“This month, HBO joined the Internet’s most successful content store with three series including ‘The Sopranos’ meriting $2.99 per episode — the first deviation Apple has made from its standard $1.99 price for TV episodes,” Andrew Wallenstein reports for The Hollywood Reporter.
“But the move was all the more surprising given that NBC Universal withdrew all of its TV programming from iTunes six months ago after Apple refused to grant variable pricing, among other issues,” Wallenstein reports. “Thus we are left with a question: Is HBO the exception to the rule on iTunes, or is Apple changing the rule?”
MacDailyNews Note: HBO is a pay cable service. HBO shows run ad-free. NBC is an ad-supported TV network.
Wallenstein continues, “With its usual Kremlinesque approach to public relations, Apple isn’t explaining the change. But sources at several major studios who spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitive nature of negotiations, say Apple has changed its tune on iTunes.”
“Long before HBO nabbed $2.99 pricing, programming providers say they have been hammering Apple to obtain not only increases but also lower price points than $1.99 — as low as 33 cents. More than one studio has been aggressively asking for TV shows to be structured like films on iTunes, which offers new releases and catalog titles at separate price points,” Wallenstein reports. “‘The conversations I’ve had with them over the last quarter are markedly different than they were a year or two ago,’ one content chieftain says. ‘Apple is much more flexible than people presume.'”
Wallenstein reports, “That presumption also might have been unfair to begin with, given that sources also suggest that it wasn’t Apple but NBC Universal that was being stubborn in their previous negotiation stalemate. Not only was the studio pushing to test a $4.99 price point — suddenly, ‘Sopranos’ doesn’t seem that expensive — but it also wanted to institute dynamic pricing, an experimental new technology that recalibrates price based on consumer demand. NBC Universal declined comment on dynamic pricing, which is being tested by Warner Music Group.”
More in the full article here.
$.33 for really old shows? makes sense.
$2.99 for new? i am out.
$4.99?!? hey NBC, as the VP says, go $&%$ yourself!
I’ll not pay more than a couple bucks. At 2 dollars it’s an impulse buy, at 4 dollars it’s a gallon of gas.
I read somewhere that variable pricing in HBO is mainly used to offset difference in length in content, I did not verify, but it seems fair, not all TV programming is the same length.
Better to check them out of the library, fire up Handbrake, and let er rip.
It all has to do with production value. HBO spends the same amount of money per hour on their TV series’ as do major studios on major movies, only their 30 hour movies (split into shows). If you buy their season’s on DVD, their quite expensive. Think of how much it costs to produce something like the Wire, whose cast is simply massive. Makes sense to me, of course, I just subscribe to HBO, and get it on demand, which is probably the best value.
Re: Bone machine…..While I am not a proponent of DRM, you are the reason for all the fuss. Don’t be a cheap dick and pay for your content.
derelict,
Why don’t you learn the differences between “there,” “their,” and “they’re” and then come back and try again.
Nobody with half a brain wants to slog through your half-assed sentences trying to figure out just what the fsck you’re trying to say, you retard.
“At 2 dollars it’s an impulse buy, at 4 dollars it’s a gallon of gas.”
At 20 bucks it’s a quick stop in the alley, at 400 dollars it’s a party with Charlie Sheen.
I’m sorry you’re too slow to have gotten my meaning…..or is it that you have such a sad, boring life that you have nothing better to do than correct grammar and insult people on comment blogs?
You obviously feel superior with regards to Language Arts. Unfortunately, your behavior only proves that you failed to learn the basic skills of Elementary School. Your Language Arts degree means nothing in the real world. In case you haven’t noticed, the most important thing in life is getting along and working with others.
Feel free to leave and never come back.
Have a great day!
I guess it was the latter.
MDN, why do I care if HBO is a pay cable service? I’m paying for a video with no commercials in either case. Why do I care if the companies revenue comes from subscribers or advertisers?
Derelict, Lost has a cast and budget on par with large Soprano or Wire type HBO shows, so should I pay more for those episodes too?
2.99 is too much. I’d rather buy the DVD set or use Netflix. What I really want is to rent it, give me a week to watch it, and then delete it. I wouldn’t even mind a couple of commercials. Under this scenario, shows should shouldn’t cost more than .$99.
