Apple Premieres iTunes Movies in Australia and New Zealand

[MacRumors]

http://www.macrumors.com/images/macrumorsthreadlogo.gif (http://www.macrumors.com)

Apple announced (http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2008/08/14itunes.html) today that movies from major film studios are now available on the iTunes Store in Australia and New Zealand. Both movie purchases and rentals are available from studies including 20th Century Fox, The Walt Disney Studios, Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros. Entertainment, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (MGM), Sony Pictures Television International and Lionsgate.

The iTunes Store in Australia and New Zealand have over 700 films available for rent or purchase with new release titles available for purchase on the same day as DVD release.“Movie fans in Australia and New Zealand can choose from a great selection of over 700 films for purchase and rent on the iTunes Store,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of Internet Services. “iTunes provides an incredibly easy and fun way for people to discover and enjoy movies, and has quickly become the world’s most popular online movie store with customers renting and purchasing over 50,000 movies everyday.”

iTunes movies in Australia start at A$9.99 for catalog title purchases, A$17.99 for recent releases and A$24.99 for new releases. iTunes Movie Rentals are A$3.99 for library title rentals and A$5.99 for new releases, and high definition versions are priced at just one dollar more.

iTunes movies in New Zealand start at NZ$9.99 for catalog title purchases, NZ$17.99 for recent releases and NZ$24.99 for new releases. iTunes Movie Rentals are NZ$4.99 for library title rentals and NZ$6.99 for new releases, and high definition versions are priced at just one dollar more


Article Link (http://www.macrumors.com/2008/08/13/apple-premieres-itunes-movies-in-australia-and-new-zealand/)

[richard.mac]

YES! Finally! :D

EDIT: here is proof

http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/6738/screencapture1ap9.jpg

[JGowan]

Congratulations A and New Z -- you deserve it!

[MacGohil]

This is will definitely be my favourite movie rental shop from now on. Thnx :apple:!:D

[TheSlush]

"Crocodile Dundee" available as a free download. ;)

[arjaosx]

Yes! always wondered what the use is of AppleTV is in NZ if you cannot actually get movies though it hehe, now the only problem is getting telcos to lower their broadband rates and we'll all be happy :D

[retroneo]

This is great!

So do we now have parity with the US with everything Apple?

In the last few months:

iTunes Movies and Rentals
iTunes TV Shows
iPhone
iPhoto Printing

None of which were available here before....

Hopefully everything will be globally launched from now on.

[richard.mac]

Ok so i can only see 19 movies. what happend to the "over 700" films. is Apple uploading the rest now?

[stellaclose]

This is new for the AUS iTunes movie rentals....48hrs to watch instead of 24hr in US

[stellaclose]

We have 1 up on the US store - 48hr rentals! ie 48hrs to finish watching, instead of 24hrs in US

This is great!

So do we now have parity with the US with everything Apple?

In the last few months:

iTunes Movies and Rentals
iTunes TV Shows
iPhone
iPhoto Printing

None of which were available here before....

Hopefully everything will be globally launched from now on.

[amac4me]

Congrats to Australian iTunes users!

[aristotle]

This is new for the AUS iTunes movie rentals....48hrs to watch instead of 24hr in US
The Canadian version is also 48 hours. Congrats btw to you all down under.

[nhyde]

And this helps the Kiwi's and Aussie's who generally have very small bandwidth caps how?

[MacGohil]

Yes! always wondered what the use is of AppleTV is in NZ if you cannot actually get movies though it hehe, now the only problem is getting telcos to lower their broadband rates and we'll all be happy :D

Even though I agree with lowering the Broadband tariff.... But still I feel..... "We can never win".....

[caprica]

Hooray, now I can finalse use my apple TV as nature intended.

[MacGohil]

Yeah... This would definitely justify the :apple:TV purchase :D.
But I will wait for the next Hardware Rev from Apple... With the falling prices of HDD and SSD I am sure apple will pull out a revision pretty soon.... I am waiting apple for pimped up :apple:TV! :rolleyes:

[stracky]

okay so someone has to do it..... whats with the pricing of the full movie? $25 - same cost in US store is $15 and our exchange rate is hanging around 90% of US dollar. i can probably go to Target and get the double disc special edition box for $28-29...

okay rant over, it is nice to see we finally have the movies avaliable in aus and NZ but i think i will keep using the US itunes store for now

[Chundles]

Yay!

Now the :apple:TV will work properly AND new release movies are about $5 cheaper than a DVD!!

Things are good for we Aussies at last.

[mogzieee]

Both movie purchases and rentals are available from studies including 20th Century Fox, The Walt Disney Studios, Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros. Entertainment, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (MGM), Sony Pictures Television International and Lionsgate.

