUPPORT for a friend to get their Sansa working, or move their music to a new machine, etc; I have had to to that with an iPod.

correlation!=causation

Granted, I've never used a Sansa or a Zen, but do you think maybe this has something to do with the fact that users of those devices tend to be more tech-savvy and specifically know what they want when they buy?

Chances are, a person who buys an iPod (slashdotters excluded, of course) does so because of the ubiquity of the device; they probably don't know about Sansa or Zen.

A user who buys Sansa/Zen probably did their research and familiarized themselves with the management UI well ahead of purchasing.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[jwildstr]

So? The title is "Why There's No iTunes For Movies." It's not "Why there's no iTunes-like infrastructure that works on every platform and isn't made by Apple."

Not liking Apple is fine by me (I like them, but to each his/her own)....but there definitely is an iTunes for movies, as pointed out, it's called iTunes.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

1 issue: E-mail has a 10MiBi Limit. So this E-Mail you speak of cannot be used.

That is not what I was suggesting.

I am talking about what I have seen done, in which after you've purchased something, the system mails you a link. Follow the link, and you arrive at a download page.

I don't know what the purpose of that is, but I still prefer that approach to downloading iTunes.

Bittorrent it, but there's not much profit in that at the moment.

BitTorrent is just a protocol. There's exactly as much profit in BitTorrent as there is in HTTP -- that is, they're orthogonal. No reason you couldn't sell a copy of an album, distributed via BitTorrent.

You can take the Itunes method, the major node of servers, and end up with a sub par'd drm'd copy.

Or, you end up with a decent copy, which you pay a few pennies more for, but you still need to use iTunes.

Lastly you can take the streaming approach. Netflicks does this through everyone's favorite program: Sliverlight 2.0. That limits to Windows only machines... maybe mac...

Right. Exactly the same problem as iTunes, with the additional problem that it is streaming. Without some extra effort, I cannot, for example, save it to my laptop, and use it in places I don't have access to Internet.

Flac isn't exactly designed for streaming last time I checked, however it is also my preferred audio format as well.

The streaming doesn't concern me as much...

Let me put it this way: I buy a few live tracks from nugs.net, which sells full albums in FLAC format. While they offer a client, you can download with nothing more than a web browser if you don't mind saving each track individually -- which means writing your own client would be trivially easy, also.

There are many other, similarly enlightened services. The problem is that they're all over the place, and most mainstream music (including all those back catalogs) won't be there.

For now, the closest is iTunes and Amazon MP3. The only reason I prefer Amazon MP3 is they have a better client, and a native Linux version.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

its impractical of to even get a 1GB attachment.

Indeed -- especially when the whole thing is going to be base64'd, thus adding about 10% to the filesize for no good reason.

No, email is not a good medium for this.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

What Apple have created shouldn't be underestimated, this isn't easy to do.

No, what would be easy to do is just create a web application, with an API that iTunes can use.

Also there are a lot of people (me included) who don't see the Internet as "just the browser" there is room for alternate access.

Fine, as long as the standard means of access works.

I have no problem with the fact that you can buy music from the iTunes store, using the iTunes client. I have a big problem with the fact that you cannot buy music from the iTunes store, using just a web browser.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

I'd substantially cut bandwidth costs by using 128 kbps OGG Vorbis.

First of all, I have terabytes of storage. Music hasn't been a big deal yet.

Second, it wouldn't be 128k Vorbis. It'd be 128k or 256k MP3.

That's why, if I were a service, I'd offer FLAC and MP3 -- because MP3 works everywhere, for people who don't know or don't want to bother with encodings, and FLAC gives the user the ability to encode to whatever they want.

Once it's stored, I absolutely prefer lossless, simply because there's no generational loss if I want to make it Vorbis for a player that supports it, or AAC for the iPod, or mp3 for something else, or as you suggested, edit or remix it. With lossy codecs, I close off some of those possibilities.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[SanityInAnarchy]

Wait. What? iTunes is bloated and buggy.

It warms my heart to hear it, but my point was rather that I don't care if it's great or not. I resent being forced to use it -- and, by proxy, being forced to use another OS -- simply to buy a file. Yes, just a dumb fucking file -- a bunch of bits which could just as easily be transfered over HTTP, FTP, SMTP, or any number of other standard protocols.

The store is no better. How hard is it to put that in a web browser? Or expose a standard API, so that other programs (like Amarok) can interface with it?

iTunes could be the best music software in existence, and I would still resent being forced into it for something so stupid.

Contrast this to something like Steam -- at least I'm already forced to be on Windows, as the vast majority of games aren't yet OS-independent -- even portable games come in different versions for different OSes.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

My bias against apple is primarly based on two things:

A) The limited selection of hardware they use in their products (less competition breeds less reason to make the best hardware you can).

B) While working in customer service, I had to troubleshoot a whole host of issues derived simply from the installation of iTunes on computers that were being used for business.

As for being able to purchase media as such. I live in Canada currently and it annoys me to no end I am not allowed to go to hulu.com or even use a netflix account for online streaming alone. I wish there was a solution I could purchase to stream "american media" currently being locked away from the rest of the world.

Speaking of which - as an american citizen - you think I could avoid getting in trouble for using a proxy? Been thinking of setting one up at my address down there. But was wondering about the legality of that. Obviously in general its discouraged. But if I have a legal address down there, would that be a workable loophole?

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[UnknowingFool]

When you drag one song onto your player and it knows the next time you connect that it has been updated. So how does your Samsung know that you have other new songs (possibly in other folders)? Did you designate a "Songs" folder? And what if you no longer want a song to be on the device? Do you have to delete on you computer? I don't have a Samsung so I don't know. Also I thought MTP did not work with MP3s only DRM'ed Windows Media formats.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[loutr]

So how does your Samsung know that you have other new songs (possibly in other folders)?

Did you designate a "Songs" folder?

I didn't, I can drop songs anywhere on the drive, I guess it just scans the whole filesystem.

And what if you no longer want a song to be on the device? Do you have to delete on you computer?

No, I just delete it from the P2 as I would from a plain USB thumb drive.

Also I thought MTP did not work with MP3s only DRM'ed Windows Media formats.

It can work with any kind of files ; the set of allowed file extensions is up to the media applications

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn straight. And some people buy SUVs because they really are having adventures, driving around mountains and canyons.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Patch86]

Not liking something is not the same as there not being something.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[UnknowingFool]

I didn't, I can drop songs anywhere on the drive, I guess it just scans the whole filesystem.

I have 20GB of songs on a 250GB HD. There must be some heuristics involved because otherwise that would be rather inefficient.

No, I just delete it from the P2 as I would from a plain USB thumb drive

So you would have to delete every single file? How about hundreds of songs? What about all songs by album or artist? Only opera songs. Only songs that came out after 1999? While you do have more control you also have to manage the complexity.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[loutr]

The P2 only holds 16GB of data at most, so a "generic" explorer is enough to manage its content quickly. But anyway most media applications detect usb devices and allow you to browse them. You can search, sort, ... as you do with your library.

I don't get the point of systems like itunes or MTP, with UMS you can do the exact same thing, plus you can use your player as a thumb drive. That's one of the reasons I don't own an iPod anymore.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[db32]

I bought a truck because I don't want to release a bunch of smug into the atmosphere. It was like purchasing a smug credit to make up for the fact that I like my iPhone.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[thebigbadme]

I've actually considered this. Here's what happens, let's say I offer an album with 16 tracks, and people buy it whole for $9.99 but I'd be content to let it go for $5 even or so... so a net difference of $4.99 ... Apple takes, I think, $0.45 for every $0.99 track, and I imagine $4.50 for every $9.99 album ... so essentially I'd gain $5.49 from each album. I would still make $0.50 on each copy of the album, which is consistent with what I would be making, at least if I'm correct about all the numbers, the same amount as if I sold it for $5 in the first place.

But here's the major thing that I'm not sure about:
tracking sales, and verifying purchases. I can't afford to hand out gift-cards to people who didn't buy the album, but claimed they did. I don't think I have much to worry about as a total unknown, but... you get the idea.

I guess I'll just have to try, eh? :-)

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, if you're manually tagging songs, then you're doing it wrong. We have this amazing thing called "the internet" now, and it has massive amounts of useful and searchable information on it. Many programs connect to this "internet" and retrieve information from it automatically.

Yeah, you go try to autograb the data on music made by bands like Skeptical Minds, Fleur, Innerfire, Morning, Heidevolk, Bury Them All, and I can cite a few dozen bands that are simply not notable enough for anyone to have entered the data anywhere one can grab it on the 'Net.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[hab136]

Im glad that it works for you, but it comes at the cost of having your 'workflow' decided for you by Apple.

What workflow is there for a portable music player besides "decide what goes on it, put that stuff on it"?

There's two exceptions I can think of, that both have the same root problem: one is moving music off the device to a host, and the other is syncing the device from two different hosts. The root problem is that the two host libraries aren't synced, and the problem is much better corrected through host library syncing than having the music player act as a go-between (as opposed to being, you know, a music player).

On a final note, and this extends to ALOT of the apple product line. You are expected to do things the apple way in almost EVERYTHING they make.

Yep. Apple products tend to support one way of doing things. This allows simplicity of design, and they work hard to make sure that one design will please MOST people, but of course it can't please everyone. Rather than try to support that minority and mess everyone else up, they leave some people unserviced.

Personally, I used to manage a folder of MP3s; at some point I threw them all in iTunes. I didn't lose any functionality, and actually gained a few tricks like smart playlists (list all my unrated songs so I can go rate them, show me top-rated but not recently played songs, etc).

Same with iPhoto. Folder of JPGs -> iPhoto. Now I can actually find that one picture of whatshisface that's not with the rest of them because I can search on keywords (and now faces). It's easy to do minor corrections, and I can still pull out the original file to work it over in an image editor if I want to.

If you absolutely hate the UI of iTunes/iPhoto, I could see that being a problem. I personally don't care; what I care about is easy access to my data, and I get that.

Most of computing is moving to big bags of data as opposed to files living in specific folders; Google is the forefront of this IMHO. Virtual email folders, keyword tagging, desktop search, smart playlists - the idea is eventually you don't care about how things are stored on disk (or where), just that they are.

Instead of manually putting things in folders, groups of items (correlations) are found automatically that cover most usage cases, and manual groups can still be created via tagging.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[Otto]

http://www.last.fm/music/Skeptical+Minds
http://www.last.fm/music/Fl%D1%91ur
http://www.last.fm/music/Innerfire

Also: http://www.last.fm/api/intro

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[GWBasic]

I tend to boycott Apple MP3 players mainly because of their proprietary formats and hardware lock-in.

AAC is an open format that can sound better then MP3 if produced and encoded correctly.

I have a friend who was car shopping and rejected one car because it had an iPod connector.

Yeah that's understandable, although I've seen $20 adapters that turn an iPod connector into a standard RCA-in. They might not work if the car uses some kind of digital interface. Did the car have options for line-in or iPod integration? I think the Prius lets you have a standard line-in, and you can also get true iPod integration if you want to control the iPod from the dashboard.

Most of the after market stereos that I looked at use a standard USB connector for iPods; I wonder if there is some kind of a standard for USB -> car stereo that the iPod works with.

Re:Actually, there is an iTunes for movies

[cibyr]

That goes the wrong way; I was to avoid having to use iTunes to get music onto the phone.

Slashdot education

[XPeter]

In school, we had a trademark infringement lawyer come speak to us during computer science telling us how bad it was to illegally download music movies and such. But now as I read this, since there is no where to buy these movies piracy seems like the only option.

I'm glad Slashdot is here to educate me.

Re:Slashdot education

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny thing, is that it is NOT illegal to download movies. It is illegal to rip them, though it appears that no lawsuits over ppl ripping PERSONAL movies for PERSONAL use. It is also illegal to UPLOAD them to ppl that you do not know. What bothers me is when Lawyers and others say that it is illegal to DOWNLOAD them. Dead wrong.

Re:Slashdot education

[MrMr]

A trademark infringement lawyer? Why not a divorce lawyer? That would have been funnier.

Re:Slashdot education

[JustOK]

The possibilities are endless. Piracy is not the only option. For example, not listening/watching "music movies and such" is an option.

Re:Slashdot education

[Ragzouken]

It's not a very fun option. And it's just as beneficial to the movie/music companies as piracy is.

Re:Slashdot education

[ray_mccrae]

I think you're wrong. Downloading something is the act of making a copy. Therefore when you download something you're actively committing copyright infringement. You might be confusing this with buying a bootleg copy of a DVD from someone. Since you did not create the copy but bought it from the seller. Therefore buying the bootleg DVD is not illegal but creating bootleg DVDs is illegal.

Re:Slashdot education

[value_added]

A trademark infringement lawyer? Why not a divorce lawyer? That would have been funnier.

Well, if we want to prepare the kids for their future, it's more practical than funny.

If you want both practical and funny, invite a marriage counselor to speak to a class and have him or her say "Nearly 50% of all marriages today end in a lifetime commitment!"

