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What your chart shows is that competition makes things cheaper. The categories on the chart where robust competition exist cost less today than 1996. The areas where the free market is constrained the cost is more expensive.

Right, and that's why Apple creating a monopoly by eliminating any other viable profit for studios from the content side would lead to LESS competition.

Please don't ever go into business, you'll fail.
 
What's the point of buying a streamed version of a 4k movie if ITunes can't even properly stream HD content now? I recently bought "Rogue One" in iTunes and the quality is good but nowhere near a physical blu ray.
 
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Unless the ATV 4 has a huge hard drive that allows you to download and store uncompressed 4k videos, $20 or $30 is a ripoff.

Your computer has- or can have- the "huge hard drive(s)." Apple could NEVER get an internal hard drive right inside of a product like :apple:TV. Else, what size is "huge?" Whatever you offer, someone else will find that much more than they need (or want to pay for) while others would see it as far too small for their collection. The first generation came in 40GB and 120GB (storage) sizes. Neither size was the "right" size for everyone. Hacking expanded that to as much as 2TB. That wasn't enough for everyone either. There's a lesson to be learned there.
 
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I would never pay that much for a movie. The only time I buy HD movies in iTunes now is when they are $9.99 or less and I have over 200 movies purchased. I'll either keep downloading elsewhere or start buying discs. I have a BR player but have never bought and discs yet in the three years I have owned it.
 
It's all about the price. Media should be cheaper and that will drive sales.
$20 or more to own a digital copy is just too much. It should be no more than $10.
Yes, I know the artists and people who work on the content industry might consider otherwise but with the amount of content out there, people will not pay too much money or worst go into piracy.
 
Redbox has set the prices in my mind. If it's reasonably easy to get a disc and use it (strangely the more difficult thing these days), being asked for more than $2 for a movie rental is a tough pill to swallow. I'm cheap and I know it, but $6 for a rental is just too much... So, if we can get to a point that I could rent SD for $2, HD for $4 and 4K for $6, I think I'd be onboard and the upsell there might actually get me into that $6 premium tier sometimes... then buying at $20 -- well that's such an easy thing...
 
Your computer has- or can have- the "huge hard drive(s)." Apple could NEVER get an internal hard drive right inside of a product like :apple:TV. Else, what size is "huge?" Whatever you offer, someone else will find that much more than they need (or want to pay for) while others would see it as far too small for their collection. The first generation came in 40GB and 120GB (storage) sizes. Neither size was the "right" size for everyone. Hacking expanded that to as much as 2GB. That wasn't enough for everyone either. There's a lesson to be learned there.
I would love to see ATV with the ability to connect to a external drive to play local content. I hate to have to turn my Mac Pro on every time I want to watch something out of my library.
 
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Even at $19.95 I'm not going to buy. But maybe that is Apple's plan. They don't have the bandwidth to send 4K to everyone so they need to limit the demand. Charging $20 will do that.

Apple's 1080p files are only slightly higher bitrate than 720p. The soundtrack on a blu ray is larger than the entire 1080p HD movie file from Apple.

4k files from Apple won't be much larger than 1080p, so the affect on bandwidth will be negligible. But the quality difference from a 4k blu ray will also be huge and that's why they shouldn't be worth $20 to anybody.
 
They think I'm gonna pay $30 for a slightly sharper movie they are having a laugh. Even $25 is pushing their luck, greedy mofos.
 
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I buy 4k discs for 25-30 usd, but quality is much better than streaming. Hope new Apple TV supports Dolby Vision and Atmos sound.
I saw a rumor on here recently that suggested the new Apple TV would be supporting Dolby Vision as well as one other standard. Studios go to the trouble of doing a full post production pass for that standard, it would be great if we could enjoy it at home on our Apple TVs!
 
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Even $20 is too much to spend for a digital download. But then again I'm happy enough with the quality of SD that I don't bother buying the HD version of iTunes movies and paying a higher price.
 
People wanted 4k last time, yeah. But they didn't get it, and I think most people realized they're ok without it. For those that still want it, are they really going to pay those prices? I won't.

Only on MacRumors can you read comments on any article about AppleTV, for years, about how Apple has failed because they didn't offer a 4K AppleTV last time. Now that it appears that they are going to actually sell an AppleTV 4K, all the comments are about how people won't pay for or don't care about 4k content.

Only on MacRumors.
 
I would love to see ATV with the ability to connect to a external drive to play local content. I hate to have to turn my Mac Pro on every time I want to watch something out of my library.
You can by downloading VLC - you can access movies from SMB servers
 

You need to keep up and actually read what I wrote. Apple does not sell it's own original content -- it streams it to subscribers but you cannot buy a copy of, say, Carpool Karaoke.

As as I wrote in my last post even Netflix, Amazon, HBO, etc., which have hit shows, still depend on Hollywood movies. Apple is no different.
 
