Why did movie rental streaming prices increase?

[MatthewB]

Here's another example Flint. I just bought a few Blurays and added them to my Flixster account so that my mother can watch them in Tucson. Is that a crime? No because according to Flixsters main page they say I can share this movie on five different devices and actually say to share with family and friends. According to you my family and friends are stealing. Hmmmmm

I think the example of The Dixie Chicks sums it up best. They became popular based on word of mouth and people sharing their music making them even more popular but who were the biggest thieves? Yep the studio that signed them. These nameless faceless schiesters and their lawyers with no musical talent whatsoever made 90% of the money and yet The Dixie Chicks still wound up with oodles of money. Just not feeling the guilt.

 

[Towen7]

According to you my family and friends are stealing. Hmmmmm

C'mon Mat. Again you compare apples to oranges. Flixster licenses the content from the studios who agreed to the specific terms. In this example you bought the content and Flixster is facilitating a way to share with a specific number of devices. The expectation is that most of those devices will belong to you and a few to family/friends. That's a far, far different thing than what we're talking about which is NOT paying for content and/or making it available to the entire Internet.

 

[Flint]

Matt, your monumental ignorance of the music industry is phenomenal. It isn't your fault, though, the industry hides everything from the world to create an image of natural genius for their stars.

Amateurs are out there in every occupation. They don't expect to make a living, but they also don't put in the time most great artists do to create stuff that will last forever. Can you name one amateur songwriter that has created timeless beauty? I can only think of one, the American composer Charles Ives. We don't need to protect the amateurs. We need to protect those who have devoted their lives to art.

Monet is dead and his works are rarely protected under copyright laws. That is a bad example for you to use.

Paying a company $7.99 to break the law for you is not a sign of you doing the right thing. Saying "but I still paid for it" is tantamount to saying the bum you handed $20 to a bum before driving a car off the street for a few hours is the same as a proper car rental.

I could go on...

 

[Kazaam]

Things must be cheaper in Minnesota. Movies here are 8-10 not even including IMAX or 3-d.

It's possible that maybe they're a little cheaper, I suppose. I know the AMC theaters are probably the best deal, and there are a lot of them around. I don't think they charge $10 (or thereabout) unless it's opening night. Or is it opening weekened? Regardless... after a few days most films drop in price.

The other theaters are typically a little more expensive. Though, there's one that has discounts on Tuesdays. I saw the new Star Trek in 3D and paid only about $9.00.

 

[MatthewB]

Flint I agree with your point of view but I just don't have any guilt knowing how wealthy studios are, directors and stars are. I realize its a business to make money but I also realize that for decades studios made a shit load of money off me for crappy songs. I chose now to listen or see first before deciding on buying. Much like going to Baskin Robbins and asking for a sample of a flavor before buying.

I will say that I am not sharing with millions on the net and I at least will buy the movie I watched that I liked.i

 

[Huey]

Matt does bring up a good point though. Maybe if we could watch a movie, or at least the first 15-30 minutes of it, we might be more inclined to at least rent it, or full out purchase it. I never really got into Pink Floyd until I downloaded, supposedly a version that had no copyright, the 4 channel mix of DSOTM. Because of that one download, I think I now have bought 11 or 12 of their cd's, even double dipping into some of the remasters.

 

[MatthewB]

Exactly my point Huey.

But will say the title of this bootleg would make me enjoy this movie more ( and also explain Drew's facial expression ).

 

[Towen7]

Help me understand... By that logic are you making the argument that the torrents and illegal "iwannadownload" sites are actually spurring sales? I'm calling BS on that one. The downloaders aren't downloading 15 minute clips but rather the whole thing.

What your saying is that you should essentially be allowed to eat a meal and only pay if you decide you liked it enough.

 

[MatthewB]

Tom I think so. I have actually bought a few Blurays the day they came out after watching it online first. Take Ironman 3 for example. After watching Ironman 2 I had my doubts on this one. Was still up in the air on if i wanted to buy this Bluray as the 2nd one wasnt the best. So I watched it (actually on the flight to Bats gtg). Loved it so much that I will be buying the Bluray the day it comes out.

This is just one example. I also just bought this week "The Man with the Iron Fists". I read mixed reviews on this one where people liked it and people hated it. So I watched it online and I really liked it. So when it came on sale this week I bought the Bluray. Happens all the time. Now if I hadn't watched it online more than likely I never would've watched it based on all the negative reviews. But I liked it so I bought it.

