Google Strikes Deal With Paramount

redletterdave writes about more movies being made available on Youtube's rental service. From the article: "Google announced a new deal with Paramount Pictures on Tuesday, which will make more than 500 movie titles available for rental on YouTube and the new Google Play platform. The deal was made even though Google is still embroiled in a four-year-old legal battle over copyrights with Paramount's parent company, Viacom. The latest deal means Google has rental deals with five of the six major Hollywood studios, including Paramount, Warner Bros., Disney, Universal Pictures, and Sony Pictures. The lone exception is 20th Century Fox, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Google will only make these titles available for rent; the search giant has not yet made a decision to sell any movies it licenses, despite pressure from major Hollywood studios looking to compensate for poor DVD sales."

Comments

Re:Your own country's film industry perhaps?

[Anonymous Coward]

Google and Paramount are both headquartered in the United States. If you live in (for example) France and want to watch French film, look for a French streaming provider that licenses from French studios.

Supporting local industry is a nice point, but having reflected on my earlier whinge I guess that's not really what I was getting at. It irritates me that these are the international companies who complain incessantly that people are illegally downloading their products without giving a large chunk of the alleged culprits the legitimate alternative. They spend huge amounts of money advertising it and building hype and then won't give us all of the available options for watching it. They've pushed European nations into enacting pretty tough anti-piracy laws and then made deals that won't allow us to use the legitimate supply lines. Your point would be great if Paramount didn't advertise in France, but they do.

Re:Poor DVD sales?

[TheRaven64]

How about making the DVDs available in a timely fashion? I don't buy many DVDs anymore, but I rent a lot. I often have to wait 6-12 months between a film being in the cinemas or a TV show airing in the USA and it being available to rent. On the other hand, if I wanted to pirate, films are usually available within a few days of cinema release and TV shows within a few hours. If you say 'you can get our product illegally now, or legally in 6-12 months' then you shouldn't be surprised when a lot of people opt for now. Especially when you spend a huge advertising budget on telling them that they want to see it right now...

Too late for me

[future assassin]

I just pirate all I can. Yes I don't fucking care anymore especially with the media companies trying hard to turn Canada into some lock down DRM utopia. I have aprox 500 dvd's of which half were bought new and rest at pawn shops. I have no intention of giving the studios any money until they stop trying to take away my ownership right off an item and stop trying to get politicians to pass insane laws.

Also HOW MANY FUCKING MOVIES must be remade from 20 year ago?

Support your local Pawn Shop and Pirate!