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48 Comments
- breakneckridge, on 10/12/2007, -2/+20And they're so stupid! Why would the consumer pay $20 for a movie download! It's either insanity or they're purposely trying to kill the concept of legal movie downloads.
- Ireland, on 10/12/2007, -4/+18The studios are a bunch of greedy bastards!!
- mastercheif, on 10/12/2007, -6/+16Why in the world would anybody pay $20 dollars for a video that is
1. DRM'ed
2. At 320*240 resolution
3. Compressed like a bitch
4. Stereo
Wait, it's not like the people who actually buy music from iTunes care anyway. - noneloud, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11You know, sometimes I wonder if you're not half right breakneckridge. It wouldn't be surprising if the whole reason for doing this is to show "See? the pirates still won't buy it legally! It's hopeless!"
Acctually, nevermind. . . . . It's not like the M.A.F.I.A.A. has ever felt compeled to justify it's actions. - NSResponder, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Nothing wrong with being greedy, the problem is that they're being STUPID. More popular movies will make a lot more money, not because of having a higher price, but because they'll sell MORE COPIES.
-jcr - node3, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I really doubt the movie downloads will be at 320x240, it just doesn't make the same sort of sense as it does for TV shows. For the ever-cynical among you, just keep in mind there will definitely be a new video iPod to go along with the movie store.
- node3, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Being greedy is not considered a very good trait, and leads to stupid decisions which ruin things for everyone. Stupid things like charging $20 for online movie downloads.
Seeking profit, benefit, or basically trying to get a good deal, is not a bad thing. We don't call that greedy until it crosses over into the realm either of exploitation (ie. oil profits, price-gauging in disaster zones, etc) or trying to charge significantly more money than seems reasonable in a market (such as in this case).
I could really get into a pricing model of $5-$15. $5 for all those old movies that no one buys, $10 as an average price for most movies, and $15 for big blockbuster new releases (dropping down to $10 in a few months).
If they want me to pay $20, they will absolutely have to make the movie available within a month of theatrical release (it should be same day, but anytime in the first month could be acceptable). Even a full DVD-quality download, with extra features and all aren't worth it when I can just buy an actual DVD for less. - angelp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6@flashboca - Considering these so-called "stupid *****" are the target audience, it matters greatly what they say and feel since they're going to be the ones purchasing the product. They may not make as much as these studio heads, but they clearly have a better idea of what the Average Joe would want to pay and most people are not being unreasonable.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I agree, in a sense. Personally, I think $5.99 would be a nice sweet spot - half the price of a movie ticket. Think about what they're competing with - free DVD rips circulating all around the P2P networks. That's why iTunes and the television show sales took off - $0.99 and $1.99 were just cheap enough to warrant a purchase and the store was easy to navigate and worked well with their iPod. A few clicks and they had their content ready to go.
The only way they could charge $9.99 and make money is if the movie is approaching DVD quality, since $10 is about half the price of a DVD. And, at that price point, it begins to cut into people buying DVDs. But, at $5.99, people would still buy their DVDs and just get the same movie at iTunes instead of spending all their time reencoding for the iPod.
But, if you thought the music industry was nuts, don't even look at the movie industry. A lot of the comments being made here are grossly uninformd. Movie studios spend a metric ***** of money creating their content, and even more appeasing distributors, movie chains and big box stores to carry their wares. Moving to digital sales is, to put it lightly, a highly disruptive move that can't be made to quickly. I'm willing to cut the studios some slack, but they still need to rethink their pricing policy. They only need to look at music and TV to realize where the money is to be made. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5"and no DRM"
Keep dreaming.
"The studios don't want to allow burning to DVD."
What Apple SHOULD do is convince the studios to put iPod versions of their films ON the DVD, instead of trying to twist their arms to do it the other way around. - Lyianis, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6If the option to download a movie legitimately at $19.99 with standard NTSC resolutions and DRM was offered, i would laugh and never touch it.
If i were to buy a movie, i would download it and then purchase a DVD if the movie was worthwhile.
At $9.99, NTSC and DRM, I'd think about it.
At $9.99, NTSC or higher and no DRM and I'd buy it.
The movie industry prices and litigates its way into failure. It needs to consider the consumer before their profits and they will see them rise. - mastercheif, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Dude, I'm all for the low price point, but $3.99 is to low. If they wanted to get some money and sales, I would think it would be between 5-10 dollars.
- Greyarea, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I just hope that when it launches it's International and not just American. Or at the very least it becomes International after, say 6 months of bedding in time.
- dearreid, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Right, the concept they're not grasping is VOLUME. Pricing downloads right (i.e., reasonably low), will lead to greater sales volume. Because downloads have no duplication costs, profits will scale much faster with downloads than they do with physical media.
