Apple Movie Store Details? Disney Movies First?

[MacRumors]

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

With the new iMac updates ("]Mac mini[/url] and [url=") released today, it appears Apple will focus on their Movie initiative during their September 12th media event. Variety provides (http://www.variety.com/VR1117949519.html) some details of the upcoming announcement.

As reported elsewhere, Variety expects Apple to provide movies for $9.99/download for older movies and $14.99 for new releases. This price range is reportedly a concession to movie studios who want variable pricing. Apple has long been a proponent of a one-price model. As a result, only Disney is said to be definitely on board with the initial launch with the other studios potentially joining in the next year.

In contrast, Amazon is also launching a movie store later this week, and they are expected to have all major movie studios signed on. Amazon's pricing will be in line with current movie download services ($9.99-$19.99).

An Associated Press report (http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060906/apple_online_movies.html?.v=1) offers a similar perspective on the ongoing negotiations between Apple and the movie studios:

...substantial disagreements between studios and Apple remain to be resolved and Apple's movie service could launch with a limited number of films, according to two studio executives who asked to remain anonymous because talks were still ongoing.

[gugy]

Bring It On!

But hopefully these are a better resolution than the current TV show on Itunes. It should be at least DVD quality, If not these price model will bomb IMHO.

[jholzner]

Does anyone else think that Apple really really needs a rental model for the movie store? I'm against it with music but it's not the same a movies. I don't want my harddrive full of these things. I would be nice to rent one for much less, watch it and delete it. I don't see it being very successful if it is for purchase only.

[Keebler]

it will be interesting to see the technology behind this...what size of movies, types of movies, quality of..etc..etc.. and will it be frickin' available in any country other than just the us of a.... :)

last poster had a good point...files need to be of high quality for this price range. that means that 14.99 USD will be about 18 CDN..i would go to the theatre for that price.

BUT, i will add that regardless of the features, this is an exciting and interesting time in the evolution of entertainment. isn't it just nuts to think we can dload movies to our house and watch them at our leisure? just think of that. WOW! :)

cheers,
keebler

[EricNau]

For 10 to 15 bucks these videos better be a higher quality than their current videos in the iTunes Music Store.


I was hoping they'd be releasing a Mac Media Center to compliment this movie service, but after today's iMac update that seems unlikely (the 24" iMac would have been the perfect all-in-one media mac).


As for Disney and Apple, who would have thought! :eek: ;) :p

[macOSX-tastic]

this surely is good news. but i wont be watching movies on my current 'pod...the window is too small. all this being dependent on wether or not it's gonna be available in the UK. it's a real bummer not to be able to download TV shows i love like you americans can!

S

[gugy]

I like the rental idea for movies, but it seems Steve is not very excite about that model.
Anyway, I still have hope for the Event next week a piece of hardware will come along with the Movie Store.
Either the Ipod Video, Airport Video or the Media Center.

[HecubusPro]

Personally, I wouldn't want to DL a large movie file without the option of being able to burn it to DVD so I can have that tangible hard copy that makes me feel safe and warm. Then I wouldn't have a problem deleting it off of my hard drive.

I could be wrong, but I don't see them dealing with rentals. Most people still don't have fast enough connections to warrant downloading a big movie file when they can just have it delivered to their door via Netflix or they can head down to their local Blockbuster and have it right away. Same goes for purchases. I like having the retail box. It just makes me a little bit happier. :) Now, if they offered HD downloads, I'd definitely be interested in that, even if it is a super big file.

[kasei]

High quality and the ability to burn them is at the top of my list. I would also like to see a reduction of time it takes for a movie to go from the big screen to my laptop screen.

If Apple and the Entertainment Indudstry are able to do that, they will have a hit on their hands.

[Anawrahta]

can they just announce the new MBPs already??

who cares about the movie store....OooH wow~! $10 movies, you can go to best buy and get a physical copy for just a little bit more. I sure hope this service will let you burn the movies to dvd otherwise it's dead to me.

[aegisdesign]

It costs me nothing to walk into town (about 10 minutes) or bike (5) and pick up a DVD at the municipal library for £1.50. Occasionally I'll copy it to my hard disk if I didn't have the time I thought I would have to watch it and watch it later, then delete it.

Unlike music, you rarely watch a movie twice. Why buy or store these on your hard disk for longer than it takes to view it?

I've not bought a movie since 1995 on VHS. It's was just kind of silly having them litter up your shelves then and your hard disk now.

[Kingsly]

Makes sense. Steve is, after all, a major player at Disney.

My guess: Disney and Lions gate now, more in a month or so.

It would be nice to have a streaming service, in which you pay for a netflix type price model and are allowed to stream movies on demand.... talk about bandwidth charges!!

[Abstract]

For that price, it better not be a rental. You should be allowed to keep it, and delete it whenever you wish. You can delete it after you watch it, but I wouldn't pay $10 or $15 to watch it once or twice.

[nagromme]

Does anyone else think that Apple really really needs a rental model for the movie store? I'm against it with music but it's not the same a movies. I don't want my harddrive full of these things. I would be nice to rent one for much less, watch it and delete it. I don't see it being very successful if it is for purchase only.
Yes. I want rentals. I almost never want to see the same movie again, so I won't want to store it.

Rentals are what I would use. At a sufficiently low price, of course. $2 for close to DVD quality would be OK. (I'm less picky about rental quality than purchase quality.)

[timnosenzo]

But hopefully these are a better resolution than the current TV show on Itunes. It should be at least DVD quality, If not these price model will bomb IMHO.
agreed, although I don't think I'd ever pay more than $9.99... I'd rather just buy the DVD.

[sisyphus]

I know they want to sell and that it is probably easier to manage, but I would rather rent than buy. I have bought a total of 4 DVDs. So few movies are worth owning. Some are actually worth renting.

[Flowbee]

Yes. I want rentals. I almost never want to see the same movie again, so I won't want to store it.

Rentals are what I would use. At a sufficiently low price, of course. $2 for close to DVD quality would be OK. (I'm less picky about rental quality than purchase quality.)

I'm with you on that one. A decent rental download or on-demand service is the only thing that will get me to give up Netflix. I'm just not buying any more movies. In fact, I'm currently selling my DVD collection (http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZdz-2000QQhtZ-1).

[boxandrew]

Yes. I want rentals. I almost never want to see the same movie again, so I won't want to store it.

Rentals are what I would use. At a sufficiently low price, of course. $2 for close to DVD quality would be OK. (I'm less picky about rental quality than purchase quality.)

Seems a lot of people are agreeing with this. If they don't have a netflix style rental model then I can't see myself using the movie store at all. If they do have rentals, then I'll say bye-bye to netflix the same day.

Having read all the rumours, I'm not holding out much hope... :(

[balamw]

Personally, I wouldn't want to DL a large movie file without the option of being able to burn it to DVD so I can have that tangible hard copy that makes me feel safe and warm. Then I wouldn't have a problem deleting it off of my hard drive.
What's stopping you from doing that now?

I know I have all of my iTMS video backed up to data DVDs...

I know I won't be spending $10-$15 for anything less than DVD quality though, so I hope there's either a rental model or at least 480p.

B

[Multimedia]

I'll Have To See It To Believe It. I can't believe the quality will compare with a physical DVD. :eek:

[Mac Fly (film)]

http://static.flickr.com/83/236356043_7d795c3fe0_o.jpg & http://www.wpc-fr.net/images/articles/disney-rachete-pixar/pixar.jpg

Guys, you've got to start somewhere. The TV show thing started with disney, and look at it now!!

(not in Europe yet, grumble grumble)

[ddrueckhammer]

I am with the rental bandwagon. I would pay up to $4.99 to rent a movie that deleted itself after a certain period of time from the first play. Also, I could care less about how long it takes to download because if they implemented a queue ala Netflix then the next one could just download. It should still be faster and more convenient than Netflix. I would even be happy if they used Bit torrent technology to help subsidize their bandwidth costs. Until there is a model like, this I won't give up Netflix and there is no way that I want to buy movies online unless they are under $9.99 and are at least DVD quality and burnable to a disk. It just isn't worth it without physical media. As it is, there are already tons of people who rent and burn movies with impunity so distributing content electronically might be a great way to get some money from those people because they would be able to have a DRM that limits the number of burns, as well as, watermarking to stop unauthorized distribution.

[Arcady]

A Netflix subscription and a spindle of DVD-R discs is cheaper then one new movie from Apple.

Sorry, not interested.

[powerbook911]

The quality needs to be *at least* DVD quality. Of course, with H264 they could do this in smaller file size than traditional DVDs.

However, I somehow doubt they'll do the smart thing and have it DVD quality. We could only hope. If they did, I'd probably buy a handful of movies (3 or 4) before the year ended, if they got some more studios.

[Sport73]

The most important insight from all of these 'rumors' is that Apple MUST have something more to discuss on Tuesday than simply the release of the Movie Store. With Amazon trumping Apple on content and major questions outstanding about quality and DRM, it would be a big mistake to hold a major press event just for that.

Clearly, the new iPod AND a media streaming/center device is on tap, otherwise this event will go on record as the biggest flop in Apple SE history.

[HecubusPro]

What's stopping you from doing that now?

I know I have all of my iTMS video backed up to data DVDs...

I know I won't be spending $10-$15 for anything less than DVD quality though, so I hope there's either a rental model or at least 480p.

B

I do backup all of my ipod videos on DVD. I was talking in terms of rentals that so many people are interested in here. Apple would have to implement some sort of copy protection for people who simply want to rent for a few days, so the movies can't be backed up to DVD. Sort of like Divx DVD back in the day. You bought the movie for $5, then after 48 hours it was unusable.

This brings up another point. There are a lot of "hackers" out there who, I would think, wouldn't have a lot of difficulty breaking encryption or copy protection on the possible movie rentals from iTunes. I think that would be another reason Apple would avoid rentals.

[twoodcc]

i just hope the quality is good

[balamw]

This brings up another point. There are a lot of "hackers" out there who, I would think, wouldn't have a lot of difficulty breaking encryption or copy protection on the possible movie rentals from iTunes. I think that would be another reason Apple would avoid rentals.
Don't be so sure. The iTunes 6 audio DRM has only just been broken after almost 11 months of fervent effort, and as far as I know the video DRM has yet to be broken.

Just in time for iTunes 7. :p.

The current DRMed files are useless when backed up to a DVD unless you have the correct iTMS username/password.

B

[mr.barkan]

Okay!
So let's heat this thread up!!

In my opinion as a moviemaker... the store should have:

10 - Lot's of movies / Variety it´s what´s all about

9 - Lot´s of Bandwidth / Assuming lot´s of people will use it on launch, slow dowloads are a HUGE down

8 - Decent compression / No comments, it´s obvious

7 - Diferent Sound Options / Not everybody want´s 5.1 or DTS or 2.0, but if I buy a new stereo surround system I´d like my 5.1 for free later on.

6 - Diferent sizes / I don´t wanna see a feature in my current iPod, but yes I´d like to see it in my PSP (if I had one) etc...

5 - New iPod / Okay, they won´t let me see it on my PSP(if I had one) so give me something better to go along and make me proud to say "I love my iPod, I love apple´s iMovies Store"

4 - iMovie Podcast sharing / I would be cool if I could post a iMovie Podcast and show my Short Films hi-res to the world!

3 - Hard Disk Burning / Oh c´mon!! Let me burn it to a DVD so I can watch it anywhere I´d like... or I´m... humm... buyin it on Amazon or Best Buy.

2 - Extras for Free / DVD extras are really important expecially if you work on the industry and would like to see how they are making things happen.

And the most important!!!

1 - HD Download Options / YES!!! In my opinion this will be the biggest revolution. If you can download trailers in 480p, 720p, and 1080i/p than why cant you download a feature film??? I mean... the files are going to be huge but with todays cable speeds (4,8mbs). And why else would be the point for the release of a 24" (user friendly) HD iMac???


