I knew it was always possible but didn’t think it would happen....

[2010mini]

...I lost purchased movies due to the content provider pulling them from the store. Really stinks. Even the apple rep I talked to over chat all but admitted it was BS....

I was denied a refund; even though they are still listed in my purchase history. I was given a free movie rental though...

Anyone else lose any movies lately?

These were purchased not a code redeemed from a dvd/Blu-ray correct?

I am wondering if there is a difference between the two as far as content provider???

Oh one more thing. I thought I lost purchased iTunes movies before. Only to find out they were just mysteriously moved to the “Hidden” folder on my iTunes account. I accessed this via iTunes on my Mac

 

[BF1M]

These were purchased not a code redeemed from a dvd/Blu-ray correct?

Yes, I got them from those 5 dollar sales they do all the time. Every single movie of my almost 700 collection was bought directly from iTunes.

I am wondering if there is a difference between the two as far as content provider???

Dunno, good question.

Oh one more thing. I thought I lost purchased iTunes movies before. Only to find out they were just mysteriously moved to the “Hidden” folder on my iTunes account. I accessed this via iTunes on my Mac

Yea, I'm familiar with the hide option but no they are missing for sure. Thanks though, that would have been easy to overlook.

I'm sure the movies will be back up sooner or later; the question is will I have to pay for them again?

The missing movies isn't really what bothers me; its that these sort of problems are happening more and more with my Apple products. I've had tickets over two issues opened since February and April respectively. Remember when their products just worked?

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

Yes, I got them from those 5 dollar sales they do all the time. Every single movie of my almost 700 collection was bought directly from iTunes.



Dunno, good question.



Yea, I'm familiar with the hide option but no they are missing for sure. Thanks though, that would have been easy to overlook.

I'm sure the movies will be back up sooner or later; the question is will I have to pay for them again?

The missing movies isn't really what bothers me; its that these sort of problems are happening more and more with my Apple products. I've had tickets over two issues opened since February and April respectively. Remember when their products just worked?

Is it just these two that have disappeared from your collection? On the plus side, 2 out of 700 is pretty small isn't it. I get the impression that Apple don't deliberately remove films previously bought from the iCloud as far far far more than two would have disappeared over the years - maybe 100-200+. It really sounds like staff error deleting a file by mistake. It's just a shame that Apple never comments on this. It's quite horrible as there is zero service from them - it's a bit like a walled corporation.

As I wrote before, there's no way that you could download & keep 700 iTunes films - that's bonkers and really goes against the streaming idea. Even Craig made fun of external harddrives didn't he at the WWDC. Just download the ones that you simply love!

 

[2010mini]

Is it just these two that have disappeared from your collection? On the plus side, 2 out of 700 is pretty small isn't it. I get the impression that Apple don't deliberately remove films previously bought from the iCloud as far far far more than two would have disappeared over the years - maybe 100-200+. It really sounds like staff error deleting a file by mistake. It's just a shame that Apple never comments on this. It's quite horrible as there is zero service from them - it's a bit like a walled corporation.

As I wrote before, there's no way that you could download & keep 700 iTunes films - that's bonkers and really goes against the streaming idea. Even Craig made fun of external harddrives didn't he at the WWDC. Just download the ones that you simply love!

700 iTunes movies is not that much to download and store.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

700 iTunes movies is not that much to download and store.

Each to their own I guess. But yes, each 1080p iTunes film averages 4 to 4.5GB in size so a good LaCie 4TB harrdrive at £120 on the Apple Store would certainly do the trick but oh gosh, that's pretty time consuming and a bit heavy on a computer. I know that I wouldn't want to have to do that over a period of time. Mind you 700 films to own is H U G E to someone like me. I thought I was extravagant at owning 150 films BTW I only watch probably 10 of those at the most we all have our favourites I guess - but I'm a person who like late last night can watch the last 30 minutes of a favourite film over a late dinner

 

[Wondercow]

As I wrote before, there's no way that you could download & keep 700 iTunes films - that's bonkers and really goes against the streaming idea. Even Craig made fun of external harddrives didn't he at the WWDC. Just download the ones that you simply love!

It may not be what you would do, but it’s certainly doable and not "bonkers"; many of us have larger collections of films on hard drives. If I’m not mistaken, an iTunes movie in HD runs about 5 GB, so 5 GBx700 is only 3.5 TB. My local shop sells an external WD 4 TB drive for $180 CAD. An 8 TB is $220 CAD.

 

[BF1M]

The point is, for many of us, that we shouldn't have to download and hoard our digital files especially when Apple has been ramming the cloud and digital services down our throats for the better part of what? 15 years now?


.... that said I'm really giving serious thought to buying a HDD and doing just that...

 

[SteveManila1960]

I have around 300 films purchased through iTunes. Back in 2015 I bought a WD Thunderbolt external raid box with two WD red 4TB drives and I run them in RAID 1. 4TB is easily enough space for the foreseeable future. Front end is a late 2012 MacBook Air from which I can stream any of the movies to any of the 3 Apple TV boxes in the apartment if for some reason we cannot stream from Apple's servers (living in the Philippines the Broadband is not always reliable).

