Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
No the are not.
4k movie files (the high quality ones) are MASSIVE. They take massive resources to upload/download and host. You also need special software to rip those movies and get past encryption. Most of those programs are grey market and can open you up to virus. Also those download sites are filled with virus.
downloading a tiny music file is 100x easier than a 4k movie.
You'd be amazed how well HVEC compresses 4K video. It's not going to be as bad as you envisage.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
No the are not.
4k movie files (the high quality ones) are MASSIVE. They take massive resources to upload/download and host. You also need special software to rip those movies and get past encryption. Most of those programs are grey market and can open you up to virus. Also those download sites are filled with virus.
downloading a tiny music file is 100x easier than a 4k movie.
You'd be amazed how well HVEC compresses 4K video. It's not going to be as bad as you envisage.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
if it takes a long time to download a pirated 4K movie, it's probably going to take pretty long to download a 4K movie that is not pirated, too, and if a significant portion of the public wants 4K enough to pay for it, piracy of 4K will become more common too.
Don't lose sight of the fact that Apple was instrumental in moving people from piracy to legitimate customers with $.99 songs in iTunes. Yes, there are always those that refuse to pay $.99, but Apple (Steve) made it easy, quick, and reliable. The cost at the time was considered reasonable. If Apple can do that here with 4k, they will succeed. There are a *lot* of sources for movies now - there's a lot of competition.
They were… with music. So far they've failed to do anything remotely the same with streaming video content in over a decade.
Maybe when they had that iTV demo for content owners back the landscape was dim, but the Apple TV wasn't released in until 2007 which is the same year Netflix started to stream content. However, in the last decade things have changed dramatically and Apple is only getting into things that Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, YouTube, and others have been doing for years.
It would be great if we could see something happen but Apple's model has been rental and purchase, not subscription. Even Apple Music seems to show Apple being late to change, but I think that's not a big concern over Apple not being able to get a shoe-in with content owners for a subscription model.
So my question to you (anyone) is: If Apple couldn't make this happen with SD/480p, 720p, or 1080p content over the last decade, then why should we expect them to be able to do it next month with 4K/2160p+HDR? I'd love to see it happen, but the odds seem staked against it.
You are correct, and I concur (and hence the "if" in my conclusion.) ATV still, in many ways, feels like a hobby. The little box seems so full of untapped opportunity.
Regarding 4K OTA transmissions, we have to wait until ATSC 3.0 is implemented in both the TV stations and ATSC 3.0 tuners in the TV sets.
I've seen some 4K Blu rays being sold for less than $20.00.
Yeah, I downloaded some songs from YouTube because they were the only place that have the songs. Sad that the music industry doesn't allow the iTunes Store unfettered access to old songs. I would buy them there.
The way I see it, until the movie studios get their heads out of their butts, piracy will survive. They think the average consumer loves having a shaft being rammed up their butts.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
No the are not.
4k movie files (the high quality ones) are MASSIVE. They take massive resources to upload/download and host. You also need special software to rip those movies and get past encryption. Most of those programs are grey market and can open you up to virus. Also those download sites are filled with virus.
downloading a tiny music file is 100x easier than a 4k movie.
You'd be amazed how well HVEC compresses 4K video. It's not going to be as bad as you envisage.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
given the number of folks with fire sticks that provide access to pirated movies still in theaters it appears to me to be trivial and pretty mainstream. This isn't being done by tech savvy folks but normal people.
Image quality isn't all that important if you can watch for free.
It bothers me when my kids go to others houses and watch pirated movies but its not my house so I don't make an issue of it. However, if the choice was between $9.99 for a HD/4K title vs a poor Korean screen cap I think the studios would see more legal sales. Whether that translates into more revenue depends I guess.
$50 to rent a movie still in the theaters is for me a non-starter. I can afford it, I just think its a poor value and I have a 100" HT setup to watch it on.
Your kids friends are living the risky life. Studios are tracking torrent sites like hawks. Especially those with high quality video. Unless you use a VPN and hide your tracks you will get into big trouble eventually. Using a VPN is not mainstream at all.
Now if you are talking about low quality video, oh well. Can't stop that. But many people won't accept such low quality junk. And if they do they would never had paid for the content in the first place.
