Do we need a VHS or Videotape section? Alamo Drafthouse launching rental store

[Flint]

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/alamo-drafthouse-video-rental-store-1202643737/

Apparently Alamo Drafthouse is launching a huge video rental superstore with VHS, Beta, LaserDisc, DVD, and BluRay discs as well as players for the older formats. Part of me thinks this is cool because some movies can only be viewed if you can find the original VHS tapes and a player, such as the original theatrical version of the Star Wars Episodes IV thru VI. On the other hand, part me thinks this is sad because you know there will be a bunch of young hipsters telling their friends and anyone who will listen that watching an old video on VHS is superior and they will be assholes about how special they are for owning a ton of old tapes and players and they'll learn all the terms to sound smart about them.

Here in Austin there are two very huge video rental stores which stock massive collections, including all the old adult stuff. So, this is not a shocking move by Alamo other than they are getting a ton of attention for being a huge company investing in a business model which was believed to be completely dead.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

VHS is unquestionably the finest, most accurate and generally most awesome videotape format using 1/2" tape in a cassette shell to be introduced in 1977 by JVC.

 

[The DirtMerchant]

Hmmm...I threw out several boxes of VHS tapes from my in-laws house because they were stored in the basement and the cardboard tape cases
had started to mold over. Maybe I should head to the dump and see if I can salvage any of them to sell them on ebay to the impending buyers.
Also, I have a VHS player or two shoved into my attic in one of those "I keep forgetting to go through the trouble of throwing it out" boxes.
That should fetch a pretty penny on ebay also. Shit, I had to buy a VHS player back in 2004 and it cost me $50.

 

[Deleted member 133]

Part of me thinks this is cool because some movies can only be viewed if you can find the original VHS tapes and a player, such as the original theatrical version of the Star Wars Episodes IV thru VI.

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/alamo-drafthouse-video-rental-store-1202643737/
They were also available on laserdisc. I have all three - and two players capable of playing them. Mine are wide screen versions with the original theatrical run times. (For example 121 minutes for IV, versus 124/125 minutes for the computer-generated effects-laden "special edition.") The sound is digital stereo.

Jeff

 

[Flint]

Yeah, i had those too, and a kick ass pioneer player which played both sides without having to flip the discs. I had totally forgotten about my brief foray into LD. At one time I had amassed nearly 100 discs. I even had the after market player upgrade so it could pass Dolby AC-3 audio. Wow... what a flash in the pan that was.

 

[Dentman]

I'm glad to see VHS come back. I just hooked up my late gen high end Sony player last night. I received my phono pre amp yesterday and had to move things around to accommodate the turntable. The only place for my DVD player was on top of my amp. The old VHS player has over sized feet, so between it and four Zippo boxes I now have roughly 2 inches of space between the blu-ray player and the amp. Who says there's no use for VHS!

 

[Deleted member 133]

I'm glad to see VHS come back. I just hooked up my late gen high end Sony player last night. I received my phono pre amp yesterday and had to move things around to accommodate the turntable. The only place for my DVD player was on top of my amp. The old VHS player has over sized feet, so between it and four Zippo boxes I now have roughly 2 inches of space between the blu-ray player and the amp. Who says there's no use for VHS!

We Canucks use hockey puck!

 

[Dentman]

We Canucks use hockey puck!

Good call!!!
It's 20 years since I laced up a pair of skates and held my Russian curved Torsbo stick.

 

[Akula]

Ha. I still have some old VHS tapes. No VHS player, but still have some tapes.

And yeah, there will always be those who claim that old way had more "life" to it. Because, you know, fiddling with tracking and dealing with low resolution was so wonderful.

 

[Towen7]

Wouldn’t it make more sense to convert films on legacy formats to a more modern and accessible format?

 

[Deleted member 133]

And by the by, the only reason that I keep a fully-functioning JVC HR-S4800U Hi-Fi S-VHS VCR in my main HT, is because I still have a few movies on VHS that are not available elsewhere. A few years back I transferred the best of those to DVD (along with a bunch of home movies). I just never got around to doing the rest, but I keep the JVC in case I ever want to. It's about the content - not the quality!

I can also do the transfer to DVD+R RWs and then use my computer to make them into digital files - instead of permanently filling up a bunch of DVD-R or DVD+R DL disks.

Jeff

 

[Towen7]

It's about the content - not the quality!

That’s my point. It seems to me that the only reason to engage in renting VHS players is to satisfy the hipster market that demands the full retro experience. If it were truly about letting the content be seen it’d be a far better experience to transfer to a disc.

Is there some legal restriction that prevents making/renting duplicates?

 

[Flint]

That’s my point. It seems to me that the only reason to engage in renting VHS players is to satisfy the hipster market that demands the full retro experience. If it were truly about letting the content be seen it’d be a far better experience to transfer to a disc.

Is there some legal restriction that prevents making/renting duplicates?

In the USA the original licensing model was for Studios to charge rental stores $50 to $150 per tape with the idea that the tape itself is the license and when that tape fails the license is gone. It was illegal to copy. That models changed when consumers got into purchasing tapes for themselves and they went to a model where the studio charges a nominal fee for the tape then the store paid a share of the rental fees to the studio. It was no longer illegal for the store to make copies, but all copies had to be tracked. I have no idea how the studio are treating the current video rental stores.