Apple Sells 1 Million Videos in Under 20 Days 478
olddotter writes "Apple has sold over 1 million videos through iTunes since the release of the Video iPod service. Personally I am surprised by this success, it raises many questions. Will this encourage more people to put their video content on the iTunes store? Is there a vast market for cheaper stuff at reduced prices? Why am I willing to pay more for music than I would for video?"
videos have sound! (Score:3, Insightful)
More? (Score:3, Insightful)
Great! (Score:5, Insightful)
Because... (Score:5, Insightful)
Shelf life - even the greatest video will probably only be played a few times at most, while you might listen to a song hundreds of times over the years.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think it will last (Score:3, Insightful)
Doesn't Seem Like Alot (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, anyone know the number of songs sold that week?
Well, duh... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because music has far more inherent replay value than video.
Everytime some slashdork bitches about how a CD costs $20 for 60 minutes while a DVD costs $20 for 120 minutes or more and what a ripoff a CD is, I want to slap them silly; the two things have nothing in common other than size and shape. Unless you're some obsessive weirdo, I doubt you'll watch the same movie a couple of times a week right after buying it like most people do with an album.
You're surprised? (Score:5, Insightful)
In the world of wasting yer money on stupid, ephemeral stuff for digital gizmos, video on iPod doesn't even make it to the semifinals; at least you get to watch a 40-minute, commercial-free TV show for your cash.
Be surprised that we're so happy to part with our money for valueless things, perhaps--but don't be surprised that the iPod video is successful at this game...
Re:Oh the insanity! (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is exactly why it's only a matter of time before there's a huge backlash from these content distributors, much like the music industry is already against iTunes. Now, cable and satellite companies will be joining the fight. It's in their best interest to beat down this new method of content distribution for TV.
Re:Please educate me, iTunes video buyers (Score:5, Insightful)
Because you can use it on a train or airplane.
Because when you connect it to a TV it's fine.
Because you can pull something out of your pocket and show it to your friends.
sure why not (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course it will. There is a market for video content; people will see this is another avenue of making money, getting more exposure, etc.
Why am I willing to pay more for music than I would for video?
People will listen to a popular song many times a day. People don't do the same with TV/movies. The entertainment value of most TV shows and movies is gone after 1 viewing. The entertainment value of music seems to carry on much longer.
Heres Why (Score:2, Insightful)
Because video is typically only viewed a few times. Music has much more longevity. You get much more in the long run out of a $1 song then you do a $1 video.
Re:videos have sound! (Score:5, Insightful)
$1.99 - Music and video.
For $30, given the choice between 30 great rock/metal tracks and 15 great ones with, yay, grungy guys running up and down a stage, I'd rather get twice the amount of music for my money and miss out on the bad videos. On the other hand, were Britney Spears more my thing, I'd likely want the videos, ideally without sound as, let's face it, her success was never about the music.
Plus there's the amount of drive space taken up. Granted videos aren't available for 80% of album tracks but I've already filled clear of 30mb with my own CD collection. Apple doesn't make an iPod big enough to rip an equivalent collection if videos were available too.
So, video's nice and all - espcially for some of the great music videos - but I'd rather save the drive space instead of having every last bland video.
Not surprised at all (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:videos have sound! (Score:5, Insightful)
like why is a full song on itunes that I can have on my computer, ipod, and CD player as long as i'd like (though only for a limited amount of burns) $0.99 while a 30-second clip on my cell phone (through spring) is $2.50 and deletes itself after 90-days
Re:Great! (Score:5, Insightful)
Now I wish that they would start selling the videos in stores OTHER THAN the US....
I actually think this is a good illustration of the fact that the copyright system is very broken. The theory of copyright is an author, band, producer, or artist creates a work and is granted exclusive rights to republish it. They generate money from selling copies, which encourages them to produce more works to make more money. One would then assume, if someone like Apple wanted to resell a song or TV show they would go to said band or producer, buy a license to redistribute it, and start offering it. This does not happen.