Not Universal Studios?

[Kace]

woohoo! finally

can justify getting an apple TV now.

prices arent too bad either. maybe a little steep for older movies.
rental price is avg. though they should make it cheaper for bulk renting

[TheReef]

Great News!

Too bad a lot of us don't have the internet connections that can actually make this conveniently useable…
12 Gig caps…256 KBit plans. Still, it's great to see Apple extending their services :D

I hope Telstra upgrades their plans soon!

[pmoeser]

The 48 hours is to give us time for the download....

Glad to see they restructured the pricing to factor in the excess download charges we pay for anything more than a few MB of download...

I just hope Groundhog Day is there!

I just hope Groundhog Day is there!

I just hope Groundhog Day is there!

[booksacool1]

And this helps the Kiwi's and Aussie's who generally have very small bandwidth caps how?

Small bandwidth caps? I'm on ADSL2+ (~12mbit)/50gb in brisbane. About $1.20/GB, not that I'd waste it on itunes.

But yeah, I suspect that the ADSL1/telstra port users will find the data costs too great. This probably constitutes most Australians.

[Kace]

okay so someone has to do it..... whats with the pricing of the full movie? $25 - same cost in US store is $15 and our exchange rate is hanging around 90% of US dollar. i can probably go to Target and get the double disc special edition box for $28-29...

okay rant over, it is nice to see we finally have the movies avaliable in aus and NZ but i think i will keep using the US itunes store for now

true but we've always paid more. the same target DVD that costs 28-29 would cost like 15 in the US.
besides the AUD is plummeting 10 cents down to the dollar in a month.
and not to mention the size of the market, the greediness of the executives here....
still waiting for the ringtones store for my new white 3g iphone. i mean come on how hard can it be. doesnt a smaller market mean less red tape???

[TheReef]

Small bandwidth caps? I'm on ADSL2+ (~12mbit)/50gb in brisbane. About $1.20/GB, not that I'd waste it on itunes.

But yeah, I suspect that the ADSL1/telstra port users will find the data costs too great. This probably constitutes most Australians.

But how much does that plan cost?
Outside main centers ADSL 2 is very limited and very expensive :(

[Kace]

Great News!

Too bad a lot of us don't have the internet connections that can actually make this conveniently useable…
12 Gig caps…256 KBit plans. Still, it's great to see Apple extending their services :D

I hope Telstra upgrades their plans soon!

jump ship to the smaller 3rd party adsl companies.
i pay $70 for a 150GB plan on ADSL 2+ and get 600-900 KBPS
they service ealier this year was pretty shoddy but a firmware update on the modem a few months ago did the trick and everything works flawlessly now.

of coarse it all depends on your location

[kiwi031]

Small bandwidth caps? I'm on ADSL2+ (~12mbit)/50gb in brisbane. About $1.20/GB, not that I'd waste it on itunes.

But yeah, I suspect that the ADSL1/telstra port users will find the data costs too great. This probably constitutes most Australians.



True true, but you'll probably have noticed that Apple downloads come through at tremendous pace. I download my software updates at around 1MB/minute, Eg. 1 100Mb update takes around a minute, as a song download from iTunes takes 4-5 seconds. Yes bandwidth caps are huge, but I don't plan to be downloading movies every day either...

[arjaosx]

About the cap, I can download movies at night full speed for free :D can anyone tell me if Apple TV can schedule downloads?

[gikku]

...Aussie's who generally have very small bandwidth caps ...

iTunes and Apple downloads quota free, http://www.iinet.net.au/my/media/mc-itunes.html

[richard.mac]

… i pay $70 for a 150GB plan on ADSL 2+ …

what ISP is this? sweet!

im currently on Internode ADSL at 1.5 Mb/s with 20GB at $60 and waiting for ports to open to get ADSL2+ at ~16 Mb/s (havent tested yet) with 25Gb at the same price.

i wouldnt mind only paying 10 bucks more for 150 gigs!

[pmoeser]

still waiting for the ringtones store for my new white 3g iphone. i mean come on how hard can it be. doesnt a smaller market mean less red tape???

Garage Band is the answer you are looking for.

Why pay more to the store. Not that you can anyway. I was waiting for the same thing when I stumbled across a page that tells you haw to do it using GB and iTunes.

Very simple, very cheap

You do have to jump through a few hoops to use store bought songs though

[lukechip]

some ISPs provide iTunes and Apple downloads quota free, eg. iiNet
http://www.iinet.net.au/my/media/mc-itunes.html

But not my ISP (Bigpond......), and since they compete with Apple, it never will be

I'm on the 12 GB / 30 mbit plan.

Great speed, and 12 GB/month is plenty for everything EXCEPT regular movie downloads.