Re:Slashdot education

[Techmeology]

Someone should point out to the itellectual property lawyers that a society based on the ability to communicate large amounts of information very rapidly (read internet) is incompatible with money. It leads to attempts to create artificial scarcity - which in tern annoys anyone who doesn't like artificial limitations. The evidence for this is clear when you consider how many people are willing to violate IP laws (especially copyright). The situation is exacerbated by releasing in different formats and countries at different times (people will start downloading illegally because they are unable to obtain a legal copy). Evidence is, as before, in wide spread torrenting.

Re:Slashdot education

[Anonymous Coward]

Piracy is not the only option.

But he'd make a wonderful Dread Pirate Roberts.

Re:Slashdot education

[sam0737]

So let me teach you one more option. In big Cities in China, you can get $1/DVD at the newsstand at every block.

Advantages:
(1) removes the 5 minutes RIAA privacy commercial that you can't skip.
(2) it's usually sync or even go ahead of the movie release time.
(3) it's usually a direct copy from the disc that sent for academy review nomination, so quality is not bad.
(4) Sometimes there are genuine verison, just as cheap ($5 at most). However, it comes with the RIAA privacy message, and only available after half a years of the movie showing. The only advantage is that you get better translation/sub-title.
(5) But if the Party decided not to allow the Movie to be distributed in China, Pirating seems to be the only solution.

Re:Slashdot education

[grahamd0]

It's not a very fun option. And it's just as beneficial to the movie/music companies as piracy is.

It's probably less beneficial to the entertainment industry. Someone who enjoys a pirated movie may very well recommend it to their friends who are willing to pay for it.

Re:Slashdot education

[Anonymous Coward]

Marriage will likely put you in an asylum. Got it. Stay away.

Re:Slashdot education

[mdwh2]

Another option is to download, but still pay them, e.g., by still paying for a TV service.

Yet despite the fact that the companies will benefit from this option, where as they won't with your option of doing nothing, this option is treated as being as illegal as those who download without paying anything.

It's evolution baby...

[DirtyCanuck]

Do the Evolution :O

Miro

[freedumb2000]

Miro http://www.getmiro.com/ goes quite a way to make streaming media and video torrents an enjoyable experience. It is sort of the iTunes (without store) for video.

Re:Miro

[bursch-X]

It's more like an iTunes Store for Movies without the store and the movies. It's basically a souped up Firefox (XUL) customised to be used for audio and video podcasts. Your point? None. My point? None either, just wanted to mention that Miro brings nothing, nada, zilch to the table here.

Segmentation

[meist3r]

As I wrote several times before about TV shows, game releases and cinema starts this is all about segmentation. Putting up an international one-price-for-all platform for movie purchases would undermine the local market branches the industry has elaborately established over the past decades. You can charge different prices for movies in the EU, Asia, US and so forth. The differences make for additional profit. They would never give that up voluntarily.

Re:Segmentation

[digitalchinky]

They aren't making much money from the Philippines then. The most expensive movie you can see here is around $10 USD, and that's for a world wide hyped movie on opening night at the posh end of town. On average it's about $4 in a good cinema. They are competing against piracy though, a single pirated movie is about $1, $2 will get you a disc containing anywhere up to 32 movies. 12 is about average though, any more than that and the compression makes them look worse than the phone cam in the cinema kind. Now an original movie purchased from a store in shrink wrap with hologram stickers, that'll set you back 1 to 2 bucks as well. They are well and truly in competition with the pirates now. Arrrrr. Most people can't be arsed to go to the mall and buy the originals though. Pirated stuff lives closer to home, and it has the adverts stripped out.

So aside from geographic IP mapping which is trivially defeated with proxies, or charging a single price for world wide distribution, people are just going to flock to the cheapest and most convenient source. I figure if they can still turn a profit at 2 bucks for an original movie on DVD, they aren't hurting so bad after all.

Re:Segmentation

[thetoadwarrior]

It's not so much the different price that's annoying. It's not having the chance to watch some things because of where you live. I can't see how giving everyone the chance to buy something that doesn't exist in their country is a bad thing.

We need to put an end to regional distribution deals for the internet. The internet should, in fact, be considered it's own region and that would allow them to get around existing distribution deals.

Re:Segmentation

[mpe]

As I wrote several times before about TV shows, game releases and cinema starts this is all about segmentation.

At least part of this has as much to do with "fragmentation". Indeed things like former Warsaw Pact countries joining the EU have made something of a mess of the DVD region codes idea.

Putting up an international one-price-for-all platform for movie purchases would undermine the local market branches the industry has elaborately established over the past decades. You can charge different prices for movies in the EU, Asia, US and so forth.

Time is probably more of an issue than price. Given a choice between pirate copy now and non-pirate copy some unspecified time in the future it's something of a "no brainer" what will happen.

The differences make for additional profit. They would never give that up voluntarily.

There's a very conservative element within the entertainments industry. Which has existed for a long time. Just about any "new thing" has been resisted until the industry has been dragged literally kicking and screaming that the sky was falling.

Re:Segmentation

[mpe]

It's not so much the different price that's annoying. It's not having the chance to watch some things because of where you live.

Except that you do have that ability. Due to the "pirates". In much the same way that the original pirate radio ships allowed you to listen to music other radio stations wern't broadcasting...

We need to put an end to regional distribution deals for the internet.

The last 3 Harry Potter books (which are larger and heavier than the typical DVD box set) had one release date around the world. Also there were two regional distributions, USA and rest of the planet.
On the other hand you have DVDs of 30 odd year old Dr Who stories released months apart in different parts of the world.

Re:Segmentation

[Anonymous Coward]

Who said anything about voluntarily? If Diz-Nee tries to release a movie in europe a whooping six month after it was released in the us it's their problem it noone wants to see it at the cinemas 'cause the Bluray is allready all over the Internet... Most other labels got that, but "The Mousse" just doesnt get it...

Re:Segmentation

[funkatron]

The distribution deals are already being got around. Just not by the side of the internet that likes to be legal.

Re:Segmentation

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

So aside from geographic IP mapping which is trivially defeated with proxies,

as someone who has tried to beat the BBC iPlayer geolocation filter, i can say this is not trivial.

Easy? Sure. but not trivial

Re:Segmentation

[Austerity Empowers]

This only explains one reason for DRM, but doesn't explain why movies aren't available. Apple, for example, could implement this and maintain the market segmentation. Netflix as well.

This market segmentation deal is very bad for the US, we really need to make it go away anyhow. Part of the reason offshoring is so attractive is that our costs here are far more than elsewhere for movies, music and software. It's true that movies and music aren't essential to the business world, but it does mean than a lower paycheck over there will get you as much as your paycheck here. Meaning people will be happy working for less there.

Re:Segmentation

[jonaskoelker]

I can't see how giving everyone the chance to buy something that doesn't exist in their country is a bad thing.

You're insufficiently blinded by greed and a desire to have control over others.

Re:Segmentation

[shutdown -p now]

Putting up an international one-price-for-all platform for movie purchases would undermine the local market branches the industry has elaborately established over the past decades. You can charge different prices for movies in the EU, Asia, US and so forth. The differences make for additional profit. They would never give that up voluntarily.

To be honest, I'd be glad to pay whatever content is worth in the region where it's most expensive (I guess it's UK, usually), if they let me get it the moment it is first released. But there's no such option.

Re:Segmentation

[guywcole]

See Price Discrimination.

The whole point of global segmentation of markets is to enforce different prices for different regions, allowing the monopoly copyright holders more profit. A movie sells for $2 in the Phillipines because that's the demand; it sells for $25 in the U.S. because that's the demand. IP laws ensure that price has everything to do with demand and nothing to do with supply.

I don't believe in international IP laws which harmonize laws but don't force harmonized pricing.

False right

[DoofusOfDeath]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

I think we call can agree that current copyright is unreasonable and undemocratic (since it was bought for by the music/movie industry). But Manjoo's reasoning doesn't make a ton of sense either.

Re:False right

[Winckle]

Perhaps he doesn't have the right, but the MPAA shouldn't act so surprised when people do it.

Re:False right

[djmurdoch]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

No, he calls himself a scofflaw. He's saying that there's a market for works in the format and timing that the customer chooses. Currently it's a black market, and the studios are going to lose a ton of money because they don't offer a legal alternative.

Re:False right

[0123456]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

A customer expecting the seller to sell him what he wants in order to get his money? Why, the very idea!

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

If they aren't selling it, they they are losing nothing when we pirate it. This in turn means that there is no damage to them, and thus no case against us.

If they are selling it, but there are artificial barriers caused by legal restrictions on over-riding region coding and the like, then this could be argued to be an illegal restriction on free trade under WTO rules, although we all know that no-one with the money to fight such a case ever would.

Re:False right

[psychodelicacy]

I agree with you, but I think there's an important point to be made about this, which Manjoo also hinted at. If the studios and so on don't start changing their business model to tap in to the internet market and clean up obsolete restrictions (like 24 hrs to watch), people will get the movies illegally. Some people will get them illegally anyway, but a decent, legal service would be a big draw and would remove the kind of argument that says "well, they don't want to provide me with their stuff legally, so I may as well get it illegally".

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

No, He's saying that copyright holders are wise to offer him their works to him in such a way that he'll buy it, otherwise he'll screw them over because consumers rule in a consumer driven market.

If movies where like say computers, then this behavior from a production company would lead to someone comming along and giving the consumers what they wanted and stealing the market. But since movies aren't interchangable, and noone wants to watch Wall-Y a cheep nock-off of Wall-E, the consumers speak through pirating instead.

It's a free market, and the industry is given enormes power, but when they use it to screw consumers, consumers screw them.

Re:False right

[Creepy Crawler]

Well, you cant buy it for any price. So you Bittorrent it.

And if prices are stupid, like a soundtrack going for 17.99 vs the movie itself going for 15.99, guess what? Piratebay here we come.

It's called competitive pressure, and that's how the free market works. If copyright and patents were more sane, they'd be more respected and crap like this wouldnt happen. So, the path of least resistance is downloading.

Those who call me names: I dont care. I have what you spend money on and mine isnt crippled.

Those who say I need to change the law: Fine. Give me a few million to shove in the congresscritters pockets. Then, they MIGHT listen.. Then again, maybe not.

Re:False right

[Philip Shaw]

If they aren't selling it, they they are losing nothing when we pirate it. This in turn means that there is no damage to them, and thus no case against us.

Also, I think very few people would argue that it is immoral to videotape something off the TV and keep it indefinitely (although this is not usually legal, an overwhelming majority of people do it). As I pay no blank-media levy, (unlike in Canada etcetera), and have never completed a ratings survey, it makes no difference to the copyright holders if I record off the TV or download off the internet (I do not have a HDTV, so that argument is moot, and I always fast forward through the ads on videos). Thus, if you accept videotaping of TV content, it is nonsensical to argue that downloading the same content is not acceptable simply because you accessed it differently.

If they are selling it, but there are artificial barriers caused by legal restrictions on over-riding region coding and the like, then this could be argued to be an illegal restriction on free trade under WTO rules, although we all know that no-one with the money to fight such a case ever would.

This doesn't quite ring true, but it is irrelevant to my point above, so I'll ignore it.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

If they have decided not to make it available, then I guess they don't want to make money on it, therefore there is no lost sale when it is "pirated". No harm done.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

He isn't saying he has the RIGHT to get them illegally.

Just that he WILL get them illegally.

And for companies interested in doing business - "right" is not important - it is what your customers will tolerate, and pay for, that matters.

Remember, when you are talking about "rights" that copyright (and patent, trademark, etc...) is a right conferred because it is in the public good. It is a profoundly "conditional" right. And when that conferral ceases to be in the public good - as - arguably, it is has now - it should be withdrawn.

I am with him - I would cheerfully pay $40 - or more - for the convenience to just be able to download stuff I want to watch. A lot of the stuff I want to watch is old - and hence cheap. Like him, I don't have that much time to watch stuff.

  So $40 to $50 'aint that unreasonable for what I would actually consume.

I DO want to pay - but for a decent service. But make no mistake, if it isn't provided, I will take what I want - with mild regret - but for free.

You know - someone should set up a charity. It would do decent things in Africa. (Or New Orleans. Whichever is the poorer.) People like me would pay $40/month to it - just to show that we are willing to PAY for what we bittorrent.

  I reckon there are at least a couple of 1000 people like me - willing to make a point to the studios.

Now there isn't such a service. So let's cut it to $20

  12 x 20 X 2000 is half a million dollars a year almost.

Is anyone up for this?

  That could do some good somewhere.... And show the studios that there really IS a revenue stream for them.

Re:False right

[Anoraknid the Sartor]

[repost - I forgot I wasn't logged in the first time....]

He isn't saying he has the RIGHT to get them illegally.

Just that he WILL get them illegally.

And for companies interested in doing business - "right" is not important - it is what your customers will tolerate, and pay for, that matters.

Remember, when you are talking about "rights" that copyright (and patent, trademark, etc...) is a right conferred because it is in the public good. It is a profoundly "conditional" right. And when that conferral ceases to be in the public good - as - arguably, it is has now - it should be withdrawn.

I am with him - I would cheerfully pay $40 - or more - for the convenience to just be able to download stuff I want to watch. A lot of the stuff I want to watch is old - and hence cheap. Like him, I don't have that much time to watch stuff.

