New Media Content Distribution System?

[stuBCN75]

You can also contact Apple once a year to give you back ALL your 'lives', in essence resetting all the old registered computers from jobs you got fired from, ex girl friends laptops etc. Don't question mighty Steve and Apple. They know their customers and products, just a little bit.

Didnt know that either
Not been fired .... yet, touch wood !

I think it's great that Apple are looking at new ways of making $$, i really rate iTunes and would also like to be able to buy films online too. But I think I will have to wait until I can get a decent ADSL connection.

 

[JoeG4]

Yep, sounds like a rental "You pay $20 a month and have UNLIMITED ACCESS TO EVERYTHING WITH NOOO LIMITS!!!!!" service.

Steve Jobs & Co is beginning to come off as raging hypocrites. They introduce something, act like it's revolutionary and awesome, then turn around a few months/years later and act as if they never did it in the first place. Shoot, it's come to the point that he even dissed the idea of a video iPod *DAYS* before it was introduced.

Why doesn't this fat old jerk stand behind ANYTHING he says? Business? Some business. That isn't a business, it's a stock investor puppet.

 

[ScubaDuc]

people watching movies on a plane is such a minority as to not be a worthwhile hinderance in rolling something like this out. i fly all the time... something like 100,000 miles this year and i see maybe 2-3 people per flight crack open their laptops or portable DVD players.

If u fly all that much then you must be aware that unless you are flying business or u are a midget, there just isn't enough room to really do anything. The screen sits at an angle and u have to slide under to see anything....

I really think it is a matter of principle...If we pay for rights, we should have the material. Period.

 

[seriypshick]

Good idea but...

What if you don't always have internet connection for example in airplanes.

I hope they go with iTunes model instead.

 

[blackpeter]

Yep, sounds like a rental "You pay $20 a month and have UNLIMITED ACCESS TO EVERYTHING WITH NOOO LIMITS!!!!!" service.

Steve Jobs & Co is beginning to come off as raging hypocrites. They introduce something, act like it's revolutionary and awesome, then turn around a few months/years later and act as if they never did it in the first place. Shoot, it's come to the point that he even dissed the idea of a video iPod *DAYS* before it was introduced.

Why doesn't this fat old jerk stand behind ANYTHING he says? Business? Some business. That isn't a business, it's a stock investor puppet.

Woah. What's with all the hostility? What's so hypocritical about a subscription model for TV and movies? That is, *if* they introduce such a model at all. Seems to make sense.

Right now I pay DirecTV $60 a month. I pay Netflix another $17. That's $77 a month for content I'll never "own" (and don't want to). I don't know about you, but I'm not one of these guys with a DVD collection. Once I watch a movie or television program, I'm done. I don't need to watch it over and over and I don't need to pay $20-per-film to watch something once.

Music is different, which is why Steve was so adamant that their *Music* Store not be subscription based. Are you saying that Apple would be acting hypocritically by going to a subscription based Video Store? Because, I don't see how the two are related. Music is very different than film and TV in this sense.

 

[johnnyjibbs]

Maybe it's the killer app that .Mac has been waiting for all these years. That said, this would compromise video sales and I'm unsure whether internet bandwidth would be good enough for the job. At the end of the day, I'm sure they'd want to free as many obstacles from a sale as possible, even if this meant having to accept some forms of piracy (which already exists anyway). Anyway - crippling DRM anyone?

 

[ScubaDuc]

I'm thinking of the living room. I don't take my 50" HDTV with me on a plane, so it doesn't bother me that this content might not be portable.

It is really the principle, like someone posted before, it seems the Time Warners of this world are looking for ways to increase their turnover, and that means less money in our pockets

50 inch? With that size your pixels must be the size of...bricks: I would hate to read teletext on it but I am not sure you ever had it in the U.S.

 

[jholzner]

Yep, sounds like a rental "You pay $20 a month and have UNLIMITED ACCESS TO EVERYTHING WITH NOOO LIMITS!!!!!" service.