Setting a price point of $19.99—higher than just about any DVD I've ever purchased—will only result in a small number of people making the purchase. In fact, the price should be much lower. You're getting a lower-resolution copy of the movie, and probably a lot less of the "special feature" content we're used to seeing on DVDs.
A high price point reduces the number of impulse buys. At $0.99 per song, I find it much easier to just go to iTunes and buy the one I need without even thinking about the price. If songs were $3.99 each, I'd be incented to open up Limewire or Kazaa once again. The same will apply to movies. - shmatt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I would just like to congratulate and thank everyone. this is the first artic le having anything to do with Apple without any immature flamebait comments. i just +dugg you all.
... although I'm sure some doofus will ruin it now. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3reading some of the comments, i do think it would be pretty smart to just sell the movies primarily for portable devices and computer monitors, and sell them at a discounted rate of around 4.99. because, a lot more movies would be sold, and if you really liked a movie you would be willing to buy the HD-DVD version of it for your big fat plasma tv.
but ther is no way near DVD quality would be sold for any less than 9.99. - Legondaree, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I think 9.99 is a fair price for itune downloadable movies if they are movies that are released the same time as the DVD. 5.99 for older releases (6 months or later than the DVD release) I have a creative zen m, never used an ipod but if the image quality of the movies on the ipod is about that of the creative zen m when using the av cable connected to the TV, then i think it would be worth 9.99. then again most of the movies I have played on my TV using my zen where DVD rips that I made in xvid or divx format so that may make a decent difference in what itunes image quality of their video downloads are. like I said Ive never used it
- cbiz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"Quicktime which is only good for telling me I don't have the current version." - - - download K-Lite Codec Pack with the hacked QTime player and U will never have to see that again, as a bonus you will be able to also have a FULL screen...
- cbiz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3flashboca - WTF R U talking about? Glad U don't work for me.
- cbiz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3That $1.99 to $5.99 DVD bargin bin at my video store is looking better and better.
- amosconi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I would like a free lunch like everybody, but there is no way a movie on iTMS will be much lower than a cinema ticket: for 10-12 bucks you go once to the cinema and you get nothing after seeing the movie.
Movies on DVDs start around the same price for older ones and go up to the roof for "special editions" just released crap
9,99 could be a good compromise for a movie that you can keep and watch again if you like it, but with a lower quality that the real thing (Cinemas, DVDs and normal television): You cannot attempt to destroy these other markets, not at the beginning, at least... ;-)
DRM is not in discussion as we all know why there must be some kind of DRM: everybody that talk about selling movies (or songs, for that matter) legally with no DRM is just deluded, or selling his own stuff which is of course perfectly fine. - natch, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6I hadn't been following this stuff, and today seeing it in the news here and there, before reading any articles was wondering to myself what price they were talking about. My guess was probably $2.99 would be a nice low price, but Jobs might settle for $3.99 since the studios tend to overprice things. At $3.99 they might sell me a few movies, maybe a dozen or so very select ones. At the lower price ($2.99) they would sell me quite a few more, probably by an order of magnitude.
But wait. Then I read the articles. Holy crap, the price they are fighting over is $9.99! OMG, and that's the Jobs price! Forget it. They are just unclear on the concept. It is not just a purchase where I am paying only in money. It is also an exchange of my time for the value the movie delivers. Two hours is a LOT of time to give to anything, so I don't expect the price to scale up as high as that. Remeber, I am paying not only in money; I also have to spend time watching the thing. There is opportunity cost for that. It's not like a song where I can enjoy the same thing 100 times while doing other activities. Movies give a lot, but you have to put a lot into them too. Adding an expensive price on top of that is no doubt exactly why viewership has been declining. The movie studios should get a clue about the fact that there are other entertainment choices out there they are competing against. I'm just not that interested in the fare to pay such high prices.
Movie industry, and Steve Jobs, $2.99 would be a good price, and $3.99 an acceptable price, with a little pain/rarity value. Anything higher than that shows you just don't get it. And yes, I'm talking about full quality, not craptastic SVGA quality. Show us you have a clue, and price movies at $3.99 or, better yet, $2.99. - Chicken2nite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I recall hearing something like that happening with future pixar flicks, which would be a nice bonus for the few people with video ipods.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4let's keep in perspective that the average budget for a feature film is 50 million dollars,and blockbusters 80mil plus, 10mil being considered almost shoe string.
whereas the average cost of producing a tv show is less than a million. some reality shows are very cheap to produce. so if tv shows are selling for 1.99, costing a few hundred thousand to make, and a film cost 50 million, i think its fair to say your not going to be seing movie download prices for anything cheaper than 9.99 - Shivetya, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I want tiered movie pricing. I do not want the bottom end price to be 9.99.