    So $40 to $50 'aint that unreasonable for what I would actually consume.

I DO want to pay - but for a decent service. But make no mistake, if it isn't provided, I will take what I want - with mild regret - but for free.

You know - someone should set up a charity. It would do decent things in Africa. (Or New Orleans. Whichever is the poorer.) People like me would pay $40/month to it - just to show that we are willing to PAY for what we bittorrent.

    I reckon there are at least a couple of 1000 people like me - willing to make a point to the studios.

Now there isn't such a service. So let's cut it to $20

    12 x 20 X 2000 is half a million dollars a year almost.

Is anyone up for this?

    That could do some good somewhere.... And show the studios that there really IS a revenue stream.

Re:False right

[TheRaven64]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

I have some sympathy with this viewpoint. Copyright is a bargain between society and the creator, where the creator gets a time-limited monopoly in exchange for distributing their work. If they are not making a bona fide effort to distribute their work, then should they be able to retain copyright? I don't believe that they should, and I think that compulsory, nondiscriminatory, licensing should be a requirement for being granted copyright. That said, I disagree with his conclusion. He should be arguing for a reform in copyright laws, not simply disregarding them because they are inconvenient. Bad laws should be repealed or amended, not ignored. Society can not function if everyone picks their favourite subset of laws to obey.

Re:False right

[cyber-vandal]

However the bad laws are not going to be repealed or amended no matter how much people complain because vested interests will not allow it. Therefore the only alternative is a mass campaign of civil disobedience.

Re:False right

[drinkypoo]

But Manjoo's reasoning doesn't make a ton of sense either.

What about it doesn't make sense? If copyright doesn't serve society, then it should be abolished. The only kind of works it seems to promote are mass market bullshit. I don't give a fuck about protecting or promoting those. True art needs to be made. And finally, anyone who releases any media without a license saying that it enters copyright when copyright originally expired is taking advantage of bad laws, and doesn't deserve copyright protection — but that appears to just be my opinion. There is no right to profit, and the ability to do a thing has never in itself been sufficient justification to do the thing.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

Well, in my country (Canada), you can not legally get HBO at any price. There is a bastardized version called "HBO Canada" which is a POS.

So, some Canadians drive down to the US, buy a US satellite dish, and bring it back. While this is illegal in Canada, I feel no moral or ethical guilt.

Re:False right

[maxume]

Are you speculating that keeping a VHS recording is illegal, or is there some precedent or whatever that has been set?

Re:False right

[forgotten_my_nick]

I can see where Manjoo is coming from. For example I would quite happily pay 2-3 euros for a new release that I could download from the net and watch at my leisure. Better yet if it was like STEAM where I buy the right to watch it whenever so I am not forced to rebuy new formats when they come out (or offer discount for extras later on).

As it stands now I have to go to a shop and buy it, or buy it online as a DVD set and pay extra costs. Or go to a movie theater where you basically get legally mugged.

So yea the media companies are the ones who are selling dated business models and they wonder why people may go to the easier models.

Re:False right

[shark72]

"And if prices are stupid, like a soundtrack going for 17.99 vs the movie itself going for 15.99, guess what? Piratebay here we come."

You're not the first one to be boggled by this. It gets worse: the videogame based on the movie might cost $50. A CD with image editing software might have a retail price of $400, or a CD with a Linux distro might be free!

There's certainly some desire for digital media to be sold by the ounce, rather than according to development costs or market value (as other goods, like clothing and cars, are sold). But it won't happen soon.

You sound very steadfast in your belief that this entitles you to pirate your stuff. I don't think this will change, so good luck and Godspeed.

I'll add, however, that if you find a soundtrack CD for $18, the store that's selling it is taking a huge markup. Most new CDs are $10 to $14 nowadays. More often than not, soundtrack CDs have only a few good tracks, so I can get by with buying just the tracks I want. That costs me about $2.50 on Amazon.

Re:False right

[Philip_the_physicist]

In .AU, there is a 2-year limit on keeping recordings. There was never a Betamax case equivalent, and it was only recently that it became legal to record TV for time-shifting purposes (although of course the law was completely ignored for years). The idea is that time-shifting is OK, but if you keep the recording for a long time you aren't really just time-shifting and should go and buy the programme. I'm not sure I agree with it, but it is a reasonable compromise between the old law and what people actually do.

Re:False right

[DavidTC]

We're way past the point where we can affect change in copyright law, as evidenced by the fact that laws are passed that have no possible public benefit at all.

Like retroactive copyright extension. The second that was passed, the second that things produced decades ago, and granted copyright for a specific time, had their copyright extended, copyright was demonstratably broken, and operating entirely outside the bounds of the public opinion.

And I'm sorry, I can do whatever the fuck I want with anything produced by the companies that supported that. They have violated the agreement they have with society, by purchasing congresspeople, making laws that serve no public benefit at all.

Re:False right

[BitZtream]

And pirates shouldn't act so surprised when the MPAA or RIAA responds with a vengeance, yet it happens anyway like it was completely unexpected.

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Re:False right

[BitZtream]

Its not really a black market, that implies there is money made there in most peoples minds. Most of the piracy that the MPAA/RIAA are fighting results in no profit for anyone, and actually costs those who are kind enough to share.

I think that distinction needs to be made clear.

People aren't selling this crap, they are giving it away. Its not valuable enough to sell even if its in the exact format other people want it in.

When your product is so shitty that the thieves give it away rather than trying to sell it, you should probably consider that

When I was young and made mix tapes, it was always my understanding that selling a copy of the mix tape was wrong, but giving it to a friend was fine because I wasn't profiting. That made sense to me, even as a little kid. Still does for that matter. If someone is willing to incur the cost of distribution for no profit, it shouldn't be illegal. I'm sorry for you if the cost of distribution is no where near what you want it to be so you can continue making your ridiculous profits, I'm sorry people have been to ignorant to notice this sooner. I'm sorry I ever gave you any of my money, or bugged my parents into giving you money.

I'm not sorry that you're business is falling apart. I'm not sorry that you and your 'artists' are going to have to go back to the traditional way of making money which is PERFORMING rather than selling copies.

Re:False right

[nine-times]

I don't think it's about having the "right". You think the RIAA and MPAA are interested in consumer rights and the rights of society to eventually take works into the public domain? They're interested in the realities of business and what will make money.

So one of the things they have to deal with is the reality that infringing copies are being made all the time and distributed online, putting them in a position where they have to compete with a free alternative that delivers any work that anyone wants directly to them right now. Not 6 months or a year after the movie has left theaters or years after the season ends. Right now.

That's the reality. If they aren't taking that fact into account already, then they should start.

Re:False right

[mpe]

Like retroactive copyright extension. The second that was passed, the second that things produced decades ago, and granted copyright for a specific time, had their copyright extended, copyright was demonstratably broken, and operating entirely outside the bounds of the public opinion.

Or indeed outside the bounds of rational thinking. Especially somewhere like the US where the reason for copyright is explicit in the constitution. IIRC such extensions even resulted in things which had passed into the public domain becoming copyright again.

Re:False right

[mpe]

So, some Canadians drive down to the US, buy a US satellite dish, and bring it back.

Possibly more useful would be the box of electronics which connects to the dish :)

While this is illegal in Canada, I feel no moral or ethical guilt.

Presumably for similar reasons that Americans arn't ment to buy their pharmacuticals from Canada or the US is kicking up a a fuss about Canadian wood. All this dispite NAFTA...

Re:False right

[jedidiah]

The RIAA and MPAA shouldn't have the right to subject anyone to
vengance if they are otherwise a non-entity to them and would never
be offered a work anyways. There is simply no "damage" there to be
"cured" buy the relevant civil action.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

If copyright and patents were more sane, they'd be more respected and crap like this wouldnt happen.

Don't underestimate the willingness of the common man to be a cheap bastard and seek out 'free' over 'paid'.

Re:False right

[teg]

You know - someone should set up a charity. It would do decent things in Africa. (Or New Orleans. Whichever is the poorer.) People like me would pay $40/month to it - just to show that we are willing to PAY for what we bittorrent.

Set up at team at Kiva, and invite others who share your views to join that team.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

But their argument is that they are selling it online in a preferred method already, you just need Windows, IE6, and this lovely ActiveX component.

Oh and agree to the 12 page EULA that a non-lawyer will unlikely be able to fully comprehend. And when they change their business model on a whim without notice and without a legal, legitimate backup mechanism, you lose 'rights' to view whatever you had previously purchased.

Anyone that doesn't want that is just being stubborn! Why would anyone want fair-use?

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it doesn't have to be black market. You can still purchase these in the stores. Just because you /want/ a digital format doesn't mean they /have/ to provide one.

Watch movies on Netflix or Hulu, if they don't have what you want, request it to be on immediate play from one of those two sources, or buy the movie yourself.

Re:False right

[Creepy Crawler]

But that's exactly it.

The stuff you pay for has even a greater cost. For example, take a recent 50$ game.

If you have high morals and wish to pay for the game, so be it. I hope it works for you. If the game is released buggy, then there's a decent chance that something wont work for you. Well, you can always take it back.... NOPE. No returns on open software. And about activations... I hope that you dont reinstall more than the number "They" allow, or plan to play the game 10 years from now.

The pirates get the goods first, and have them fixed so annoyances that paying customers deal with arent even there. Restrictions preventing legit customers are gone, hacked out. There was no money traded hands, so if it doesnt work, just delete it.

The companies are hard against the customers due to perceived "pirates". That's called cost of doing business when a few friends share a game between each other. Smarter people call that mindshare. However, as long as these companies see potential (and successful) customers as the enemy, then they will become one, either by choice or by force.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally?

Yes, and he's willing to pay for that, too.

Honestly, I don't see what the problem with this is - in fact, it seems absurd to complain about it. Can you imagine any other industry where a customer that's willing to pay a considerable sum for a product is just turned away? And can you imagine any other industry where people accept this as NORMAL and where somebody who - good grief! - dares to want to buy a product and pay for it is seen as making unreasonable, absurd, nonsensical demands?

I can't.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

They'd be stuck between a rock and a hard place if they actually started a service to compete with your charity fund.

Re:False right

[Haeleth]

Yes, yes, we know those options exist. But you're missing the point.

The whole point of this article is that the available legal options are all vastly less convenient than the illegal option. Either they don't have the movie you want to see, or they don't let you choose when to see it, or they force you to go out and drive to a store, or they force you to wait for the post ... and all the while, if you just break the law, you can get anything you want instantly.

Nobody's trying to justify this. Pretty much every adult who does it realises they're doing something wrong. We're just explaining why people do it, even people with plenty of disposable income who are perfectly happy to pay for stuff.

Re:False right

[bcrowell]

So basically Manjoo is saying that copyright holders are obligated to make their works available to him in the format and timing he demands, or else he has the right to get them illegally? I think we call can agree that current copyright is unreasonable and undemocratic (since it was bought for by the music/movie industry). But Manjoo's reasoning doesn't make a ton of sense either.

Okay, let me preface this by saying that I buy all my music legally, and I don't download movies or TV shows illegally (although that's partly because I'm not interested in TV). But:

1. He doesn't say he has a moral or legal right to do it. He just states that he does it.
2. I don't see how it's relevant whether copyright is or is not democratic. To the extent that copyright is a kind of property (and I know that's a contentious issue), it's valid to make analogies with other kinds of property. Should property rights be determined democratically? If so, then why did there have to be a specific provision in the U.S. constitution to protect property rights from being violated by the democratic government? Democratic!=good, undemocratic!=bad.
3. I happen to agree with you that current copyright laws are unreasonable. That leads to at least two possible moral stances: (a) one should comply with an unreasonable law, because without the rule of law, modern society couldn't exist; or (b) if a law is unreasonable, then complying with it isn't a moral necessity but simply a matter of convenience (if I drink whiskey in Yemen, will I get caught?). I lean toward b, and even if you like a better, that doesn't mean that it goes without saying that everyone has to agree with you.
4. Re "in the format and timing he demands," I think there's a problem with the article, and with most of the slashdot discussion, because it confounds a variety of situations. There's the situation where I want to sit at home today and watch (a) "Up" before it's released; (b) "Duplicity," while it's still only in theaters; (c) "The Wizard of Oz," which has been on TV at least once a year since before I was born. In case c, it's legal for me to tape the movie and watch it later, and to watch it as many times as I like. It seems to me like extreme hair-splitting to say that there ought to be something illegal or immoral about downloading a TV show when I could have legally and morally watched it for free on broadcast TV at some other time.
5. When it comes to TV, there seems to be an underlying technological shift that's creating all the tough issues. When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s, the bargain was that you got your TV for free, and in return you got shown commercials. Another part of that bargain was that big corporations got legal control over a huge and extremely valuable part of the electromagnetic spectrum, which is a national resource. TV viewers could get up and turn down the volume knob, go in the kitchen for potato chips, or whatever, but basically most people ended up watching the commercials. Nowadays technology makes it trivially easy to eliminate the commercials, and the EM spectrum is slowly heading toward obsolescence as a way of transmitting TV signals. The original bargain was struck based on a particular set of material and technological circumstances. A different set of circumstances applies now, but because of the incremental nature of change in law, technology, and industry, we can't just rewrite the whole contract.

