Movie Studios Add Another Window: The $30 Dollar Rental
from the please-be-an-april-fools-joke dept
btr1701 points us to a report from Thursday's (not April Fool's Day) Variety, which claims that the movie studios are getting ready to offer $30 dollar per movie Video On Demand (VOD) offerings. This is a classically short-sighted Hollywood-type of solution. Over the past few years, the big movie studios have become even more enamored than ever with the concept of release "windows," in which they offer movies on different platforms/formats at different times. Rather than moving in the other direction, towards so-called "day and date" releases that offer up movies on all platforms at once, they're trying to make the whole thing more frustrating and annoying for customers by spreading things out and offering more windows.This explains the recent efforts to delay various movie rental releases and the whole plan to break your DVR/TV so that you can't actually record certain VOD showings. Now that they have these in place, apparently they think the answer is to offer this new window, between theater showings and when you can rent from Netflix or your video store of choice, in which they somehow think people will be okay paying $30 per movie.
It kind of makes me wonder what they're pumping into the air down in Hollywood.
I'm sure their argument is that since a "whole family" or a group of folks can watch the film, it's more cost reasonable, and they'll argue that the release -- closer to the theater release -- makes it worth the extra money. This, however, assumes that consumers are stupid, and I think Hollywood may quickly discover that consumers aren't quite as stupid as the studio execs think. Of course, even more amusing is that the theater owners -- who have always fought any attempt to do releases close to the theatrical release, are freaking out about this. I doubt they have much to worry about.
The report notes that Paramount has chosen not to join in this scheme, suggesting that it's worried about how this might increase piracy. I'm not sure if that's true. After all, Paramount is the one studio that has publicly said that those 28 day rental delays didn't make any sense and that it didn't drive customers to buy DVDs. So maybe the folks at Paramount actually realize that consumers don't want more windows and more ridiculous price points...
Of course, at the very same time that Hollywood is going down this ridiculous path, others are urging them to go in the other direction. TorrentFreak has a post about a UK movie reviewer's simple and clear explanation for why the studios should offer day and date releases:
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Filed Under: $30 rental, hollywood, movies, releases, windows
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The theater "release" is in fact a retail pre-release. The comparative scarcity of theaters and seats in them means that they can charge more for them. Then they move to PPV previews, which are still scarce because many people don't have access to PPV or want to use that sort of system.
Finally, the movie is actually released at retail, which is it's official release.
They are selling the scarce. Windowing is just another way of defining scarcity.
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There's really nothing to say that a DVD can't be made and cut on the first day of a movie's release.
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It's fun to make up fake definitions to prove your indefensible points isn't it? Theater seats are scarce and have a certain supply and demand effect applied to them. However, PPV isn't scarce because not everyone has access. That's a complete non sequitur. Lack of access to or a refusal to utilize a service does not make the served content "scarce".
"They are selling the scarce. Windowing is just another way of defining scarcity."
They are not selling the scarce goods, they are trying to put artificial barriers to content to make it appear scarce. There is no scarcity in what is easily copied and transmitted.
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Almost all scarcity is artificial, limited by something that can be changed by man. In our lives, almost everything we have isn't scarce at all, but made scarce by marketing, promotion, or distribution.
Manufactures choose to make a limited number of something. It isn't scarce in reality, it is artificially scarce because they chose the point to stop at.
Real scarcity comes in unique objects (say like a painting). Other people can replicate it within reason, you can make lithos of it, whatever, but you cannot have more than the 1 original, something truly scarce.
(original post may or may not be an April fools joke... the point remains: windowing is just scarcity by another name).
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And if another guy takes upon himself to produce more that manufacture can do nothing about it.
There is artificial scarcity only in monopolies, that is why they are so bad, it decreases the quality of products and raises the price for consumption.
That is why copyright is so dumb, even more so because it can't even be properly enforced.
Doubt?
I will copy a DVD right now please stop me.
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By this definition, digital information is nearly never scarce. I trivially and without measurable cost to myself give you an exact copy of a movie or a song without reducing my inventory of movies and songs.
If I make 100 DVDs, they are scarce. If I have 1000 theater seats, they are scarce. But a movie, the information, the content, is never scarce, because I *can* give THAT away (via sharing a file) in a way that doesn't reduce what I myself have.
Just because the information isn't scarce doesn't mean I as a owner *have* to share it. But I can, and it isn't scarce by definition.
There is another word that might confuse you, and that word is "rare". Something that is rare is something that is hard to find or acquire. If a movie owner manages to keep control of the content of a movie, then they might make the movie rare, and because it is rare, they can charge more for access to the movie.
But just because they owner manages to make a movie rare, does not mean that the content, the information, is scarce.
It isn't any harder than that.
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Almost all scarcity is artificial, limited by something that can be changed by man. In our lives, almost everything we have isn't scarce at all, but made scarce by marketing, promotion, or distribution.
Manufactures choose to make a limited number of something. It isn't scarce in reality, it is artificially scarce because they chose the point to stop at.
Real scarcity comes in unique objects (say like a painting). Other people can replicate it within reason, you can make lithos of it, whatever, but you cannot have more than the 1 original, something truly scarce.