I don’t think the issue with NBC was the price per show, it was their insistence of bundling. Apple wasn’t going to go along with NBCs plan where to get the show you want, you’d have to also by whatever crap they were trying to promote.
-jcr
@MDN:
It doesn’t matter that HBO is a premium cable service and their shows are paid for by subscribers, or that NBC’s shows are paid for by advertisers. The downloads from iTunes are commercial-free, so what’s the point, MDN?
Also, Apple has always had flexible/variable pricing. Look at whole album costs on iTunes. Older albums can cost as little as $6.99, while others may cost $12.99 or more.
This is where Apple could have a nice option plan. Bundle entire seasons of a show together for a nice, low rate compared to the per episode price. That would help sell more downloads, more episodes, and keep people coming back.
While I myself often cringe at poor language, grammar and spelling on these forums, I cringe even more at those who swiftly insult those language offenders. General consensus is that manners are taught at home and proper language in school.
At the risk of making a broad generalisation, most language offenders here ironically tend to be from the US. Their transgressions aren’t, for the most part, caused by their poor spelling skill (we all use Safari, don’t we?); it is just conscious disregard for proper language, for the sake of expediency (I’m not sure which of the two is worse; poor skill or conscious disregard). The insultors (insulters? is there such a noun?), however, tend to come from anywhere, not just the US. While language offenders can use the (lame) excuse of purposeful lack of effort, there is no valid excuse for those who use broadside insults.
Derelict would probably be more convincing and sound much more authoritative if he took an extra second to think before writing/spelling; ‘Tired of Retards’ could probably do better just not to post at all, unless he has something valuable to say on the subject of the article.
I fear Andrew Wallenstein is another unskilled writer with compensation issues because he stuffs the superfluous term, “price point” into his sentences instead of simply typing the word, “price”. What next, Andrew? “Irregardless”? “Ironical”? Are you going to use the word, “Innovation” in the same sentence as the name, “Microsoft”?…
Tip: “On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, by William Zinsser
Ah, you guys that moan about the price of gas. I wish I had your problem – here in the UK I’m paying more than NINE $’s per gallon.
Apple should hold the line here. I would not mind a couple of tiers, but you can guess that if the content providers had their way, new episodes would be astronomically priced initially. The only stuff that would be $0.33 would be 70’s sitcoms that you can get for free in Comcast On Demand.
Kremlinesque
Love it!!!
Sorry
Tired of Retards has left the building.
Let’s all enjoy our moment of silence.
Isn’t it nice to be able to converse without having to watch our P’s and Q’s.
In case your wondering spelling doesn’t matter as long as the first and last letters are in the correct order most people with an average IQ can understand what is being said.
Cheers
For a song hat I will enjoy over and over, $.99 makes sense. For a tv episode that I will watch once, even $1.99 seems a bit high, but it is still an impulse purchase.
For prices to go higher than that makes Bit Torrent more attractive than it already is.
I won’t by shows for more than $1.99 based in principle. I also won’t be buying any $.33 cent shows like Flash Gordon. I have better things to do with my time like microwave my head or install Vista on my iPod.
What bothers me more than these new high prices is that Apple removes all reviews on iTunes that criticize these prices. I reviewed the show “Rome” and mentioned at the end of the review that as much as I liked the show, I did not see the need for such a high price. My review lasted 24 hours, yet in that time it had the majority of positive votes.
If you look carefully at the HBO reviews on iTunes, you will notice that all of the reviews that speak positively of the price, and criticize those who criticize the price, are left alone. I wish that someone in the press would pick up on this and take Apple to task for it.
I for one was a huge fan of the iTunes store. But now I fear that the consumer is becoming secondary to corporations, such as HBO. Apple should leave the price structure alone and let the customer base build. As the base builds, corporations like NBC and HBO will have no choice but to move over to iTunes.
@derelict
The problem is that I already paid HBO once to watch those shows. I paid them indirectly through DirecTV. Now I have to pay them a premium price to view them again?
Also, HBO prematurely canceled “Deadwood”, “Rome”, and other shows. Now they want to charge a premium to watch and incomplete storyline. Wanting Premium pricing for a complete story, like “The Sopranos” I can understand.