The reality of the situation is the producers of work almost inevitably have to give up that copyright to numerous parties in numerous countries since various organizations and cartels have monopolized all the popular distribution and advertising venues in a given territory. In order to distribute a work in multiple countries Apple (or any other retailer) has to contact hundreds of organizations, negotiate hundreds of licenses and evaluate hundreds of separate business cases. This leads to most works only being distributed in one given country and a very segregated market. It also leads to most artists making very little compared to the middle men with the cartel. How could the system have gotten this fucked up? This is exactly what the drafters of the original copyright laws in the U.S. were trying to avoid, since the printing house cartels were so detrimental in Europe. I guess greed and money eventually will corrupt any legal system.
Re:videos have sound! (Score:5, Insightful)
Because that's what the market will bear! I just can't imagine what satisfaction one gets from buying a ring tone.
Re:Oh the insanity! (Score:3, Insightful)
Or something to that effect.
Re:Doesn't Seem Like Alot (Score:1, Insightful)
What it actually will make happen (Score:4, Insightful)
Many people don't yet even realize what this might do to the industry. There will become more and more scifi series, because TV-companies don't have to rely on US Scifi fans only. And that's just the beginning. Soon you'll able to order tv-series like you order magazines now. Fans might even start to have their own tailored episodes or even whole series.
I'll sincerely welcome iTunes. It will change the industry - mark my words. Difference to other Video-on-demand services is that iTunes is 'the standard'. It's safe to buy there and you don't have to worry about having to deal with some strange proprietary DRM software.
Hmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because, up until now, the studios had given us so much full-quality digital non-DRM encumbered content?
Please.
When they were already providing essentially *no* content, how would the first major commercial offering of such a service flopping "force" them to provide *more* content?
Further, you think that they'll provide content with "less" DRM? (Are you implying you'll accept DRM, if there's "less" of it? Or do you really mean no DRM? Because if that's what you mean, you'll NEVER get it.)
As to higher res, there's a problem here other than the content providers or Apple. And it's just a little one called "bandwidth". Before you go off telling me that you want to download your 1080i movies, even H.264 compressed, please explain how, even on the highest bandwidth home broadband connections generally available in the US, a 6 hour download jibes with Apple's strategy.
Never underestimate of the power of stupid anonymous coward posts on Slashdot.
Music $ Video $ (Score:3, Insightful)
Why am I willing to pay more for music than I would for video?
Because most of us can only stand to watch the best of videos three times at the most, but can listen to the best of songs hundreds of times.
Re:Oh the insanity! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, they are adept in hurting their own intersts.
Funny thing is, they've fought against PVRs, and now most of them even offer one as part of the subscription.
The broadcast, cable and satellite networks very often finance the programming they use, I bet they could stand to make more from subscriptions + video sales than they do with just subscriptions. They resisted putting their shows on DVD, but then caved in and many of them are making a lot of money doing so, be the shows new or old. I don't see why it is sensible for them to reject a deal to get listed in iTunes. They'll make more money (net!) per episode than with DVD sales, and only have a little bit of preparation and encoding work. I hope that this untapped potential gets exploited, though I'd prefer not to use iTunes as the conduit. I've heard it said that making a show like Enterprise could cost about $0.25 (US) per episode per viewer.
Surely this is common sense (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not just replay value (Score:3, Insightful)
For some reason, music is worth more than movies. I'm not saying that I understand why, I'm just saying that it's deeper than just replay value.
What's really interesting about this article (Score:2, Insightful)
"Selling 1 million videos in less than 20 days strongly suggests there is a market for legal video downloads," Steve Jobs, chief executive officer, said in a statement. "Our next challenge is to broaden our content offerings, so that customers can enjoy watching more videos on their computers and new iPods."
Interpret that how you will, but I take it to mean apple wants to offer a larger number of TV shows for download to your Mac or PC.
Michael
Re:Comparing song sales vs. video sales (Score:5, Insightful)
My first purchases from iTunes were this past week, when I bought some episodes of Lost. Slow day at work, no iPod, just my 21" monitor and my headphones. Thanks, Apple, problem solved.
What does this say? It says that videos are more appealing for purchase than music for some people. And it says that full-screen Quicktime on a 21" monitor is a fine substitute for an iPod with a 2-inch screen.
Re:Because... (Score:3, Insightful)
If I had a music video for every one of the tracks I've got on my iPod right now, I'd be deliriously happy. On my computer now, I've got only about 30 music videos, but boy is it rad to be able to alt-tab over to iTunes when "On" by Aphex Twin starts playing and watch it. If that were in my pocket on the subway, all the better.