I have not purchased any 4k movies yet of course. I did have an issue back in 2017 when High Sierra was released. My third party ripping software stopped working and the company never found a way around Apple's code changes or whatever they did. So I stopped ripping movies.

With the demise of iTunes in Catalina I decided I would like to have a backup of my entire collection so I recently bought a 10 year old Macbook White off eBay for next to nothing, loaded Sierra and the third party ripping software and am now back up to date with my collection copying.

There are of course different views on how safe your purchases are with Apple, 4k and extras etc but for me just having the plain vanilla movie tucked away in my own collection just in case Apple screws up is enough peace of mind.

 

[Wondercow]

The point is, for many of us, that we shouldn't have to download and hoard our digital files especially when Apple has been ramming the cloud and digital services down our throats for the better part of what? 15 years now?


.... that said I'm really giving serious thought to buying a HDD and doing just that...

Don’t get me wrong, I understand that, but to be fair all around they do clearly advise to download and back up the files. Also to be fair, it’s moronic that when the user cannot download a file through no fault of their own, e.g. 4K, and thus it’s impossible to make a back up, that the files can then disappear. Apple really should have the responsibility in this case.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

The point is, for many of us, that we shouldn't have to download and hoard our digital files especially when Apple has been ramming the cloud and digital services down our throats for the better part of what? 15 years now?


.... that said I'm really giving serious thought to buying a HDD and doing just that...

I agree 100%!!!

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

Don’t get me wrong, I understand that, but to be fair all around they do clearly advise to download and back up the files. Also to be fair, it’s moronic that when the user cannot download a file through no fault of their own, e.g. 4K, and thus it’s impossible to make a back up, that the files can then disappear. Apple really should have the responsibility in this case.

I agree Apple should have the responsibility however, I can't help but think that their attitude nowadays is 'buy it again'.
Maybe they'll release Apple Care for iTunes - All your purchases protected from when one of our staff accidentally (on purpose) deletes one of your films - because we can!

 

[redheeler]

I don’t have one of the needed drives, so no, I haven’t yet ripped a 4K disc. I’ve been following the discussions and hoping that the universal workaround comes quickly!

I bought an LG WH16NS40 (NS50, I previously had the older NS40 version and that one does not work for 4K discs on any firmware version). Very easy to downgrade the firmware using the utility posted on the MakeMKV forum with the caveat being that it only works in Windows (luckily have a spare PC for such an eventuality, but I also could've used Bootcamp or possibly a VM). Was able to back up my copy of Star Trek (2009) using MakeMKV on the Mac Pro, so I can finally watch the 4K HDR version on my 5K iMac (Late 2015).

The file is large as expected, weighing in at about twice the size of a normal 1080p Blu-ray movie. Playback is smooth in VLC and IINA, confirming my suspicion that DRM is the only reason my three-year-old iMac is being kept from playing 4K content on iTunes. I'm sure it was done at the insistence of rights holders, but I'm still not going to bother buying another movie on the iTunes store.

Edit: Playback is not smooth in IINA. IINA doesn't appear to be very well optimized. Other players such as VLC and mpv handle it fine, other than Quicktime Player which doesn't support the MKV container and lossless audio tracks.

 

[pagansoul]

I rip all my favorite DVDs which currently are about 2,000 movies and TV shows. I do reduce the size where an hour is about 1 gig and have about 8TB of video and another as a dup copy. All my music CDs are also ripped.

 

[BF1M]

So the movies are back on the store....for sale again....I have to rebuy them both hahah

 

[-Gonzo-]

So the movies are back on the store....for sale again....I have to rebuy them both hahah

Source Code is back in my Library

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

So the movies are back on the store....for sale again....I have to rebuy them both hahah

Well, you have a case there as it's clear that these files have been 'deleted' in error. Imagine this effect EVERY person in your country who bought that title from iTunes. That's a horrible and dishonest way to do business.
It's very clear that you need to speak to someone in management there and discuss the problem. The Apple TV 4K is designed 100% to be a streaming device from the Apple servers - iCloud. There is no way that a customer outside of this forum can be expected to use Apple Homesharing and all of its bugs just to play a film. It's not going to happen. It's too complicated & time consuming - they'd simply use another platform or which the majority are doing, just stick to Netflix or Amazon Prime.

This drama should be sorted immediately by Apple. It's making them look a very third rate company and is terrible PR.

 

[-Gonzo-]

So the movies are back on the store....for sale again....I have to rebuy them both hahah

Try logging out of account then logging back in again as that seems to of worked for others.

 

[BF1M]

Try logging out of account then logging back in again as that seems to of worked for others.

I tried that and no joy. What did work though was buying a new movie. My library updated right away with the missing movies returned.
This was an ordeal.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

I tried that and no joy. What did work though was buying a new movie. My library updated right away with the missing movies returned.
This was an ordeal.

