6 ms·

These are great points and a good portion of piraters do so for these exact reasons. There are always going to be people who steal content/apps instead of payin

These are great points and a good portion of piraters do so for these exact reasons. There are always going to be people who steal content/apps instead of paying for them but I am sure more than a few people pirate purely because it is a better user experience than what is currently offered. TV shows are a great example. I cut my cable about a year ago and haven't looked back since. I refuse to pay a premium for channels packaged together that I never watch. Currently, I use a combination of Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon Prime, Apple TV, and Zune Marketplace to fill my content needs. They provide a great user experience but the pricing structure/availability is lacking. Most shows available on Prime, Apple Tv, Zune are only available for purchase. What if I don't want to purchase them? Why can't I rent TV shows just like I rent movies? I have never been one to purchase and own content since I usually don't watch things more than once. I pay to rent movies all the time from Apple TV and Zune via Xbox. Hulu Plus is great, but they have a fraction of the content I would like to watch. Basically, there's not a perfect solution yet but I refuse to go back to cable. Here's what I would like to see: 1. Charge me per view, don't sell me the content to own. 2. If the margin is too thin for the rental model, throw an ad in there...I won't mind. (Hulu plus does this) 3. Let the content producers sell their content directly to me to increase margin. This can be done by the content producers creating apps for Xbox, Roku, etc. 4. Make all previous seasons of shows available to me for rental to increase revenue. 5. Use these awesome new technologies to create deeper experiences/interactions with the content, which will open up new revenue streams.

coob 15y ago
Apple tried rental of TV shows. They shuttered it: http://allthingsd.com/20110826/apple-pulls-the-plug-on-tv-rentals/ http://allthingsd.com/20110826/apple-pulls-the-plug-on-tv-re...
- mattmanser 15y ago
  But look at the price point. Originally $1.99 per episode to just rent it. Even $0.99 sounds a lot to me. That's almost $50 for an entire series. What's the average amount of time someone would spend watching TV series per night? An episode of this, an episode of that, 3 or 4 times a week. Suddenly you're spending vastly more than cable. That's more than a modern box set will cost you, e.g. Boardwalk Empire, just released is selling for $40 on Amazon. Yet they spent $5million per episode, that's a lot of views to just break even, plus the server hosting costs and vendor marketplace cut to make. The whole thing is overly complex, per item rental is too complicated, a fractured marketplace makes subscriptions poor, the time drip model that studios and channels used to use is dying, but they won't let it go. I think it'll be 5 to 10 years before we finally see a decent resolution to this where actually paying is less hassle than piracy.
  - ajg1977 15y ago
    I agree that shows are generally overpriced but you've selected some bad examples - Boardwalk empire had 12 episodes so even at $3 an episode (premium content or HD) that's still less than the $40 you'd pay on Amazon.
  - MatthewB 15y ago
    $1.99 just to rent? It's $1.99/$2.99 to buy them currently, are you sure about those prices? I can't remember the rental price so you could be right, but it doesn't seem likely since they charge the same amount for purchasing now.
- MatthewB 15y ago
  Yes, I do remember when they shuttered TV show rentals. The only reason they gave is that users preferred to buy TV shows. I find that hard to believe although I could be wrong. Charging people $1.99/$2.99 to purchase an episode of a show means $20-$30 for a season (sometimes more). It makes more sense to just pay for cable at those prices, which I refuse to do.
  - trotsky 15y ago
    Apple doesn't like rental services because unlike purchases of proprietary drm content rentals don't provide long term lock in to the platform.
    - astrodust 15y ago
      Apple has been pushing for less DRM, not more, and would rather people bought into their platform without being held hostage. It is not an easy thing to convince publishers that no DRM is the way to go, yet the music companies reluctantly agreed. Considering Apple is the number one retailer of music, ahead of Wal-Mart, this seems to have worked out quite well. Rentals are hard to market because in the digital domain you have the same media file as you would if you had "purchased it", only the licensing is different. Charging hotel-room prices for movie rentals will not translate to many sales. Netflix has the right idea for rentals. Low-quality streaming, flat rate pricing.