:cool:

[DeSnousa]

i just hope the quality is good

My thoughts exactly, the current quality is to dry, especially considering the new iMac 24" :)

Also, bring the movies to the other world stores, please Apple :(

[JimmyB248]

Can people please stop with the whole, I want 1080p resolution download files!

It's insane, it would never ever work, Apple would sell far more movies at the current resolution than if they did HD. Sure, you guys would probably buy, if you had the patience to wait for 2 and a half days to download the film, and then be able to fit maybe 2 or 3 onto your hard drive, and that's it! Not going to happen. The majority of the world is not as obsessed with quality, they'll choose convenience. Nobody thinks "I fancy watching a film, maybe I'll go buy it off iTunes so I can watch it in 3 days time". The idea is convenience people, if it takes longer than 4 hours to download it will never fly.

HD would be awesome, when the hard drives are big enough and the internet speeds are up to it. But that is a good 4 or 5 years off.

My thoughts are, DVD quality, quite possibly 720p if we're very lucky and Apple have a form of compression that no one is expecting up their sleeves.

[HecubusPro]

Don't be so sure. The iTunes 6 audio DRM has only just been broken after almost 11 months of fervent effort, and as far as I know the video DRM has yet to be broken.

Just in time for iTunes 7. :p.

The current DRMed files are useless when backed up to a DVD unless you have the correct iTMS username/password.

B

Oh, I'm not sure. That's why I always say "I think" instead of "I'm sure." :)

I just think (see ;) ) that a DL rental program woudn't be that popular because most people still don't use broadband. Unless they can really compress a movie down enough so that it's enticing to people who don't use broadband, while maintaining a certain degree of quality, a rental system from Apple's point of view, IMO, would not be worth attempting.

Conversely, I could see them offering different quality versions for those broadbandless people similar to different quality versions of trailers, so who knows. I'm just anxious to see what they'll be offering on the 12th. It's very exciting.

[peterjhill]

I'd rather buy than rent... but that's me. I am already ripping my dvds to disk anyway (thanks handbrake). I would guess that just like songs, we will be able to burn a dvd that will play in any dvd player... likely limiting the number of times you can burn a dvd. Of course we will be able to back up the DRMd copy. It is about time that people start considering using hard disks to back up their files and not dvd-r's. When 10.5 comes out, everyone will want an external drive to use with time machine anyway..

As for other companies coming out with downloadable movies, will they work on both mac and pcs? What DRM works on both Mac and Windows? fairplay or windows media? Maybe the mac market is small, but I wonder how the market is with people who buy media online that buy fairplay content versus WMP?

[balamw]

Conversely, I could see them offering different quality versions for those broadbandless people similar to different quality versions of trailers, so who knows. I'm just anxious to see what they'll be offering on the 12th. It's very exciting.
I agree on the excitement, and the potential for different quality options*, but I don't think even their current video offerings are attractive to anyone without broadband, since the typical 30 minute show would take ~4 hours to download. A 2 hour movie would then still take 16 hours to download on dial-up. I don't think so.

By comparison with a 3 Mbps pipe you should be able to download the same show in ~4 minutes or 16 minutes for the movie.

EDIT: * I wish they'd give us a lossless option for iTMS audio too.

B

[camomac]

i really hope this is not true, i mean, c'mon for that much money i'd rather buy the DVD.
so it cost $9.99 - 14.99 for the movie, plus how much more for the wasted space on my hard drive.
after a while i'll have a $300. drive full of movies, minus the artwork, and have paid way more just to waste hours downloading them... this does not seem to add up.

netflix seems way more appealing, sorry apple.

[Stridder44]

A Netflix subscription and a spindle of DVD-R discs is cheaper then one new movie from Apple.

Sorry, not interested.


HA I like your style. Think I'll adopt it too.

Honestly though, am I the only one who thinks they should change/add/replace iTunes and just keep it for music, and make a separate app for videos & films (or something)? The "iTunes Movie Store"? That sounds like the "Home Depot Car Dealership & Laser Tag Center". I understand Apples' all about simplicity, but buying movies from the music store to play in iTunes...then again it does make it simpler for the iPod...meh. I just think some form of change should be made here.

[balamw]

Honestly though, am I the only one who thinks they should change/add/replace iTunes and just keep it for music, and make a separate app for videos & films? The "iTunes Movie Store"? That sounds like the "Home Depot Car Dealership & Laser Tag Center".
:p I concur. iTunes is getting too busy with Music/Audiobooks/Podcasts/TV Shows and Video already...

As some have suggested perhaps "Showtime" refers to something like a new app...

B

[KilGil27]

It costs me nothing to walk into town (about 10 minutes) or bike (5) and pick up a DVD at the municipal library for £1.50. Occasionally I'll copy it to my hard disk if I didn't have the time I thought I would have to watch it and watch it later, then delete it.

Unlike music, you rarely watch a movie twice. Why buy or store these on your hard disk for longer than it takes to view it?

I've not bought a movie since 1995 on VHS. It's was just kind of silly having them litter up your shelves then and your hard disk now.

you don't watch movies more than twice? I feel bad for you...

[Mac Fly (film)]

Quality is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more important to me, than price.
There I said it!

When I see those delicious trailers, I cry for movies like that. Please God make it happen. 720p would be unbelievable, but I would believe it.

[Ace25]

The best option (besides a rental model, which we know is not going to happen) would be to release a media center (iTheatre, iHome, etc.) that has a 250GB or 500GB hard-drive. All the movies could be downloaded through the GUI on the TV!

Then, if you ever were to need them on your laptop you could transfer them via firewire to up to 5 computers at one-time (just like your purchased iTunes music.)

[dogcowabunga]

The most important insight from all of these 'rumors' is that Apple MUST have something more to discuss on Tuesday than simply the release of the Movie Store.


If the last big event like this is any clue, Apple will announce the updated iPod Hi-Fi 2. Now in your choice of SIX pretty colors!

Plus a leather case for the Apple Remote.

[puuukeey]

Why exactly is fixed pricing so important? isn't that.. well.. a bit anti supply/demand? Anyone have any stats on the percentages that bestbuy, a local music/video store, and apple are making on a normal purchase?


-matt

[macfan881]

i have a list to that is aparently from ipodhub.net of the movies that will be scheduled to be avalible or soon coming within the following year

from Walt Disney Pictures: James and the Giant Peach, Pocahontas, The Lion King, Aladdin, Chicken Little, Herbie: Fully Loaded, Sky High, Ice Princess, National Treasure, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

From Disney/Pixar: Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3 (?), A Bug's Life, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars.

From Miramax: Cold Mountain, The Hours, Chicago, Cinderella Man, Scary Movie 1,2,3 and 4.

From Touchstone Pictures: The Royal Tenenbaums, Pearl Harbor, The Sixth Sense (with Hollywood Pictures), Unbreakable, Gone in Sixty Seconds, Shanghai Noon, Deuce Bigalow Male Gigolo, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, King Arthur, Hidalgo, Open Range, Signs, Reign of Fire.

Apart from Disney and Pixar, Lion's Gate Entertainment will make the following, mostly horror, movies available: American Psycho, Dogma, Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, Pi, Requiem for a Dream, Open Water, Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights, The Punisher, Fahrenheit 9/11, Crash, Alone in the Dark, Hostel, Saw 1 and 2. if any one wants to update that that is coming from ipodhub.net

[donlphi]

CAN YOU SAY, "HERBIE FULLY LOADED IS THE #1 DOWNLOAD ON ITUNES MOVIE STORE"?

IF YOU CAN'T, GET READY, BECAUSE THAT WILL BE THE ONLY MOVIE AVAILABLE... ugh... that and Mary Poppins... geeze...

56781

[zoozx]

If you can't burn it it will never fly.
People can just join netflix and do there own sampling for much cheaper.

[mr.barkan]

Can people please stop with the whole, I want 1080p resolution download files!

It's insane, it would never ever work, Apple would sell far more movies at the current resolution than if they did HD. Sure, you guys would probably buy, if you had the patience to wait for 2 and a half days to download the film, and then be able to fit maybe 2 or 3 onto your hard drive, and that's it! Not going to happen. The majority of the world is not as obsessed with quality, they'll choose convenience. Nobody thinks "I fancy watching a film, maybe I'll go buy it off iTunes so I can watch it in 3 days time". The idea is convenience people, if it takes longer than 4 hours to download it will never fly.

HD would be awesome, when the hard drives are big enough and the internet speeds are up to it. But that is a good 4 or 5 years off.

My thoughts are, DVD quality, quite possibly 720p if we're very lucky and Apple have a form of compression that no one is expecting up their sleeves.


I didn't say "I want 1080p" it´s just a matter of (short)time before we all have HD-DVD/Blu-Ray burners and have suficient bandwidth to dowload large stuff quickly...
But until then, I´d like to have my favorite movies on 480p and/or 720p on my EXTERNAL hard drive just for the joy of it.

But yes... paying for something that it can be accidentally DELETED from your harddrive is NOT cool...

I´m not sure on how the movie store could work... especially coming from "fail-safe" Apple.

Maybe "SHOWTIME" stands for Leopard? ;)

[eliamx]

I hope hope hope that iTMovieStore becomes a super success.... and I hope that Steve will force them into a $9.99-Only model and not that stupid $14.99 hierachy..... they'll have to "submit" after it becomes super successful. haha.

now seriously, movies here in new york are a blasted $10.50-10.75!!! ridiculous. I remember like "2 weeks ago" when movies were at most 8.75, but then when Star Wars Episode 1 came out and then Episode II, AMC 25 in manhattan suddenly bumped their prices up.....each time. "Oh, cause Star Wars, we must raise prices".

And, they've kept it ever since. Movies are making huge returns, and yet we have to pay a boat-load of money.. Soon it'll be $15. And you know what, Hollywood is going to pay and so will the theater chains. I hope the online model takes over at high quality. I can see it now, I'll pay $50 for a "rental" ...i won't mind........ when i have a 54" iTunes-DRM-signed code for mass-viewing (This is the future, i think) and i'll have 10 friends over.... it'll be Theater-replacement baby!! Like boxing on PPV.... pay $50 and have 10 friends over. I'd pay.... i am talking about current releases. And, when they are 3 months old... $9.99 to buy. THank you Apple. Now, Do it!

no more distribution costs. no more manufacturing costs. lower prices. right? Not if Hollywood has their way with ridiculous $19.99 prices... HELLO!! Hello!! that's DVD prices.... for a packaged DVD......!! HELLO!!! McFly!!

This is why I'm getting into Hollywood myself. I plan to be part of the revolution. Sure I like money just like any other schmoe. But, there is something wrong with everythign right now. Especially since all movies are crap these days.... formulaic and tired. And they want to keep raising the prices!

Rant over:confused:

[Tommyg117]

still think the prices are a little steep for things that can be watched on an ipod. Sure you can use the output from the dock to play it on your tv, but if you have a slightly big tv, it doesn't look DVD quality.

[boncellis]

There has to be something in the cards that Apple plans to implement that will trump Amazon. I just don't think it will be the iPod this time. What's in store, I wonder...

[fenixx]

Even though Apple is Apple, going up against Amazon, which will have more movie options at the time of launch is going to be tough...

unless... they release some sort of new hardware [full screen ipod, plzkthx] that will take the spotlight.

Here's hoping for "one more thing"... on Sept 12.

[boncellis]

:p I concur. iTunes is getting too busy with Music/Audiobooks/Podcasts/TV Shows and Video already...

As some have suggested perhaps "Showtime" refers to something like a new app...

B

It could be, but Apple has so much invested in the iTunes "brand" that I don't see them moving away from it. I agree they really should improve it though, the video playback and iTMS browsing need to be faster.

[PeteyKohut]

::::Queue the dream sequence/back in time music:::::::

Remember several months ago when there were rumors circulating about an app that would trump Final Cut Studio? It was supposed to make FCS the "mid-range" suite. So, it would be iLife, FCS, and the new killer app. I remember the rumors mentioning something about it being a sort of "all in one" app. Final Cut, Motion, and Soundtrack all in one.....something like that. Anyways, we will definitely see new iPods, though it will only be a storage bump, and yes, I see Disney movies kids, but that's it for the downloadable movies.