Steve Jobs & Co is beginning to come off as raging hypocrites. They introduce something, act like it's revolutionary and awesome, then turn around a few months/years later and act as if they never did it in the first place. Shoot, it's come to the point that he even dissed the idea of a video iPod *DAYS* before it was introduced.

Why doesn't this fat old jerk stand behind ANYTHING he says? Business? Some business. That isn't a business, it's a stock investor puppet.

No they are not coming of that way. Jobs has even said that music isn't like movies. You want to own your music because you listen to is so much. But how many times do you watch your favorite movie? Not nearly as much. I think it's inline with what they've said in the past. Besides, this is just a rumor...I bet the final product (if it even exists) will make more sense once we know the whole and true story.

 

[Cooknn]

It is really the principle, like someone posted before, it seems the Time Warners of this world are looking for ways to increase their turnover, and that means less money in our pockets

50 inch? With that size your pixels must be the size of...bricks: I would hate to read teletext on it but I am not sure you ever had it in the U.S.

Hi-Def on a 50" looks great from the couch. I actually prefer 720p to 1080i. I guess 1080p is on the horizon as well.

 

[puuukeey]

According to their source, the new system will rely on .Mac's iDisk for storage, keeping media files from ever being held locally on the purchaser's hard drive, utilizing the rumored Front Row 2.0.

its a fairplay fix....

now we don't even get VIRTUAL copy of our media. we would truly be renting something for buying rates playing it only on apples and media companies terms

HEY APPLE!!! BOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

/recording engineer.
-matt

 

[laughingboy]

Closed minds?

For a bunch of mac users, the minds are quite closed...

1) just because it's referred to as .mac in TS's article, it likely won't be the same infrastructure i.e. so slooooow, or it would be a non-starter. Apple will provide more than enough infrastructure so support whatever this is. I've never had a problem getting any updates or files quickly from Apple servers in recent years - unlike the Mac OS 7,8,9 days...

2) Video isn't the same as audio. It doesn't demand as much replay. How many times to you want to watch last nights Daily Show? Not as many times as the latest album from your favourite artist. It can be subscription...much like cable acts today.

3) Bandwidth. Few, in North America at least, have sufficient bandwidth for 1080 HD. So what. It will come when bandwidth increases. I'm not up on the sweet spot for bandwidth levels of the population vs. content quality, but it's probably going to be on par with most current non-HD, or 720 HD content.

4) Portability. I doubt Apple would require fulltime connection to support some content playback. Probably a 24 hour local download, or more would be doable.

5) Clearly a mini-like chunk of hardware, perhaps acting more like an appliance (like the iPod) than a mac will anchor the release of this.

It would be interesting to count up all the shows I watch in a week, and divide the amount I spend on cable / month, and see what the cost is /hour or per show. I think it's possible I would get better quality, service and content while saving money with the Apple model.

I can't wait to see what's really up. It's an interesting time that will eventually affect all of the tube staring population.

 

[m-dogg]

This is one rumor i hope is not true. I would not feel comfrotable have my purchased media on a remote sever.

What if I wanted to watch the movie on an airplane? Or some where else i don't have an internet connection.

I don't think this is going to happen. Steve has always stressed that people want to own there media.

Hmmm...he has said that people want to own thier music...because they like to listen to that again and again much more than they'd watch a movie.

But a movie on the other hand, Blockbuster/Netflix/etc...show that a market does exist for renting movies.

 

[stoid]

Yeah. Steve has said repeatedly that video and music are inherently different. You might watch your favorite show or move two dozen times at most, however your favorite song you could play hundreds of times.

Notice that there are hundreds of video rental brick and mortar places. However, how many music rental places are there? I can't think of any, and certainly none as big as Blockbuster or Hollywood Video or other (inter)national chain.

 

[Super Dave]

The iMac was just a beta test.