WOW How bizarre is that!!!!!!!!
I noticed last week that a film that got deleted by Apple from their store 2 years ago REAPPEARED on my wishlist!!!!!!!! How freaky is that!
Sadly, the movie documentary that got stolen from my iTunes library was never returned :'(
iTunes is weird!

 

[jwolf6589]

I have over a thousand movies and TV shows, all ripped from their discs, with all of the extras, and no further compression. Basically full discs, minus the ads. They’re all on hard drives.

You could do it if you wanted to

Seriously though, your current issue is the reason why I don’t buy anything but disc-based media. (and the better quality)

your situation is a rare one.

 

[Juicy Box]

I have recently gone back to physical media, partly due to the potential of what happened to the OP.

I have a huge collection of DVD and some BluRays, and started collecting more in the past year. An interesting note, I do not own a DVD nor BluRay Player. I use PLEX, which is much better than iTunes for almost everything.

I also have a large CD, Cassette, and vinyl record collection for music. Most has been imported to iTunes, and I still use iTunes Match for most of my music collection, but would not trust Apple with the storage of my music.

Back in 2015, my entire iTunes Match collection disappeared from Apple's servers. Apple's engineers' response was that I never had any music stored using iTunes Match, which was of course BS.

Always keep a back up or two.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

I have recently gone back to physical media, partly due to the potential of what happened to the OP.

I have a huge collection of DVD and some BluRays, and started collecting more in the past year. An interesting note, I do not own a DVD nor BluRay Player. I use PLEX, which is much better than iTunes for almost everything.

I also have a large CD, Cassette, and vinyl record collection for music. Most has been imported to iTunes, and I still use iTunes Match for most of my music collection, but would not trust Apple with the storage of my music.

Back in 2015, my entire iTunes Match collection disappeared from Apple's servers. Apple's engineers' response was that I never had any music stored using iTunes Match, which was of course BS.

Always keep a back up or two.

OUCH!!!!!!!!! That's horrid about iTunes Match. This is why I won't use Apple Music as there has been so many reports where users have lost their own collections. All of my music downloads are in iTunes and for my streaming I use Spotify. I'll never recommend Apple Music because of this and warn friends about it.

iTunes used to be reliable until 2015+ and every few weeks I get a bug when syncing my iPhone and for some reason the iTunes on my Mac decides to remove every piece of content from a playlist that i'd synced to my iPhone previously. And then 1 in 3 times it won't sync to my iTune and gets stuck on 'checking photos library'. The only solution is to quit iTunes and start again. Remember when iTunes USED to work reliably?

I use iCloud for iTunes films but I like to keep everything else downloaded to my MacBook & iPhone. I tend to buy the larger storage option.
I don't upload my photos etc to iCloud. A friend had a similar situation to you. For a few years she'd been uploading her iPhone pics to the iCloud and paying the monthly charge. She ruined her iPhone by spilling water on it. When she tried to retrieve her photos on her Mac they simply were not there. Apple's response was that she'd never uploaded her photos to the iCloud - even though she'd been charged the 79p a month for the extra storage etc. Sadly, she ended her business with Apple and has bought Samsung Galaxy phones ever since etc. What a terrible way to loose a customer along with her family.

For me, I download now the iTunes film & keep it safe on my Mac & back it up if it's something that I love or i'll keep it on my iPhone X for travelling. Although in fairness, I wouldn't say that I buy many films.

If you like cassette tapes, you MUST watch the documentary 'Cassette'. It's on Amazon Prime to watch and to rent/buy in iTunes. Really great watch!

 

[Wondercow]

your situation is a rare one.

The only rare part of it is not recompressing the video. There are many, many people who rip their own discs (or rip borrowed discs ) and store them on local hard drives.

 

[jwolf6589]

The only rare part of it is not recompressing the video. There are many, many people who rip their own discs (or rip borrowed discs ) and store them on local hard drives.

It’s just so much cheaper andeasier to buy a external CD drive.

 

[Juicy Box]

It’s just so much cheaper andeasier to buy a external CD drive.

I am confused about what an external CD drive has to do with having a media collection.

I think you are not understanding the situation.

Most people that are ripping and encoding their CD, DVDs, and BluRays are most likely doing it to use in some type of media server.

For example, I encode all my DVD and BluRay collection, and use it with PLEX and I have my own Netflix style app to view all my own content.

It is a lot of work to rip and encode everything, but the convenience of being able to play my massive DVD and BlueRay collection on demand using my ATV more than makes up for the work of encoding each disc.

buy a external CD drive

People do use some type of disc drive, either internal or external, to rip and encode.

Do you mean like a DVD or BluRay player connected to a TV being easier? I guess it is easy because you don't have to do the ripping and encoding, but it isn't as convenient as playing your DVD collection from an app.

You don't have to worry about getting the disc, putting it in, potentially damaging the disc, storing the cases for the disc. I have all my encoded discs packed away in boxes in my basement.

I personally do not have a DVD nor BluRay player connected to any of my TVs in my home. There is not need.