What else might be introduced is anyone else's guess. Rarely have these types of events been used for "pro" stuff, but...hey, who can predict what Steve will do.

[heffemonkeyman]

Can people please stop with the whole, I want 1080p resolution download files!

It's insane, it would never ever work, Apple would sell far more movies at the current resolution than if they did HD. Sure, you guys would probably buy, if you had the patience to wait for 2 and a half days to download the film, and then be able to fit maybe 2 or 3 onto your hard drive, and that's it! Not going to happen. The majority of the world is not as obsessed with quality, they'll choose convenience. Nobody thinks "I fancy watching a film, maybe I'll go buy it off iTunes so I can watch it in 3 days time". The idea is convenience people, if it takes longer than 4 hours to download it will never fly.


Using an advanced video codec like h.264, you can get decent quality in 720p at 6 Mbps and 1080p at 8 Mbps. (Look at the HD trailers on apple.com)

With current cable modems now getting 8 Mbps download speeds, we're not talking 2 and a half days, we're talking realtime or close to it.

I'm betting apple skips "DVD Quality" (whatever that means) and goes straight into HD. It is the 21st Century after all...

[evilgEEk]

$19.99 for a downloaded movie, that's absolutely ridiculous. There is no way I would ever pay that much when I can go buy a new release DVD for $12-14.99. Amazon's service will fail, especially if Apple does indeed release a Movie Store.

I'm not a fan of $14.99 either, but it's a little more reasonable.

Of course all of this depends on the quality and if you can burn it.

Six more days. :)

[iMikeT]

I have the feeling that movie distribution is going to be a tougher obstacle than music.

It's too bad that these Hollywood execs will not let Apple handle how movies will be distributed.

[Doctor Q]

Why exactly is fixed pricing so important? isn't that.. well.. a bit anti supply/demand? Anyone have any stats on the percentages that bestbuy, a local music/video store, and apple are making on a normal purchase?You are correct that "market pricing", where the price of a movie is based on what that particular movie might be worth to people, and possibly on the relative cost of bringing it to you, would better follow the principles of supply and demand.

The other side of the story is that Apple wants to keep things as simple as possible, and fixed pricing is very easy for consumers to understand. It changes a tricky buying decision (is this movie worth this price?) to a simpler buying decision (which movies are worth the standard price?). It may not seem that complicated either way, but it makes a difference with skittish first timer buyers. It's like not having to haggle when the price of something isn't negotiable. Less flexibility, but less decisionmaking.

Among the general public, there has been a much larger resistance to these download services than you'd know from reading posts from tech-minded people in forums like these. I think fixed pricing for iTunes music was one of the keys to the success of the iTunes Music Store. Remember that only a small percentage of music buyers buy online, and movies are going to start out the same way.

[whoooaaahhhh]

Does anyone else think that Apple really really needs a rental model for the movie store? I'm against it with music but it's not the same a movies. I don't want my harddrive full of these things. I would be nice to rent one for much less, watch it and delete it. I don't see it being very successful if it is for purchase only.


This always seemed like a no-brainer to me. I have been BEGGING for a subscription model.

How many times do you listen to a CD again? A million
How many times do you watch a movie again? Maybe 10 times at most (for most customers) Maybe less

If you have high speed internet (which is getting faster and faster everyday) then you can afford to just setup a queue like Netflix and you'll get to see probably 100 movies a month if you feel like downloading that often.

Look at the success of Netflix, the company has practically exploded! People stopped going to traditional rental houses so they had to adopt a Netflix type of service. It really couldn't be more obvious.

Besides, no matter how good the quality gets, do you really have the storage space for your ENTIRE MOVIE COLLECTION? Even if I filled my new Mac Pro with 3TB of storage, there is NO WAY I COULD EVER FIT MY MOVIE COLLECTION AT DVD QUALITY!

[zwida]

It's too bad that these Hollywood execs will not let Apple handle how movies will be distributed.

Apple will win them over, I suspect. Or rather, the dollar signs in their own eyes will win them over.

That is, if it works (which I guess I have to believe it will).

[mi5moav]

I hope that one day the wealthiest working person could only make 2x to 3x of the poorest working person. God, would that change the world for ever. If the butcher makes 7 bucks and hour a doctor should make 12bucks a waitress 6bucks the president 15 bucks, no more no less... sick and tired of all this GREED!!!!

[zwida]

I hope that one day the wealthiest working person could only make 2x to 3x of the poorest working person. God, would that change the world for ever. If the butcher makes 7 bucks and hour a doctor should make 12bucks a waitress 6bucks the president 15 bucks, no more no less... sick and tired of all this GREED!!!!

Huh?

What's greed have to do with it?

[JimmyB248]

I hope that one day the wealthiest working person could only make 2x to 3x of the poorest working person. God, would that change the world for ever. If the butcher makes 7 bucks and hour a doctor should make 12bucks a waitress 6bucks the president 15 bucks, no more no less... sick and tired of all this GREED!!!!

Nice idea, lets give communism another shot!

[Flowbee]

still think the prices are a little steep for things that can be watched on an ipod. Sure you can use the output from the dock to play it on your tv, but if you have a slightly big tv, it doesn't look DVD quality.

You don't need the dock, you can just use a cable (http://podophile.com/2006/08/16/watch-ipod-videos-on-your-tv/).

I have to believe that movie downloads will be higher quality than the current TV shows.

[kadajawi]

Too expensive if you ask me. In the cinema I pay $2 for a not so new movie (1/2 year old?), indie stuff/classics/etc. costs $4, new big movies $5. Most DVDs I buy cost around $10. How good will the quality be? Better be good, it's possible to download HD quality stuff (with HD resolution) for free nowadays (not legal, but iTunes etc. have to compete with their free enemy too). I don't like the system of buy before you try anyways. I mean who knows if the movie you pay for isn't crap? The new Pink Panther was ok for example, but I thought that the trailer was some sort of best of... the good stuff was in the trailer already.
I prefer to have DVDs of movies I really like, not of movies where I think they may be great.

[mdntcallr]

Apple should let the record companies do variable pricing on their product as well.

would lead to some older albums at 7.99 and some newer at say 12.99.

[heffemonkeyman]

Too expensive if you ask me. In the cinema I pay $2 for a not so new movie (1/2 year old?), indie stuff/classics/etc. costs $4, new big movies $5.

What planet are you on?

[MattDell]

Renting would never fly. It's far too easy to just burn the movie to DVD if it's already in digital format. The movie executives would flip. It would take some impressive coding to prevent users from doing this, and even then... somebody will figure out a way around it.

So, no. I don't think any movie corporation will allow digital movie rentals.

-Matt

[kadajawi]

What planet are you on?
Planet Germany ;) The not so expensive part of it though (other Germans are quite surprised too). Macs are pretty expensive here though, IMHO. And there isn't a single store you can get Macs... in a town with 200000 people or so. Oh well...

[heffemonkeyman]

Planet Germany ;) The not so expensive part of it though (other Germans are quite surprised too). Macs are pretty expensive here though, IMHO. And there isn't a single store you can get Macs... in a town with 200000 people or so. Oh well...

Wie Geht's!

In most major US cities (I'm in Seattle) 1st run movies in the theaters are over $10.
So $9.99 for a movie download starts to look more reasonable...

[MattDell]

I do backup all of my ipod videos on DVD.
That brings up something that has really bugged me for a while. I think it is absurd that if you delete something you bought from Apple, you have to pay to get it back! If I buy a song, I should be buying a license to that song... not just one 'instance' of that particular song.

Apple keeps track of all the songs you buy anyway, so it's my opinion that you should be able to just "get another copy" if you have already purchased a song.

I think this would be especially great for movies. That way you won't have to eat up precious hard drive space. You could purchase your movie, download it, watch it, delete it, and then re-download the movie if you want to view it again.

-Matt

[coffey7]

I rather just buy a dvd for $10-20. I'm not downloading anything from the apple store for that price.

[ddrueckhammer]

Renting would never fly. It's far too easy to just burn the movie to DVD if it's already in digital format. The movie executives would flip. It would take some impressive coding to prevent users from doing this, and even then... somebody will figure out a way around it.

So, no. I don't think any movie corporation will allow digital movie rentals.

-Matt

It is already far to easy for me to get the $9.99 per month Netflix account and burn every disk that I get in the mail. Also, it is very easy for me to download HD quality movies from Bit Torrent any old time I please. I don't do it because I am honest but I don't think it is right for the movie industry to not offer a viable alternative for electronic downloads as well. (and no I don't think that "Movielink" is a viable alternative) The ability to pirate things from the iTMS is no greater than any other form of distribution IMO.

Also, I'm sorry but I guess I just can't relate to people who still don't have broadband. I got it in 1998 for Pete's sake and I have seen videos of people using broadband in internet cafes in Afganistan...I just got 15Mbps Verizon Fios!!!! I say bring on the high definition rentals for $5 a piece. Then I will buy them for $15 if they are good...

[heffemonkeyman]

I rather just buy a dvd for $10-20. I'm not downloading anything from the apple store for that price.

What if it was HD?

I think you're right. A lot of people will feel the same way.
That's way they're not going to try and compete with retail DVDs and Netflix or PPV. Apple is going to create a new market with HD downloads before HDDVD/Blu-Ray movies are widely available...
:)

[zwida]

What planet are you on?

I don't know, but I think I'm going to plan for an early retirement there...:)

[MattDell]

It is already far to easy for me to get the $9.99 per month Netflix account and burn every disk that I get in the mail. Also, it is very easy for me to download HD quality movies from Bit Torrent any old time I please. I don't do it because I am honest but I don't think it is right for the movie industry to not offer a viable alternative for electronic downloads as well. (and no I don't think that "Movielink" is a viable alternative) The ability to pirate things from the iTMS is no greater than any other form of distribution IMO.
I agree with you that it's very easy to pirate movies from Netflix, but by already having the movie file on your computer makes it that much more likely that you will pirate it.

Rented movies in a digital form just take away some of the steps required to pirate a movie, it makes it that much easier, and will invite more people to do it. (this is from the view of the movie executives, of course)


I just do not see it happening.

-Matt

[AidenShaw]

$19.99 for a downloaded movie, that's absolutely ridiculous. There is no way I would ever pay that much when I can go buy a new release DVD for $12-14.99. Amazon's service will fail, especially if Apple does indeed release a Movie Store.

I'm not a fan of $14.99 either, but it's a little more reasonable.

Of course all of this depends on the quality and if you can burn it.

Six more days. :)
Agree - $19.99 to $24.99 is the price for pristine 1080p Blu-ray discs at Fry's or Best Buy.

Ever watched a YouTube video full-screen on a 40" Samsung 1920x1080 LCD television...

If you have, did you manage to stick it out for the whole 30 seconds before stopping it?

HD or DOA. Two options. (At that $19.99 price - for $3.99/movie I might do some VHS quality stuff for a plane trip.)

[brepublican]

Yeah it'll really be interesting to see what the res of the movies'll be. And SJ is only like, the biggest shareholder in Disney, so no, I did not expect them to be FULLY on board :rolleyes:

[powerbook911]

I just don't see the point in buying a crappy low resolution movie. I don't see who wants to watch a movie on a handheld either.

I think a movie store should be selling movies to watch on your computer and living room television. They need at least 480p resolution, for that.

[JGowan]

Netflix is made for movies! I love Apple but they'll never do for movies what Netflix has! In the past 5 weeks, I've had 21 movies delivered to my door. I'm on the 3-at-a-time plan (unlimited for $17.99/mo). Also, I can buy tons of used DVDs for $5.99 that are 100% guaranteed!

I think a dollar a song is one thing because you can pick and choose from an album so the trade-off for quality is justified. However, $9.99 is a lot to ask for something that is very low quality, only looks really good an a 2" screen and takes a long time to download. Right now, we don't even know if you can back the file up or burn to a DVD. I think Apple will do ok, but I don't see it being the same bonanza that that music was/is.