Re:False right

[geoskd]

I think we call can agree that current copyright is unreasonable and undemocratic (since it was bought for by the music/movie industry). But Manjoo's reasoning doesn't make a ton of sense either

Actually, I would say the GP has a valid point. The copyright holder should have some control over the distribution and profits involved with their work-product, but they have no right to control what one individual does with their legally purchased copy, so long as it does not involve anything that would deprive the copyright holder of their right to make profits from sales to others.

The basic problem is this. Copyright was meant to protect authors, and give them incentive to release their works to society, thereby benefiting society. The only reason to do this is to increase the overall benefit to society, *not* to improve the profitability of anyone or their assigns. That means that when copyright law is used to prevent society from benefiting from any given set of works, that copyright law is a failure and needs to be amended to correct the problem.

as an example, if someone makes copies of a product and offers it for sale, but gives the same amount of money for each copy sold, to the copyright holders, as they would have made from their own sale, then the copyright holders rights have been upheld in the spirit of the law, if not in the actual fact of the law.

That having been said, it is in societies best interests to have work product offered in whatever format the public wishes to have it in, such that they can use that work product for whatever personal uses they have dreamed up. Anything else is a violation of the original intent of copyright law, and should be treated as such. Come to think of it, the DMCA is in fact a violation of the original intent of copyright law. Most people know intrinsically that the DMCA was a failing of our legal system, but very few people have been able to put that reason into words.

-=Geoskd

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

Possibly more useful would be the box of electronics which connects to the dish :)

Ok, I made an ASSumption. You also need to get set up an DirecTV or Dish account with a US mailing address or PO Box. Happy?

Re:False right

[__aailrp9629]

He's not asserting it as a right. He's saying that there's a giant untapped market available, and that distributors are foolish to not take advantage of that.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad laws should be repealed or amended, not ignored. Society can not function if everyone picks their favourite subset of laws to obey.

Right. Only the wealthy can do that. The other 95% of us can just "Do what we're told."

Re:False right

[KrimZon]

It's pretty unreasonable to obligate someone to make something available in every format every individual requests, because that places undue burden on the copyright holders and distributors.

However, it is pretty reasonable to be allowed to convert the data into a format that is more accessible to you yourself. We already have intermediate copies and conversions made in the process of playing something, so why not copy something over the net with the net effect of changing the format of original? Or what about when the net effect is to repair the original?

Maybe it would end up being legally acceptable if it weren't for the masses of people who just leech.

Re:False right

[SanityInAnarchy]

Which is pointless bickering. The real solution is right there -- offer a service that actually competes with piracy.

It's not about price, as this article demonstrates. It's about functionality.

Re:False right

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you kidding me? "in the format and timing he demands" is exactly what the Internet has introduced to our culture. Current copyright laws protect an old business model that dictates when and where you can watch what. The TV show industry is improving with online HD players (but not available here in NZ unfortunately). Movies need to go this way too.

Re:False right

[jwilcox2009]

If they aren't selling it, they they are losing nothing when we pirate it. This in turn means that there is no damage to them, and thus no case against us.

Try this example. Blockbuster does inconvenient, per-rental in-store rentals of movies. A new company (let's call it Netflix) comes around offering more convenient, flat-fee rentals. Many people start using to Netflix and stop going to Blockbuster. This costs Blockbuster business as they (initially) do not offer a comparable service to Netflix. Can you say with a straight face that Blockbuster lost nothing when people switched to Netflix since Blockbuster wasn't offering a comparable service?

Some people pirating movies wouldn't rent or buy them even if torrents did not exist. Some (probably many) would but instead use torrents as a substitute because of convenience or cost.

Re:False right

[The End Of Days]

Did you just make the argument that game companies should make games for mindshare instead of money? Is it the 90s again?

The reason isn't difficult.

[Anonymous Coward]

Songs are usually a few Mb.

Movies are usually several hundred Mb, if not reaching into Gb depending on quality.

The author of that article himself admits he just watches stuff from online because he just recently got a high speed internet connection.

The connection needed to download a movie in a reasonable amount of time is not the same as what's needed for music, and then there is the question of download caps and fees.

The reason why there is iTunes and not iMovies is because movies are a totally different kettle of fish when it comes to obtaining them, and I guess nobody has decided it's quite financially viable yet.

Give it time. Maybe when we're all on properly-unlimited 100Mb/s connections.

Re:The reason isn't difficult.

[beelsebob]

iTunes for movies exists, and solves the problems you're pointing out. All you need do is make the data-rate of the movie lower than the average internet connection (not hard, movies typically are encoded at around 1.5Mb/s for SD), and stream it to them. They can start playing after a few minutes, while the movie is still busy streaming in the background.

The reason iTunes for Movies hasn't taken off is more to do with the lack of selection, and prices that are higher than plain o'l DVDs.

Re:The reason isn't difficult.

[mdwh2]

It's unclear to me why it's not "financially viable", when it's possible for other people to do it for free (both downloading entire files, and streaming).

Money, again

[psychodelicacy]

Interesting article. It seems that the studios etc. are wary of losing the guaranteed revenue that comes from the premium and pay-per-view TV channels. But what happens when these channels wise up to the fact that an increasing number of people are getting these films for free online? Will they become more reluctant to pay the studios for the right to show a movie that everyone's already seen via bittorrent?

Does anyone have any figures on how pay-per-view services are doing? I wouldn't be surprised to see that the number of people paying for the Hollywood blockbusters is on a downward trend as broadband speeds increase.

Re:Money, again

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be interesting, because I suspect that the number or paying customers will increase as broadband speeds improve. It's only when download speeds are significantly shorter that iTunes for movies can really take off.

Re:Money, again

[psychodelicacy]

Yeah, I guess that's probably true, too. But in the situation that the article is talking about - where there are few legal ways of getting movies via the internet - all the studios would likely see would be a decrease in pay-per-view and DVD sales. Until they rework the system and come up with a good download service that actually offers what customers want, rather than a tiny selection of movies for a limited time, they're going to find it hard to compete with the torrents which offer pretty much everything for free download. iTunes for movies would benefit from shorter downloads, but until it can actually offer the content that customers want it's effectively hamstrung.

Re:Money, again

[BitZtream]

Considering that now days 'the studios' and 'the service providers' are one and the same its turning into an internal politics matter.

Time Warner for instance in some markets and for some movies/tv shows owns everything from start to finish. From movie studio to cable box/modem in the home. This makes it REALLY bad for the consumer. They'll make the same money if not more regardless of what changes, they'll just raise the price somewhere else (metered bandwidth all of the sudden anyone?)

Re:Money, again

[ImOnlySleeping]

Or wise up to people dropping cable subscriptions as they access tv programs online. The premium movie channels are dependent on people having cable in the first place.

Re:Money, again

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anyone have any figures on how pay-per-view services are doing? I wouldn't be surprised to see that the number of people paying for the Hollywood blockbusters is on a downward trend as broadband speeds increase.

Hence why the cable/PPV companies are trying to push for broadband bandwidth caps. If you don't have bandwidth, you can't watch a ton of new movies, and you don't kill their other cash cow.

Yip

[Norsefire]

The only thing I pirate are episodes of a TV series, it only started showing here about a month ago (5 months after it started showing in the US). At the end of the first series I bought the DVDs of the season, and I intend to do the same for the second. I've tried to find a legit way to watch it, mainly because I would like to contribute towards the ratings of the series. I've tried watching it through NBC's website, Amazon, Hulu, and many other websites but no one will offer it to viewers outside of the US.

I'm a fan of the show, I want to watch it legitimately and if I could I would pay to do so.

It just goes to show how far behind with the times the entire industry is that people *want* to pay them and can't, so they break the law instead.

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

Sitting on previously broadcasted content should speed up its copyright expiration. Revlon would not just stop selling a popular makeup brand, so how come content providers will do that?

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice point.. But you are one in a million

Re:Yip

[mpe]

The only thing I pirate are episodes of a TV series, it only started showing here about a month ago (5 months after it started showing in the US).

What those involved don't appear to understand is that this kind of "staggered release" actually encourages piracy.

At the end of the first series I bought the DVDs of the season, and I intend to do the same for the second. I've tried to find a legit way to watch it, mainly because I would like to contribute towards the ratings of the series.

The way ratings are typically gathered you'd need to be in the right place for starters. Anyway the primary purpose of ratings in commercial television is to set rates for ads. However advertisers don't care much about viewers who couldn't actually buy what they are advertising.

I've tried watching it through NBC's website, Amazon, Hulu, and many other websites but no one will offer it to viewers outside of the US.

Though you could watch the broadcasts in parts of Canada, Mexico and possibly Russia.

Re:Yip

[rdnetto]

Not really. I do the same thing, and I know plenty of others who do. In Australia, we're lucky to get some series half a year or more after they start airing in the US, and even then there are heaps of hiatuses and breaks.
IIRC, this approach is also especially common among fans of anime, since western channels don't usually air it until a dub is produced and many hardcore fans would rather watch an original subbed version than a dub.

Re:Yip

[HighFalutinCoder]

Actually, no matter how you watch those shows, you will not affect their ratings. Nielsen Sigma, the company that collects and distributes ratings data, uses special hardware to gather ratings information. This hardware is installed into the homes of carefully selected viewers and allows Nielsen to keep track, not only of what is being watched, but who is watching it. Nielsen ratings are broken up by demographics based on a number of factors including age and gender, so they try to make their sample set of viewers representative of the actual population.

I know that's how it worked years back. They might not use hardware anymore, maybe it's software based now, but Nielsen definitely doesn't monitor every person in the world that watches TV. Also, I don't think they gather ratings data for outside of the US (I could be wrong on that one).

Re:Yip

[VulpesFoxnik]

I think a TV tuner in your linux box is a perfectly legitimate means to watch your shows.

Although even mine has fallen in disuse over torrents. I've never actually got mythtv to work properly on my debian machine.

Maybe I'm just an idiot.

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

I do the same thing. Because of my downloading, I've bought several entire shows on DVD: Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Crusade, Third Rock from the Sun, Farscape, and I'll buy Daria the minute it comes out.

I do the same thing with music. I download the collected works of some artist, rate every song, figure out what CDs to buy to get the songs I want in a financially optimal fashion, buy those and delete the rest. It's been amazing how much good stuff I've missed in my life, and conversely, how much bad stuff people think is good. I mean, Pearl Jam? Seriously?

Re:Yip

[DerekLyons]

It just goes to show you how little honesty and integrity people have when they treat "I want it, and I'll hold my breath until I turn blue if I don't get it" as an excuse to break the law.

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll buy Daria the minute it comes out.

Supposedly there are major problems with Daria being released complete on DVD due to licensing issues with the all-pervasive music soundtrack. If it ever comes out on DVD it'll likely be with some of the music changed.

Re:Yip

[neomunk]

Actually, having just done this a couple weeks ago, I can tell you that at least in my case they send you a little booklet for each TV that you use and you're supposed to write down what you watch on that TV.

Interestingly, I don't have cable (television, I do get my internet access from Time Warner over a coax cable), I don't have satellite TV, and I don't watch OTA broadcasts. I DO however watch movies and television shows via my internet connection. The interesting part is that I told the nice lady who called and asked me about being a Nielsen family all of this and she actually sounded excited. She informed me that they really wanted some perspective on the viewing habits of people who do that, but for some reason (I suspect it has to do with Nielsen's mission statement) only if they pipe the video to a TV to watch it. I do exactly that in 3 rooms of my house, so they sent me the packets.

I wonder how Thundercats and He-Man are going to enjoy their ratings boosts... The late, great George Carlin is going to be highly rated this month too, as well as some online-only media outlets that probably have never seen a rating point.

The fact that they were highly interested in my survey suggests to me that some media companies see the writing on the wall, and want accurate information about my viewing habits in spite of the fact that they keep screaming that I'm killing them by watching online content exclusively. A small critique I have is that if they're going to start recording activities of people who use their TV like I do, they're going to have to make the box for you to write the channel name into bigger, so I can properly fit a URL into it.

Finally, I'd like to say that I don't know how large of a sample they take any given week, but I hope it's low enough that a media company or two takes notice that someone out there is seriously using sites like Hulu and netflix, and considers expanding the content available via such channels.

Re:Yip

[mpe]

In Australia, we're lucky to get some series half a year or more after they start airing in the US, and even then there are heaps of hiatuses and breaks.

Which makes little sense, since the hiatuses and repeats in US showings tend to be to spin out both showing and production to last a year. Anything made in the rest of the world and even in some cases in North America tends not to start showing until it's complete (or at least to the point where episode 5 requires less than a month's post production after the airdate for episode 1).

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you set up a proxy in the US? EG through amazon?

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no "supposedly" about it. MTV has/had a broadcast license for all the music they showed on the air, which is pretty much everything for all major labels. As a result, they used pretty much nothing but popular mainstream music in the series as BGM, since it cost them nothing.

