Hot off the press, Think Secret reports that at WWDC starting on August 7th, Steve Jobs will announce that iTunes will soon have movie rentals. Currently Apple has sealed the deal with such movie studios as Universal, Warner Brothers, Paramount and Walt Disney with more on the way. The rentals will come in the form of downloads with digital rights management technology restricting play after a certain date or number of plays.
It is not known exactly how the coding system will work, but industry experts tell Think Secret the software would likely either limit the number of playbacks or provided unlimited viewing for a period of time, after which the movie will be “turned off” and no longer available.
I think this can only further Apple’s lead with iTunes as the multimedia king. This also opens the door for a more advanced video iPod. If people are going to start watching movies on their iPod, and not just music videos, Apple will probably respond with a 16:9 aspect widescreen video iPod.
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So I guess that this will be no different than say Blockbuster or NetFlix. The only difference is that it’s a download. Me thinks that if the Jobs does enable something like this for iTMS (iTunes Media Store?), then NetFlix and Blockbuster will have to come up with a new paradigm for online rentals. They may also consider changing their price structure in order to compete with Apple. Seeing how big the NetFlix userbase is, I think they may be the only company who could withstand Apple entering the market.
This is a great idea! I really hope it does go through.
The rental model is more sensible for movies; I listen to my favourite music on a daily basis but only ever watch a home movie once, at most twice. If you’re a big fan of a particular movie, you’re probably better off buying and keeping the DVD.
From my point of view, they should limit viewing based on number of playbacks rather than a set period of time. Nobody actually watches a movie 10 times in 2 weeks, but they may want to watch it perhaps 2 months down the road. Having a time-based system is going to encourage people to share the movies by authorising a friend’s computer and then deauthorising it after viewing.
This initiative may be targeted solely at home viewing. I don’t think it’s going to be possible to view an entire movie on an iPod, the battery can barely last an episode of Lost at the moment. Having an iPod with a screen the size of the PSP would be nice though.
It’s a great concept and rental model as weisheng said, but if they cost $3-4, I might take my chances with Red Box. I’ve ditched BlockBuster for Red Box and have been using it for a long time now. It was beta-tested in Houston at McDonald’s locations and I think they are now starting to spread out.
Now if they can just figure out a way to get it onto my 1080p tv.