[AidenShaw]

Yeah it'll really be interesting to see what the res of the movies'll be. And SJ is only like, the biggest shareholder in Disney, so no, I did not expect them to be FULLY on board :rolleyes:
Note that Jobs has only about one out of 18 of Disney's shares, and as a board member he's legally bound to do the best thing for the other "17" owners.

Jobs could be roasted for cutting a deal that's bad for Disney. Can you say "fiduciary responsibilities" and "conflict of interest" in the same sentence?

[powerbook911]

From everything I can tell, the movie trailers in Front Row are 480p.

I don't think Apple would want to go below this movie trailer quality. Let's HOPE they don't want to. :)

480p would be impressive to sell at $10 and $15 IMHO. To get it delivered directly to your computer in 2-3 hours. Remember, 480p could look better than a DVD, since DVDs are 480i. Of course, it would look better unless they end up putting too much compression on the 480p.

[yojitani]

Sure this has been said more than once here, but those prices, for DVD quality films, are waaaay too much. This is what is called gouging. They supply film and bandwidth, we need bandwidth, HD space - and don't get case, cover, etc. So they reduce overheads and charge the same:rolleyes: . Now, if this was a program for which you paid a nominal fee for membership, they supplied a 500GB USB2 drive, and you could download to your heart's content... something like that... maybe....

yt

[blueflame]

I think everyone is obsessing about quality. someone here said earlier that its about convinience. these are going to be the same resoluition as the tv shows, and cost 3.99. i actually dont think they will be letting you burn it on a disk either. I agree that a movie rental system is the way to go. but honestly, for these prices, i can get through time warner all the on demand stations, (stars, stars2, cinemax, showtime, and like 3 hbo channels.) this is the future, there is no waiting to download anything, this model is waht for all reality needs to be used, then if you like the movie enough, you pay $15 for you to burn it to one dvd only (comes with label pictures and cover) maybe they even mail you the emtpy case. for that price, they will afford it.) anywy. maybe this set top box everyone wants is some sort of propriatary thing they are making like tivo, with a burner, from an apple cable server, with an ipod port. I like it. but this is such an exciting time.
A

[APPLENEWBIE]

After following all this stuff today, I am really concerned about whateverthehell it is that will be announced next week. There seems to
be limited interest in movie downloads, when there are already good alternatives (netflix, the local video shop, etc.) There are definitely some
questions if that would/will even fly. I, for one, don't really care if I rent. I have a bunch of DVD movies, but rarely view them more than twice. So... even though an apple movie download service comes along, I really wonder how successful it will be. Which leads me to wonder... The Steve is not dumb. He is not going to order up a special meeting like this for something that may turn out to be nothing... Hell, it is apparently viewed by apple as much more important than the introduction of the 24" iMac, which is a heck of an interesting gadget. Do you think that there may be some REALLY BIG new technological/hardware gizmo being intro'd? Something that makes the movie store just a minor part of a larger picture. I keep thinking, Apple is a hardware company. Always has been. SHOW ME THE HARDWARE!

[Frisco]

After following all this stuff today, I am really concerned about whateverthehell it is that will be announced next week. There seems to
be limited interest in movie downloads, when there are already good alternatives (netflix, the local video shop, etc.) There are definitely some
questions if that would/will even fly. I, for one, don't really care if I rent. I have a bunch of DVD movies, but rarely view them more than twice. So... even though an apple movie download service comes along, I really wonder how successful it will be. Which leads me to wonder... The Steve is not dumb. He is not going to order up a special meeting like this for something that may turn out to be nothing... Hell, it is apparently viewed by apple as much more important than the introduction of the 24" iMac, which is a heck of an interesting gadget. Do you think that there may be some REALLY BIG new technological/hardware gizmo being intro'd? Something that makes the movie store just a minor part of a larger picture. I keep thinking, Apple is a hardware company. Always has been. SHOW ME THE HARDWARE!

Agreed! On-Demand is the future for movies. It just needs more of a selection then it's perfect.

Downloading movies is of limited interest to most people. Just give up the Mac Media Center (iHome) and we'll all be happy campers come Tuesday!

[JoshH]

I'm in consensus with everyone else... the quality has to be there. 480p minimum, and even then, that can look questionable on a high res monitor.

[dongmin]

Rentals...

The studios won't go for it because people will figure out a way to record off the streams and/or rented file. You can argue that people'll figure out a way to crack the purchased movie fiels too, but at least in this case the studio has the $10 or $15 for it instead of $4. Personally, I love the Netflix model, but I don't see the studios going for it.

Burning DVDs...

The new hardware from Apple (video iPod and video-streaming Airport) will make DVD players obsolete. Really, why hassle with discs when you get just browse and play via Front Row?

As for backing up, you can easily back up the .m4v file onto a HD or DVD-R (data). Why would you need to burn a video DVD, except for the convenience of playing on a stand-alone DVD player (which I addressed above)?

[meanmusic]

There has been talk about release movies at the theatre and DVD at the same time. It seems people would like the choice of where and when to see a movie. Home theatre technology brings the movie experience at home even large screen computers. What if Apple will be the first to experiment with viewing movies released to the theatre at home through the movie store? We've seen TV studios release TV episode sneak peeks and new episodes the following day it airs. Could this be the big thing? $14.99 to watch a new movie at home with the whole family is actually a bargain. Steve obviously has influence with Disney to make it possible. Imagine watch the next Disney/Pixar movie in the confort of your own home on a 24" wall mounted iMac.

[macfan881]

i agree thats why i think we will see new airports basestations with 8021n so that way we get high networkspeeds when viewing the movies on tv etc

[puuukeey]

not that this is anything new. but ethically, if a company insists that you are buying your little piece of a movie(or music or art) instead of buying a physical copy, then you should be able to procure as many copys as you want from where ever you can for the cost of production materials.

after the first purchase of course

[gugy]

True APPLENEWBIE, Steve is not going there to show something that most people believe will be the same as the TV shows on Itunes. Steve knows that will not fly.
You are right, is either a combination of Movie Store and breakthrough hardware or/and Hi-def movie downloads.

Anything less will be just a waste and a joke.

The Apple folks are well aware of everything has been said in this forum. It's no accident Apple is on the forefront.

So be ready for the Special Event. I think we will all be amazed.

[Ozu]

It seems to me that the distribution of 480i content is pretty much settled. Netflix and Blockbuster do this well and at very competitive prices. I can't see that Apple would benefit much from trying to compete there.

How high-def content is distributed, on the other hand, is far from settled. In fact, the world of high-def video in 2006 looks a lot like the world of digital music in 1999; a technology consumers clearly want, but an emerging technology mired in competing standards and confusing technical details. Apple must have noticed that similarity.

I've had a beautiful 720p TV for eight months, and have yet to actually see anything in 720p on it. The closest I've come is hooking my MacBook up to it and watching quicktime trailers. I'm not going to buy a Blu-Ray or HDDVD player until the standards war is over and the players cost less than $300, and that's not going to happen until late 2007 at the earliest.

If I could buy a movie in 720p from the iTunes Music Store and watch it on my TV next Tuesday night I'd do it. Sure it'd take a few hours to download. But the alternative is to wait at least a year.

[swingerofbirch]

I think fixed pricing for movie purchases would encourage better movie production. There are crappy movies that quickly become $7 on DVD after they are released. And there are ones that stay around $17-19.

I have one sort of off topic question: has anyone ever bought a DVD at 7-11 or Eckerd for $24.99? Why would anyone do that? It makes me sad to think people might not know they are paying three times more than they have to. Maybe I'm just too jaded.

[SiliconAddict]

Meh...I said it before and I'll say it again. I can find better deals on DVD's at Hollywood Video and Blockbuster in their used section. $12 and in some cases 2 for $20 is not uncommon. A move store only appeals to me personally in the event that I need something spur of the moment and even then. $1.99 is impulse buy territory. $9.99+? No so much. On the other hand a service where I can get 4 movies a week or something. That I would do instead of waiting for them to arrive in the mail. I think Apple is on the wrong track here. Right on the money with much. Right on the money with TV shows. (Just want something higher res.) But movies at that kinda price? thanks but I personally will pass. For those who would bite more power to you.

[balamw]

It seems to me that the distribution of 480i content is pretty much settled. Netflix and Blockbuster do this well and at very competitive prices. I can't see that Apple would benefit much from trying to compete there.
I agree with you, except for the fact that Netflix already carries both BluRay and
HD-DVD formats, so Apple would be directly competing with them in HD videos.

My 2 720p HDTVs are salivating at the possibilities...

B

[Music_Producer]

I hope hope hope that iTMovieStore becomes a super success.... and I hope that Steve will force them into a $9.99-Only model and not that stupid $14.99 hierachy..... they'll have to "submit" after it becomes super successful. haha.

now seriously, movies here in new york are a blasted $10.50-10.75!!! ridiculous. I remember like "2 weeks ago" when movies were at most 8.75, but then when Star Wars Episode 1 came out and then Episode II, AMC 25 in manhattan suddenly bumped their prices up.....each time. "Oh, cause Star Wars, we must raise prices".

And, they've kept it ever since. Movies are making huge returns, and yet we have to pay a boat-load of money.. Soon it'll be $15. And you know what, Hollywood is going to pay and so will the theater chains. I hope the online model takes over at high quality. I can see it now, I'll pay $50 for a "rental" ...i won't mind........ when i have a 54" iTunes-DRM-signed code for mass-viewing (This is the future, i think) and i'll have 10 friends over.... it'll be Theater-replacement baby!! Like boxing on PPV.... pay $50 and have 10 friends over. I'd pay.... i am talking about current releases. And, when they are 3 months old... $9.99 to buy. THank you Apple. Now, Do it!

no more distribution costs. no more manufacturing costs. lower prices. right? Not if Hollywood has their way with ridiculous $19.99 prices... HELLO!! Hello!! that's DVD prices.... for a packaged DVD......!! HELLO!!! McFly!!

This is why I'm getting into Hollywood myself. I plan to be part of the revolution. Sure I like money just like any other schmoe. But, there is something wrong with everythign right now. Especially since all movies are crap these days.... formulaic and tired. And they want to keep raising the prices!

Rant over:confused:


Dude, stop ranting. Do you even work in the movie industry? God damn price of milk is going up too.. why don't you rant about that as well? I hate it when people complain about rising prices.. sheesh.. do you know that the cost of producing a movie or a music album has gone up?

If I don't like the price of a DVD, I don't buy it. If its a movie I really, really like.. then sure, I find the $19 price tag more than acceptable, because I know I will be watching the movie a couple of times. Nobody's asking you to buy a DVD of every single movie that comes out.

[elgruga]

Reasoning goes like this:

Music costs a small amount to make - can be as low as $10k for an album.
Sell a bunch and make some profit.

Movies cost upwards of $50 million to make, often $100mil or more, so you got to rent them and sell them and do whatever you can to get that cash back.
And its got to go out the door at $25 if you are buying.

Thing is, if Apple want me to buy a movie for $15, I can rent it for $5 at the store.....and copy it if I want.
Yeah, I know thats against the law but a LOT of people do it, and anyway, if you d/l from Apple, where are you going to keep them all?

250 gig drive will hold about 30 movies. Thats not a lot of movies, and most people dont have 250 drives yet.....

[MarcelV]

Apple was offering 14.50 wholesale for the 14.99 movies and the studio's don't agree. That's more than they receive wholesale from Wal-Mart and Best Buy. Also, collectively it looks like they are not agreeing with those prices. Looks to me as price fixing. The studio's want to set the individual prices for movies to consumers, and to me it looks like they are forcing same prices on Amazon, MovieLink, CinemaNow and iTunes. That's dangerous waters for them......

As for picture quality and HD, the market doesn't seem to be there at all. VOD on cable and satellite has become a huge market, and those aren't HD either. In addition DirecTV and DishNetwork use 'HD-Lite' (1080x1280 in stead of 1080x1920) on most if not all of their HD channels. And SD channels are heavily compressed in the digital line-up on both cable and satellite. Most consumers just don't care....

