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Internet Steve Jobs Ready for Ubiquitous iTunes Movies
Brandon Hill (Blog) - June 19, 2006 5:15 PM

17 comment(s) - last by Trisped.. on Jun 20 at 12:11 PM

Jobs pursues $9.99 movie downloads

Steve Jobs is a force to be reckoned with in the entertainment industry now. Buoyed by the phenomenal success of the iPod music players and the iTunes online service, record industry executives have found themselves at the mercy of Jobs’ demands.

Jobs and Apple proved that the flat fee of $0.99 per song worked for music downloads -- over one billion music downloads worldwide should be proof enough to skeptics. The $1.99 TV shows and musics have racked up over 15 million downloads since their introduction. Jobs wants to translate that same success into feature film downloads for the price of $9.99 per download. Movie studios are hesitant to accept a fixed price model for films and are trying to persuade Apple to sell content at multiple price points.

It would be tough to make Apple budge from its set way of doing business as has been witnessed in the past. Record execs tried to get Apple to raise its $0.99 music downloads in the past, with Apple (and Jobs particularly) disregarding the request. Not surprisingly, the record industry backed down. Jobs' winning formula is hard to question and he knows it. He's also not afraid to let you know who's in control. From Variety:

For those who cross Jobs, it's not a pleasant experience. He often has reduced people to tears with verbal abuse, says the former worker. "But he's not doing it for fun. He's doing it because he wants things better. He cares intensely and 95% of his comments are right." Recently treated for pancreatic cancer, co-workers say that the 51-year-old Jobs seems to have mellowed. "Though a 'mellowed Steve' is still a sight to behold," says one. "At every meeting, you are on pins and needles because someone will get their head handed to them, every time, and you just pray it is not you. It's like playing Russian roulette."

With talks of movie downloads coming to iTunes, it’s only a matter of time before we see a new iPod released that is better suited to handle movie viewing.

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Price point a little bit high

By cnimativ on 6/19/2006 7:07:52 PM , Rating: 1

$10 bux per movie download is a little bit expensive considering you can get some DVDs at the same price.

If its $6-$8, I would definitely use this service. Saves a lot of trouble on bit torrent finding high quality contents.

RE: Price point a little bit high

By UlricT on 6/19/2006 7:57:17 PM , Rating: 2

I doubt this would be what is considered high quality, especially looking at the TV eps. available for download.

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RE: Price point a little bit high

By Wolfpup on 6/19/2006 8:21:56 PM , Rating: 2

Yeah, way too expensive. DVDs are the same price basically (and have physical medium, and extras, and higher quality video.)

I'm much more interested in a movie RENTAL service. I might actually use that, but I have no interest in what ammounts to a $10 extended rental when I could get a DVD for $6-14 of the same movie and actually own it free and clear.

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RE: Price point a little bit high

By AlexWade on 6/19/2006 10:43:22 PM , Rating: 1

Don't forget the media. DVD+DL discs are still very expensive. I'm not sure that 4.7 GB would be enough for some movies. So, $9.99 is far too high considering the extra costs.

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RE: Price point a little bit high

By rushnrockt on 6/20/2006 1:01:17 AM , Rating: 2

You say "some" DVDs can be bought for $10 and yet you bash the ability to buy ALL movies for $9.99? How does that make any sense. Most of the decent to good movies cannot be bought for anywhere close to $10 for a while after they come out, so your complaint on the pricing is not quite valid. It's also true that some albums can be bought cheaper than what iTunes have it for, but that does not disqualify the majority of them from being competitively priced.

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RE: Price point a little bit high

By Trisped on 6/20/2006 12:10:17 PM , Rating: 2

$9.99+DownLoad time+Storage cost=$10-14

Yes, Most DVDs release at $20, but there are many who watch the release sales and buy it at $15 or less the day it is released. There are also those that wait till it hits the bargin bins for $5-10 (I like my moves at $5 as I think that is a fair price for how much I watch them). When you consider that $10 is buying you the movie, and nothing more, a DVD is worth more, as you can play it in any DVD player, you usually get extra features like other language support, subtitles, commentary, games, and other media like how the movie was made, trailers, and interviews with the cast and crew.

I can see why they want a split pricing scheme, as they can sell movies for $15-20 when they are first released, drop it to $10-15 after a year, and sell it for $5 a few years latter. That way they sell the most copies possible, while also allowing people the chance to buy it at an appropriate cost.