So Apple wants a lower price for content that they don't produce while they charge higher, than industry standard, prices for their hardware.
I can't torrent an exact molecular copy of an iPhone. Movies on the other hand...
 
Right, and that's why Apple creating a monopoly by eliminating any other viable profit for studios from the content side would lead to LESS competition.

Please don't ever go into business, you'll fail.

I don't think you understand what a monopoly is. You NEED to go to business school. Then law school. Then maybe you'll understand and can use the word to its true meaning, not as a board game.
 
I will be very pissed when my HD purchases will not be upgraded to 4K automatically. That's what should happen, but I'm entirely expecting it won't, just like SD movies won't. Which really pisses me off, because I have 106 iTunes movies now. I'm not paying $25 to upgrade each of them. Heck, I'd consider paying some sort of difference/fee to upgrade them, but I'm not outright buying second licenses for each.
 



Apple is said to be "scrambling" to strike deals with movie studios in Hollywood regarding the exact prices of 4K movies in the iTunes Store, taking places just weeks ahead of the rumored debut of the new 4K Apple TV in mid-September.

While the talks have been ongoing for some time, discussions have been recently hampered by disagreements over the pricing of 4K movie purchases, according to sources close to the talks (via The Wall Street Journal). Apple wants to charge $19.99 for 4K movie purchases in its digital iTunes Store, the same price it currently charges for newly-released HD films.

apple_tv_diagonal.jpg

However, many Hollywood studios it has talked with are pushing back on that price point and are looking to charge customers a premium for the new 4K content: $25 to $30 for a 4K movie in iTunes.
Apple is said to be trying to finish these discussions well before September 12, the currently rumored date that will see the unveiling of the new 4K Apple TV, iPhone 8, iPhone 7s, iPhone 7s Plus, Apple Watch Series 3, and more software-related announcements. As iTunes loses market share to companies like Amazon and Comcast, Apple is hoping that a revitalized Apple TV streaming box with 4K content -- which many rival devices have already supported -- will help boost iTunes sales into the last half of 2017 and the new year.

In other Hollywood-related talks, earlier this month it was reported that multiple studios were pushing forward with a plan to offer digital movie rentals mere weeks after they appear in theaters. Studios like Universal Pictures and Warner Bros. were said to be in talks with partners, including Apple, to offer movies in iTunes as early as 17 days after their theatrical debut for about $50, or four to six weeks from release for $30.

Article Link: Apple Wants to Sell 4K Movies for $20 in iTunes, While Film Studios Want $25 to $30


Since I already think that $14.99-$19.99 to "rent" a movie on my Apple TV is too expensive, it looks like Im going to fall further behind. No one told me that being an adult would be this hard.
 
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True facts: VHS tapes in 1980 were priced to sell only to rental stores. They weren't priced to sell to the end consumer (because it was expensive to mass produce the tapes then). And, in today's dollars it's more like $300-$500. (VHS movies cost between $150-$200 in 1980). The first VHS movie targeted for consumers to buy was "Star Trek II : The Wrath of Kahn" in 1983 for $40.00 ($100 today).

From Wiki:

Paramount released The Wrath of Khan on VHS and Beta in 1983. The studio sold the VHS for $39.95, $40 below contemporary movie cassette prices. It needed to sell 60,000 tapes to make the film as profitable as other tapes, but sold 120,000. The successful experiment was credited with instigating more competitive VHS pricing, an increase in the adoption of increasingly cheaper VHS players, and an industry-wide move away from rentals to sales as the bulk of videotape revenue.[99][100]

Please, investigate what you are talking about before saying something is a "fact."

From Videophile Magazine 1980:
 

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I'm all for digital copies. And, I do buy movies at the $20 price point (I just bought "Wonder Woman" this morning). I spent more than that to see it in the theaters with someone this summer (more like $40 with concessions). So, that price point doesn't bother me.

I don't buy 4K movies at $30, however. Just not enough benefit for a 50% surcharge and Apple knows this.
 
I'm so cheap that even $20 sounds like a lot to me.

Gotta say...with so much great content out there I'm okay with waiting until it's on TV for free and yep, I just turned into my parents.
Nope. You're just reasonable. $20-30 for a movie is ridiculous. Looks like pirating it'll remain for me then :D
 
Redbox has set the prices in my mind. If it's reasonably easy to get a disc and use it (strangely the more difficult thing these days), being asked for more than $2 for a movie rental is a tough pill to swallow. I'm cheap and I know it, but $6 for a rental is just too much... So, if we can get to a point that I could rent SD for $2, HD for $4 and 4K for $6, I think I'd be onboard and the upsell there might actually get me into that $6 premium tier sometimes... then buying at $20 -- well that's such an easy thing...

and renting 4K is currently $9.99 (through VUDU). I still use redbox for blu-rays, cheaper and better quality.
 
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