And every single person asking for 1080p, you maybe out of touch with reality. Official HD standard does not even include 1080p. 720p and 1080i are the only official HD recognized resolutions within the broadcast standards. Broadcasters don't even distribute their signal that high!

Would I love it in HD, of course :D Do I see it happen, nope.

And an additional thought just occured. Currently FrontRow already allows you to watch trailers. What if you have the same interface but you can purchase the movies that way and it will add the purchased movie into Itunes for iPod sync. (Of course, you will be able to buy it dircetly thru iTunes if you like). It would be a very nice integration, with a high degree of simplicity.... Just a thought.

[Machead III]

If by "Disney" they mean "The Walt Disney Company", therefore including Touchstone and Miramax, we've really got nothing to worry about in terms of choice; you've got 2/5 major films released over the past 15 years right there.

Course this all means jack **** to me and the majority of the world unless Apple can wheel it out somewhere other than the lil' old USA.

[Stridder44]

Holy eff. What if they changed iMovie's purpose? For managing content (music & movies): iTunes and iMovie. For creating/editing content: Garageband and "Showtime" (or whatever speculated new name that was).

It makes so much more sense, even if it would be confusing at first.

[kadajawi]

Reasoning goes like this:

Music costs a small amount to make - can be as low as $10k for an album.
Sell a bunch and make some profit.

Movies cost upwards of $50 million to make, often $100mil or more, so you got to rent them and sell them and do whatever you can to get that cash back.
And its got to go out the door at $25 if you are buying.

Thing is, if Apple want me to buy a movie for $15, I can rent it for $5 at the store.....and copy it if I want.
Yeah, I know thats against the law but a LOT of people do it, and anyway, if you d/l from Apple, where are you going to keep them all?

250 gig drive will hold about 30 movies. Thats not a lot of movies, and most people dont have 250 drives yet.....
Upwards of $50 million? Yeah, the crappy ones do. Usually though I prefer low budget movies... Donnie Darko was made for maybe 4 million for example. Mulholland Drive: 15 million. Machuca: 1.5 million. 12 Angry Men: $340.000 (ok, that's an old movie, but I doubt it would cost much more when it was made today). American Beauty: 1.5 million. 2046: 12 million. Muxmäuschenstill: 40000 € (absolutely fantastic movie). Why do the actors earn so much money when there are tons of good, unknown actors who could do the job better? Why so many special effects? And even if you use so many... Sin City was 40 million, Renaissance 14 million €, A Scanner Darkly 8.5 millions. These movies shure took quite a lot of efford... why are they so cheap? Somethings going wrong in Hollywood. Too many bad movies done for too much money made only to earn money.

Anyway, buying DVD isn't too expensive too, the Criterion Collection is unfortunately expensive as hell, and you'll have to import them here, but there are quite a few good movies for a low price. Donnie Darko e.g. sells for a low price (around 10 € for the tin box 2 disc version), Mulholland Drive 10 €, some Kubricks 10 € or less, ... the Arthaus label is very expensive unfortunately... they seem to be some sort of German Criterion, without packing in so many specials.

Apple would have to compete with these prices, and that doesn't mean same price, but lower, much lower. I mean what looks better? A nice, big DVD collection, or, well... nothing...?

[Machead III]

"Sin City was 40 million, Renaissance 14 million €, A Scanner Darkly 8.5 millions"

These were cheaper because they relied on digital effects to make a visual impression, rather than a couple hundred tons of actual explosives blowing up a genuine Boieng 747 as you might have in a Hollywood blockbuster.

Good to see you mentioned 2046. Great movie ^^ Wong Kar-Wai is awesome.

[rtjstevens]

this surely is good news. but i wont be watching movies on my current 'pod...the window is too small. all this being dependent on wether or not it's gonna be available in the UK. it's a real bummer not to be able to download TV shows i love like you americans can!

S
This can easily be done with the excellent Miglia TV Mini with the latest EyeTV software -it even has an ipod button on it!
BW

Richard

[kadajawi]

"Sin City was 40 million, Renaissance 14 million €, A Scanner Darkly 8.5 millions"

These were cheaper because they relied on digital effects to make a visual impression, rather than a couple hundred tons of actual explosives blowing up a genuine Boieng 747 as you might have in a Hollywood blockbuster.

Good to see you mentioned 2046. Great movie ^^ Wong Kar-Wai is awesome.
Right, but there were tons of artists working on the overpainting of A Scanner Darkly. And they don't blow up 747 anymore... they did such things with Tora! Tora! Tora! and other old movies, but today there is a lot of CGI involved. Remember Batman Begins and how proud they were that the car scene was without any CGI?
Initial D had a tiny budget compared to The Fast and the Furious I and II, yet it had great car scenes with lots of drifting and a nice story. I thought it was by far superior to the Fast ... movies, and it's far more stylish. But it had the Infernal Affairs directors, so that's pretty obvious.
I think big budget today means the studios think it appeals to the masses. They will try to put in a star not for the acting talent or because the star fits in the role best, but because of the name and the promo. They movie will be made for the mainstream, so there will be a bit of a love story, some action scenes, or just some obscene humor. Maybe a remake. And don't experiment. Shouldn't be intellectually challenging. Boring!

Yeah, Wong Kar-Wai is awesome, though I prefer his Chungking Express. Dunno how the budget was on that one, but I'd guess pretty much non existant.

[Machead III]

I know they don't blow up 747s anymore, and the days of John Woo film sets with million dollar explosives going off in every scene being over (aside from the odd Speilberg or Scott production), but admittedly there are plenty of expensive CGI films out there.

It seems you can save a lot of money by avoiding a lot of pure CGI; films like Star Wars and King Kong that contain vast portions of CGI developed from scratch seem to cost a lot more than films like Sin City and A Scanner Darkly that are essentially live-action films that have been doctored in post-production.

Renaissance is the exception because although it's entirely from-scratch-CGI, the scenes are no where near as complex and detailed as King Kong etc.

[SPUY767]

Judging by the ratings, I get the sensation that some of us here don't like disney movies. Anyhow, Apple's not really trying to break into any new markets with this, nor are they trying to be revolutionary. They already have an incredibly robust content distribution system, and it costs them next to nothing to host these movies on it. If people download them, great, if not, so what. But seriously, for the price, these mofos better be Hi-Def!

[RodThePlod]

Even though Apple is Apple, going up against Amazon, which will have more movie options at the time of launch is going to be tough...

unless... they release some sort of new hardware [full screen ipod, plzkthx] that will take the spotlight.

Here's hoping for "one more thing"... on Sept 12.

I think it's funny that this is pretty much the only mention of Amazon in this thread... even though Amazon will be announcing a competing movie store in a few days with supposedly much more content than Apple's offering! :D

It just shows how people think that Amazon will simply not be able to compete with what Apple has up it's sleeve. You just *know* that Apple would not announce this thing until they had the end-to-end user experience worked out to perfection - iPod-iTunes styleee - effectively using hardware and software that works seamlessly and that anyone can pick up and use.

In contrast, Amazon will launch a service that will have a very comprehensive back catalog but will be frustrating to use as after downloading your movie, your options will be:


View it on your PC or
Use some dodgy software, (Windows?!!), to copy it to some other device
Use some unintuitive method or mechanism to copy it to some other device


Either way it will result in a disappointing user experience and, ultimately, the failure of their store.

The only fly in the ointment I can see is if Amazon have got into bed with Microsoft - and Zune is somehow integrated into their store. That might give Apple some competition...

Anyway - I can't wait to see that new Apple hardware next Tuesday!

;)

RodC
www.expodition.com - for iPod users who love to travel

[bryanc]

but I just don't see how this is going to work.

Either the files will be *enormous* (even with H.264), requiring many hours to download even with high speed connections, and therefore costing a lot in terms of bandwidth, or they'll be crappy resolution. Either way, I don't see how it can compete with a 5 minute trip to your local video place to rent/buy a DVD.

The only way I can see this as a win is if they have some amazing catalogue of old/foreign/indi films that you can't get at your local blockbuster.

Unlike music, which most people listen to many times, most people don't watch the same movie more than two or three times, so there's no point in investing $15, many megabit-hours of bandwidth, and the blank media to burn it after you've finally downloaded it.

99 cents and a 1 minute download is a good deal, and well within the impulse-range for most people, but $15 and several hours of downloading is not.

On the other hand, Steve Jobs is a multi-billionare, and I'm just some guy with an opinion, so maybe he knows what he's doing.

We'll see soon enough.

Cheers

[conradzoo]

Dear JS.

HD or whatever you fancy, it's cool with me, but talking about quality, why are the iTunes songs still at that lousy 128 bitrate. I mean if they can do movies, nice quality (at least 256) songs are not that diffucult?

Conrad

[milo]

It's a nice idea, but WAY too pricey. I don't know what makes them think people will be willing to pay these prices when the DVD is available for just a little bit more (in some cases the same or less) and includes special features, probably better quality, and no DRM.

If the studios insist on this kind of pricing for all download services, it will just drive people to bittorrent and netflix. It's just silly to insist that pricing be as much as DVD when you don't get as much for your money.

The rumors also haven't addressed picture quality. I assume it will be an improvement, and it DEFINITELY won't be HD...but will it be even DVD quality? I'd say that's the bare minimum for something like this to even be considered by most consumers.

I don't think rental is that big a deal. It would be nice (and may be added later), but it's a completely separate market from sales. I think people are going overboard saying lack of rentals would kill it.

[Galex]

Apple keeps track of all the songs you buy anyway, so it's my opinion that you should be able to just "get another copy" if you have already purchased a song. I think this would be especially great for movies. That way you won't have to eat up precious hard drive space. You could purchase your movie, download it, watch it, delete it, and then re-download the movie if you want to view it again.

My thought exactly! Apple should be the holder of a virtual movie library, in which you would have access to all the films you have ever bought from Apple, possibly limited to a fixed number of computers per account. iTunes or some new software would keep track of the films in your library, including all kinds of information and trivia about the movies you have purchased. You should be able to save your films on your own hard drive or DVD-R if you wish, but Apple would provide the long-term storage capacity necessary for people who have large collections.

/Galex

[milo]

Personally, I wouldn't want to DL a large movie file without the option of being able to burn it to DVD so I can have that tangible hard copy that makes me feel safe and warm. Then I wouldn't have a problem deleting it off of my hard drive.

I don't think there's any question about that...it's just that you'd burn it to a data DVD and play it in computers with the DRM enabled, not on a DVD player. Backing up drm media isn't limited, just playing it back.

Hopefully someday we'll see real DVD burns allowed, but the way the studios are going I don't know how likey that is.

Unlike music, you rarely watch a movie twice.


I think you meant to say "*I* rarely watch a movie twice". You may not, but many people do, especially kids, who will be well covered by disney releases. It really just depends on the consumer and the movie, there's no question that millions of DVDs are sold.

There are a few issues with rentals. Besides DRM, they'd have to compete with netflix and similar companies, which would mean the price would have to be incredibly cheap, probably far less than the studios would be willing to go (don't forget, really the studios are setting prices, not apple). There's simply no way they could compete with netflix without losing money (assuming the studios even allowed it, which would never happen).

And for all the people who will be disappointed if apple can't compete with their piracy scheme? Give me a freaking break. :rolleyes:

The best option (besides a rental model, which we know is not going to happen) would be to release a media center (iTheatre, iHome, etc.) that has a 250GB or 500GB hard-drive. All the movies could be downloaded through the GUI on the TV!

But apple has an even better idea, just have an airport on your tv and stream the video from ANY computer in your house. WAY cheaper, and you're not wasting an expensive computer by having it sitting by the TV all day instead of using it for computer stuff.

But yes... paying for something that it can be accidentally DELETED from your harddrive is NOT cool...

So back it up, why would it be any different than the video and audio content apple already sells? Their current DRM hasn't been hacked yet, has it?

still think the prices are a little steep for things that can be watched on an ipod.

You won't just watch these on an ipod, apple will release a streaming solution for TVs along with the movie store.