Cost for a family of 4 to see Despicable Me 3 is like $50-$100 (depends on how much popcorn you buy). $50 for a rental isn't enough of a savings to bother.
Do they buy content? Yes. They have blu-rays, console games, Netflix, etc.
The point of my comment is that the choice is not limited to buy 4K or pirate 4K. It's buy 4K or pirate stream via the fire stick and maybe, maybe not (probably not) buy it later.
To deny that pirate streaming isn't big is ignoring reality.
4K content is gold plated. Each bit is a collector's item. Hewn from only the world's finest H.265 encoders. These encoders have been used to digitize images of kings and queens of royalty. How much would you pay for a movie file encoded thusly? $300? $150$? Try $39.99. Call now and we'll throw in 6 hours of bonus materials, including the 3-hour 4K screensaver of a burning fireplace. You can see each ember glowing in glorious HDR.
This is a two-headed coin. While paying less for media content is nice for consumers (and Apple will profit more if iTunes is the go-to for movies) it may discourage content creators investment in quality films and music. It's already tough for music performers and writers to make a living from streaming songs, and studios may suffer from ever-cheaper movie streaming as well with big-budget productions making less and less financial sense, especially as theater visits are declining.
The inflated price of 4K content has nothing to do with the "quality" of films and music. Whether you define "quality" as the technical aspects or artistic merits. Prices are often set by perceived value to the end consumer. Extra profit from inflated media pricing doesn't flow back to the artist.
Regarding 4K OTA transmissions, we have to wait until ATSC 3.0 is implemented in both the TV stations and ATSC 3.0 tuners in the TV sets.
Informative and helpful. I did not know this. I did and do suspect the source has to be captured in appropriate 4k cameras too, right? Oddly enough, I think the latest iPhone cameras do this. But I'm not sure the NFL's cameras at all the stadium are of iPhone quality. I think that sort of thing has to happen too, right?
This is a deal best for Apple and movie watchers. The price should be able to adjust according to how long the movie is released. When it is first released the fee will be whatever the studio wants. The studio knows best how much the movie is worth.
It literally costs no more to make an HD version as it does to make a 4k version today.
Ok, maybe a few thousand more for extra storage, but on a $40-200 million budget, that's not even the coffee bill for a week of production.
I recently did one of those "write, film, edit your short film in 3 days" things and did the whole thing in 8k raw. The longest part was converting it to 1080p for the showing.
Apple doesn't really need to have a purchase option at all, just a rental option, which is around $6.99 max and people can watch the movie more than once within 24-48 hours. Once they encourage people to rent by default, people will see how few movies they actually watch multiple times. When they go to rent the movie again, they pay another rental and after the 3rd rental, Apple can just add it to their library.
I think Apple should try for a $20/month subscription and allow 10 movie rentals/month (maybe limit to 3 movies released in the last 2 years) with options to watch TV shows too and have a library of older content like Netflix. They can have a credit system where you get a certain amount of credits every month and some streams use more than others e.g old movies might use 1 credit, new ones 5 credits and people would be able to topup credits at any time. If Netflix can manage their library at average $8/user/month, Apple must be able to throw in some movie rentals at $20/month and match what Netflix is doing. There aren't always new movies worth watching so people will be watching lower priced movies in that amount and not everyone will have time to watch 10 movies every month. They can run a limited subscription for a while and see how it works out. If the studios want more money, they can up the subscription a bit.
Your kids friends are living the risky life. Studios are tracking torrent sites like hawks. Especially those with high quality video. Unless you use a VPN and hide your tracks you will get into big trouble eventually. Using a VPN is not mainstream at all.
I am all for the enforcing of software and content piracy, but I have yet to see anyone get arrested or being fine for that. Its not working...
Yeah I was gonna chime in, while the studios do monitor some trackers, it's not immediate doom. If a completed torrent is closed after completion the odds are favorable. My friends have never been penalized, anyway.
Thieves are thieves. The price of something doesn't really matter. It's all about the thrill of stealing. Then use price as the rationale for thievery. According to reports almost 3 million thieves illegally streamed the Mayweather/McGregor fight.
I think you have your pop psychology wrong. Nobody that I know who torrents does it for a thrill of stealing. They do it because they don't want to pay 7 bucks for an HD stream to be watched in a 24-hour window of licensed use. You can say that's not their choice to make, but the facts remain that it is, because piracy is a thing and a readily available alternative. As the Napster era showed us, the market will adapt. Corporations then adapt and something that seems valuable to both parties results. Case in point, we now have individual-song iTunes sales, where we didn't before. Etc..
