“Some days you just wonder if entertainment execs wake up in the morning planning to shoot themselves in their collective foot. The latest display of entertainment exec short-sightedness is that the Hollywood Studios have apparently forced both the Apple iTunes store and Netflix’s download store to remove certain movies just as they’re getting close to being available for TV,” Mike Masnick writes for TechDirt.
“As you probably already know, Hollywood makes a lot of money through a ‘windowing’ system, where they release movies in different formats at different times: theaters, special locations (airplanes, hotels), DVD, cable and finally network TV. Of course, they’re working on adding some more tiers to this as well, but apparently they convinced these online download stores that they need to kill certain movies as the timing reaches where the movies can appear on TV,” Masnick writes.
“The studios’ myopic reasoning is that TV broadcasters pay a lot of money for those rights, and they don’t want to piss them off… This makes no sense. The movies are already released on DVD and the studios don’t prevent Blockbuster or Netflix from offering the physical DVD for rent, so why do that with the download version? If people really want to download these movies, they’re more likely to just go get them from an unauthorized site, rather than bother to watch the network broadcast version,” Masnick writes.
Full article here.
Masnick gives Hollywood way too much credit. It’s quite likely they haven’t even thought about the issue at all.
Personally I think Hollywood should put commercials in the middle of their DVDs. That way consumers can pay to watch advertisements which is good for everybody, especially consumers.
with itunes I buy a movie download it and thats it…..convenient and works perfectly and I cant give a copy to anyone else or even burn it for playback on a dvd player (that I know of)
If I buy a dvd I immediately rip it for my apple tv and give copies of it to my friends…. I guess hollywood likes people sharing…..
HMCIV suggests putting commercials in the middle of their DVDS. To that, I say “Nuts!”. Commercials just interrupt the flow of the story, making for a lesser experience. And there’s no evidence it would result in lower cost DVDs. So how does that benefit consumers?
Almost no one with the financial capacity or technical knowledge to run a computer would choose to watch any movie on broadcast TV or basic cable. More likely, they would rent it on DVD if they wanted to watch a specific movie at a specific time. The much less likely (but increasing) secondary choice would by using a download service.
There is no conflict here. These “Hollywood” decision makers are only denying themselves more profits. How stupid. It does not significantly help the broadcasters get more viewers. It does not significantly hurt Apple; Apple makes most of its profits from selling hardware, not from selling digital content. Apple is not going to sell fewer iPods and Macs, just because a few movies are no longer available from the iTunes Store.
I will not buy or rent any movie that has commercials in it! Nor will I watch the movies prohibited from the iTunes Store or NetFlix when they appear on broadcast or cable TV channels.
Have 3 things for the Movie/Music/Entertainment Cartels:
Newsgroups
BitTorrent
WinMX
To the rest of you, if you don’t know what/how/etc about those 3:
http://slyck.com
http://vladd44.com
arrrrr, matey ….. now – but with apologies to Jimmy
Get out on that Sea of Adventure
Watch the films, read the books
About heroes and crooks
And learn much from both of their styles
Good pint zipy. I do exactly the same thing. I still buy DVD, but I am augmenting my movie collection by shearing movies.
No one knows what they’re doing in the movie business. It’s always been that way – in Hollywood it’s always been about luck.
clearly HMCIV is being sarcastic, Raymond….
Netflix subscription + HandBrake = hours of fun!
Who cares if they pull the *&#@(@! movie at TV time?!
You don’t need to see it if you haven’t seen it by then.
But I say, if the Studios want to drag it back to iTS once it’s finished the television run, it had better be ninety-nine cents or less!
SWEEET!!! better movies coming on cable TV now!!! where’s my highlighter and my tv guide magazine!!!!!wooohooo!!!
@ Raymond
Look up the word sarcasm.
In fairness to “Hollywood” (yeah, I know…) they were contractually obligated to remove the movies due to exclusive deals with cable networks. Namely Starz and Encore. Since those networks had the rights to show the movies for a period of time (over and over and over again…) they didn’t want you to be able to purchase them for download. Once those contractual rights expire the movies should return to iTunes and Netflix.
Looking forward to the day Hollywood eats itself
Now if I had my way I would ban all newspaper sales when TV news is being broadcast.
Gotta make a level playing field after all.
So when the movies are on TV, I can’t buy them off the net. Therefore, I am being herded [Moof!] to record the movie off the TV instead.
So I set my DVR to the time of the flick, let it record, take the movie off the DVR, remove the commercials (if I care that day), and I have the movie at home for free.
Or I just go get a rip off it off the net. Same difference, less time and energy spent, thank you to the ripper.
And the average IQ of Hollywood film marketing executives is what? I’d rather have one of my Downs Syndrome friends running the show. I think it’s time to exercise The Sanity Clause (… is coming to town!) and dump some of these nut jobs.
What is it with bad marketing lately? It’s like every trailer trash Joe and Jolene can get an MBA these days.
I think perhaps you are missing the forest for the trees. Hollywood studios gain nothing by interrupting distribution via netflix and itunes.
The on demand movie providers (like comcast) on the other hand benefit greatly (and are likely demanding removal)
This comes at a time when cable providers are beginning to limit total downloads (allowing them to pinch off the bandwidth of competitors netflix and itunes (and who ever else come along and tries to compete with them on content)
Follow the money…
Which movies, I would like to see a list so I can download them before the ttl expires.
” online download stores that they need to kill certain movies as the timing reaches where the movies can appear on TV”
It’s all about trying to create a captive audience with no other viewing options. They are losing their grip on the CD/DVD and are desperately trying to find ways to leverage the market so they can justify exorbitant profits via advertising from the networks or elsewhere. That’s what DRM is all about, not morality, theft, or feeding starving artists. It’s all about boundless greed and you can bet they conspire endlessly about how to fill their pockets, even to their own detriment.
nice to see that this topic is finally getting some airtime. Keeping hush-hush about it doesn’t make it go away…
Movie execs.
Music execs.
Greedy morons.
I might be a bit charitable towards these f**ktards if they made a GOOD movie, say, once a year?
Nah, never happen.
network broadcast is Dead!! CBS,ABC and NBC should just shut down…Crap TV!
I would think having them available on iTunes when the movie appears on TV might lead to more sales.
I would think having them available on iTunes when the movie appears on TV might lead to more sales.
Can’t read, huh?