Apple keeps track of all the songs you buy anyway, so it's my opinion that you should be able to just "get another copy" if you have already purchased a song.

But sending you files over and over costs apple money. Why don't you just back your files up?

HD or whatever you fancy, it's cool with me, but talking about quality, why are the iTunes songs still at that lousy 128 bitrate. I mean if they can do movies, nice quality (at least 256) songs are not that diffucult?

Because 128 is "good enough" for most listeners. The "good enough" point for movies is probably 480(i or p).

[MacsRgr8]

I am hoping for the full 1920 x 1080 rez movies!

Best would be 3 sizes available to choose from:
- Full HD quality
- DVD quality
- iPod quality

I wonder what they will do about Dolby Digital. If you want to view movies with Dolby Digital surround, you either must use DVD player, or VLC.

Maybe an updated version of iTunes / QuickTime / Showtime.app could play HD movies (H.264 encoding), with AAC Dolby 5.1 sound...?

[Machead III]

Judging by the ratings, I get the sensation that some of us here don't like disney movies.

Like I've said already, Disney own Touchstone and Miramax, both of whom have a vast catalog of films between them covering practically every genre.

Miramax also pick up the odd non-English language film too, which is important for serious film fans. I know a whole bunch of Jean-Pierre Juenet and Adurey Tautou movies were, like "Un long dimanche de fiancailles" and "A la folie... pas du tout", both of which are fricking brilliant.

[zoozx]

Nice idea, lets give communism another shot!

A good idea, just poorly executed.
Actually makes more sense than the system we have now.

[zoozx]

ps this download system will never work until the time it takes to DL a full movie is under 2 hrs. Most films now are 4-8 gigs.

[CyberB0b]

Am I the only one that doesn't care what they sell? As long as they make some neat hardware to play with that I can use to stream my own stuff...

[APPLENEWBIE]

My prediction FWIW: What will not happen on the 12th: We will not see Jobs stand up in front of the crowd and make go on and on about a new fantastic movie download service. There is no need to do that. Movies on iTunes store is not revolutionary, unless they have developed some way to undo the laws of physics. We won't see Jobs demonstrating how easy it is to download movies, because it will take hours. Movies on iTunes is merely an incremental improvement. Could be done with a simple announcement. Everyone knows it is coming anyway.

THe 12th, I think, is all about hardware. It will be about an integrated system of hardware to manage and play music, movies, data, email. It will be about either a video iPod or the iPod cell (with video). This is the media center mac introduction. I also think that it may look like the g4 cube, roughly. Did you notice that the new flagship store is a cube? Those are my predictions. I am preparing the condiments to be ready to eat crow...

[Machead III]

A good idea, just poorly executed.
Actually makes more sense than the system we have now.

Agreed.

[jwp1964]

A good idea, just poorly executed.
Actually makes more sense than the system we have now.

Just where would you prefer to live? Make a choice from the list below:

USA, England, Austalia, New Zealand, Germany, Japan, Korea (South) most other EU members OR

China, Cuba, Russia, North Korea.

You've got to be kidding me, unless you actually believe we should all be equally miserable.:p

[jagolden]

A good idea, just poorly executed.
Actually makes more sense than the system we have now.

Yes, everything should be given to everyone, no one has to work for it.

A good idea?! What, work hard so you can give it away to someone else who's to lazy to work hard? Wont give anything us shortterm for longterm returns?

It makes no sense, period.

Why do you think the roles of Welfare in the US are so huge? It's overflowing with the lazy ones who wont get off thier a###s therefore taking away from the the people who truly need that welfare.

[fenixx]

I think it's funny that this is pretty much the only mention of Amazon in this thread... even though Amazon will be announcing a competing movie store in a few days with supposedly much more content than Apple's offering! :D


P'rhaps because we are at a Mac-biased site,... this isn't AmazonRumors.com

:rolleyes:

[macfan881]

guys trust me i know steve will not disapoint on this im sure we had our doubts when we had the musc store im sure come tuesday night we will think steve is god lol

[mazola]

And 'The Boatniks' too!

[Unspeaked]

One thing I'd like to point out to everyone:

I realize it may not matter ro most of you (which is obvious from several comments in this thread), but one major difference between Apple's fixed price, buy-it-and-own-it model and the "NetFlix & a DVD-R Spindle" model or the "Public Library & Rip to My Hard Drive" model is that the former is 100% legal and the others are ILLEGAL.

Again, as is evident from the huge download community online, this means squat to a lot of you, but for some people, it could make a difference (the same way the iTunes Music Store did, in some regard).

[bretm]

I've not bought a movie since 1995 on VHS. It's was just kind of silly having them litter up your shelves then and your hard disk now.

Bite the bullet like I did and toss all your jewel cases for CDs / DVDs. Now I just have a couple large binders on the shelf that contain all my software and CDs and DVDs. Nice and neat and takes up about 1/100th the space.

[ipodG8TR]

When will the studios get a clue. I can rent movies almost anywhere for a couple dollars (only $1 at the grocery store vending machine with my debit card). So, why buy?

More convenient - I don't think so. It will take a decent amount of time to download.

Better quality - I doubt it. Don't expect much better than iTunes offers now.

[MattyMac]

5 more days!

[Yahgo]

There has been a lot said here and elsewhere on what Apple is going to release. But let’s step back and look at the big picture for a moment and think through this process.

What we know:
1. Apple maintains the largest online movie trailer site on the internet. They have the technology to stream data in HD and they just bought a level 4 data center in March this year to storage an enormous amount of data. (I’ll get to this later)
2. HD downloads are enormous and storing them on your hard disk would fill up the disk in no time. So keeping the file for long periods of time is not an option.
3. Apple sells more laptops then desktops and laptops have a smaller hard drive with limited capacity, no one wants an external hd to carry along with their laptop, it would defeat the purpose of being portable.
4. Apple doesn’t make money on downloads, but selling the product that it runs on.
5. iPods screens are too small to watch full length movies on, and their disk space is too limited for movies (iPod nano outsells the video iPod)
6. FrontRow is made for displaying on the TV, not a computer monitor.
7. People WILL NOT PAY $9.99 or $14.99 for a download of a movie, even with a burn option. DVDs can be bought at Wal-Mart or BestBuy for the same price and you get the cover and quality you want and deserve. ( I know a few mac fans will go out and buy whatever Apple puts out, but thinking of an average person )
8. Steve Jobs said in an interview that most people only watch live action movies 1 or 2 times with the exception of animation, but music they listen to over and over again. And he hates variable pricing for content.

So what does all this mean? I think we will see on Sept 12th a streaming rental service that runs off a new media device made to hook up to your TV and runs FrontRow with Showtime as a feature on it that looks a lot like the Movie Trailer section on FrontRow today, where you see the cover designs of the movie instead of a text. (Think about when you go to Blockbuster and all you see is cover designs, and a description on the back) With this service you will be able to see the cover design, the rating, run time, the description and preview a trailer of the movie. Then if you want you can “rent” it for $2.99. After watching the movie, the content is deleted; this would work a lot like pay-per-view. For music and photos, this device will wirelessly connect to your computer to stream music from iTunes and photos from iPhoto. The device will probably sell for around $149 - $299, depending on what it can do.

But who knows… I’m probably completing wrong and Apple will release a download movie site, charge $9.99 for a movie download that around 600 MB per download and take 2 hours to download and release an airport express with video output and charge $129 for it.

[bretm]

Netflix is made for movies! I love Apple but they'll never do for movies what Netflix has! In the past 5 weeks, I've had 21 movies delivered to my door. I'm on the 3-at-a-time plan (unlimited for $17.99/mo). Also, I can buy tons of used DVDs for $5.99 that are 100% guaranteed!

I think a dollar a song is one thing because you can pick and choose from an album so the trade-off for quality is justified. However, $9.99 is a lot to ask for something that is very low quality, only looks really good an a 2" screen and takes a long time to download. Right now, we don't even know if you can back the file up or burn to a DVD. I think Apple will do ok, but I don't see it being the same bonanza that that music was/is.

Netflix will slow down your service most likely. You'll start to see online that the movies you've sent back haven't quite cleared yet and that movies being sent out start to slow down.

Unless things have changed recently. But that's what they've done in the past.

[Cygnus311]

Low priced rentals only for me please. Not paying the same price for a movie as I can get the DVD for in stores, not to mention it needs to be playable on people's big HDTV's (which I'm sure they're aware of).

[dalvin200]

Do you think that there may be some REALLY BIG new technological/hardware gizmo being intro'd? Something that makes the movie store just a minor part of a larger picture.


I think the 5G iPod with "video capabilities"" was just a test to see how the public took it. And adding TV shows to the US store in iTunes may proved a success depending on the stats they have.

They've had time to seriously think and come up with a product(s) and interface(s) and they are fully aware of all theeir competition and what other products & interfaces exist too.

So in answer to your question, YES :-) I think this will be something revolutionary just as when the 1st iPod was announced.

I've got faith, although we will have to wait and see.

[Yahgo]

I forgot to mention this in my earlier post.

Netflix and Blockbuster's Mail Delivery Business Plan is flawed. Here's why:

1) Physical DVDs starch and become useless after many times of use or by shipping and handling.

2) Shipping Cost is only going to increase and this is an overhead that NO COMPANY WANTS. Plus having to maintain distributing centers in each state with physical inventory that has to be maintained, organized and checked for quality control.

3) People watch movies on an impulse. Do you ever plan what movie you are going to watch several days in advance? NO. I know at my house, we subscribed to Blockbusters DVD Mail Service only because we get 2 Free in-store movie rentals each month. This is because I don't know what I want to watch, until I go to the store and see what they have available and what MOOD we're in. Maybe I felt like a Comedy a couple of days ago, but now I want a Thriller, so instant gratification is a BIG KEY to this new service from Apple. Whatever mood you are in, you don't have to wait a few days to receive it from Netflix, just to play it and it's so starched up that you are not able to view it.

[whooleytoo]

It'll be interesting to see what they mean by "New Releases". Does this mean digital movie downloads are released at the same time as the DVD release, or before/after?

Obviously, the most likely answer is the at the same time as the DVD release, but I really wish the studios would think 'outside the box'. Once setup, digital movie downloads could become an enormously profitable market:

- Impulse buying: want to watch a movie? Just one click in iTMS.
- Very low distribution costs.
- Easy to launch globally: no need for marketing campaigns in different regions, just one global marketing campaign online - cheaper.
- It's the best (arguably, the only) option that stands a chance in the fight against piracy.

In fact, it could potentially be a more profitable market than the cinema, so why relegate the download market to trying to squeeze a few last dollars out of 6 month old movies, why not consider releasing the digital download around the same time as the cinema release, if not even before?

For some reason, every time I think of MPAA (or RIAA, or any of the non-US equivalents) executives, I imagine someone huddled underneath their desks with their eyes closed and ears covered, mumbling a prayer that the big, bad internet will go away and make their lives a lot easier and cushier again. These people are so resistant to change they make the Catholic "Yup, world's still flat" Church seem avant garde.

[Machead III]

Yes, everything should be given to everyone, no one has to work for it.

A good idea?! What, work hard so you can give it away to someone else who's to lazy to work hard? Wont give anything us shortterm for longterm returns?

It makes no sense, period.

Why do you think the roles of Welfare in the US are so huge? It's overflowing with the lazy ones who wont get off thier a###s therefore taking away from the the people who truly need that welfare.

I'm not sure whether to be offended by this grotesque post, or should just laugh at how utterly uneducated some people are when it comes to history and political ideology o.O

Anyway, this is probably not the best place for the communism argument, which invariably ends up with everyone agreeing it's a good theory, but half of the forum claiming "it won't work because of human nature" etc., at which point the debate cannot continue.


So back to Macs and ****?

[jagolden]

I'm not sure whether to be offended by this grotesque post, or should just laugh at how utterly uneducated some people are when it comes to history and political ideology o.O

Anyway, this is probably not the best place for the communism argument, which invariably ends up with everyone agreeing it's a good theory, but half of the forum claiming "it won't work because of human nature" etc., at which point the debate cannot continue.