(original post may or may not be an April fools joke... the point remains: windowing is just scarcity by another name)."
wow, this whole post just makes me sick to my stomach. From the "Ah Greevar...... lets just be friends" at the beginning to the flippant "original post may or may not be an April fools joke..." bullshit ending.
What's my point? Oh, who really cares.... because the humans with agendas are gonna try to keep on pushing them... and the humans without agendas are gonna keep on reminding them that they are full of shit.
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coke heads would be pushing to get everything out fasterfasterfasterOMGITSNOTFASTENOUGH!FASTER!
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Mike, I think you're forgetting a little thing called "Barnum's Law":
"You will never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public."
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Hmmm
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I have said it before
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So that is when the young hipster hits bittorrent.
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That's true, but that young hipster is FAR more concerned with getting his skinny jeans to stop strangling his ape-nuggets to really care all that much....
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I won't be going to the movie theater, which has turned into a big rip off with terrible viewer experiences. I won't be going to these "special showings". Both are far over priced for today's economy.
I have over time realized that there are only 2 or 3 movies released every year actually worth my time to watch. Other than that, I find that seeing one is a waste of time and I always leave wanting my money back as it felt like a ripoff from start to finish.
Being continually dissatisfied, I have learned that movies are like the music albums of yesteryear. Most of it is total crap and it's not worth the time nor money to bother.
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And if I doesn't seem special, I wait around and see if it looks worth the money to try it out on a tv.
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Microeconomic Theory
I don't think most of the "families" they mention in the article will see the benefit of paying a $25 premium to watch a movie on DVD a few weeks earlier than they normally would be able to.
About the only time I could see myself doing this would be if my kids were having a birthday party and they wanted to see a movie that was JUST RELEASED at the theatres. $30 would be a HUGE savings over the $150 I recently paid to have them bring their friends to the theatre and pay for refreshments. Of course, if the window starts 2 months after theatrical release my kids would think this was lame since all of their friends would have already seen the movie.
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After that, I realized it doesn't matter what's showing...
its all about having a good time. I realize now that I can wait for entertainment to hit my price point (still pissed off I spent $22 dollars on a non-widescreen dvd). Which is not what I want a consumer..... Give me what I want! Stop trying to control your customers MPAA/RIAA. It just makes good business sense.
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There may be some instances where this would fly (like the party scenario previously described) but unless families already watch a lot of PPV (and we don't) I don't see this as an attractive alternative to just releasing the damn thing on DVD.
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Also, my friend would order PPV fights, and then have a viewing party where if people wanted to help him pay for the fight, they could. If people want to overpay for a movie, they go to the theater to see it, not over to someone else's house.
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Because the flight actually does something useful outside of the 3 hour duration, perhaps? Unless I'm wrong, most people don't fly unless they want to get somewhere to do something...
"why would they not pay 30 for a movie that isnt out yet that they really want to see?"
Because it will be a lot cheaper to wat a few months and get the DVD, which can be watched as many times as desired, exchanged or even sold on for a small return on investment? Because they recognise that "not out yet" is an artificial marketing strategy designed to get as much money as possible from people, not something that's actually necessary? Because they've been ripped off so many times by poor movies that they'd rather wait?
I also wonder: when you say a lot of people buy PPV, is that movies, or other events that are best watched live such as sports? If movies, what price are they paying, and what makes you think they'll happily pay the extra?
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mr. barnum speaks
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I even think it's reasonable for studios to be concerned about piracy from pay per view. After all you're piping a stream into someone's house, after they get it there they can do as they please with it(including hardware copy)(which is why I always laugh at traditional media DRM, since it eventually needs to be output in a standard format).
As a consumer I'm just annoyed that the release windows get longer than a few weeks or a month. It doesn't even make business sense to have such a long release window since you lose all the publicity momentum from the theatrical release.
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until reality sets in...
And it won't matter how much DRM it comes loaded with because it will be still easier to 'cam' and sync it off the 72" LCD TV then it would be to do it in the theater.
And best yet no bouncing heads on the copy.
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Re: until reality sets in...
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Says the guy that charges $15/year to access his early release window called the Crystal Ball. Genius.
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Goodwill of his fans.
Doubt?
Go to any corner and ask people what they thing about studios and labels and you see what I mean.
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Don't like it? Then don't buy, simple. No crying necessary.
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Don't like it? Then don't buy, simple. No crying necessary."
Yep, I don't think many techdirt readers will buy it. What most of the community wants is for content producers to realize that the internet has changed the game and if they want to make money they have to change their game.
Making money from giving consumers what they want is plain and simply capitalism. Forcing consumers to pay (through crap business models and bullshit laws) is plainly a loosing strategy....... just sayin
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Nobody is being whiny.
It is simply alarming to see the industry moving in exactly the opposite direction from what would make sense.
It is yet more evidence that they are as far as ever from getting a clue, which means yet more time to be wasted and much more taxpayer expense trying to enforce the unenforceable, along with the likely continuance and increase of the trampling of the fundamental rights of us all.
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How have you personally been affected by what you call trampling of you fundamental rights? Please explain which of your personal rights have been trampled.
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not quite
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Movie Studios are stupid
Then I'll charge them $5 for popcorn and $5 for sodas and I'll make 70 bucks a movie!
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