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Warner and Fox entertaining forcing a 28-day time delay on new releases to Redbox and Netflix
sepher
Member Posts: 3,561
...and all other rental type channels. Snippet:
Warner said today that it will sell its titles directly to the kiosk channel, led by Redbox, beginning in October and will offer Warner titles 28 days after their general market release. The studio also will sell directly to the mail-order subscription channel, which Netflix dominates, but Netflix and others in the mail-order rental business will be offered titles at their initial release or with a 28-day window depending on the terms each retailer chooses.
The studio will no longer allow wholesalers to sell to the kiosk or mail-order rental channels.
Warner has a longstanding relationship with Netflix but is believed to be renegotiating its deal under these new terms. “We will evaluate the current proposal and discuss it with them,” said a Netflix spokesman.
“Redbox was informed today that Warner Bros. will take action to limit our consumers’ timely access to new release DVDs,” Redbox president Mitch Lowe said in a statement. “Redbox will continue to stand behind our customers and our commitment to providing convenient, affordable access to new release DVDs from all studios including Warner Bros.”
Source: http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6676736.html?nid=2705
In short, Warner and Fox want artificially boost DVD/Blu-ray sales by stunting the popularity of services like Netflix. DVD sales are down, movie rental prices up. A large part of this is the fact that a lot of us consumers are getting our movies digitally now.
Now, I often defend the film industry and berate piracy. But only when they're supporting services like Netflix and explore new channels of delivery rather than old ones. Increased piracy won't be justified even if Netflix is forced into a 28-day time delay for new releases, but I'd certainly understand why some people would engage in it for a convenience that was once there, and then deprived.
Pretty ridiculous.
Comments
http://scitech.blogs.cnn.com/2009/08/14/are-redbox-dvd-rentals-too-cheap/
Here is a competing article. According to this one it sounds like Redbox does not share rental profits with studios like Blockbuster and Netflix do. Since redbox is so cheap they are also pulling rents from BB and NF.
DVD rental prices aren't up, they are down to $1 with Redbox. The others are losing money. Even in sales. $1 rental vs. $25 Blue-ray or $15 DVD purchase. At least when the rental charge is $5 dollars plus tax it helps close the decision gap between rent or buy.
"Suddenly, thousands of Trekies whose heads are full of facts of things like the stardate when the Cardassians farted on Deep Space nine are irrlelevant." - hardcoremoviecritic
I actually hadn't even heard of Redbox which is why I didn't say much about 'em besides what the article quoted. Well I've seen Redbox around, but never used it.
That's an interesting difference between it and Netflix though, so hopefully the studios will not force that time delay upon Netflix.
At the same time, Blockbuster is supporting the time-delay because they still have an interest in at the very least curbing the competition of Netflix and Redbox.
Seems Redbox is being cut off at its source though with the change to direct sales from the studio instead of wholesalers. Regardless, it looks like Redbox will be forced to accept whatever situation the studios find happy 'less Redbox prevails in court.
But really, all I care about is my Netflix not getting caught up in the middle of all that with some crazy 28-day time delay.
I wouldn't worry about Netflix and the time delay. Remember Blockbuster has already adapted to them and opened their own mail rental store online. Netflix is just too big to ignore. They are in contract with Xbox. Blockbuster has recently changed their in store rental pricing structure. They still have $5 dollar rentals with a 7 day grace to compete against Netflix from within store rentals (have it now instead of waiting for mail). But they now have $2 daily new release and $1 old release rental programs probably to compete with Redbox. Both big companies buy and maintain older movies for rent. Their purchases are HUGE! Redbox only holds like 20 titles at a time. No old movies. Their buying power is small.
My guess on this studio move is the studios are trying to force Redbox's hand into signing a contract just to share DVD rental profits. Perhaps even force them to raise prices so the existing rental venues with studio contracts can compete on price. Either the studios will back down or Redbox will give in in the long run. I believe Redbox is in better position. The machines don't require staff or a warehouse like blockbuster and Netflix. Their overhead is low, and I bet the gas stations own/lease/commision the machines. I know from personal retail sales experience that there are plenty of shell wholesellers/redistributors that are generated just for this sort of thing. Generally legal unless explicit fraud is used. Redbox doesn't even have to own the shell. They just have to find somebody that will sell them. That wholeseller takes the legal burden not Redbox. So Redbox will never actually have to pay full retail.
I don't use Redbox myself. I have seen them. I also chuckle to myself when I see people standing in line to use them. Where I live there is one at almost every gas station. They are so plentyful I don't see why people bother waiting in line when the gas station up the street has nobody there.
I myself use Netflix primarily for the free to view on my computer. $9 a month and all the movies I can stream. I watched all three series of Heroes this way. It would be crazy expensive to rent them from Blockbuster. Mailed Netflix would take forever. Store and mail rentals charge/send for each disk. Streamed, it doesn't matter. It is cheaper than all the premium cable movie channels with about the same content. They have "Starz Play" which is licensed buy the Starz movie channel. You figure the mailed rentals that come pick up the slack for new release. I don't watch actual tv any more. Most tv shows are streamed on their websites with commercials where Netflix does fail.
"Suddenly, thousands of Trekies whose heads are full of facts of things like the stardate when the Cardassians farted on Deep Space nine are irrlelevant." - hardcoremoviecritic
Like this will accomplish anything. If I'm already going to wait 3 months til the DVD release, I can wait another month.
I subscribe $5 a month and get to see brand new movies as soon as they release on high quality streaming video.
www.graboid.com/
Well, they reap what they sow.
I can almost guarantee that this 'stunt' is to literally force people into piracy. Also, the rental numbers will obviously go down and in a few months, or a year, when everyone has forgotten this move, they will claim piracy is at an all time high. Then they'll claim they are ready to "be the first to pioneer piracy combat methods", etc. They'll do so by trying to gain control of sections of the internet. They have wanted to do this for a long time.
How nice of them.