So back to Macs and ****?

Funny, that's what I thought reading your original post.
Cearly "education" didn't serve you as you started the communism argument.
Please, enlghten me, off forum, so I may better understand.
Considering your locations (UK and France) I'm not surprised.

[WildPalms]

There has been a lot said here and elsewhere on what Apple is going to release. But let’s step back and look at the big picture for a moment and think through this process.

What we know:
1. Apple maintains the largest online movie trailer site on the internet. They have the technology to stream data in HD and they just bought a level 4 data center in March this year to storage an enormous amount of data. (I’ll get to this later)
2. HD downloads are enormous and storing them on your hard disk would fill up the disk in no time. So keeping the file for long periods of time is not an option.
3. Apple sells more laptops then desktops and laptops have a smaller hard drive with limited capacity, no one wants an external hd to carry along with their laptop, it would defeat the purpose of being portable.
4. Apple doesn’t make money on downloads, but selling the product that it runs on.
5. iPods screens are too small to watch full length movies on, and their disk space is too limited for movies (iPod nano outsells the video iPod)
6. FrontRow is made for displaying on the TV, not a computer monitor.
7. People WILL NOT PAY $9.99 or $14.99 for a download of a movie, even with a burn option. DVDs can be bought at Wal-Mart or BestBuy for the same price and you get the cover and quality you want and deserve. ( I know a few mac fans will go out and buy whatever Apple puts out, but thinking of an average person )
8. Steve Jobs said in an interview that most people only watch live action movies 1 or 2 times with the exception of animation, but music they listen to over and over again. And he hates variable pricing for content.

So what does all this mean? I think we will see on Sept 12th a streaming rental service that runs off a new media device made to hook up to your TV and runs FrontRow with Showtime as a feature on it that looks a lot like the Movie Trailer section on FrontRow today, where you see the cover designs of the movie instead of a text. (Think about when you go to Blockbuster and all you see is cover designs, and a description on the back) With this service you will be able to see the cover design, the rating, run time, the description and preview a trailer of the movie. Then if you want you can “rent” it for $2.99. After watching the movie, the content is deleted; this would work a lot like pay-per-view. For music and photos, this device will wirelessly connect to your computer to stream music from iTunes and photos from iPhoto. The device will probably sell for around $149 - $299, depending on what it can do.

But who knows… I’m probably completing wrong and Apple will release a download movie site, charge $9.99 for a movie download that around 600 MB per download and take 2 hours to download and release an airport express with video output and charge $129 for it.

Interesting take.

[DStaal]

On the rental vs. purchase argument...

I'm not going to touch which one is 'better' for videos at the moment. I have opinions, but nevermind.

Let's work on the technolocial aspects for a moment, shall we?

Rental requires working DRM. Period. Absolutely. Otherwise there is no way for it to be just rental: you have the file, you can watch it whenever.

Purchase doesn't. You get the file, you can use forever, because you own it.

There is no unbreakable DRM scheme. It doesn't exist today, it probably never will. This is because you, the consumer, are required to be able to decrypt the files sometimes but not others. Which means you have all the info needed to decrypt it. Which means, sooner or later, that someone will figure out how to access that info when they want to, not when the software wants to.

So, Apple requiring a purchase model is just recognizing the limitations of the technology. They have nothing they can 'take back' at the end of a rental period, and it is no cheaper (it's actually more expensive) for them to rent something to you.

There is an apparent temporary advantage to the rental model to the movie studios, since they can charge you multiple times for the same movie. It costs Apple just as much to 'rent' you a movie or sell it to you, so Apple has no advantage, and you get the same file either way.

If you don't want to keep it, just throw it out. Same difference. The rest is pricing games.

[peterjhill]

Quality is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more important to me, than price.
There I said it!

When I see those delicious trailers, I cry for movies like that. Please God make it happen. 720p would be unbelievable, but I would believe it.

Why buy an HD DVD player when you can download the movies at 720P... That would be good enough for me... Of course it depends on how much compression they use to make the file size smaller.. Also, would I be able to stop and resume downloading of the files?

We will find out I guess.

[CyberB0b]

Whichever way the Apple store does it, buy or rent, Microsoft will do the other way in a couple years but will be nowhere as easy to use or as popular. But Microsoft will license it to thousands of other companies to set up their own movie stores and movie hardware and they will all be incompatible with Apple's store and hardware.

I can't wait for all the stories about Micorosoft's own "killer" new movie thingamabob.

[supremedesigner]

This is a very special thread. :)

So who knows what will happen next week. I think I'd much rather buy movies from iTunes (hopefully QT 7 HD quality) or regular physical DVD than HD-DVD/Blu-Ray (way over-priced).

[MM2270]

I agree with everyone here that if Apple only intros a movie purchase model, it will suck. Most people don't want to own movies. After all, you don't see many music rental services out there in the brick and mortar world, but there are millions of movie rental places. It's a tried and true model that they should emulate to an extent and bring to the online world. Of course, they should innovate on the basic model as Apple is known to do.

But, I keep thinking, why stop at one model? I know Apple likes to keep things simple, but it seems to me you could have both.

Here is how I would envision a great movie distro system.
Users have the option to either rent or buy a movie, with two buttons "rent this movie", "buy this movie" next to it's description.

The rental model would work like this:
• Quality would be slightly lower than DVD quality. Maybe same resolution, but compressed a little bit more to reduce file size (after all, if you aren't keeping it, it should download quickly)
• You can play the movie up to 5 times or within a 14 day period, whichever comes first. After that, it expires, so you can no longer play it. This would be linked to the DRM model within iTunes.
• No DVD burning with rentals. They would never allow you to make a copy of it since you don't own it. (I mean of course, burning to DVD playable in a standard DVD player. If you wanted to somehow back up the data file itself, you could, but it would be pointless.)

The purchase model would be like this:
• DVD quality playback. So, somewhat larger downloads, but they will be worth it, because it would be the same as renting from your local video store.
• You can play it unlimited number of times. You own it, so why not?
• DVD burning capability for backup purposes, but would be limited to 3 burns, then it's done. They would have to encode something within the file itself that would know it's been burned to DVD 3 times, not within iTunes, or that could possibly be circumvented.

Oh, and as for price of each? I think $2.99 - $4.99 for rentals and $9.99 - $14.99 for purchase would be ideal.

And one other thing. The iTMS would keep track of what you've rented, and if you decide you'd like to own that movie later, you can purchase it by paying the difference in price between the rental and purchase. So, for a movie that was $4.99 rental and $14.99 puchase, you'd pay $10. Now THAT would be sweet!

In the end, I doubt we'll see something like this, but that's what I would want and use. For those great movies that I would like to own, I would pay the purchase price for the convenience of not having to go out to a store or buy it at Amazon and wait for it to arrive.

For everything else that I don't want to keep, the rental model would be what I'd use.

[mi5moav]

I really believe that Itunes will not be housing the ITMS, I think IMOV or another app will be used for the video store. So, if someone works hard as hell 80 hours a week and only makes $5.00 and hour so he can support his family and then you have a plumber who just graduated highschool making $95 bucks every 1/2 hour to support his crack habit, that's the kinda of society you are looking for. Most Docs and Lawyers make about 2x to 3x a normal living wage in Europe, and they get along with the so called comon folks just fine. If a fry cook where to ask a Dr. to come to his house for some beer the Doc would probably sue the guy. Anyway... new "IMOVIE STORE" .APP

[Machead III]

Funny, that's what I thought reading your original post.
Cearly "education" didn't serve you as you started the communism argument.
Please, enlghten me, off forum, so I may better understand.
Considering your locations (UK and France) I'm not surprised.

I'm not interested in talking to bigots.

[ATG]

To be honest I don't care about movies…

GET THE TV STORE IN THE UK ALREADY!!!! :mad:

[wkhahn]

Using an advanced video codec like h.264, you can get decent quality in 720p at 6 Mbps and 1080p at 8 Mbps. (Look at the HD trailers on apple.com)

With current cable modems now getting 8 Mbps download speeds, we're not talking 2 and a half days, we're talking realtime or close to it.

I'm betting apple skips "DVD Quality" (whatever that means) and goes straight into HD. It is the 21st Century after all...

On my lunch break at work, I just downloaded a couple of HD trailers, both 2min30sec in length; 1 at 480p and the other at 720p. My set up is an 3.0Ghz Pentium D, 1G ram, 256K Nvidia Gforce 6800, 20" Dell Digital LCD.

I could tell no difference in file quality. The problem lies in download time. Both files average dl speed was 150KBps. Thats 1.2Mbps if my math is right. The 420p file took 4:28 to dl, translating to 3:34:24 for a 2hr movie. For 720p, it took 12:39, meaning a full movie would take 9:28:45.

I know my cable provider offers up to 4Mbps downlaods, for about $120/month. And thats before the cable servise itself. Even then its not dedicated. Most people with cable will opt for their providers basic service ,like $40 - 50/month for 500-600kbps, or 1/2 as fast as my test. The movies would take twice as long to dl. 19hrs to downlaod will not fly. 7hrs may not either.

If the compression works to get a DVD quality movie down to 1G, then it could be downloaded in about 1h50mim, nearly realtime at work, or 3h40min at home. At work, I would only need maybe a 15min buffer before I start watching, and not catch up to the dl. But at home, I would need about 1h40min buffer. Maybe this is acceptable to some, but if I can walk to Wal-mart or Blockbuster and back in that time, then what's the consumer advantage beyond the novelty?

I'm sure apple engineers can do these same napkin calculations. There would have to be some alternative to the straight dl. Maybe a torrent of some kind built into iTunes 7. I don't know. Just thinking.

[pagansoul]

I'm a collector and I love movies. I can watch something I like 5 times a year and not get tired of it. I must note that my favorite genre is Science Fiction. My DVD collection is in the thousands. I do not watch TV because I can not stand commercials but I have several sets of shows, past and current. I also have about 400 CDs. I have purchased about 10 songs off iTunes but I tend to get the CD if I find I really like the sound. With only 2 of the songs did I decide not to purchase the CD.

Now, iTunes Movie store. For myself I don't see much use. I have downloaded for free some short films that I play on my PSP and keep on my computer. I have ripped (off a DVD) a total of 6 movies (2 are Music Video DVDs) to my iMac just to see how long it would take and the quality. Since I believe I have just about every 'public domain' b-movie made on DVD already and just about everything I want that comes on a DVD I'm not the type of person Apple is gunning for. Right now there are people using P2P for downloading movies that actually think what they are doing is legal. They pay a few bucks to some site that's based in some other country that has different laws. It's these people that iTunes wants and they will pay a few dollars to get a downloaded movie off a creditable site. All iTunes needs to do is offer what those other sites do (a bit more, since it is legal) same speed and as good or better quality.

Side note: If Sony would drop their price for UMDs to a more reasonable price like $5 then I would not need to make my own movie copies to load on my card. All they do is put the full lengh movie on a mini DVD, why charge $25 when a full size DVD is half the price and contains extras. Sorry for the side rant.

[balamw]

I'm sure apple engineers can do these same napkin calculations. There would have to be some alternative to the straight dl. Maybe a torrent of some kind built into iTunes 7. I don't know. Just thinking.
The torrent isn't going to increase your DL speed to > 150 kBps (typical for 1.5 Mbps links including overhead) if that's all your pipe can do.

Perhaps what they'll do is more like a TiVo suggestions like service where it'll download movies you might want to watch in the background at night or while you are away and "unlock" them when you start to watch it.

We'll see next week.

B

[heffemonkeyman]

On my lunch break at work, I just downloaded a couple of HD trailers, both 2min30sec in length; 1 at 480p and the other at 720p. My set up is an 3.0Ghz Pentium D, 1G ram, 256K Nvidia Gforce 6800, 20" Dell Digital LCD.

I could tell no difference in file quality. The problem lies in download time. Both files average dl speed was 150KBps. Thats 1.2Mbps if my math is right. The 420p file took 4:28 to dl, translating to 3:34:24 for a 2hr movie. For 720p, it took 12:39, meaning a full movie would take 9:28:45.