Only problem with this is that Daria started before DVD took off. MTV had yet to work out any kind of licensing for home video distribution. This means that to release it on DVD with the music unchanged, they'd have to go through and individually bargain for home video distribution rights on every single piece of music they used in the entire series. This is a bit prohibitive in cost for a niche market show, so it's never going to happen unless MTV can work out some kind of blanket redistribution contract with all the major labels.

They've already released the two movies on DVD and a few episodes on VHS. They replaced all the BGM with new stuff, and it's bad. Really bad. Muzak level bad.

In other words, don't expect an actual DVD release from MTV. I know lots of people who love one, but given the tangled up mess that is current copyright law, it just doesn't make business sense to even try.

Re:Yip

[DrgnDancer]

This may be true, but it also says something about the industry that it has thousands or even millions of potential customers out there that it simply won't sell to in order to protect a business model that seems in danger of dying. I've posted, many times and some quite recently, about how I don't want to see the content industries fail, and want to see them come up with viable Internet business models. I'm not a "pirate everything and let artists produce for free like God intended" type, by any means. The problem is as much to do with the way the content industry refuses to adapt at all, as it is with the "everything should be free" pirates.

It's like there's two opposing forces: The ultra conservative "Why should I ever have to change anything about the way I do business? I've made money with this exact model for 50 years now and I demand to be able to continue the same way for another 50!" entertainment industry, and the "Nothing digital has any value since it's infinitely copyable. Even though I clearly want it, and consume it voraciously, I somehow think it should be valueless" radical pirates. The rest of us have to site here trying to find something to watch or listen to that isn't illegal, immoral, unusably tied with DRM, unavailable in our countries of origin, or otherwise annoying.

If someone doesn't compromise on one end or the other, I fear that as the digital divide closes and more and more people have data access, original content will be forced to disappear or become wholly amateur. Quite frankly I don't see us getting much LOTR or Batman Begins out of wholly amateur content.

Re:Yip

[Anonymous Coward]

You think that's bad. Fox Crime Asia just aired, on Friday (Apr 17 2009), season 1 episode 1 of Numb3rs. This is about the same time as CBS and subsequently TPB 'aired' season 5 episode 19.

Same geo-locked shit trying to watch it on any of the legitimate web sites, whose ads might earn them some revenue. So, where do they seriously think I'm actually getting this show from?

Re:Yip

[Lumpy]

I do the same, the biggest problem around here is my shows being preempted for some really stupid sporting event, so I torrent it and get the show they preempted and that my Mythbox did not record.

I circumvent them on my own. Mythbox -> myth2ipod -> ipod I got what the guy wants for very little hassle and money. It seems that Tv shows on the ipod are available to those that actually want to put forth effort into it.

Re:Yip

[mdwh2]

I break the law when I copy a purchased CD to my mp3 player too. I guess I'm just lacking honesty and integrity. How appalling of me to break the law by doing this, just because the record companies won't give me what I want.

Re:Yip

[Guido von Guido]

I ran into this a few weeks ago. I'm an American living in Canada, and my wife borrowed the first season of Dexter from somebody. Despite my best intentions, I got hooked on the damn thing.

Well, turns out the season finale was missing. It was late and the local video store was closed. My wife tried to get it on iTunes. Great, it's there, we can watch it for a few bucks. But no go--they've figured out we're in Canada from either our IP address or our credit card billing address. We tried a couple of other places, without any luck.

I might add that this was a DVD that has been out for a while, and is definitely available in Canada.

Re:Yip

[SilverJets]

Yes, we get screwed up here in Canada. iTunes Canada was WAAAAAY behind everyone else in offering movies and tv shows. If I remember correctly the UK, other parts of Europe and I think Australia had movies and tv shows before we did. On top of that the offerings we get SUCK! I browse the US iTunes movie and tv sites and cringe when I then go back to what is offered in Canada. Personally I think they messed up and gave Canada the redneck offering of tv shows. Here are some examples of what we get: TNA iMPACT!, Ax Men, Real World Road Rules, The Exterminators, Trucks!, Horsepower TV, Tank Overhaul, Nitro Circus, etc. The majority of content are these kinds of shows.

Then I look at the US offerings and see: House, Heroes, 24, 30 Rock, The Office, etc. Real, actual tv shows that we get up here on satellite and cable tv.

So why do we only get reality tv reject shows on iTunes?

Itunes pricing is already segmented.

[tpgp]

Itunes pricing is already segmented. Amazon's digital offering is region locked. As are all the other players.

I'm not sure your point holds.

Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

The answer is twofold. First, the vast majority of people will not pay a hefty monthly fee for immediate access to recent movies and TV shows. So there really is not market for it. You cannot compete with free by putting a "hefty" fee on it. God, that's fricken ludicrous. Why is this completely asinine idea even posted here?!

Second, the movie industry makes a lot of money with its gated approach to releasing movies. First, to theaters. Then to premium TV channels and pay-per-view. Then to DVD/Blue-ray. Than the normal TV. If the studios started releasing new movies as soon as they were released in they theaters, or even soon after, the money from the premium TV/pay-per-view/DVD/Blu-ray releases would drastically decrease. It's all about making the Benjamins, not about making it convenient for the viewer.

Re:Here's the answer....

[downix]

Tell that to the vinyl record industry.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed.

But maybe its time for the industry to wake up for some needs that weren't around a fews years ago. People nowadays want things fast and now, and will not stand in line when they could have things right a way.

Maybe if we thought less about massive money making and tried to respond better to those needs things would be different..

Re:Here's the answer....

[iYk6]

First, the vast majority of people will not pay a hefty monthly fee for immediate access to recent movies and TV shows. So there really is not market for it. You cannot compete with free by putting a "hefty" fee on it. God, that's fricken ludicrous. Why is this completely asinine idea even posted here?!

Presumably, if the writer would be willing to pay a hefty fee, he would also be willing to pay a reasonable fee.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

"Tell that to the vinyl record industry."

Tell what to the vinyl record industry? That it's a tiny niche market because only a minuscule percentage of people buy vinyl compared to other forms of access? Heck, I bet you don't know this, but profits from the ringtone market totally dwarfs the mighty iTunes. And vinyl is a mere drop in the bucket compared to iTunes.

And why are you comparing quicker access to movies and TV versus a higher fidelity sound recording? People want LPs for a completely different reason than theodp wants movies and TV. He's not willing to pay more for higher quality. In fact, it appears he wants to pay more for lower quality. He doesn't want to wait for the Blu-ray release, as a vinyl lover would wait for vinyl, he wants a crappy and immediate internet release. That's exactly the opposite of what the vinyl market is all about. God, you couldn't make an accurate analogy, on the most analogous day of your life, with an electrified analogy machine!

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

But would that "reasonable" fee for immediately access make up for the money lost on pay-per-view/premium TV/DVD/Blu-ray? (I'm talking about movies here, I have no idea why anyone would pay anything to watch TV!)

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

I have to admit, if I could buy a movie on the way out of a theater, I probably would in some circumstances. And think of all the parents who would have to buy the movie right then because their kids are screaming, "We want it now, we want it now, we want it now!!!"

I think the movie industry is missing out on some nice profits there. But, maybe I'm an idiot when it comes to profiting. As a poor idiot, I'm probably not qualified to make such judgments.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Mishotaki]

The answer is twofold. First, the vast majority of people will not pay a hefty monthly fee for immediate access to recent movies and TV shows.

Unless that includes every single show on earth as soon as it airs...

Re:Here's the answer....

[downix]

The tiered approach was how vinyl was handled for years, with singles, 45's and 33's, casettes, 8-tracks, nothing could knock the mightly LP off of it's perch. The vinyl disk fabricators got lazy, the production quality of the disks suffered with inherent scratches, even unplayable disks becoming all too common. Into this market comes the CD, with it's lossless playback, far more portable nature. The companies that produced the vinyl sat on their laurels, and lost out. Not talking the record companies, but the actual vinyl disk manufacturers, which they oftentimes had subcontracted the work out to. The record companies saw the potential of CD's, and grabbed at them, while the vinyl disk vendors continued to focus on their platters in many cases. The vinyl companies misjudged their customer base, the record companies and consumers, and as a result became the specialty vendors they are today, far smaller. The movie companies, never forget, are a middleman, delivering us content produced by the Production Houses. Only a matter of time before the Production Houses eliminate the middleman, and then the distributors that only focus on the traditional model will be the ones left out in the cold, I fear. They need to adapt, or will find themselves in the same boat.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

You have no idea what you're talking about. I agree that the quality of vinyl decreased. However, that was an intentional decision by the music industry to get us over to the CD. I worked at a music store back in the 80s to early 90s. The LP didn't die off, it was murdered.

And I have no idea what you're talking about a tiered approach to music. Other than releasing a single to radio, or releasing a single early to whet listener's appetite, all music was and is released for sale at the same time. Movies are released in tiers because each tier represents a valuable independent market that depends at least partially on the delay. That simply doesn't happen in music. Sure there are CD, iTunes, Amazon, ringtone markets. But there's no financial reason to delay any of them as there are in the movie industry.

Once again, you're talking about two completely different things. Stick to the topic, not about something completely unrelated.

Re:Here's the answer....

[TheRaven64]

I pay around $20/month (approximately, at the current exchange rate) to be able to rent almost as many DVDs as I can watch, and have them shipped to me. This is the only way I watch any TV shows now, by renting them after they are aired. I would be more than happy to pay the same amount to be given access to a library of DRM-free downloads to watch, saving the shipping costs of transporting the DVDs to and from me. I would not pay for DRM'd media, because that would almost certainly prevent me from watching it on some of the devices I may wish to use for playback.

The movie industry needs to realise that the rental and sales models are doomed. Few people watch the same movie over and over again (small children excepted), and so the benefit in owning a copy of a film is small. Rental simply can not work for soft copies, because rental requires a scarcity that is not applicable. What they can offer, which has great value, is timely access to new material and large archives of older films. If you can download any film or TV show you want for a fixed monthly fee, in high quality with a good download speed, the incentive to pirate them disappears. Some people will download everything they can and archive it to massive hard disks, but most people won't. Why would they? If they want to watch something again they can just download it again and not have to worry about paying for the local storage and backups.

Re:Here's the answer....

[downix]

There isn't a tier anymore, but at one time there was. Bands did shows with new songs, then the radio stations got "the drop" weeks if not months before the single was released, and the album came out weeks after that. That ended awhile ago, and for the improvement in the complete market I feel.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anonymous Coward]

The answer is twofold. First, the vast majority of people will not pay a hefty monthly fee for immediate access to recent movies and TV shows.

That is not true. People today are paying for pirate copies when they pay services like rapidshare and binary news group access. So people will pay for legal content, if they could.

Second, the movie industry makes a lot of money with its gated approach to releasing movies.

That may be so, but they are also loosing money on all those people who download pirate content. Perhaps they would have made more money if all these people would pay the studios instead of to rapid share and the like.

Re:Here's the answer....

[c]

> First, the vast majority of people will not pay a hefty monthly fee for
> immediate access to recent movies and TV shows. So there really is not market
> for it. You cannot compete with free by putting a "hefty" fee on it.

A significant chunk of the population already pays a hefty monthly fee for whatever crap their cable/satellite providers choose to send them. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that people might be willing to transfer that hefty bit of change to something they actually want to view enough that they'll go through the hassle of downloading it (which, easy as it is, is still more of a pain than flipping on the TV and channel surfing).

> Second, the movie industry makes a lot of money with its gated approach to releasing movies.

That's certainly (was) true. But the gates are getting closer together, to the point that it doesn't make much sense to have them.

c.

Re:Here's the answer....

[mpe]

The movie industry needs to realise that the rental and sales models are doomed. Few people watch the same movie over and over again (small children excepted)

Obsessive fans will often do so before the DVD is out too.

and so the benefit in owning a copy of a film is small.

If that copy has political messages or trailers for other films which cannot be skipped that actually counts against it's value since these will annoy people.

Rental simply can not work for soft copies, because rental requires a scarcity that is not applicable.

That hasn't stopped people trying to come up with ways of making such copies behave like physical copies.
A problem is that the idea of copyright is based around a situation of copies being cheap only if you make a lot of copies in one go. Be it with a printing press, DVD factory or even a broadcasting station.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Alan426]

That's ridiculous! Next, you'll be saying bands should sell their cd right at the concert. Oh ...

Re:Here's the answer....

[mr_matticus]

Rental simply can not work for soft copies, because rental requires a scarcity that is not applicable.

Rental doesn't require scarcity; it only requires integrity.

If you make the decision to pay $1 for a one-time viewing, or to pay some other amount for a subscription, it doesn't matter whether you're using the only copy in the world or whether there are 7-billion-plus copies. All that matters is that you have arranged for a one-time viewing and nothing more. Whether you would have paid more under other circumstances is not relevant.

Museums that charge admission don't do it because visitors can exhaust the exhibits; they do it for remuneration for costs and sometimes for profit.

It does work if people exercise some self-control and move beyond the brainwashing of the entitlement generation. That people can't do that speaks more to the people than to the business model.

Re:Here's the answer....