      - Drbble 15y ago
        Apple is only anti DRM for the rights of music and movies and phone companies. They love DRM when they own the rights. Cf App Store. Amazon broke through with DRM free MP3 originally.
        astrodust 15y ago
        Amazon was an important pioneer in selling DRM free MP3 files, but they couldn't break the back of the whole industry like Apple managed to. As for the App Store DRM, I'm not sure how that's any different than Steam, which everyone seems to agree is a great model for both customers and developers. Apple's App Store and Steam both allow you to install the same application on multiple devices. I'm not sure if you can point to a better model that's been successful in the past. Some indie developers have done alright with DRM free games, but they depend on community goodwill to keep themselves profitable, something a large corporation has a much harder time doing.
MoreTuple 15y ago
In response to #1 If I'm paying you to watch it, there better not be any commercials ;)
- click170 15y ago
  I think the OP meant that there should be a 'buy' option with no commercials and unlimited viewings, and a rent option possibly with commercials and a limited number of viewings.
  - MatthewB 15y ago
    Correct. At first it annoyed me that I was paying Hulu Plus for content and then they also layered in advertising but after speaking with a friend who works there, the margin just wasn't great enough to make it work without ads. Content is expensive.
Karunamon 15y ago
Minor niggle, but please stop misusing "steal". We need to get that meme killed.
- MatthewB 15y ago
  What do you call it?
  - Karunamon 15y ago
    Take your pick. There's: Using unlicensed software copyright infringement downloading a torrent pirating ..among others. None of them roll off the tongue as nicely as "steal" or "thief", but copyright infringement is just as illegal as stealing. The industry groups have been campaigning for years (with great success) to ensure they mean the same thing. They do not. Please don't fall into their trap.
    - MatthewB 15y ago
      Hmm...interesting. I see the difference you are trying to illustrate but to me, obtaining something illegally that was intended to be purchased is stealing. We're talking about the same thing though:)
      - Karunamon 15y ago
        The crux of the matter is that "steal" implies you've deprived the owner of something. (Actually, the us supreme court ruled on this a long while ago and clearly delineated the two..) The only reason for the tap on the shoulder is the effort by the industry groups to get people to conflate the two things. I hate seeing people be tricked, especially by such an odious organization :)
        sanderjd 15y ago
        Could you link to that decision or do you perhaps know the name of the case so I could search for it? The deprivation idea doesn't seem to be intuitive to most people I've talked with and it would be great to know the actual case law.
hendrix 15y ago
You wouldn't download a car...
- slavak 15y ago
  When you pirate MP3s, you're downloading COMMUNISM! http://www.twopotscreamer.com/images/when_you_pirate_mp3s_you%27re_downloading_communism.jpg http://www.twopotscreamer.com/images/when_you_pirate_mp3s_yo...
soyelmango 15y ago
re: 3 Surely one reason for Netflix, Hulu, etc is to aim to provide a single point of access. Without this, you'd have to sign up to an account at HBO, Fox, Universal, Everylabeloutthere, then download each of their apps to get at the content. That is, until Mr Entrepreneur creates a service that scrapes, aggregates, links to, or otherwise makes it easier to access all these content producers from a single site. The content producers might even decide that hosting, billing, and all that coding takes too much, and outsources it to Mr Entrepreneur. That hosting, billing, and coding costs Mr Entrepreneur, so he'll want a cut to cover costs, and some more to provide a profit incentive. Still, as a single point of access, tempting the producers with the promise of its big user base, the service can negotiate bulk licences… And so, we're back to where we are now, where you access content through an intermediary, and pay for the convenience. Capitalism comes in for a lot of criticism, but arbitrage and innovation is one of the things it does well (as long as there is balanced competition and regulation.) That said, just because that's the way things are done now, that doesn't mean it's right. There is always scope for things to be done better, and for some of us, that ease is provided by torrents and such.