Typically, how big is an iTunes movie rental download ?

[richard.mac]

^ nearly a gig.

maybe you move to another ISP with bigger data caps. unless your on cable which is pretty good on BigPond.

[lukechip]

^ nearly a gig.

maybe you move to another ISP with bigger data caps. unless your on cable which is pretty good on BigPond.

My Bigpond = Cable and is mega quick.

Plus they gave it to me in a bundle 'for a song', to win my business back from another ISP.

If a whole movie is around 1 GB, then maybe downloads are possible with my 12 GB cap.

Financially though....

$ 5.99 for an iTunes rental vs $ 6.99 at Blockbuster. That's 329 rentals before my AppleTV has paid for itself. 329 rentals = about 10 years for me.

Until AppleTV is also a STB with twin tuners and PVR functionality to match my Topfield, it doesn' make sense to me.

[Kace]

what ISP is this? sweet!

im currently on Internode ADSL at 1.5 Mb/s with 20GB at $60 and waiting for ports to open to get ADSL2+ at ~16 Mb/s (havent tested yet) with 25Gb at the same price.

i wouldnt mind only paying 10 bucks more for 150 gigs!

im with TPG. granted the 150GB comprises of 60GB usable hours and 90GB night time. but still if im running low on remaining day time download quota i usually use apple script do to the work for me and make use of the night time quota.


btw the store on windows itunes sucks. at the moment anyway. cant wait to get home and check it out.

also im sure if the US store has variable pricing yet. but im digging the 12.99 on terminator.

[Kace]

Garage Band is the answer you are looking for.

Why pay more to the store. Not that you can anyway. I was waiting for the same thing when I stumbled across a page that tells you haw to do it using GB and iTunes.

Very simple, very cheap

You do have to jump through a few hoops to use store bought songs though

thanks for that. i got my iphone the day before yesterday so havent done too much research on it. just tried putting ringtones yesterday to find out i cant get em. but surely will look for the garageband soln on the weekend.

digging the app store btw... so far so good... and cuz i held out for a month after launch i got a contract with Virgin with 5GB download limit.

[Doctor Q]

48 hours is much more sensible than 24 hours.

[EricNau]

48 hours is much more sensible than 24 hours.
I agree. The extra day makes it feel more like a rental and less like an on-demand system.

[pmd]

The Canadian version is also 48 hours. Congrats btw to you all down under.

As is the UK version. In fact, everywhere gets 48 hours apart from the US I believe :p

[ezekielrage_99]

YAY.... But it's about time :D

After having a look it's still cheaper to buy the DVD at JBHIFI...

[macfan881]

congrats to you guys but this sucks that the us cant the extra 24 hrs i hope this changes soon :mad:

[philgilder]

The 48 hours is to give us time for the download....
no its not
when you rent a film, you have 30 days to start watching it, when you do start watching it, you have 48 hours to finish

[dawnraid]

I live in New Zealand and I am with Xtra and have an unlimited download cap, and have an 8.5mbit connection and download on average at 900kb/s, I only pay NZ$50 a month and I certainly make the most of it, 246 GB last month lol :D. I guess im part of the reason Xtra stopped offering the Go large plan. Im waiting for ADSL 2+ to be rolled out in my area.

[SuperMacMan]

Woohoo!!!

Now the new Netspace plans which were 1.5Mbps and 10GB (5GB peak 5GB off peak times) is now 18GB total, leaving me much more plwyng room for downloads!!

If only I could afford them though... :(

And that's great news that the :apple:TV has dropped in price too. Now the :apple:TV can be used as it is meant to be!!

Oh, BTW, with Netspace 1.5Mbps I am 1KM away from exchange and get 1.2Mbps actual speeds. With iPrimus (Which I like to call iPoomus) I got 430Kbps when I paid for 1.5!!! Oh, and Netspace have brilliant customer servce too. iPoomus have poor POOR service!!

[hereandthere]

I'm in Auckland also, and use my US iTunes account to rent movies on my appleTV. I can tell you that even though my Internet connection is not super fast - I can hit the rental button and be watching within 2 minutes generally. It has always amazed me how quick it is. Would have no hesitation in recommending getting movies this way ( particularly with appleTV)

[stevenz]

I live in New Zealand and I am with Xtra and have an unlimited download cap, and have an 3.5mbit connection and download on average at 900kb/s, I only pay NZ$50 a month and I certainly make the most of it, 246 GB last month lol :D. I guess im part of the reason Xtra stopped offering the Go large plan. Im waiting for ADSL 2+ to be rolled out in my area.