[Lumpy]

And think of all the parents who would have to buy the movie right then because their kids are screaming, "We want it now, we want it now, we want it now!!!"

wow spineless parents. That explains a lot about society today.

the correct answer to "we want it now" is... "Hows it feel to want?"

Re:Here's the answer....

[Anita Coney]

"Hows it feel to want?"

A literal laugh out loud!

Re:Here's the answer....

[MtViewGuy]

There's also another issue here: movie downloads put a huge strain on the Internet infrastructure and even if you have Verizon FIOS, tie up your connection for a long time given how big a VC-1 or AVC-encoded file is for 1080p high-definition video (about 15 GB for a two-hour movie!).

I'd rather get a Blu-ray disc of a movie, where you're not subject to the problems of downloading and you get ultra-sharp 1080p video consistently.

What are you talking about?

[Anonymous Coward]

WTO rules about free trade have nothing at all to do with telling producers how they must sell their products internationally. Free trade refers to making sure that GOVERNMENTS don't set protectionist or xenophobic rules about the sale of foreign goods in their respective countries. Rules about region locking 1) Aren't passed by governments trying to keep foreign goods OUT and 2) Aren't enforceable in countries -receiving- goods unless they agree to those rules, and WTO is quite fine with all of that.

It's caled "Netflix" idiot

[Anonymous Coward]

Get a Netflix account and a Roku box. Then you also have access to Amazon VOD.

Amazon has a service where you can purchase movies

[Marrow]

They even have their own download client. Search on Video on Demand.

It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[RobotRunAmok]

Apparently they see some magic gain in *not* making their product available in *preferred* distribution channels.

It's not magic, it's real money. Follow the entertainment trades like "Variety" and you will see that the studios are selling nice lump-sum deals for some movies into broadcast and cable distribution windows even before they hit the theaters. The domestic and foreign TV distribution channels are not going to pay this big money if the movie is widely distributed in one form or another prior to their contracted window of distribution. The studio *must* restrict online distribution -- or at least make a big show that it is trying to. It's part of their contractual obligations.

When a studio gets confident that the money it can make via "easy early global online" distribution will be enough to off-set the reduced fees it can charge its "old school" distribution partners, believe me, they'll pull the trigger on it. But the old school guys pay big bucks, and, currently, the new skool online direct-to-consumer model is, literally, pennies.

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[DrgnDancer]

It does seem to me though, that iTunes has proved the "If you build it they will come" theory of digital distribution. The music industry kicked and screamed and cried and refused to build a good digital distribution center both because they were worried about piracy (which didn't really seem to get any worse), and because they were completely unconvinced it could ever make any amount of money. So Apple built iTunes, which is at best a "decent" attempt at a distribution center, and it's a license to print money. Once people realized that there was a (relatively) friendly store that had (a lot of) the content they wanted, they flocked there in droves. It's only gotten better as Apple has refined the UI and increased the catalog. Now anybody who's anybody in on iTunes. My dad can find his obscure Jazz musicians, my brother can find his favorite grunge bands, I can find weird Irish folk rock, and my wife can find the soundtrack to CSI. All in one place, and without too much effort.

It's pretty clear to me that the reason video production companies aren't making money hand over fist from the Internet is the lack of an iTunes store. It's not the music is magically easier to sell online, and it's not that Apple is magically successful where other companies are not. It's that there is no one place that I can go to reliably expect to find any movie or TV show I want with a reasonably easy searchable index. The bandwidth is mostly there, the storage is mostly there (I saw a not-quite-a-netbook at Costco for $750 yesterday with a 360GB HDD, and HDMI connector) all that is needed for the "iMovies" store to take off is someone to convince the video distributors to give them (something approaching) everything all the time at an acceptable level of quality, and for them make give a halfway decent UI. The People will come. Just like they did to the iTunes store.

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[c0p0n]

The domestic and foreign TV distribution channels are not going to pay this big money if the movie is widely distributed in one form or another prior to their contracted window of distribution.

What you say makes an awful lot of sense, however there's something that doesn't quite fit in this picture; when you say "in one form or another" it also has to include dodgy bittorrent distribution, which has been going on for a few years now. I would've thought TV channels were aware of this, but they pay the same money regardless.

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[Son of Byrne]

You're absolutely correct, but do remember that literal pennies add up to literal billions when you aggregate receiving literal pennies from millions of consumers.

It's about risk right now. For the studios, business is profiting very well by selling rights strictly to the "old school" distribution partners. What the studios need is for someone to demonstrate to them the market cap for distribution online and show them how much *better* they could be doing by distributing online.

Even then, if you're running a business that is making money hand over fist with a current business model (regardless of so-called pirating), then would you be ready to switch to some new business model that would put your entire business at risk? Probably not. Also remember that a lot of studios are publicly traded and that means that they are obligated to their shareholders. Their shareholders will likely want to make dividends at the end of the year, not lose money.

I'm as much for online distribution as anyone, so I'm doing my part by not subscribing to premium cable channels, not buying dvd's, and subscribing to the closest plan that exists for what I want: Netflix.

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[lennier]

"but do remember that literal pennies add up to literal billions when you aggregate receiving literal pennies from millions of consumers. "

Er... literal pennies from literal millions actually adds up to literal tens of thousands of dollars, not billions.

Perhaps you were meaning the figurative kind of 'literal'?

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[The End Of Days]

do remember that literal pennies add up to literal billions when you aggregate receiving literal pennies from millions of consumers

Arithmetic suggests it would add up to literal hundreds of thousands. Since all the numbers bear no relationship to reality in any case, it hardly matters.

Re:It Ain't Philosophy, It's The Business Model

[Son of Byrne]

lol. You got me. :)

one stop media service

[rs232]

Same here, where can I sign on for a service that I can watch what I want whenever I want and pay a fare price for it. Without hunting up stuff on iPlayer, Hulu, iPlayer, itvPlayer etc. One payment to the ISP and a pay-as-you-go service with micro-payments.

Re:one stop media service

[Anonymous Coward]

spelling: s/fare/fair/

Idiot...

[Anonymous Coward]

So let me get this straight....this guy has a buying pattern where he might be spending $100 or so on movie rentals, but thinks he should only have to spend $35 or so, and is surprised no one is taking him up on the offer?

He should send me $35/month just to show he's not about saving the money.

Marketing 101

[Dan541]

My ISP offers a movie service, BUT you have to install a proprietary player to play the movie on.

I'm a customer, I want the option of having the product as a .avi but the service is not giving me the service I want and am willing to pay for.

So I use The Pirate Bay, money has nothing to do with my decision Movies cost nothing anyway even on DVDs it's all about the service. The Pirate Bay simply provides a better service than the studios can so they get all my downloads.

Considering how big the market for movies is that must be a fair bit of money they are missing out on, all because they want people to use a certain piece of software.

Re:Marketing 101

[westlake]

Movies cost nothing anyway even on DVDs it's all about the service.

This is too dumb for words.

Most stories and scripts are never produced. You can spend a lot of money before deciding that this just isn't going to work.

The production budget for an A-list feature is $100-$200 million. That is not the price of getting audiences into theaters or in line for PPV, the DVD or Blu-Ray disk.

Your hit films have to carry the weight of all the projects that fail.

You can minimize the risk by negotiating prior agreements for IMAX, broadcast and cable distribution.

Broadband penetration in the states is under 50%.

When metered billing comes into play - The Pirate Bay at $1 a GB doesn't look like much of a bargain. Not when 50 GB of Blu-Ray HD is $20 at WalMart.

The downloader cherry-picks the winners.

He is unlikely to pay full value for anything. He is unlikely to pay anything at all There is no reason for the studios to make his life any easier.

The first lesson of Marketing 101 is that you produce a product for your paying customers:

Hannah Montana, High School Musical XII

Re:Marketing 101

[SectoidRandom]

Movies cost nothing anyway even on DVDs it's all about the service.

This is too dumb for words.

Err, I believe the original poster was referring to the cost of purchasing a movie on DVD vs. cost from any other service.

He's right, paying £15 for a DVD or £10 on iTunes means nothing if you can't do either until 6 months after it is available on a Torrent.

Since when?

[zogger]

Millions and millions of households are quite willing to pay a monthly fee for cable or satellite television, even when free OTA signals are available. Why would another method of delivery be different? All it has to do is A) not suck technology-wise, and B) be fair in price.

AVI codecs are patented too

[tepples]

My ISP offers a movie service, BUT you have to install a proprietary player to play the movie on.

I'm a customer, I want the option of having the product as a .avi

In what codec? The United States is home to Slashdot, the major motion picture studios, and two-thirds of native English speakers in the developed world. But in the United States, most codecs used in AVI files are subject to several patents. For example, the codecs commonly used in DivX .avi files are MPEG-4 Part 2 video (patented) and MPEG-1 layer 3 audio (also patented). So the software needed to play .avi files is just as non-free as your ISP's player.

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[Dan541]

VLC player was free and plays all .AVI files I have ever downloaded, I'll admit I don't know much about codecs mainly because they have never been a problem so long as it's an .avi file it plays.

Well so far atleast.

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[TheTurtlesMoves]

And its illegal in the US because VLC don't pay the license fees. So is mplayer and ffmpeg. In fact to play a DVD on Linux is to break the DMCA. Its not like this in all countries. But it is this way in the USA.

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[darpo]

AVI is not a codec, it's a container format: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AVI

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is also a major problem. Once you pay for the DVD, you should be able to watch it. Period. DeCSS would have never been necessary if the industry didn't insist on being Nazis about this. What exactly have they gained by their hardline stance?

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[linzeal]

And 10's of millions of people choose to break the law. Doesn't sound like much of a law to me.

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not like this in all countries.

"Hey, we're working on it!" -- Uncle Sam

Re:AVI codecs are patented too

[sbeckstead]

Thousands of people choose to jump off bridges too, There had to be said. Your questionable ethics are really disturbing.

Devil's advocate

[tepples]

It's not so much the different price that's annoying. It's not having the chance to watch some things because of where you live.

"If it's that important to you, emigrate." -- Movie studio exec, speaking on condition of anonymity

Re:Devil's advocate

[mpe]

"Have you tried hiring an immigration expert to help get you into the United States?" -- Movie studio exec, speaking on condition of anonymity

"If you have enough money we may have a solution for you" -- Airbus/Boeing exec, speaking on condition of anonymity. At least until they know that there is a market for an A380/744 with the cargo section converted into a fuel tank, thus avoiding the hassle of having to actually land in the US.

Any price? How about a hostile takeover?

[tepples]

Well, you cant buy it for any price.

Yes you can. Many of the movie studios are publicly traded companies. Buy half the company's outstanding stock for several billion dollars, and not only do you own the copy, you own the copyright. But some movie studios have tried to make themselves hostile-takeover-proof by joining conglomerates, such as General Electric's purchase of Universal City Studios from Vivendi.

Depends on your juristdiction

[Mathinker]

YMMV. Widely. Depends on where you are.

This includes many things besides downloading, including spitting on the ground.

monthly fee... tv and movies....

[mblase]

You mean, like, TV with a DVR attached? You know, using one of the cable or dish providers that support on-demand programming for almost every major new release the first month it's out?

Oh, yeah, they don't have an extensive catalog of older movies and TV shows. Well, it's a good thing the author of TFA already has a Netflix account for that.

Even better, the current crop of TiVos let you connect them to your home network and watch recordings on your PC or laptop, offering the author all the convenience of BitTorrent without the piracy.

Yeah, it's not a cheap arrangement, but TFA did specify a willingness to pay a "hefty" monthly fee. He just doesn't want to do it.

(And the /. headline's all wrong -- iTunes DOES offer recent TV and movie releases a la carte, but since when did it offer any music at all for a monthly fee?)

You have never listened to vinyl have you?

[tg123]

I remember vinyl, its was only good for the first say 10 plays and then you would get a scratch or a bit of dust and then you get pops and crackly sounds.

its the reason Vinyl had dust covers - usually two a cardboard/paper cover and a plastic cover.

Now matter what you did the records always got scratches.

the noise was dreadful I was stunned at the sound quality of cd's when they came out I could here the singer taking a breath and the guitar players fingers sliding on the strings. - Simply magic.

Devil's advocate

[tepples]

I'm a fan of the show, I want to watch it legitimately and if I could I would pay to do so.

"Have you tried hiring an immigration expert to help get you into the United States?" -- Movie studio exec, speaking on condition of anonymity

Cannibalization

[tepples]

Sitting on previously broadcasted content should speed up its copyright expiration. Revlon would not just stop selling a popular makeup brand, so how come content providers will do that?

A couple reasons:

• Fear of cannibalizing sales of copies of the company's other, more recently published works. It's why Disney only releases a given movie on home video about once every ten years.
• Fear of backlash from $direction-wing media watchdog organizations, for one. It's part of why Disney hasn't published Song of the South on VHS in the United States or in any DVD region.

Apple, Disney, sports, and small children

[tepples]

This is the only way I watch any TV shows now, by renting them after they are aired.

You can replace TV news and weather with online news and weather, and you can replace scripted TV series with DVD rentals. But how do you watch college or professional sports?