coob 15y ago

Apple tried rental of TV shows. They shuttered it: http://allthingsd.com/20110826/apple-pulls-the-plug-on-tv-rentals/ http://allthingsd.com/20110826/apple-pulls-the-plug-on-tv-re...

mattmanser 15y ago
But look at the price point. Originally $1.99 per episode to just rent it. Even $0.99 sounds a lot to me. That's almost $50 for an entire series. What's the average amount of time someone would spend watching TV series per night? An episode of this, an episode of that, 3 or 4 times a week. Suddenly you're spending vastly more than cable. That's more than a modern box set will cost you, e.g. Boardwalk Empire, just released is selling for $40 on Amazon. Yet they spent $5million per episode, that's a lot of views to just break even, plus the server hosting costs and vendor marketplace cut to make. The whole thing is overly complex, per item rental is too complicated, a fractured marketplace makes subscriptions poor, the time drip model that studios and channels used to use is dying, but they won't let it go. I think it'll be 5 to 10 years before we finally see a decent resolution to this where actually paying is less hassle than piracy.
- ajg1977 15y ago
  I agree that shows are generally overpriced but you've selected some bad examples - Boardwalk empire had 12 episodes so even at $3 an episode (premium content or HD) that's still less than the $40 you'd pay on Amazon.
- MatthewB 15y ago
  $1.99 just to rent? It's $1.99/$2.99 to buy them currently, are you sure about those prices? I can't remember the rental price so you could be right, but it doesn't seem likely since they charge the same amount for purchasing now.
MatthewB 15y ago
Yes, I do remember when they shuttered TV show rentals. The only reason they gave is that users preferred to buy TV shows. I find that hard to believe although I could be wrong. Charging people $1.99/$2.99 to purchase an episode of a show means $20-$30 for a season (sometimes more). It makes more sense to just pay for cable at those prices, which I refuse to do.
- trotsky 15y ago
  Apple doesn't like rental services because unlike purchases of proprietary drm content rentals don't provide long term lock in to the platform.
  - astrodust 15y ago
    Apple has been pushing for less DRM, not more, and would rather people bought into their platform without being held hostage. It is not an easy thing to convince publishers that no DRM is the way to go, yet the music companies reluctantly agreed. Considering Apple is the number one retailer of music, ahead of Wal-Mart, this seems to have worked out quite well. Rentals are hard to market because in the digital domain you have the same media file as you would if you had "purchased it", only the licensing is different. Charging hotel-room prices for movie rentals will not translate to many sales. Netflix has the right idea for rentals. Low-quality streaming, flat rate pricing.
    - Drbble 15y ago
      Apple is only anti DRM for the rights of music and movies and phone companies. They love DRM when they own the rights. Cf App Store. Amazon broke through with DRM free MP3 originally.
      - astrodust 15y ago
        Amazon was an important pioneer in selling DRM free MP3 files, but they couldn't break the back of the whole industry like Apple managed to. As for the App Store DRM, I'm not sure how that's any different than Steam, which everyone seems to agree is a great model for both customers and developers. Apple's App Store and Steam both allow you to install the same application on multiple devices. I'm not sure if you can point to a better model that's been successful in the past. Some indie developers have done alright with DRM free games, but they depend on community goodwill to keep themselves profitable, something a large corporation has a much harder time doing.

MoreTuple 15y ago

In response to #1 If I'm paying you to watch it, there better not be any commercials ;)

click170 15y ago
I think the OP meant that there should be a 'buy' option with no commercials and unlimited viewings, and a rent option possibly with commercials and a limited number of viewings.
- MatthewB 15y ago
  Correct. At first it annoyed me that I was paying Hulu Plus for content and then they also layered in advertising but after speaking with a friend who works there, the margin just wasn't great enough to make it work without ads. Content is expensive.

Karunamon 15y ago

Minor niggle, but please stop misusing "steal". We need to get that meme killed.

MatthewB 15y ago
What do you call it?
- Karunamon 15y ago
  Take your pick. There's: Using unlicensed software copyright infringement downloading a torrent pirating ..among others. None of them roll off the tongue as nicely as "steal" or "thief", but copyright infringement is just as illegal as stealing. The industry groups have been campaigning for years (with great success) to ensure they mean the same thing. They do not. Please don't fall into their trap.
  - MatthewB 15y ago
    Hmm...interesting. I see the difference you are trying to illustrate but to me, obtaining something illegally that was intended to be purchased is stealing. We're talking about the same thing though:)
    - Karunamon 15y ago
      The crux of the matter is that "steal" implies you've deprived the owner of something. (Actually, the us supreme court ruled on this a long while ago and clearly delineated the two..) The only reason for the tap on the shoulder is the effort by the industry groups to get people to conflate the two things. I hate seeing people be tricked, especially by such an odious organization :)
      - sanderjd 15y ago
        Could you link to that decision or do you perhaps know the name of the case so I could search for it? The deprivation idea doesn't seem to be intuitive to most people I've talked with and it would be great to know the actual case law.

hendrix 15y ago

You wouldn't download a car...

slavak 15y ago
When you pirate MP3s, you're downloading COMMUNISM! http://www.twopotscreamer.com/images/when_you_pirate_mp3s_you%27re_downloading_communism.jpg http://www.twopotscreamer.com/images/when_you_pirate_mp3s_yo...

soyelmango 15y ago

re: 3 Surely one reason for Netflix, Hulu, etc is to aim to provide a single point of access. Without this, you'd have to sign up to an account at HBO, Fox, Universal, Everylabeloutthere, then download each of their apps to get at the content. That is, until Mr Entrepreneur creates a service that scrapes, aggregates, links to, or otherwise makes it easier to access all these content producers from a single site. The content producers might even decide that hosting, billing, and all that coding takes too much, and outsources it to Mr Entrepreneur. That hosting, billing, and coding costs Mr Entrepreneur, so he'll want a cut to cover costs, and some more to provide a profit incentive. Still, as a single point of access, tempting the producers with the promise of its big user base, the service can negotiate bulk licences… And so, we're back to where we are now, where you access content through an intermediary, and pay for the convenience. Capitalism comes in for a lot of criticism, but arbitrage and innovation is one of the things it does well (as long as there is balanced competition and regulation.) That said, just because that's the way things are done now, that doesn't mean it's right. There is always scope for things to be done better, and for some of us, that ease is provided by torrents and such.