 

[Flint]

Do you get to try a few bites of a candy bar to see if you like it before you buy it? Should I be able to read a newspaper before I decide whether or not I want to buy it? How about shoes? If I wear the shoes for a week, or two, before I buy them, maybe i'd buy more shoes, or maybe I would stop buying them and just keep trialing them over and over.

You can claim the industry does not provide a business model you like all day long. You can propose better sales models that you would prefer. That doesn't make stealing right, ever.

Most music can be listened to on YouTube without buying anything, so I call BS on the idea that you need to illegally download an album to see if you really want it. Just sit down and play several of the songs off the album you are questioning via YouTube or some other free online media streaming service.

For movies things are more complicated. Most of the time you can see trailers and reviews for any movie you'd like to know more about which is usually more than enough to know if you want to take a risk on buying it.

 

[MatthewB]

Actually no Flint on the movie trailers. Take Oblivion that I mentioned earlier. In fact I mentioned above I saw the trailer and it looked awesome but turned out to be the dumbest movie I've seen in a long time. Most trailers show you the exciting parts getting you pumped for the movie. I would be pissed if I actually bought this movie (based on trailer) and spent my hard earned money on this POS movie. So glad I watched it free and didn't waste my money but if it sets your mind at ease I did buy a few Blurays this week putting money into the studios.

 

[CMonster]

It's like $1.50 to rent a blu-ray from Redbox...

 

[Huey]

There are lots of things in life that you get to sample before buying. Test driving a car, samples at supermarkets, etc. I'm not saying somebody should be illegally downloading anything, but in my instance, downloading something that I hadn't purchased before, directly caused me to want to own more of their music. But then again, some people just like to argue.

 

[MatthewB]

Or free online and then use that 1.50 savings when I buy the Bluray.

 

[CMonster]

I pay a fee of 7.99 for a website called "Iwannadownload" they have DVD quality movies not out yet as well as movies still in theaters.

Or free online and then use that 1.50 savings when I buy the Bluray.

Or you could legally rent 5 blu-rays a month instead of paying $7.99 a month to download pirated dvd quality movies. :angry-banghead:

 

[MatthewB]

I was retreading this entire thread to see if I missed anything and some good points were brought up on both sides of the coin. This led me to this train of thought. So movie "XYZ" comes out today at 25.00 (cost to production company, studios and actors and so on is about 1.00 per disc to produce and distribute to all involved. So Best Buy and Target buy these movies in bulk and sell for 25.00 now they are getting 24.00 profit. Nothing wrong with that they are in the business to make money. Now after six months the movie is now 15.00 so Best Buy still makes a 14.00 profit (still not bad on their 1.00 investment). Now nine months later the movie is priced at 9.99 but wait Best Buy has their 5.00 DVD trade in offer. So with my old DVD of the same title (that I paid 30.00 for a decade ago) I get to double dip again on the same title but cost to me is 4.99. So now I have paid 34.99 for the same movie. Best Buy still made a profit of 3.99 plus the original 29.00 profit on my DVD purchase ten years ago that cost Best Buy 2.00 for the cost of the original DVD and Bluray. So BB has now made a 3300% profit on one movie off one customer and that's for the bargain basement cost of the Bluray on close out and not the astronomical profit made on opening week of the Bluray.

Yet I'm the thief................interesting.


Btw this is for the same movie nothing changed between opening release day and close out bin (yet my chances of getting the UV version has dramatically decreased due to expiration dates but yet I still paid for UV that I may or may not get to use.

 

[CMonster]

Okay, I guess we're just going to have to agree to disagree. I think your logic is seriously flawed and I see no point in trying to convince you otherwise.

 

[MatthewB]

No problem Chuck. Most of my views are flawed. I do see things from your side too and it's quite understandable. I just see things on what's better for me and not making studios even richer......well richer on poorly made products.

 

[Batman]

My biggest problem with your argument Matt is the stating AS FACT, how you BELIEVE the industry works and using these facts as the basis for your stance/argument. I can't even begin to comprehend how you come up with the $1 to produce a disc factoring actors/studios/distribution etc, and that a B&M store acquires a disc for a $1 and every penny over that dollar is pure profit. I see it much like Cmonster, the logic is just....OFF

 

[MatthewB]

Bats here's an article explaining just how much it costs for companies to buy Blurays in bulk.

http://www.emedialive.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?CategoryID=112&ArticleID=14071

And according to the first chart at just 10,000 discs the cost is 1.80 per disc as the more units a company buys the costs go down per disc so I figure at around 100,000 discs nationwide the cost would be around 1.00 per disc or even less.