I wouldn't *have* to take it out of my pocket and watch it. It's still one of my favorite songs.
With music videos integrated into your audio playlists, of course they have replay value. I agree that I don't want to rewatch the last episode of "LOST" but I don't have a TV and I didn't want to watch that in the first place. I'm not sure I belong in the conversation. 'Till they have the Daily Show or the News Hour available for download, I'm not really interested.
But music videos *do* have replay value.
ESPN + iPod = Pregame goodness (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Good deal? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:More? (Score:2, Insightful)
I just had to wait a month from finding out about the BBC sitcom Extras to being able to watch it - and that wait was extremely annoying, because I'd already watched the clips on the microsite and it looked really good. In the end I obviously had to wait for the dvd.
Now, had it been available on iTunes I would have bought it straight away after seeing those clips, because I wanted to see it and I wanted it *now*. I could also see myself buying stuff on fridays or saturdays, when the next parcel delivery is soooo far away (monday).
Re:Great! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:pay more for music (Score:5, Insightful)
What does "artificially high" mean?
If we are "going along with it," that means this is a price the market will bear, and thus the prices are not too high. Incidentally, music CD's used to cost more. When they were new things, they were regularly in the $20's. Then it was high teens. Now it is low to high teens, and sometimes below that.
Also consider inflation, and you will see the actual price of a CD has indeed come down quite a bit over the years.
You probably also think gas prices in towns affected by hurricanes should be kept as low as they were before hurricanes, thereby creating gas shortages, rather than letting supply and demand to its thang, increasing the cost of a good that is in short supply to naturally curb hoarding.
The market is what it is. If you think CDs are "too expensive," don't buy them. If enough people agree, they'll come down in price or be replaced by similar technology that is less expensive.
Re:More? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most obviously, you can buy each episode through the itvs the day after it first airs--as opposed to the year after on dvd.
But equally importantly, buying things on dvd requires me to either physically travel to a store just to do so, or to order it and wait days or weeks for it to be delivered. Neither of those allows me to realize that I have a bit of free time, and have some new television in front of me in fifteen effort-free minutes.
And lastly, if I buy dvds, I then have to putz around with physical discs: I want to watch to show someone the Buffy episode that I know is titled "Hush". So I have to dig out the box of dvds, open up the ginormous packaging, pull out the booklet in the back, and look through it to figure out which disc that's on, then put that in, and remember to take it out and put it away later. That's a whole lot more of a pain in the ass than just typing "open video/television/buffy/*hush*".
Paying more for music than video (Score:3, Insightful)
So overall, I would say that it is for what music lacks that makes me see it as more valuable.
Re:Well, duh... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Well, duh... (Score:1, Insightful)
iTMS vs DVDs vs DVD-Rips (Score:3, Insightful)
All very true. However, the same reasons are why I simply downloaded all of Buffy . . . and proper dvd-rips result in far better quality than the ones that iTMS offers, and then I have all the extras and commentary tracks . . . but you're right, DVDs are inconvenient. Which is why I still have DVD rips of the shows I actually own on DVD (whether I downloaded them before, or made them myself afterwards).
I'll add some things to the list of inconveniences of DVDs: load times and random pauses/silences when I'd rather things just be playing already (once you go through the motions of popping in the DVD, you have to wait while the menu loads, then go to the episode in question, then click "play" or etc depending exactly on the DVD), and stuff like having to start an episode/movie over again most of the time if you want to switch to the commentary track.
But there you have it: some sort of completely on-computer (should I just say PC? Apple'll be Intel soon anyways, will we get to simplify things then?) version works better for accessing than the rather clumsy setup of DVDs, but with the iTMS versions you don't get all the extras and you don't get the quality. Personally, since it's usually all the extras on the DVDs that push me over the edge into buying them (I've usually seen the TV show or movie before already), I would never bother buying the costs-as-much-or-more-but-is-stripped-down iTMS versions, but at the same time I would probably buy many more DVDs if it was less of a pain to rip them to my computer for easy access (it's a price one has to pay to be able to do something like, say, queue up a slew of episodes at once, but still, it's annoying that companies are so gung-ho on restricting what legitimate customers can do with their purchases... yeah, I understand the fear of piracy, but it doesn't hamper pirates much at all, there's always someone out there willing to take the time and effort to copy them (and no protections have worked forever yet, nor ever really will) and then they just spread everywhere from there to anyone feeling like downloading them, the customer is inconvenienced far out of proportion with any actual piracy-prevention).
Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some big advantages (as you note, good parent, you can get the shows the day after it airs, and can download them quickly without ever leaving home), but in the name of convenience it does leave some things behind, some of the things that are big selling points for DVDs (extras, quality, etc).
I won't bother going into any "actually having packaging" arguments, since that's all personal preference (and I don't always buy into it anyways), but it IS nice having copies that aren't on your computer already, I should point out . . . even with 600GBs, I certainly don't have unlimited space here on my computer, and it's nice to be able to just store away high-quality copies somewhere else if you're not going to be watching it for awhile or something.
So I guess my arguments can be summed up with the following: iTMS vids miss out on some things, DVDs are inconvenient, it would be better if there was legal ways to download something more akin to scene retail rips and/or copy legitimately owned DVDs without the disks acting as if you're a criminal every step of the way. But towards getting to this (probably somewhat naive, definitely idealistic) state of media, yeah, I'll give you that iTMS videos are a good step in the right direction. They're just not for me, at least not yet.
Re:Well, duh... (Score:3, Insightful)
Car Salesman: This car is $20,000.
Man: But I'm not planning on using it very often. It's only worth $15,000 to me.
Car Salesman: But it cost a lot to make.
Man:
Also bear in mind that DVDs and CDs are essentially mini-monopolies: If you want to own a copy of Firefly, the only legal way to buy it is from one particular source, which can control the pricing. If you've taken Microeconomics, you know that monopolist pricing is based more on consumer demand than cost of production.
So now back to your question, which I will rephrase as: "Since when does the [price] of an item relate to how [useful the purchaser think it is]?" The answer is: Since monopoly forces came into effect. The only way to avoid this in the sale of media of DVDs and CDs is to repeal copyright protection, at which point the price would be somewhere slightly above the cost of media and reproduction.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Well, duh... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, that's not really true - the two primary determinants of the cost here, are what the market will bear and the scarcity of what they're selling. The market will indeed bear exorbitantly high prices, because they're selling extremely unique products. The cost it takes them to produce it doesn't have anything to do with it.
It's greedy, sure, but isn't that the entire point of capitalism?
That's what the radio people said (Score:3, Insightful)
So ignore the history of portable video devices, and instead start thinking of what is really improtant here - not the iPod with video at all, that's just a footnote to backdooring real on-demand TV by a major player. If enough shows are offered, and you only watch a few shows here and there... why even have a cable subscription at all? That's what is going on here.
Even Apple doesn't make a big deal about video support on the iPods, noting that they added it to see what happens. Personally I could care not a whit for video support in a portable device but I am interested in online video and have bought a few things there already.
Re:Hot Damn (Score:3, Insightful)
People, pay attention! Story not about iPod (Score:5, Insightful)
Vidoe capabile iPods are a non-story and a gimmick. The foot in the door to FINALLY buy TV on a per-episode basis is the topic at hand, and a far more interesting discussion.
Re:ringtones (Score:1, Insightful)
Ding ding ding ding bah bah bah... need I say more?
Re:More? (Score:3, Insightful)
I tried watching the show as aired on TV. It's frustrating and boring. Each moment when it seems like it could be interesting either a commercial comes on or the show ends. Additionally after talking to a few friends who do watch the show religously, I think it's going to end up like the Matrix. Great first show/season and then sucker everyone along for the $$$
Re:What it actually will make happen (Score:3, Insightful)
Or the BBC and offer the new *Doctor Who* exclusively through iTunes here in the States...
Re:Well, duh... (Score:2, Insightful)
Just my understanding mind you, but I think that the point of capitalism is to offer the greatest and most efficient distribution & exchange of resources to individuals at the lowest possible cost. If that were to be taken as a given, we might observe that the music industry is very, very broken, and anti-capitalist.
It does seem to be stuck on distributing its resource in a comparatively inefficient manner (shipping CDs), through limited channels (contracted retail stores), at a higher cost of production, and a higher price for the buyer...
Re:iTMS vs DVDs vs DVD-Rips (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Well, duh... (Score:3, Insightful)
An infidel! Kill the heretic!
Re:Europe (Score:2, Insightful)
We may as well just cancel civilisation, it's clearly a failed experiment.