Yes, people buy movies, because they want to be able to watch a movie any time; streaming is fine on a whim (Netflix competes with HBO in this way) but being unable to watch/share a favorite movie because of blackouts, etc. is maddening.
The technical side of movie-making (4-6K cameras, editing, etc.) is LESS EXPENSIVE than it ever has been in the past (relatively). This is why Oats, and other tiny studios can produce compelling content that embarrass Hollywood. Charging MORE for crappy 4k blockbusters (or remastered classics) is the NON-creative studio tyrants milking the stupid public.
I assure you, the creatives aren't seeing a dime of this gouge.
I own over 200 HD movies on itunes and I can tell you I will not be buying those same movies again just because its 4k. I was expecting a free upgrade of those movies to 4k.
I think 4k should not cost more.... Its the same content, just a different resolution. Hollywood wants to pull the same trick they did when we went from dvd's to blue-rays. Well guess what, nobody is buying physical media anymore, it wont work this time.
It is literally not the same content with a different resolution.
It is:
Created from a separate grading session (HDR) from the raw camera files, restored 35mm, or other 4k+ Source Created in a different color space (p3 vs 709) A new mezzanine level master is created to deliver to Apple. Audio is typically redone to match the master (to be frame accurate). Encoded with HEVC instead of AVC Ingested into the iTunes CMS Stored on edge servers on a CDN (taking up more space than the HD SDR Version)
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
No the are not.
4k movie files (the high quality ones) are MASSIVE. They take massive resources to upload/download and host. You also need special software to rip those movies and get past encryption. Most of those programs are grey market and can open you up to virus. Also those download sites are filled with virus.
downloading a tiny music file is 100x easier than a 4k movie.
So how come a 4K movie is so easy to stream on YouTube or Amazon. It's just as easy as music from my point of view.
Apple needs to make the movie industry understand what Steve made the music industry understand years ago: the price needs to reflect the reality that the competition is free (pirated). It's basically an example of the fact that if you're not willing to disrupt your business model as the world changes, someone else will.
As fewer and and fewer people "buy" movies, studios will have less incentive to refuse to license streaming rights to their newer and more popular titles, and they will probably just sell to the highest bidder. If we end up with fewer mediocre big-budget movies about superheroes saving the world from destruction, so be it.
I think the the music streaming model seems to be working out pretty well, all things considered. My friends who were making a living with music pre-streaming are still doing every bit as well, but like most recording artists, album sales were always a small part of their income--it's mostly live shows and licensing. And streaming services are probably at least as good as the average record store for helping lesser-known musicians to become recognized.
It's different for movies of course, but as streaming services grow, there will be more money to go around. If studios have to take a chance on an undiscovered talent rather than paying millions to an established star, that won't be so bad. And I'm with Sog on this one--if you have a good story, you don't need a ton of CGI.
huge difference between music and movie business.
Its very difficult to pirate 4k movies. Very difficult. Like 100x harder than music.
You can download a music file in 5 seconds. It takes days to download/upload a 4k movie.
Because of this pirating movies isn't mainstream like how music was.
All of you assumptions regarding pirating 4K are 100% wrong.
No the are not.
4k movie files (the high quality ones) are MASSIVE. They take massive resources to upload/download and host. You also need special software to rip those movies and get past encryption. Most of those programs are grey market and can open you up to virus. Also those download sites are filled with virus.
downloading a tiny music file is 100x easier than a 4k movie.
You'd be amazed how well HVEC compresses 4K video. It's not going to be as bad as you envisage.
Pretty much solidified my choice to move everything to HEVC.
If you aren't converting from Mezz or Source there really is no benefit other than decreasing size. You won't get any of the qualitative benefits of HEVC re-encoding an existing elementary stream.
Comments
https://www.techspot.com/article/1131-hevc-h256-enconding-playback/ ;
Pretty much solidified my choice to move everything to HEVC.
I've seen some 4K Blu rays being sold for less than $20.00.
Yeah, I downloaded some songs from YouTube because they were the only place that have the songs. Sad that the music industry doesn't allow the iTunes Store unfettered access to old songs. I would buy them there.