I don't know how many people read my last post (about Apple's Front Row movie trailers already utilizing this streaming technology), but about 20 minutes after I posted it I figured something out.

The iMac using Front Row INTENTIONALLY sucks. It was a trial balloon before the real thing launched. To test how well the new streaming technology works in the real world.

Front Row 2 will undoubtedly fix this.

For those who think this is going to fail, please remember the No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame. comments when the original iPod was released. You're just not getting the vision. Video on planes is a non-issue for the vast majority of human beings. This is for your house. Read that again, your house. The only people who watch portable video are kids in the back seats of cars and an ever changing group of 10 teenagers who think it's cool. For a week. And for those kids, the iPod direct download will work fine for them, and for visiting a friends'.

So long as you own the videos, and can put them on your iPod to watch on the go or at your friends' place, no one will care if they have their videos hosted locally on their computer. Who would want to have to buy a hard drive that ridiculously huge anyway?

So long as your ISP is up or you've copied the one you want to watch to your iPod, you have your movies. This won't involve .Mac (Apple's not that stupid), it won't be subscription (Apple's not that stupid). Apple is about to own a huge portion of the television and movie industry in 10 years or less.

EDIT: maybe it will be subscription. I forgot how much Jobs mentions people not wanting to watch movies over and over again. But I stand by the rest of my analysis.

David

 

[otter-boy]

Really?

Video on planes is a non-issue for the vast majority of human beings. This is for your house. Read that again, your house. The only people who watch portable video are kids in the back seats of cars and an ever changing group of 10 teenagers who think it's cool. For a week. [emphasis added]

David

I'm not saying that I go around watching movies and TV on the road or in the air that much, but when I travel by plane I do like to have something there that I can watch on my laptop.

I'm not kid, not a teenager, just a regular old boring adult. My wife, my brother, and most of my friends have laptops. We're all pretty tech-savvy, and we all watch at least some media (movies, TV, video blogs) on our laptops.

Watching something on a laptop is not necessarily an optimal experience, but we often settle for it because it's better than watching the latest Ashton Kutcher film on a plane. It's also nice for long train rides and, yes, even car trips. But, I also watch movies on my laptop when my wife has commandeered the TV or when I'm sick and stuck in bed.

I think it would be short-sighted of Apple to tie their content exclusively to TVs and iPods. They would definitely limit their sales and slow adoption of the service.

 

[vmardian]

Think FAR into the future when the network is everywhere, and its fast enough to stream HD content. In this kind of world, streaming video on demand to a controlled device is the ultimate solution to all the problems associated with content distribution.

 

[doucy2]

agreed - seems a little weird to me. Also begs the question of what if you're not a .Mac subscriber?

exactly like me
this mini would probally be a total wast of money

i do like the idea of frontrow with idisk

 

[aprilfools]

.mac

I would imagine that almost everybody here is of a "Mac techy" type nature and loves all the cool stuff Apple puts out. I know that I am that way for sure. And I finally just bought .Mac last week on black Friday. Point being, get .Mac and stop complaining about it if Apple makes .Mac a requirement for the new services rumored about. .Mac is kinda fun to have anyway so bust out and buy it c'mon.

 

[supergod]

I think this idea is brilliant, but that's not what I'm going to talk about. What I think should be pointed out is such an obvious point that most people never think about it; you may think you "own" the albums you have bought with iTunes, but you can not access them without a computer. They are virtual: not real.

With the amount of progress the internet has made over the years, it is quickly replacing most of the duties of regular computers, or supercomputers. Is there any difference between having your bits and bytes of data located on the internet, where it is invisibly and conveniently accessable on your computer to having those same bits and bytes on your Hard Drive? It is the same content either way.

It would be great if Apple made films available for download, but realistically the file sizes would be huge: most people who could want such a service would be unable to use it because they wouldn't have a large enough Hard Drive. This internet based approach means that any computer user, no matter the technology of their computer (how large a HD they option for) can use it and have the same experience.