They don't seem to offer anything like that now though, certainly not at a reliable 900kb/sec (which is basically the maximum adsl speed they offer, which you rarely get anything near). The nearest plan I can find that would let me download that amount of data anything better than 64kbps would be roughly $300 from Xnet, and they're the best deal in the country as near as I can tell.

Service keeps getting worse, price keeps going up, something's wrong there...

Is there some way we can get an idea of quality of the different types of movies without forking out most of the cost of the respective DVD to buy them?

[Slap Dash]

Bout time.. Now i can use my Staff Discounted iiNet connection for better use.. Free downloads from itunes.. FTW :D

[rayzor]

What gives, I can't rent or purchase directly from my TV. I still only see, Trailers and MyMovies???

[PCMacUser]

I think it's worth mentioning, that although it's great that movies are now available, TV shows are STILL not available on the New Zealand iTunes Store. I'm not sure what it's going to take for this to happen.

[dawnraid]

They don't seem to offer anything like that now though, certainly not at a reliable 900kb/sec (which is basically the maximum adsl speed they offer, which you rarely get anything near). The nearest plan I can find that would let me download that amount of data anything better than 64kbps would be roughly $300 from Xnet, and they're the best deal in the country as near as I can tell.

Service keeps getting worse, price keeps going up, something's wrong there...

Is there some way we can get an idea of quality of the different types of movies without forking out most of the cost of the respective DVD to buy them?

I guess I get pretty decent speeds (up to 1.3mb/s on torrents) because i live in central auckland maybe close to an exchange? Yes they stopped offering the Go Large plan about 2 months after it was launched due to bandwith issues lol, I was one of the lucky ones :).

[appleguy]

Anyone else have this?
is there a soultion

[neil51]

Just had the same issue on my Apple TV, here's what I did to get the store showing up: Go to Settings, then General, choose the iTunes store, select United States, click back out to the main Apple TV screen, then go back in and reselect New Zealand and the store will then show in the main Apple TV screen. You can then browse the Genres, new releases etc from there, view the trailers and purchase.

[KindredMAC]

Come on Apple.... why is the Land of Oz able to have 48 hours and your bread and butter USA still stuck with 24 hours??????

[blueskyrocket]

What gives, I can't rent or purchase directly from my TV. I still only see, Trailers and MyMovies???

You have to have it synced to your iTunes account. Have you setup your itunes account on the Apple TV?

[nick9191]

They've reduced the TV price in Oz, why not in the UK? Robbing bastards. I'm not buying one until they do.

[igazza]

This will test my 25Gb limit. Really sucks i cant get iinet were i live :eek:

[jfanning]

They've reduced the TV price in Oz, why not in the UK? Robbing bastards. I'm not buying one until they do.

What about the Euro price, the UK price is way lower than what we are charged.

(And for the people that always bring this up, even when you take off the taxes etc)

[onemanarmy333]

What about the Euro price, the UK price is way lower than what we are charged.

(And for the people that always bring this up, even when you take off the taxes etc)

the poor value of the pound is making the euro price look higher . in december 2007 1 pound was equal to 1.50 euros now 1 pound is equal to 1.23. so prices in britan seam lower

[barefootman]

Glad to see they restructured the pricing to factor in the excess download charges we pay for anything more than a few MB of download...



I'm glad I'm in iiNet. Anything downloaded through iTunes - and this includes AppleTV is not counted towards monthly download quotas!

Al

[Kilamite]

48 hours is much more sensible than 24 hours.

I thought this wasn't because of Apple but to do with a law or something in the US that restricted it to 24 hours?

It is 48 hours in the UK too.

[twoodcc]

glad to see Apple releasing this in more countries

[DoFoT9]

But how much does that plan cost?
Outside main centers ADSL 2 is very limited and very expensive :(

im paying $100 per month for ADSL2+ 20gb in rural NSW. pretty darn expensive there aint many other ISP's other than telstra that are reliable.



the movies seem a bit expensive, i can stil get all of those for free...

or i can go rent the DVD's for $3-$4 over night..

[Nermal]

im paying $100 per month for ADSL2+ 20gb in rural NSW.

You have my condolences on price. Meanwhile I'm waiting for Telstra to roll out VDSL2 in my town...

[DoFoT9]

You have my condolences on price. Meanwhile I'm waiting for Telstra to roll out VDSL2 in my town...

just wish i didnt have the mobiles/home phone on the plans so that i could get off the stupid plan and go with someone 1/2 the price with 2x the data!!

[jfanning]

the poor value of the pound is making the euro price look higher . in december 2007 1 pound was equal to 1.50 euros now 1 pound is equal to 1.23. so prices in britan seam lower

That don't just seem lower, they are lower. I can drive to Belfast, purchase one, and drive home and it will still be cheaper than getting on in Dublin