Few people watch the same movie over and over again (small children excepted)

The article mentions iTunes Store, a service of Apple Inc. The CEO of Apple is also on the board of The Walt Disney Company, which owns several major cable sports channels and a movie studio known for its animated features watched by (yup) small children.

Re:Apple, Disney, sports, and small children

[Arcady13]

But how do you watch college or professional sports?

On a TV in the bar that I don't pay attention to anyway?

Can't stream to an iPod

[tepples]

All you need do is make the data-rate of the movie lower than the average internet connection (not hard, movies typically are encoded at around 1.5Mb/s for SD), and stream it to them.

Streaming would rule out playback on iPod Touch. It would also anger AT&T and Apple's other iPhone partners, as the mobile data plans that I've looked at tend to be provisioned for no more than 5 GB/mo. And a lot of places still have an "average internet connection" speed of 0.05 Mbps; dial-up is painful but tolerable for downloading singles at 15 minutes each, but unbearable for video.

Re:Can't stream to an iPod

[schmidt349]

>Streaming would rule out playback on iPod Touch.

Nope. Hulu's in the works for iPhone and iTouch, and Pandora's already available. Streaming on iPhone OS devices is child's play -- the problem is when you try to route the streaming data over EDGE/3G instead of Wifi. Blocking media streaming over the cell network is certainly obnoxious behavior on AT&T's part but not surprising or unique amongst the providers.

Of course, had you ever used or looked into using one of these devices you would already know that.

Re:Can't stream to an iPod

[beelsebob]

No, just because you stream it, doesn't mean you don't also collect the data at the other and write it into a file. This is exactly what iTunes does. You click buy, iTunes begins downloading a streaming ready file from the beginning, after a couple of minutes it begins playing, by the time you've finished watching your film, it's on your hard drive.

It's true that there are places in the world which still rely on 56k modems, but I simply don't buy a suggestion that that's average. Average is at least 2Mb/s, probably more like 4-8Mb/s these days.

How much to move?

[tepples]

Get a Netflix account and a Roku box.

How much does it cost to move to a country where these are available?

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[Anonymous Coward]

We have detected that you are not located within the US. Due to licensing restrictions Amazon Video On Demand customers must be located in the United States when viewing videos online. (Whatâ(TM)s This?)

Have you tried Cable?

[ccollins00]

I have Digital Cable, with the dvr box, i have can record any tv show i want, with on demand i can watch many tv programs, a ton of movies, with hbo and showtime i also get more on demand options... many movies are available on demand same day as the dvd release

Re:Have you tried Cable?

[Zantetsuken]

Except most people are looking for something closer to Netflix, where as most any plan I've seen for digital cable + dvr + movie tiers + on demand is going to cost $150 USD monthly - not cool...

Monthly Fee for Music != iTunes

[LostCluster]

iTunes recently raised prices for most popular tracks, and still charges by the track for music. Competitors like Napster, Zune Store, and Real Rhapsody offer unlimited music plans.

Movies have ALWAYS been about restriction...

[dpbsmith]

Read something like Terry Ramsaye's "A Million and One Nights," about the early history of the movies--up to the early twenties--(Ramsaye doesn't believe the talkies have much of a future)--and, to a technical guy like me, it's incredibly boring.

It's all about complicated business maneuvers based on artificial restrictions. (The phrase "B movie" dates back to the days when distributors wouldn't rent a good movie to a theatre unless they agreed to rent a lousy movie too). The various Laemmles and Selznicks and Zukors are doing nothing but finding clever ways to restrict product flow, cutting complex deals to outdo each other.

The movies themselves are sort of a byproduct of the real industry, which is business deals. The movies are sort of a necessary evil, like the chips that are needed at a casino. Who cares who designed the chips, or whether the artwork on the chips is great or mediocre?

Patents, too. Patents and patent pools and trusts and cartels, the whole nine yards.

Why is the movie industry associated with Hollywood rather than New Jersey? No, it's not because of reliable daylight. Anyone old enough to be familiar with the little loop of film in a camera or projector that buffers between the intermittent motion at the film gate and the smooth motion of the reels, so the claw doesn't need to pull against the inertia of the reels and tear the film? You need that if you want to put the film on reels and run continuously for more than a couple of minutes.

Well, that's the famous patented Latham Loop, and the people that held the patent refused to sell cameras, only rent them at exorbitant costs. So a bunch of people decided to make movies with pirated, illegal cameras... and they did it in California to make it harder for the process servers to find them.

Printing has always been about making books cheap and available... starting with the Bible. Movies have always been about restricting product. It's in their DNA.

Re:Movies have ALWAYS been about restriction...

[BitZtream]

Define irony:

Well, that's the famous patented Latham Loop, and the people that held the patent refused to sell cameras, only rent them at exorbitant costs. So a bunch of people decided to make movies with pirated, illegal cameras... and they did it in California to make it harder for the process servers to find them.

Pick your modern day example to associate this with, not like there aren't plenty.

Re:Movies have ALWAYS been about restriction...

[surfingmarmot]

Right, but with one characterization: entertainment has always been about restricting access to product to make it more valuable. The Music and Concert industries play this game well too.

Re:Movies have ALWAYS been about restriction...

[Anonymous Coward]

In the history of motion pictures, there is also the little tidbit regarding the Studios owning the whole supply chain to choke out the independent theatres. Warners, MGM, Paramount, etc.â"the big studiosâ" all owned the theatres that showed the films in most cities. They controlled the whole system from start to finish.

It was only when you got out to the "sticks" that distribution deals were negotiated with the independents.

That all changed in the late 1940's when a group of independent theatre owners urged the Feds to break the studios' racket in the United States vs. Paramount anti-trust suit.

Of course, the studios losing that case was the start of the decline of the traditional studio in the making of motion pictures. The real money is in the distribution of movies, not making them. Which is pretty much all that the old guard do nowadays.

How to speed things up:

[marvis]

Buy more movies from iTunes and other legal streaming services!

Seriously, nothing big is going to happen here without more people creating demand for such a service.

BTW, the situation is even more annoying here in Germany: iTunes Movies just started about a week ago, and they currently only offer about 500 movies. There are a few competitors, but their range of movies does not look much better.

Monthly Fee Ain't the Half of it

[Wingsy]

If you get what you wish for, be ready to also pay a hefty monthly fee for overages in your monthly usage cap.

Missing the point

[nicholdraper]

Many people commenting here have missed the point. The point is not that there are not movies on iTunes or other venues. The point is that there are many people who would pay a premium for first release movies to their houses. I will have to say that often I would be willing to pay $100 or more for a just released movie. I spend that much going to the theater and to be perfectly honest my home theater beats out all of the theaters around my house for quality and comfort. The motion picture producers should realized there is a market especially if the movie is targeted for a more intelligent crowd than the 14 year old boys that most PG-13 films aim to attract.

Because timothy is an idiot?

[BitZtream]

Funny, the email account I use for iTunes gets a couple emails a week telling me about movies.

How is this on slashdot? If you have used iTunes in the last 3 years you'd be fully away of the movies and TV shows you can buy and rent from it.

One of the first things I did 2 years ago when buying my iPhone was buying Southpark Bigger, Longer, Uncut (thats a movie timothy) to see how it looked on the phone.

The rest of this post is for illustrative purposes, but that makes it look a lot like an iTunes advertisement so ignore it if you wish.

I just opened iTunes and the first thing I see when I go to 'iTunes Store' at the top of the pages is 'Kids and Family Shows: $0.99'

First box in the left column, second line:
Movies

Second box down on the lefthand column is titled:
'More in Movies & TV'

It contains the following:
HD Movies
HD TV Shows
TV Shows Just Added

The box just under that is titled:
Top TV Episodes

And the next box is:
Top Movie Sales

It contains:
Slumdog Millonaire
The Reader
Quantum of Solice
Bedtime Stories
Marley & Me
(More that I'm not listing)

The next box down says:
Top Movie Rentals

So in short, anyone who thinks iTunes doesn't have movies is a fucking idiot, it not only has movies it has the same shitty movies that you can get from Blockbuster or Netflix. Just because it doesn't have your obscure retarded movie that was seen by a total of 6 people around the globe doesn't mean it doesn't have movies.

Likewise, just because your obscure OS with so little market penetration that its statistically irrelevant isn't supported does not mean it doesn't have movies. It means no one gives a fuck about you and your too cheap to pay for the service ass anyway. /rant

Not where I live.

[krischik]

Where I live - or more importantly - where my credit card lives there is no "Movies" in the iTunes store. Nor is there "TV-Shows".

But I somehow blame the movie industry for that. I am sure Steve would love to sell movies and TV shows in Switzerland.

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[funkatron]

Let's see. Categories on amazon.co.uk under Music, DVD & Games:

• Music
• MP3 Downloads
• DVD
• Blu-ray
• PC & Video Games

Nope, it's not there.

3-4 movies a month for $77? Why NOT buy?

[argent]

This fellow estimated that most people on the $77 a month plan Netflix watch no more than 3-4 movies a month instead of the 22 they could theoretically manage.

If they "bought" (ok, rented them until Apple gets tired of supporting the authorization servers) them on iTunes you could afford five movies a month for that.

What are you saving by renting for a month?

Re:3-4 movies a month for $77? Why NOT buy?

[MiKM]

$17/month, not $77/month. At that price, watching 3-4 movies is a bargain. The nearest rental place to me costs $4-5 per DVD. It's also about an hour round-trip on bike (1.5-2 if I'm walking). It's worth it, if only just for the convenience. Buying the 3-4 DVDs a month is going to cost me more than $17, not to mention that some movies I have no intention of seeing a second time.

Re:3-4 movies a month for $77? Why NOT buy?

[argent]

Ah, OK, that's a much better deal.

not to mention that some movies I have no intention of seeing a second time.

That's one reason for the screwed up licensing, I guess. Unlike books and music and video games movies don't have much "replay value".

But it's a reason, not an excuse. If the layers of bad contracts slathered on corruption and piracy lead them to leave money on the table, they need to do something about the screwed up contracts.

Car Salesmen

[Weedhopper]

There's a certain point in my consumption of media where things just became absurd. And then I became a pirate.

It's similar each time I go to buy a car. I'm there at the lot because I want to buy something but first, I have to deal with the first enemy, the salesman. I usually know exactly what I want but almost but not quite invariably, he tries to sell me something else first. Then he tries to sell me a couple things I don't want before I can manage to leave. I looked up your inventory and the inventory of your competitors before I came, don't try to BS me. I have Edmunds and AutoTrader right here on my phone, why make me distrust you by lying to me? This is changing, but not fast enough for my tastes.

The movie/TV industry is the same way. They're either trying to sell me what I want in a way that I don't want them or don't sell what I want at all.

First, let's get this notion of having to sit down at a certain time to watch a TV show out of the way. It's an obsolete mode of thinking. We started with primitive VHS, but now we have DVRs and even those will eventually be replaced by streaming.

I find it remarkable that the torrent of a popular show is usually up within minutes of the show airing. Lately, even the HD versions are up lickety split.

Yet, despite the pirates offering a mostly superior product (commercial free, 720/1080p), I have yet to torrent a single episode that I can watch on Hulu instead. But then again, once Hulu's not allowed to stream an episode that I "missed," guess where I am? You got it, TPB. There's a months long gap between "legit" online availability and the DVDs being released where I physically can't access the content.

That's if it's even online in the first place. Show me where I can watch The Big Bang Theory online. I can't. Thus, I will download it.

And man, I would pay for this if I could. In fact, I did. Then I gave up. I rented video on iTunes for a while until I realized what a sham it was. It's not that I didn't want to pay, (though the prices are way too high for TV episodes), its that once I pay, I don't want to be told when, where, and how I can watch or otherwise be forced to pay for the same content again. This is why Blockbuster is gasping its last breath and NetFlix is standing over its dying body.

I could potentially be the best consumer the movie/TV industry has, but instead, I became the enemy for no other reason than the industry treated me as such.

This stuff about complex contract systems and embargoed air dates is a product of a system that's no longer appropriate for the technology of today, much less the near future. And you know what, this is THEIR problem, not ours (the consumers). They're paid the big bucks to solve the problem before it gets to us, instead of just passing the problem along to us. I really couldn't give a shit about the contract between Warner Bros and HBO. That's really not my problem and by making it my problem, you, the content provider are my problem. Thus, I will torrent.

I want to pay. But you have to give me what I want, not what you think I want.

Re:Car Salesmen

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm using Netflix, and I'm very happy with the video quality and price (essentially unlimited for $9/mo) of the streaming films. I wish they had a bigger selection of downloadable films, but there are enough films in there that were I to watch only the good ones, I could easily blow months of my life doing only that.

This is to say nothing of the vastly large selection I can choose from for DVD's, which albeit comes at a slower pace via mail, is essentially an unlimited source of entertainment.

A lot of this "I pirate because no one offers me the service I want" nonsense sounds a whole lot like weak rationalizations to me. A fuckton of effort goes into making great entertainment, whether games or films or television, and if you can't be bothered to pay for it, then don't watch it. Use the time to make some money so that the rental fees look more like noise.

Re:Car Salesmen

[Weedhopper]

Hi AC. Maybe you should read the post. I'm mostly referring to TV shows. If I miss the air date, how do I watch the season opener of Battlestar? I can't. I have to wait for the DVDs.

