Record Labels Looking To Stagger Releases

from the good-luck-with-that dept

As some movie producers and rental services look to shift the movie business away from its long-held tradition of releasing movies to DVD or other formats months after they've come out in theaters, the music industry is longingly eyeing the idea. As the number of digital distribution outlets for music expands, record labels see an ideal opportunity to offer products at different times with different prices in hopes of raising what they can charge for downloads. With more and more people preferring to watch movies at home rather than in theaters, giving them the opportunity to watch a movie at home at the same time it's released to theaters removes much of the motivation for piracy. Initiating this "windowed" approach with music seems like it would have the opposite effect, driving people who want a new song that's only available from certain outlets to file-sharing networks, rather than making it as easy as possible for them to buy it. The movie industry is being forced away from windowing -- so it's unclear why the music industry thinks it can successfully introduce it.