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9.99 for movies?

By UsernameX on 6/19/2006 6:19:58 PM , Rating: 2

Netflix anyone?

I'm sure you wont be able to copy this downloaded media to dvd's...

RE: 9.99 for movies?

By dead1ne on 6/19/2006 6:36:31 PM , Rating: 2

You can still copy your music to CDs. So maybe you will be able to burn it. I think thats very likely if Jobs gets them to accept $9.99 for movies, which I doubt they will be willing to do far more than I doubt they'll kill the deal over burning.

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RE: 9.99 for movies?

By Supa on 6/20/2006 12:24:37 AM , Rating: 2

I think at this point, final price is just a speculation.

---

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RE: 9.99 for movies?

By srdemby on 6/20/2006 9:54:46 AM , Rating: 2

Hello All,

I think Jobs has seen and found attractive from a business standpoint, www.Vongo.com . Just perhaps he's looking to put a spin on the marketing and technology used by this, "gaining popularity", movie download site.

~S

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At $10 it's pretty much the same as music through iTunes

By Ralph The Magician on 6/19/2006 8:40:41 PM , Rating: 2

I expect that you'll be able to burn it to a DVD. Otherwise, it's pretty pointless. I'd expect them to be something like 480p H.264 video files that can be burned to a DVD via iTunes just like music. If you can't burn it to a DVD, $10 is ridiculous. If you are stuck watching in a small, windowed QT box, $10 is highway robbery.

Pay the same price you would for the physical media, but trade off quality for convience. That's the iTunes model.

RE: At $10 it's pretty much the same as music through iTunes

By TomZ on 6/19/2006 9:05:13 PM , Rating: 2

I'm sure an "iVideoPod" would have outputs to let you also connect it to your TV, right?

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RE: At $10 it's pretty much the same as music through iTunes

By Trisped on 6/20/2006 12:11:52 PM , Rating: 2

Or you use a HomeTheater PC and iTunes to play it through you TV.

That makes the most sense to me.

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RE: At $10 it's pretty much the same as music through iTunes

By tdawg on 6/19/2006 10:02:46 PM , Rating: 2

I'm not holding my breath that they will allow you to burn these movies to DVDs. I can't even burn the 2 shows I've bought for $1.99 to watch via a standalone DVD player so I don't have to sit in front of my PC to watch these.

Coincidentally, if anybody does know how to burn purchased video content thru iTunes for viewing on a home theater system, I'm all ears.

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This will be iTunes first flop

By hmurchison on 6/20/2006 1:45:22 AM , Rating: 3

There really is little chance for success for iTunes movies. The way we consume media depends on what exactly that media is. With songs you have small rather short pieces of media that lend themselves to putting in playlists, remixing or just randomly listening to. Listening to music is passive and something that is easily done on the road.

Now try and extrapolate that and apply to movies and you see that feature length films are generally two hours. People don't consume movies in a random fashion nor do they concern themselves with putting them in a playlist or other managment tasks.

There just doesn't seem to be the upside to iTunes Movies that audio has. You cannot enjoy the media in a passive manner your eyes have to be constantly gazing at the screen.

I'm thinking that Steve is going to offer movies but that they will not devote too much marketing to the effort.

RE: This will be iTunes first flop

By Hare on 6/20/2006 3:49:53 AM , Rating: 2

Not necessarily a flop. I agree with the most part but I believe there's a large enough consumer base that would adapt to this quickly. The more I think about it the more sense it makes. Why buy a DVD when I can skip going to the store and just d/l it home. After that just hook up your laptop/computer/videopod to your TV and that's it. Clean library of movies and a convenient way to shop. It doesn't sound that bad...

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Not for me...

By Trisped on 6/20/2006 11:58:41 AM , Rating: 2

I like my movies at $5 about 1 year after they are released. I don't see the point in paying $10 for a version that I can only use with an iPod or iTunes. If they let me burn it to DVD or HD DVD (or Blue Ray) and give me the HD version I will consider it, but you still have to download the 4-25GB of movie and may not get the extra features you would expect from a DVD release.

Still, the ability to hold all your movies on your hard drive would make HTPCs even better, since you wouldn't have to get up to swap the disk.