Warner Brothers And Redbox Sign New Deal: Rental Blackout Window Cut From Ridiculous 56 Days To Equally Ridiculous 28 Days
from the 'half-as-stupid'-isn't-the-same-as-'twice-as-smart' dept
Redbox has ended its "standoff" with Warner Brothers and, despite its earlier moves, has come out on the losing end of the deal. If you'll recall, earlier in the year Redbox decided to let its contract with Warner Brothers expire after the studio decided to withhold its new releases for 56 days -- up from the already ridiculous 28 days. Redbox looked at the obscene size of this window and said, thanks but no thanks, we'll just purchase your movies elsewhere.This couldn't have made WB too happy, what with Redbox exercising the right of First Sale to bypass the studio's window and let itself in the front door. As for those looking to rent new releases while they were still new, Warner Brothers basically told them to shove off, and go look elsewhere for their entertainment. Having cut off a source of income and given more than a few potential customers a reason to check out alternate sources, the studio finally decided to renegotiate.
Here's how it all works out for Redbox (and by extension, the customers):
For titles with street dates between January 1, 2013 and December 31, 2014, the studio will grant Redbox the rights to offer Warner Bros. theatrical titles on Blu-ray Disc and DVD 28 days after their retail release dates.Apparently, a stupid window is slightly less stupid when it's half the size it previously was. (But more stupidly, it's exactly where the window sat previously, before Warner decided not enough people were buying during the rental shutout). What Warner refuses to understand is that people want to rent movies when they logically should be available (i.e., day and date with the DVD release), rather than at some arbitrary point in the future. Warner is still willing to trade rentals for sales, even if it means giving up some rentals for file sharing. But the stupidity of the deal gets worse:
In addition, Redbox announced plans to join the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) and has agreed to promote UltraViolet through a program of mutually agreed-upon promotions and marketing tactics designed to help retail customers discover UltraViolet.On top of being forced to humor Warner's ignorant windowing, Redbox is now being made to play nice with the studio's too-little-too-late digital "offering." It's a bad deal all around, but the press release ignores all reality to paint a gloriously rose-tinted future for all involved.
The arrangement will improve the economics for both Warner Bros. and Redbox while ensuring consistent availability of Warner Bros. titles for the consumer.Really? Judging from past experience, it seems more likely that Warner will continue to cripple the rental service by adding ridiculous agreements and stipulations while slowly killing off the everything anyone liked about it. There's nothing about this equation that "improves economics." Warner opens itself up to more piracy by setting up arbitrary windows and consumers looking for the latest Warner releases still have 28 days to kill before they become "consistently available."
Here's some more rah-rah, go team doublespeak from Warner Bros.
"We are pleased to once again have a direct relationship with Redbox, providing their consumers access to our movies," said Ron Sanders, president, Warner Home Video. "In addition, we look forward to working together on other key initiatives such as UltraViolet and creating promotional opportunities to offer consumers great content when and where they want it."Translation: We are pleased that we have prevented Redbox from simply purchasing our movies from a third party and renting them out during our arbitrary blackout periods. In addition, we look forward to pushing our clunky digital services and creating restrictive "opportunities" to offer consumers great content when and where we say they can have it.
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Filed Under: movies, rentals, windows
Companies: redbox, warner bros.
Reader Comments
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clockwork orange
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LOL
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Re: clockwork orange
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Missed opportunity
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Re: Re: clockwork orange
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WB wanted more money, tried to negotiate a bad deal, then got scared that they were losing money because of it and quickly tried to go back to the way it was...
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"Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
It's possible that your position differs from Pirate Mike's (and even that you both have consistent views, and that those differ from the scurvy swabby low-level pirates), but I conclude it's that all the writers here just slant arguments however needed.
You need to sometime make a clear statement of position that you stand by or for. -- Or point to one already made. -- In absence of such, no one can possibly follow you as you wander around this angle and that. -- Take the time to sit down and write out exactly your positions and the justification for such. I think it'd be a big help to copyright if you did.
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Their supply is lame,
their boxes are broken down most of the time,
returning discs is a huge hassle,
the discs are nasty with germs and viruses,
and the corporation won't accept responsibility for
the diseases they spread, and the costs they incur.
You're a fool to bring these things into your home, especially if you have young children.
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Re:
Yes, I discovered it a long time ago, and then wished that I hadn't.
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just die, you zombie bastards. dvd is an obsolete media, blueray is DOA. ultraviolet is a POS, but your shit's still up on the bay, 3 days before release date, in a variety of formats.
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Ultraviolet would have been a great system 20 years ago, but the world has moved on since then. too little to late yet again by the studios.