I work in emergency humanitarian aid and I spend 9 months out of the year overseas, mostly in Africa, sometimes the mid East and SE Asia. I get somewhere between a few days to a few weeks between assignments. I want to watch the first six episodes of this season's Heroes so I get what's going on this season. Tell me how I do that.

Please, tell me again about my weak rationalizations and how I should get get a job to pay for content.

Best advice of your life ....

[freaker_TuC]

I will have to say that often I would be willing to pay $100 or more for a just released movie. I spend that much going to the theater

Quit eating popcorn, costs less..

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[Anonymous Coward]

Great tip!
Now if they would let anyone outside the US watch...

I just keep on trying, someday someone will get my money!

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[Marrow]

Perhaps it will let you buy them on amazon.com.

You are correct, its not on their UK site.

Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Hulu

[OrangeTide]

You can pay a monthly fee ala Netflix. You can pay per movie with Apple and Amazon (which does have new releases, unlike watch-instantly on Netflix). Or you can watch recent TV programs for free with advertisements with Hulu.

It's like the author of TFA didn't even try before writing a rant about how he's just going to use bittorrent.

From the comments, I guess its US only currently

[Marrow]

Sorry about that. Seems unnecessary, but they certainly would want to make the money if they could.

Stop the war on piracy: compete with it.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd gladly pay for a service like that.

I think the main requeriment would be a vast library comparable (or bigger) in quantity and variety with P2P networks, direct downloads, FTP, etc. That means, not only a lot of movies, but also having the choice to see them with or without subtitles in a lots of languages or dubbed (if available).

Then there are a lot of good services and pricing plans they could put. A few examples of services I'd consider worth to pay.

* A suscription to the service would allow a certain amount of movies on streaming.

* High-speed download of DVDRip-like movies... very cheap, and giving a discount if you buy the DVD later.

* Some kind of premium membership providing unlimited downloads if you buy a minimum or N DVDs per year.

* A premium membership could have extra services for attracting people like seeing on streaming extras of movies you've seen (making of, interviews, etc). That would work specially well if they're streamed there before they're available everywhere else.

There are tons of posibilities. A lot of plans that a huge amount of people would pay.

Anyway, I think that's like dreaming but, what if there were a service similar to what I described but also including music (providing extra services like high quality audio, bootlegs, etc).

Reality

[msimm]

He's saying that out-dated distribution models have created a market for independent distribution channels and because of the current state of things those distribution channels are training the consumer that the product is free.

Then again

[Goffee71]

On the other hand, films now hitting 10 years old (so should be hitting online rental services soon): Fight Club American Beauty The Green Mile Sixth Sense Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels Magnolia Big Lebowski Saving Private Ryan So, its not all that bad!

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[Anonymous Coward]

Is there any way to get this to work if you are outside North America?

Netflix?

[Anonymous Coward]

I pay a monthly fee ($15-18 depending on my schedule)
and they ship me ~4 or 6 (respectively) DVDs per week.
Granted I have to wait until shows come out on DVD, but as my queue is full (500 DVDs not an issue)

They have an "OK" download system that runs on my TV.

What you say?

[Anonymous Coward]

Printing has always been about making books cheap and available... starting with the Bible.

Are you saying the first thing that the Chinese printed was the Bible? That's amazing!

Same thing for international users

[Anonymous Coward]

Here - in Denmark, Europe - most of the popular shows are YEARS behind the US schedule, IF they are shown at all on the channels here.
There is NO way we can legally purchase the rights to watch, since we are always told "sorry, US Residents only".

Hey, this is the Internet. Internet != US in case you missed that point ?

So again, that leaves us with TPB or uTorrent. Latest shows, commercial free and premium quality.

And yes, we actually subscribe to a Danish service showing TV episodes from a Danish channel.

Just need to push for DRM free movies.

[MikeFM]

I buy movies and tv shows from the iTunes Store but I wish they'd learn from their music sales and get rid of the DRM. I remove the DRM anyway but it's an extra step that I find annoying.

Other than that my biggest complaint is price. It costs as much, or more, to buy the content from iTunes than it does on DVD. Without physical media, packaging, shipping costs, etc we should save at least a couple dollars per movie. And I think $2+ per tv episode is rather high. I'd buy way more if they were kept to $.99 or less per episode. I'd certainly buy more than twice as much content. I think greed is hurting their sales.

Re:Just need to push for DRM free movies.

[GiMP]

If you ditch cable and just buy television series on iTunes, the $2/episode can actually be pretty cheap. This is especially true now that the broadcast channels are putting their shows online for free (well, with ads). However, for that same reason, there is little worth buying on iTunes that you can't get elsewhere for free, legally -- if it has just aired in the last month. If it is older, you're better off getting it on DVD, if it has even been released yet.

Finally, there have certainly been a few cases where iTunes was cheaper than the corresponding DVD releases. I bought my episodes of "24" for cheaper than I'd have bought the DVDS.

Re:Just need to push for DRM free movies.

[MikeFM]

Episodes are still frequently over priced. A big example I was recently annoyed by was School House Rock - They wanted about $1 per minute of play time. I'd love to give them some money but that is just outrageous and many comments indicated similar feelings from others.

I don't pay for cable because it costs more than it's worth for me. Largely because the shows I want to watch aren't on all the time and I'm not going to dedicate myself to a show schedule.

Um ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I must have missed something, but "willing to pay a monthly fee" (hefty or otherwise) for "access to recent TV shows and movies" sounds like cable television to me ...

Some people don't seem to be able to think outside the (other) box.

Re:Um ...

[mdwh2]

I'm in the UK. I sometimes have to wait months for recent TV shows and movies.

Not to mention having to worry about when it's on, or being in (yes, I could record it - but it's easier to download it).

Flat rate? Also, he mentions Itunes

[mdwh2]

RTFA:

Apple's iTunes rental plan, meanwhile, sits at the other end of the spectrum: It offers a wide selection of new releases that go for $3 or $4 each, but it's crippled by a surfeit of restrictions. After you press play, you've got just 24 hours to watch the full film, and new releases tend to disappear off the virtual shelf after a few months as they enter a new circle of Hollywood's contractual purgatory.

And how many TV shows does Itunes have?

In addition, "a hefty monthly fee" suggests he would rather a flat rate - as I would. I currently pay about £380 a year to TV companies (compulsory licence + cable fees), which gives me access to hundreds of channels. That's £380 that I could be paying to a legal online service, if someone would offer it. Unfortunately one off purchases rather than a flat rate can quickly add up to be very expensive when you're watching TV shows with 20+ episodes a season.

We hear hype about "on demand" from TV companies, but it's typically a limited selection, and technology that's way behind what we already have here and now in the form of Bittorrent. (Note that I do still pay money to the TV companies, even though I almost get it via downloading rather than watching the TV, as I still feel I should pay for it - however, greedy actions such as the recent Pirate Bay ruling make me wonder if I should just keep my money, since they seem to happily be able to get the money by suing people instead, and in their eyes I'm breaking the law whether I pay or not.)

Mod parent up

[dpbsmith]

It's a good point.

Where does he say that?

[mdwh2]

Where does he say he has a right?

I don't think he's claiming he has a right, he's just pointing out that he does download, and explaining why he does so. The closest he gets is blaming "the system", but that's a different thing. He then asks for what he's looking for, and would be willing to pay for, but that's not demanding a "right", that's just him telling companies what he'll hand over money for.

illegal movie "services" already to far ahead

[Anonymous Coward]

Today I'm already getting a better digital media experience downloading a dvdrip (with 5.1 audio) instead of renting the same "new" movie release from my digital-TV-service provider (in 2 channel audio).

Since I also am willing to pay for a good digital movie service, I think it's really sad to realize that even if the movie industry would start offering good online movie services, they'd still be one step behind the latest dvdrip download, since that download is yours as long as you like and available offline. (...and indexes nicely in XBMC, and burns nicely to a DVD-R, and can be used in handheld digital media players)

Straw man

[mdwh2]

If you actually try RTFA, you'll see that Itunes is mentioned.

Likewise, just because your obscure OS with so little market penetration that its statistically irrelevant isn't supported does not mean it doesn't have movies. It means no one gives a fuck about you and your too cheap to pay for the service ass anyway. /rant

Tell that to the Mac users when they whine that something isn't available on their OS.

Where to watch Big Bang Theory online?

[Anonymous Coward]

10 goto cbs.com.

20 Look for a link called InnerTube.

30 Watch all you want.

40 And it's free.

50 You no longer have a reason to bitch.

Re:Where to watch Big Bang Theory online?

[Weedhopper]

10 goto cbs.com.

20 Look for a link called InnerTube.

30 Watch all you want.

40 And it's free.

50 You no longer have a reason to bitch.

http://www.cbs.com/video/?showname=primetime/big_bang_theory#video

60 STFU if you don't know WTF you're talking about.

Re:Where to watch Big Bang Theory online?

[Anonymous Coward]

70 holy shit, you are one dense mongoloid moron

80 goto 70

Re:Where to watch Big Bang Theory online?

[Weedhopper]

Click on full videos, you imbecile. Full videos are NOT AVAILABLE ONLINE.

A slice of green.

[Ostracus]

http://blog.streamingmedia.com/the_business_of_online_vi/2009/03/estimates-on-what-it-costs-netflixs-to-stream-movies.html

While Netflix is not yet giving out a lot of details on their costs associated with their streaming video service, they have given out enough data for us to have a pretty good idea of their costs when it comes to their streaming delivery costs for the XBOX 360 and other devices. Here's what we do and don't know and how it all breaks down.

WRONG: Movies have ALWAYS been about restriction..

[sakusha]

That's the worst (and most totally incorrect) description about the early history of the movie industry I ever heard. And I've heard a zillion of them, since I worked in Hollywood for many years.

Obviously you are confused about the origin of the patented Edison cameras. There was a format war and Edison owned the basic patents on standardized film cameras that worked with the movie projectors in all the theaters. Some people tried to issue cameras in the Edison format that didn't pay Edison royalties. Others tried to start a new format, with predictable lack of success.

If you're going to argue a historical point, you should at least make a MINIMAL attempt to get the history right. I'm no fan of Edison (who often acquired patents in ways that we would now call him a "patent troll") but that doesn't make the early history of the Movies anything more than a plain old patent infringement problem. Without Edison's corporate backing of a standard format, movies as a medium would have been delayed in development and might never have taken off as a popular entertainment. You can try to recast that as a the activities of Robber Barons, but you're not being the least bit objective about that.

Would not cost them anything?

[Anonymous Coward]

Other than paying people to design the APIs, develop examples, fix bugs, make updates if the store gets new features, run and maintain new servers, support developers with problems, establish branding requirements, etc, etc, etc? Don't forget the appropriate security considerations. Do you want some guy living in mom's basement with delusions of 1337 hacker grandeur getting access to your credit card or other personal information? I assure you, it would cost them a lot of money and involve a lot of people.

Re:Amazon has a service where you can purchase mov

[shutdown -p now]

Perhaps it will let you buy them on amazon.com.

It won't. They do a check on your CC when you buy, too.

This crap is not just for buying things to download. It also occurs when you try to e.g. buy a DVD and get it shipped to you when it's not released in your country (well, at least for some of them...).

Doesn't he understand CopyRIGHT

[DaveDerrick]

Basically, this guy (and a few others on here), dont understand copyright. Look at the word copy-right. These means the studios have the rights to it being copied (distributed etc). If they choose not to make the film available in formats and times the customer wants, that is the RIGHT of the copyright holder. There are often legal reasons why a film is not distributed, there may no be licensing agreement for a film in a certain country, or it may violate laws in certain areas. The end customer is not in a position to dictate to the copyright holder how to distribute their IP. This guy needs to be taken to court just like Pirate Bay was.

mOrSa - Portugal

[Anonymous Coward]

We have this service in Portugal with IPTV. You can rent a movie for a couple of bucks and see it during 24h. I would never buy one unless I had no other choice! There is no such term as respect anymore...

Proprietary versus open formats

[RaigetheFury]

A lot of people are getting confused between the two. Open formats mean you can move them easily and they don't have DRM on them. People want open formats... they don't care if it's proprietary or not unless they don't know wtf they are talking about... or are fanboys.

Me... I just want open formats on anything I buy and if I can't get it... I turn it into it. I rarely touch my original physical media. I rip the DVD without regional coding, or DRM, or unnecessary stuff like federal warnings and ads.

Then I take that file and put it on my media server and reburn another. I don't have a 50 terobyte media server so it stays there until I get tired of it and move it.

I've gotten this down to a fine art where I just put the DVD in the drive hit go and it does everything for me, even placing a copy on my media server.

When companies get it through their thick heads that NOONE... not them, not the government... not anyone can stop people like me using the media we purchase the way we want... then they'll make a buttload more money not paying lawyers and trying to enforce a system that equivalent to the US/Mexico border fence.

I don't bittorrent, I don't share my stuff... I'm just a normal joe.

Try iGraboid.com

[Anonymous Coward]

There is an alternative and you can try it free. http://www.iGraboid.com