“Apple Inc. strayed from making any material announcements during its shareholders meeting on Thursday, but did hint that it will offer video rentals through iTunes at some point in the future,” Prince McLean reports for AppleInsider.
“‘Timing of this is difficult to determine, but we would expect [iTunes video rentals] sometime in 2008,’ said PiperJaffray analyst Gene Munster, who attended the shareholder gathering in Apple’s hometown of Cupertino, Calif.,” McLean reports.
McLean reports, “In a note to clients, Munster [also] noted that an Apple stock split is looking less likely in the near term.”
Full article here.
World Domination will be one step closer… muuuahaahahahahaha!
MDNMW: hit. They will be a HIT.
At last! Movie rentals. I was waiting for it soooo long. I may wait a little bit longer, but hey, it’s on their radar screen.
2008? AAAUUGGHHHHHHHHH ! ! ! ! ! I can’t wait that long.
The day they begin their movie rental service is the day that I buy an AppleTV and cancel my three year old NetFlix subscription.
That will be a great day!
I won’t buy an AppleTV unless and until they offer movie rentals.
If I have an APPLETV, I would not able to watch all movies that are not available with subtitle or closed captioning.
If you are an Apple shareholders, please help us because 30 millions people who are deaf and hard of hearing are waiting for it. Apple will make a lot of money from Deaf community alone!
Thanks
Handbrake does a great job of converting DVD movies to ipod with Closed Captions and very legible as well.
Handbrake is now mediafork.
And that’s not his/her point. Their point is that they can’t buy/rent movies from iTunes because they don’t have captions. I’m sure he/she is well aware that they can get movies and rip them with captions.
this is fantastic news! Exactly the way movies should be handled. Even the best movies cannot be watched more than 5 times..
Nice to have the choice, though I prefer to buy for my library.
@ Me
Handbrake became Mediafork and then became Handbrake once again….
Confusing yes, but the original Handbrake developer went quiet, a new group started Mediafork (Handbrake source + improvements) and the the Handbrake person and the Medifork person got in touch with each other and it is NOW Handbrake once again (with lots of nice improvements!).
Didn’t the last QuickTime update mention support for closed captions? Maybe Apple are adding support via QT…
Firstly, correction for “me”, Handbrake is not Mediafork any longer, Mediafork is now Handbrake again. Look it up for yourself.
Secondly, this would be great news if we could rent movies, for say 2 days or even a week. As long as it is not more expensive or inconvenient than renting from another business.
Thirdly, it would be nice if Apple would make more of an effort to sell the movies in other countries, like here in Canada. I am still waiting for them, and now Apple hints at the next phase in movies for the US of A!?!? Come on Apple, it can’t be hard to sell movies in Canada, we have some of the most straight-forward copyright protection rules around, besides maybe Europe. Why is there such a long wait, and more importantly, why has it not been officially addressed since stating “We plan on selling movies worldwide in 2007.” I would like some more information than just a year figure please Apple, I need to plan on how I may be buying my media in the future.
Movie rentals should not be ‘timed’ but work more like NetFlix: you can have ‘out’ a certain number of movies.
Then when I’ve watched one, erase it and download another. I would need to be able to have two or three available on my local hard drive. So often I start a movie that has an interesting description but is still unwatchable. Many of my NetFlix movies don’t get fully watched.
If a 40 minute TV show now takes 10 minutes (on a good night) to download from iTunes a two hour movie at 720p should take less than 2 hours.
Fill it up with DRM, I really don’t care. Just allow me to watch it when I want and keep it for as long as I want. Look over my shoulder to be sure I erased it… fine by me. Just get high-def movie downloads working.
Thank you.
Oh… and the 720 p videos made by the new Canon TX1 are fantastic.
Mike,
While you are correct that movies generally are not watched more than a couple of times…SOME films are absolutely watched many times (Star Wars, Wizard of Oz, Citizen Kane, Rocky Horror Picture Show…and literally many others)..SOME films are watched even more often…by kids…who seem to want to have films become part of their brain in some way more material than memory. Either way…those are small markets compared to rentals…Watch Apple do it better though..and make the rental good for 2 weeks with the option to rent it again (on the same IP) for half price..
I think movie rentals will come earlier than what this article says
“If I have an APPLETV, I would not able to watch all movies that are not available with subtitle or closed captioning.”
I agree that they need to release the movies with subtitles. At least it’s in the right direction, but I remember the recent Quicktime update allows for watching videos with subtitle information. I also very much hope they implement it cause I have been watching TV with subtitles more and more – sometimes it is very helpful for understanding.
Do what I do and go to:
http://www.apple.com/feedback/
and leave them feedback. I have no idea how much they listen, but I tend to leave feedback when there is something I want or don’t like about something.
My favorite quote from the share holders meeting (and, no, I wasn’t there – it’s on MacRumors):
“I wish developing great products was as easy as writing a check,” said Jobs. If that were the case, Microsoft would have some great products.”
I’d rather see them buy back shares to reduce float and skip the split.
This announcement was fairly inevitable when AppleTV didn’t sell extraordinarily well. That’s no knock on ATV–I badly want one. But I think it demonstrates the absolute genius of Apple’s business model–introduce some hardware with core functionality and then extend that functionality only when necessary. It’s <brilliants>.
hmmm
Gene Munster says that Apple hints that “it will offer video rentals through iTunes at some point in the future”, with no particular context or quote.
meanwhile Macworld reports:
“When a shareholder asked Jobs for high-definition video content on iTunes and asked if his Apple TV could allow him to rent movies, the CEO smiled. “One never knows,” he said cryptically.”
http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/05/10/shareholder/
yeah I guess Steve’s cryptic non-answer could be interpreted to say that rentals are in the works…. or not….
>”I wish developing great products was as easy as writing a check,” said Jobs. If that were the case, Microsoft would have some great products.”
All man, what a digg, LOL! Seems Mr. Steve is over his cancer scare, up and swinging!
uh…
Go Apple?
I agree about subtitles.
My hearing is terrible, and it isn’t getting any better.
“I won’t buy an AppleTV unless and until they offer movie rentals.”
this would push me over the edge as well for a purchase
Rentals will come at some point, but the movie execs seem much more cautious with Apple seeing what happened with music– Apple took control before anyone realized it was happening.
As long as Apple doesn’t get greedy (and I doubt they will), a small take of movie rental revenues will ensure the movie-makers their huge cut of the pie, while keeping Apple in its comfortable position at the top.
I keep wondering what that huge data center Apple bought a while back will be used for…? It seems like a perfect place to stream EVERYTHING people want for iTunes.
Anyone have any insight here?