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Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
"besides the witless assertion that piracy is due to corporate decisions: "pirates gonna pirate" so WB must try to minimize that rather than pirates follow simple rules in the area of copyright."
That's why I bought the special edition of the Avengers instead of downloading it via bittorrent. Because anybody who violates copyright in any fashion is a filthy pirate, and once a pirate, always a pirate. It doesn't matter if all I've done is Xerox a page from a library book in 1969; everything I've done since then (and before then; why not make it retroactive?) is piracy, because "pirates gonna pirate" and there's nothing else to know.
And Paramount still treats me like a criminal and, simultaneously, like a capitive audience; they abuse my attempt at honesty by shoving 20 minutes of advertisements and warning down my gullet every time I try to watch the movie. (Including an advertisement for the movie I'm trying to watch.)
So I ripped the DVD and stripped out the bullcrap so that I could actually watch the movie I paid for.
But of course, according to your accounting, that just makes me a filthy pirate and I've just stolen trillions of dollars from Paramount.
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Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
Really? You think that's what's holding it back? My POSITION STATEMENT? Copyright doesn't need my help. It's got the FBI, ICE and various parts of the DOJ backing it up. It's got lifetime + 70 years to collect rent. I don't think any perceived waffling on my part is keeping copyright from being all it can be.
Now, here, you (Tom), seem to be admitting that piracy costs sales -- besides the witless assertion that piracy is due to corporate decisions: "pirates gonna pirate" so WB must try to minimize that rather than pirates follow simple rules in the area of copyright.
Yes. I'm admitting (if that's the correct term -- I'll run it by Tom) that piracy costs sales. If you are not willing to make rentals available for those who aren't looking to purchase, then they can always find it elsewhere. Sure, it would be nice if everyone just played nice with all the madeup rules and stopped breaking arbitrary windows and regional restrictions and every other thing that no longer makes sense when the "competition" already has all the entertainment in the world queued up if you've got the time and the bandwidth.
You want to lay this all on the consumers. DO THE RIGHT THING. WAIT 28 DAYS. BECAUSE.
No one cares that WB thinks it can make more money shuffling the movie in and out of various PPV services. No one cares but Warner, but it's not as if it's buying its own product. Those other people are. The people who won't "respect" copyright. Well, that street runs both ways and copyright holders have long shown complete contempt for the desires of their potential customers. Sow and reap. If you keep removing legal options, what do you expect? "Go without?"
Warner cut its window in half (from 56 days) because extending it had no discernible effect on DVD sales. And yet, it thinks 28 days will be the magic number. Why? And more importantly, in the eyes of the consumers, who gives a shit? You can't force people to buy. Realizing that, perhaps you should at least pick up some cash from rentals. Or, you know, do this sort of thing and let some of your market share choose to give you $0 for your efforts.
I forget the point you were trying to make, OOTB, but Tom will be around later to clarify.
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Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
What the fuck did you just type? You make no sense whatsoever.
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their consumers? One should think they're Warners consumers too. Given these words, I don't think Warner Truely supports this deal. Oh, and ultraviolet is a piece of crap not worthy of our attention.
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what Warners actually did was give Redbox the old deal back with some extra bits tagged on (Ultraviolet) that should totally screw Redbox for good. once that happens, Warner can continue to screw themselves over so as to be more practiced and ready for the next idiotic company that comes along and asks to join them. in the mean time, customers will flock to the shops to buy the movies because they cant bear to wait for 28 days until the rental is available. also during this same 28 days, file sharing/downloading will never take place and i'll become a multimillionaire over night!
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Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
No. He seems to be admitting that windowing cost sales. Who said people would buy after having waited x days,rather than simply go without in case infringing copies weren't available?
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The only question is...
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is WB offering them that much better of a price?
is WB still selling them "rental" versions of the discs with far fewer features and more advertising?
I've never used UV, but does it still require logging into 4 different accounts in different systems and then sacrificing a chicken to a dark god that it'll actually work?
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Need a snappy name for glorified rentals.
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Re: Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
If you force people to wait 2 months then the excitement is lost. People may forget all about your movie. It may even be marked down and headed for the $5 bargain bin in 2 months.
The industry is deluded that they can push the casual customer into spending more. People will likely just not bother.
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personally i'm a late to the party second generation geek, so i just got a proxy and stick to torrents.
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Re: Re: "Warner opens itself up to more piracy..."
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Quality Control?
Even the "Scene" can self-manage/police quality standards to bring you quality far exceeding studio encodes for those terrible "+ digital copy" versions that come with Blu-ray discs these days.
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Re: Re: clockwork orange
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