The way I see it, until the movie studios get their heads out of their butts, piracy will survive. They think the average consumer loves having a shaft being rammed up their butts.
Yes. I hope they update Compressor with support so I can batch re-encode. I'm moving everything to HEVC and HEIFF.
Do they buy content? Yes. They have blu-rays, console games, Netflix, etc.
The point of my comment is that the choice is not limited to buy 4K or pirate 4K. It's buy 4K or pirate stream via the fire stick and maybe, maybe not (probably not) buy it later.
To deny that pirate streaming isn't big is ignoring reality.
http://mashable.com/2017/08/09/kodi-box-firestick-that-shit-illegal-streaming-piracy/#hJZIM_TONaqx
Informative and helpful. I did not know this. I did and do suspect the source has to be captured in appropriate 4k cameras too, right? Oddly enough, I think the latest iPhone cameras do this. But I'm not sure the NFL's cameras at all the stadium are of iPhone quality. I think that sort of thing has to happen too, right?
Ok, maybe a few thousand more for extra storage, but on a $40-200 million budget, that's not even the coffee bill for a week of production.
I recently did one of those "write, film, edit your short film in 3 days" things and did the whole thing in 8k raw. The longest part was converting it to 1080p for the showing.
4k shouldn't cost more to buy!
https://www.amazon.com/Wonder-Woman-Blu-ray-Charles-Roven/dp/B0714QRG4Z ($24.99)
https://www.amazon.com/Spider-Man-Homecoming-Combo-Blu-ray-UltraViolet/dp/B073RW6NGL ($22.99)
https://www.amazon.com/Transformers-Knight-Blu-ray-Wahlberg-Mark/dp/B071GVGD2B ($19.99)
https://www.amazon.com/War-Planet-Apes-Digital-Blu-ray/dp/B071GRTQTN ($19.99)
https://www.amazon.com/Despicable-Me-Blu-ray-DVD-Digital/dp/B072Y3LDZB ($24.99)
4K:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06Y3NY4K9 ($27.99)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01LTIBWTO ($24.96)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0714QRG51 ($29.99)
Apple doesn't really need to have a purchase option at all, just a rental option, which is around $6.99 max and people can watch the movie more than once within 24-48 hours. Once they encourage people to rent by default, people will see how few movies they actually watch multiple times. When they go to rent the movie again, they pay another rental and after the 3rd rental, Apple can just add it to their library.
I think Apple should try for a $20/month subscription and allow 10 movie rentals/month (maybe limit to 3 movies released in the last 2 years) with options to watch TV shows too and have a library of older content like Netflix. They can have a credit system where you get a certain amount of credits every month and some streams use more than others e.g old movies might use 1 credit, new ones 5 credits and people would be able to topup credits at any time. If Netflix can manage their library at average $8/user/month, Apple must be able to throw in some movie rentals at $20/month and match what Netflix is doing. There aren't always new movies worth watching so people will be watching lower priced movies in that amount and not everyone will have time to watch 10 movies every month. They can run a limited subscription for a while and see how it works out. If the studios want more money, they can up the subscription a bit.
Has Apple said which A-processors will support playback of HEVC? I hope my A8-equipped iPad Mini makes the cut.
Edit: A8 and later, according the article linked above.
I think you have your pop psychology wrong. Nobody that I know who torrents does it for a thrill of stealing. They do it because they don't want to pay 7 bucks for an HD stream to be watched in a 24-hour window of licensed use. You can say that's not their choice to make, but the facts remain that it is, because piracy is a thing and a readily available alternative. As the Napster era showed us, the market will adapt. Corporations then adapt and something that seems valuable to both parties results. Case in point, we now have individual-song iTunes sales, where we didn't before. Etc..
It is:
Created from a separate grading session (HDR) from the raw camera files, restored 35mm, or other 4k+ Source
Created in a different color space (p3 vs 709)
A new mezzanine level master is created to deliver to Apple.
Audio is typically redone to match the master (to be frame accurate).
Encoded with HEVC instead of AVC
Ingested into the iTunes CMS
Stored on edge servers on a CDN (taking up more space than the HD SDR Version)
Uninformed speculation does not help.
So how come a 4K movie is so easy to stream on YouTube or Amazon. It's just as easy as music from my point of view.