Since it is to be provided without physical media it must cost less than a store bought DVD.
Some issues.
1. What is the resolution?
2. What is the DRM used?
3. What sound format is provided? If its 5.1 then we are fine, if its just aimed for headphones then it better be damn cheap.
4. Regarding #1 and #3, just how in the hell do they expect people to download these things without seriously reducing the overall quality?
I don't think the majority of high speed surfers have the connections required to download DVD quality titles in any reasonable time.
Back on the subject of pricing.
I regularly can buy old DvDs and straight to DvD titles for less than 10 bucks, sometimes I can get them as low as 5 bucks. Now with tiered pricing this would allow me to pick up titles I would otherwise dismiss. I think the starting price needs to be a whole lot less.
How the studios could cash in.
Reduce the quality to EDTV, sound to 2.1 or a emulated 5.1. Apply the price paid as a mailed coupon to the purchase of the DvD. Sell copies off the net for $2.99 for old DvDs and up to $9.99 for new releases. Once purchased they mail you a coupon to purchase the DvD. They could give you any percentage of the price you paid for the digital version off the real version. The key is how greedy they get, if you could only use the coupons at their store it would not be worth it, but at any retail outlet it would be.
While I like the idea of downloading movies I doubt I will pleased with the format they choose, I especially fear it will be Quicktime which is only good for telling me I don't have the current version. - noneloud, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3The studios don't want to allow burning to DVD. I think Apple should suggest that for 2 more dollars or some set price, people can burn the DVDs.
Pricing the new movies at 19 would be rediculous and they are asking to have the service fail if they want that. There are new movies that I can buy for less than 19 dollars and have them on DVD, and I know they wouldn't be a ble to push DVD quality with this thing; It's just physically impossible. - dmann, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Agreed...
They need to realize that an itunes resolution download is essentially a rental. I know, you can keep it and watch it more than once, but only on an ipod or computer... People arent going to buy a film to keep in their collection this way.
Then again, there are MANY times I would buy a flick, if there were a library similar to the Itunes one, as something to do on a boring night after getting off work.
Studios, learn the itunes lesson, make the price reasonable, and people will pay for the things that they used to steal, out of sheer convenience. Even when the file is lower quality and less versatile, its CONVENIENT.
Duh... - Chicken2nite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2It's like what they used to do with music singles and what they're currently doing with tv shows on itunes: Charge a premium so that they won't be price competitive with Albums or DVD's. That way they aren't shooting themselves in the foot in terms of the proven cash flow (DVD season sets and the like). Still, 20 bucks is too much for anything less than 720p. Edit: And the ability to burn it to disc.
- danr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2They're still going to produce special features for the DVD versions anyway though, so it's not like it would add to the cost to include them on the downloadable ones.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Ha, yes, I had just blogged about why it's idiotic that movies aren't up on iTunes the day before all these stories hit, and I too thought that $5.99 was the right price, considering what it costs to see a movie in a theater in most parts of the country.
The point I had made was that studios are looking at this too strictly as an end-product and not as an extension of the movie experience, something that can support both theater and DVD releases as well as gets a modest amount of money from the just-curious-enough who wouldn't have paid for it in the first place. - cbiz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3The hollystupid crowd is in (reel) trouble. Blu-Ray & HDDVD should get very little consumer support unless you have a giant TV screen and just have to have it. One thing I find funny is the discs won't yet hold an entire "Lord of the Rings" or "King Kong" so you won't be seeing longer event movies on these discs. Downloading is the way to go but they will ***** that up with BS pricing schemes.
- NSResponder, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1You bring up a good point about the pricing. The RIAA and MPAA think that their choice is between charging 99 cents or two bucks for a song, and between 9.99 and twenty bucks for a movie. What they fail to realize is that the REAL choice is between getting 99 cents for a song, or getting NOTHING, because people will just go find what they want on a P2P network. They've really shot themselves in the foot with the litigation. If's never a good idea to make your customers hate you.
-jcr - JoeyDeacon, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Price these things too high and they will fail for the same reason UMDs have failed. For 3-5 quid I woudl ahve bought UMDs galore. In fact every time I took a plane trip I would have bought them and then discarded them. For the £15-20 they were asking they can kiss my ass.
I watch a movie once and thats me done. I'm not going to watch it ten times and I don't really care to own it. I just want to watch it when and where I want. - natch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The stores in China have figured out a fair price: $12 for a six-DVD set (Godfather series) and if you shop around you can find it for $10. This is talking about legitimate stores, not street stalls that fold up and disappear when the police show up. Single-DVD movies are around $2. No DRM. Let me say that again. $2. No DRM. People there buy movies like crazy. Unlike in the US, where most people own just a handful of titles, most of those Disney kids cartoon features bought at Costco or picked up at a garage sale.