I know my cable provider offers up to 4Mbps downlaods, for about $120/month. And thats before the cable servise itself. Even then its not dedicated. Most people with cable will opt for their providers basic service ,like $40 - 50/month for 500-600kbps, or 1/2 as fast as my test. The movies would take twice as long to dl. 19hrs to downlaod will not fly. 7hrs may not either.

If the compression works to get a DVD quality movie down to 1G, then it could be downloaded in about 1h50mim, nearly realtime at work, or 3h40min at home. At work, I would only need maybe a 15min buffer before I start watching, and not catch up to the dl. But at home, I would need about 1h40min buffer. Maybe this is acceptable to some, but if I can walk to Wal-mart or Blockbuster and back in that time, then what's the consumer advantage beyond the novelty?

I'm sure apple engineers can do these same napkin calculations. There would have to be some alternative to the straight dl. Maybe a torrent of some kind built into iTunes 7. I don't know. Just thinking.

This is a good test, but your connection is not fast enough for this to be viable. If your getting only getting 1.2mbps, that not going to cut it.

Bandwith is a huge issue. In my area, Seattle, I can get Comcast cable for about $50/mo and I get 6-8mbps solid download. So I can stream anything that is encoded at 6-8mbps just fine. The 720p trailers are about 4-8mbps, so it works for me.

I know not everyone can get that kind of bandwidth/price, but they will soon. I think this is where Apple is going, but it's not going to work for everyone. At least not right away. But maybe enough to be profitable?

[HecubusPro]

5. iPods screens are too small to watch full length movies on, and their disk space is too limited for movies (iPod nano outsells the video iPod)

A lot of thought went into your opinion, and it was a good read (I agree with a lot of it), but I have a slight problem with point 5. Not a big problem, just a slight one. :)

I have a 30GB iPod video, and I do enjoy watching movies and tv shows on it. I also have what I think is a ton of content on it (all 3 LOTR movies extended editions, 150 eps. of various Star Trek episodes, a couple of Star Trek movies, all 3 star wars movies, all 3 Indiana Jones movies, about 30 eps. of Kids in the Hall, Akira, a few episodes of Deadwood, 5 or 6 other movies [not pr0n :) ] and about 30 music videos) and I still have 8gigs of space left on the drive.

I have no problem watching movies on the small screen. I enjoy it, but that's my opinion. I find there's plenty of space on the drive for tons of content, but you may look at that and say that's not a lot.

I will however, very much look forward to a widescreen iPod video. I hope it comes out on the 12th, but I don't think it will. We'll see.

[interlard]

I want to RENT a movie for a few dollars, not buy it for $10-$15. Doh!

Imagine if you had to OWN every movie you'd ever seen?

[chukronos]

I think it will have to be a rental or stream service. There is no way I would pay $14.99 for a lower quality movie at the same price I would pay for a DVD at circuit city or best buy. I know Steve Jobs has been fighting with the movie companies to have a uniform price. Unfortunately, these companies get pretty greedy and don't see the big picture.

I also don't think apple would put out an option, like $14.99 downloads, when that doesn't make sense.
-Chuck

[kadajawi]

In contrast, Amazon will launch a service that will have a very comprehensive back catalog but will be frustrating to use as after downloading your movie, your options will be:


View it on your PC or
Use some dodgy software, (Windows?!!), to copy it to some other device
Use some unintuitive method or mechanism to copy it to some other device


Either way it will result in a disappointing user experience and, ultimately, the failure of their store.
I'm not so sure... they own MobiPocket, and their eBook system seems to work quite ok.

@Machead III: Sin City was CGI only too, wasn't it? They filmed everything infront of the greenscreen, IIRC.

[Stewie]

Sorry for the nasty long URL (http://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:9OrBsXYjfxgJ:www.amazon.com/b/%3Fie%3DUTF8%26node%3D16263011+unbox+site:amazon.com&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1&client=firefox-a), but this is a cache page from a google search where you can see what Amazons offerings our for their new download service.

[balamw]

Sorry for the nastly long URL (http://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:9OrBsXYjfxgJ:www.amazon.com/b/%3Fie%3DUTF8%26node%3D16263011+unbox+site:amazon.com&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1&client=firefox-a), but this is a cache page from a google search where you can see what Amazons offerings are for their new download service.
Pretty broad selection. Including some TV Shows similarly priced to iTMS.

B

[Chupa Chupa]

I think it will have to be a rental or stream service. There is no way I would pay $14.99 for a lower quality movie at the same price I would pay for a DVD at circuit city or best buy. I know Steve Jobs has been fighting with the movie companies to have a uniform price. Unfortunately, these companies get pretty greedy and don't see the big picture.

I also don't think apple would put out an option, like $14.99 downloads, when that doesn't make sense.
-Chuck


You won't, but you are probably more technically savvy then 99% of the world population. How many people pay $10 for an album of songs encoded @ 128Mbps and couldn't be happier?

[pagansoul]

For the prices they are asking $14/15 for a new movie that can only be viewed on 2 computers and a portable doesn't cut it for me as it would be better to just buy the DVD. The TV shows at $2 is like iTunes and I have only used that to download free pilots and some of Surface I just had to see. :D With HD and BRay coming out I find the price of a simple DVD drop so if I want something I tend to get it, usually used for $5-10. Still, I do see people renting off the site for 2 to 4 dollars if they have the time and bandwidth.

[mi5moav]

We'll I guess you guys are right about getting a new streaming airport... looks like the wait time is back up from 24hours to 1-3 WEEKS WEEEEHOOOOOO!!!!!

[macfan881]

There has been a lot said here and elsewhere on what Apple is going to release. But let’s step back and look at the big picture for a moment and think through this process.

What we know:
1. Apple maintains the largest online movie trailer site on the internet. They have the technology to stream data in HD and they just bought a level 4 data center in March this year to storage an enormous amount of data. (I’ll get to this later)
2. HD downloads are enormous and storing them on your hard disk would fill up the disk in no time. So keeping the file for long periods of time is not an option.
3. Apple sells more laptops then desktops and laptops have a smaller hard drive with limited capacity, no one wants an external hd to carry along with their laptop, it would defeat the purpose of being portable.
4. Apple doesn’t make money on downloads, but selling the product that it runs on.
5. iPods screens are too small to watch full length movies on, and their disk space is too limited for movies (iPod nano outsells the video iPod)
6. FrontRow is made for displaying on the TV, not a computer monitor.
7. People WILL NOT PAY $9.99 or $14.99 for a download of a movie, even with a burn option. DVDs can be bought at Wal-Mart or BestBuy for the same price and you get the cover and quality you want and deserve. ( I know a few mac fans will go out and buy whatever Apple puts out, but thinking of an average person )
8. Steve Jobs said in an interview that most people only watch live action movies 1 or 2 times with the exception of animation, but music they listen to over and over again. And he hates variable pricing for content.

So what does all this mean? I think we will see on Sept 12th a streaming rental service that runs off a new media device made to hook up to your TV and runs FrontRow with Showtime as a feature on it that looks a lot like the Movie Trailer section on FrontRow today, where you see the cover designs of the movie instead of a text. (Think about when you go to Blockbuster and all you see is cover designs, and a description on the back) With this service you will be able to see the cover design, the rating, run time, the description and preview a trailer of the movie. Then if you want you can “rent” it for $2.99. After watching the movie, the content is deleted; this would work a lot like pay-per-view. For music and photos, this device will wirelessly connect to your computer to stream music from iTunes and photos from iPhoto. The device will probably sell for around $149 - $299, depending on what it can do.

But who knows… I’m probably completing wrong and Apple will release a download movie site, charge $9.99 for a movie download that around 600 MB per download and take 2 hours to download and release an airport express with video output and charge $129 for it.

yes hd video will be huge but hds now are biger and cheaper to get the new mac pro u can get up to techniclay 3tbs with the new 700+ gig hds if you could get a movie and be able to burn it on your own for anything under 20 bucks i would im sure many others to with many computers now coming out with dvd burners

[mi5moav]

This sure is starting to sound like MOVIEBEAM... and who owns that???

So, we can que up 10-12 movies we want to watch for the month and in the background my mac downloads them and then either stores them on this yet to be anounced product or onto my mac... Then this new Airport(now, available in 1-3 weeks) can then stream it to my TV. This does make a lot more sense now.

[Yahgo]

This sure is starting to sound like MOVIEBEAM... and who owns that???

Walt Disney Owns MOVIEBEAM.

[Porchland]

We'll I guess you guys are right about getting a new streaming airport... looks like the wait time is back up from 24hours to 1-3 WEEKS WEEEEHOOOOOO!!!!!

Airport Express still shows available within 24 hours, so looks like Extreme is getting updated but Express is not.

[Porchland]

This sure is starting to sound like MOVIEBEAM... and who owns that???

So, we can que up 10-12 movies we want to watch for the month and in the background my mac downloads them and then either stores them on this yet to be anounced product or onto my mac... Then this new Airport(now, available in 1-3 weeks) can then stream it to my TV. This does make a lot more sense now.

If 88 percent (http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/news/releases/pressrelease.asp?ID=2006135) of households have cable or satellite -- and a big chunk of those have access to PPV or on-demand new releases -- I don't understand why an iTunes movie-to-your-TV service is such a big hoopty-do.

Unless Apple goes to a subscription-based service that essentially replaces my cable, this doesn't really give me anything I don't already have other than the ability to watch a movie on an iPod.

I'm excited, I guess, because it's new and a different direction for Apple, but none of the rumors I've seen about what's coming next week show much "think different."

[balamw]

Airport Express still shows available within 24 hours, so looks like Extreme is getting updated but Express is not.
Or they have a decent inventory of Express units and just want to throw us off... :p

B

[dmcgann]

i think apple will announce a hard drive specifically for these downloads approx the size of a dvd player! you put it on top of your dvd player and you can download the movie to the hard drive through airport! you can then wirelessly control the hard drive with your computer! this would make high def a possibility! just a thought!

[Porchland]

And one other thing. The iTMS would keep track of what you've rented, and if you decide you'd like to own that movie later, you can purchase it by paying the difference in price between the rental and purchase. So, for a movie that was $4.99 rental and $14.99 puchase, you'd pay $10. Now THAT would be sweet!


I've actually submitted feedback to Apple before suggesting that you should get a $1 discount on an album if you've already bought a single track. I can think of a number of times that I've thought about buying a whole album but feeling like it was a bad value because I would be spending more money on it than if I had just bought the album in the first place. But with even a $1 discount, I probably would have rolled the dice on more albums.

I like your idea for the same reasons.

[macfan881]

I also pray That the will have family guy and simpsons on The Tv Store Tuesday i mean they have fox and adult swim i dont see why they would hold back for family guy i bet you to that simpsons would be the next dl series on itunes also if they put it up along with faimly guy

[macfan881]

If 88 percent (http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/news/releases/pressrelease.asp?ID=2006135) of households have cable or satellite -- and a big chunk of those have access to PPV or on-demand new releases -- I don't understand why an iTunes movie-to-your-TV service is such a big hoopty-do.

Unless Apple goes to a subscription-based service that essentially replaces my cable, this doesn't really give me anything I don't already have other than the ability to watch a movie on an iPod.

I'm excited, I guess, because it's new and a different direction for Apple, but none of the rumors I've seen about what's coming next week show much "think different."
because im sure alot of people have a video ipod now or plan on getin one soon and say hey i wanna play movies on there i know i did i mean i like riping my own movies but some times its alot of work to rip a movie and put it on ur ipod this way people can just order there fav movie and put it in on ther ipod in a easy way

[balamw]

because im sure alot of people have a video ipod now or plan on getin one soon and say hey i wanna play movies on there i know i did i mean i like riping my own movies but some times its alot of work to rip a movie and put it on ur ipod this way people can just order there fav movie and put it in on ther ipod in a easy way
If that's the extent of it, I'm going to be very underwhelmed on Tuesday. 320x240 movies. (Maximum supported by the 5G iPod). Meh.

B