 

[johnnyjibbs]

You're just not getting the vision. Video on planes is a non-issue for the vast majority of human beings. This is for your house. Read that again, your house. The only people who watch portable video are kids in the back seats of cars and an ever changing group of 10 teenagers who think it's cool. For a week. And for those kids, the iPod direct download will work fine for them, and for visiting a friends'.

The biggest marketing mistake they could make would be to release the new VIDEO iPod and then produce a video content service that was NOT compatible.

I think this idea is brilliant, but that's not what I'm going to talk about. What I think should be pointed out is such an obvious point that most people never think about it; you may think you "own" the albums you have bought with iTunes, but you can not access them without a computer. They are virtual: not real.

Actually, I do own my iTunes downloaded music because I have the right to use it how I want, when I want. I can burn a CD of it LEGALLY and then use it in a CD player. I hope you're not trying to tell me that I don't own music CDs that I buy from a brick and mortar store and play - they are not virtual because I need a CD player to listen to them!

I own them because no-one can ask for it back.

 

[JonDownin]

I think this idea is brilliant, but that's not what I'm going to talk about. What I think should be pointed out is such an obvious point that most people never think about it; you may think you "own" the albums you have bought with iTunes, but you can not access them without a computer. They are virtual: not real.

With the amount of progress the internet has made over the years, it is quickly replacing most of the duties of regular computers, or supercomputers. Is there any difference between having your bits and bytes of data located on the internet, where it is invisibly and conveniently accessable on your computer to having those same bits and bytes on your Hard Drive? It is the same content either way.

It would be great if Apple made films available for download, but realistically the file sizes would be huge: most people who could want such a service would be unable to use it because they wouldn't have a large enough Hard Drive. This internet based approach means that any computer user, no matter the technology of their computer (how large a HD they option for) can use it and have the same experience.

Point VERY well made!

 

[neutrino23]

This could be really great. I really don't want to own videos. We have a shelf full of them and we've watched most of them once.

Most of the movies I've seen more than once are those that happened to be on TV when there was nothing better to watch. In other words, the TV was the network and there was a film catalog of one. If there was a film catalog of tens of thousands I would rarely watch the same movie over again.

If Apple offered a huge library of films for a monthly fee that would suit me fine. New releases could be had for an extra charge.

If the monthly fee was all you want to watch then that would practically be the same as owning. Instead of going to the DVD rack you use the network. If you need a screen shot or short snippet just launch the movie and grab it.

Certainly there will be ways to hack this to do so even if it is not officially supported.

 

[Marvy]

Like Amazon?

I've thought for some time that they should offer a free ".Mac lite", with a smaller iDisk allocation and maybe banner ads on Homepages. Perhaps tie it to a hardware purchase, and make it good for like three years. With additional revenue coming from video sales, this might be plauible.

This is moving so fast, don't know if this has been said: This concept reminds alot of the new Amazon DVD rental service in Europe (don't know if it's available in the U.S.): You can order a fixed number of DVDs and keep them as long as you like. When you want to have new ones, you need to send your current ones back. Renting movies costs nothing, other than a monthly subscription fee, and you can return movies for new ones as often as you like.

Apple could do it like this as well. As an example: For $9.99 a month you get enough iDisk space for 3 full movies (for $15, you get space for 5, and so on). When your disk is full, and you'd like a new one, an old one has to go. Other than the subscription fee of disk space, the service would cost nothing.

Wouldn't that be something?

 

[gangst]

Do not like the idea of this at all. If it is as slow and awful as iDisk then this will be awful, it sounds like a horrible idea, but you can't fully judge till you've seen and used it so I'll wait till I pass full judgement.

 

[m-dogg]

Do not like the idea of this at all. If it is as slow and awful as iDisk then this will be awful, it sounds like a horrible idea, but you can't fully judge till you've seen and used it so I'll wait till I pass full judgement.

Agreed. They would have to seriously speed up iDisk for this to really happen.