Stunned That Movie Download Sites Have Made It This Far

from the ouch dept

The NY Times has a fairly staggering (and often amusing) review of the "official" movie industry download sites, CinemaNow and MovieLink, where they wonder how the two companies could possibly remain in business. While they pick on MovieLink a bit, the real harsh words are reserved for CinemaNow, which charges a $10 monthly subscription plus a $4 or $5 per movie charge to download such great movies as "Addicted to Murder III: Bloodlust" and "Witchcraft XI: Sisters in Blood." Some great quotes: "How CinemaNow stays in business is a marvel. The site is so marred by typos and poor programming, it could have been a high school sophomore's first Web design project." At the end of the article, the reviewer makes the point that so many consumers have been trying to tell the movie industry for ages. If they're trying to offer such a service, why not embrace the technology and actually take advantage of what it lets you do - rather than trying to (weakly) imitate the offline experience with less features at a higher price? Overall, the reviewer points out, "Movielink and CinemaNow stand out primarily for their puny selection, poor video quality and overly rigid copy protection." Tell us what you really think, why don't you?
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  1. identicon
    dorpus, 15 May 2003 @ 2:47am

    More rubber monsters?

    If file sharing takes the money out of movie making, will we see more movies with rubber suits and purple smoke bombs?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Some guy, 15 May 2003 @ 8:34am

    Re: More rubber monsters?

    "CinemaNow was founded in 1999 and its investors include Lions Gate Entertainment, Microsoft and Blockbuster. The company is located in Marina del Rey, California."

    You see, Microsoft!

    link to this | view in thread ]


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