Consumers want lower prices. If you think the market will bear today's high prices, you aren't paying attention to the fact that most people simply aren't buying that many titles.
Message to those smart people who actually work in the industry: Helloooo, I didn't pay anything for movies in the last year, yet I have watched a ton of them. How smart are you, exactly? You COULD have made money off me. I'm not exactly poor. When Amazon launched years ago and I decided to build a library of technical books, you should have seen the bookshelves fill up in my house! I'd love to do the same with movies, but will never do so at the ridiculous price points you are proposing. I'll continue to borrow movies from the library, and will continue to pay nothing to watch them. - geekee, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1They're stupid if they deal with Apple. Why deal with a company that uses a proprietary DRM system to create an artificial monopoly and lock out all the online competition? Apple has already shown they are neither friendly to customers, nor the recording industry. So why deal with them when Blockbuster, Netflix, or Amazan could easily do the job, and not put selling hardware before selling their movies.
- haooken, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2nah, they're more like potatioes...
/I LOL'd - xoineg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I have no problem with DRM and at $9.95 it should be DVD quality and allow you to burn a few copies to DVD. After all the studios will be saving money on DVDs and packaging. They can also offer low quality movies for iPod, but anything more than $3.99 for one would be just too greedy. Unlike movie executives Jobs is very aware of pricing and can influence their decision after all he owns a big chunk of Disney.
- actorboy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Hahaha! Dude! That is so awesome! You took the words Hollywood and stupid and made them into Hollystupid! Hahaha! /sarcasm
Seriously, try making your points without the childish name-play -- you might actually get someone who holds a different view to read and consider your opinion. Otherwise, you're just talking to the people who already agree. Kind of a waste of energy, don't you think? - skippy619, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Frankly, I don't see how Apple can expect to get people to pay 10 dollars for a movie without any special features. I still can't believe they charge 2 dollars for some 10 minute clips.
- dombi, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I agree with some of the people posting above. $10 would be the right price. $20 is way too high and I could buy a DVD for that price. I would understand a higher price for a higher quality download (like $20 for an HD version), but the standard widescreen TV movies should not cost more than $10.
There is much less trouble for the movie studios with the downloads. They don't need to bundle all the extra crap that comes with the DVD releases. They don't need to manufacture the discs and put extra features on it. Heck, put 10 minutes worth of commercials in the beginning of the movie and knock the price down to $5 a movie! I am sure that new movie trailers, other companies would like to add their own commercials to the beginning of the downloaded movies.
Don't screw the customer. They are the ones paying your salary! - skippy619, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0also please check out my site and blog at
www.web.mac.com/bennettgavrish - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4So...you think you should be COMPENSATED for the time you spend watching a movie that you CHOOSE to watch?
That could possibly be the dumbest thing I have ever heard of.
Youi know, Major League Baseball games are almost a full half hour longer on average than they were 20 years ago. Therefore, ticket prices should be lower, since they should pay the fans more moey for their time spent. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -6/+4@natch
im sorry but i think your a fool if you think any movie studio is going to sell your cheapo self a new movie for 4 bucks. thats absurd. i think 10 bucks is a perfectly fair price to pay if they make the resoluction much higher and playable on a 42" tv. apple is going to have to spend a lot of money to make it possible to upload a million movies (with file sizes exponentially larger than music) a day to be selling stuff that cheap.
also, only a fool looks at a film and thinks " oh gee, i shouldnt pay as much for a movie as i would for a cd because i actually would have to use my brain". one reason why so many awful mindless movies are made, is because of so many meatheads who think like that - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+2What the ***** kind of business model raises the price of items that have higher demand!
Oh wait...ALL OF THEM! - catoutfit, on 10/12/2007, -4/+1are studioes like potatoes?
- noneloud, on 10/12/2007, -6/+3My post (this one) is another example why Digg needs a limited 'delete' function. I totally posted it in the wrong place. Sorry.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -9/+3You gotta love all the diggies not only disagreeing with the idea, but also coming up with hteir own detailed "analysis" based on absolultey NOTHING but how they FEEL the prices should be. No actual market analysis. No expertise in the area at all. Yet you stupid ***** actually think you know what to do more than the people who make more money in a year than ALL OF YOU COMBINED ever will!
- ubica, on 10/12/2007, -13/+55. in retarded .mov format
6. 3 to 6 months after it goes to theaters (as is the trend with dvd's these days)
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