Johan Lieu, maker of products

Why Not Try An Infinity-Day Window?

The 56 day window is just the latest of the stupid moves made by Hollywood. I’ve learned to live with these arbitrary windows with my subscription to Netflix, appreciating new stuff whenever it does finally get on there but not everyone has that kind of patience.

I have plenty of friends who were once hardcore music piraters who now buy music legit from Apple/Amazon because it’s easier, because they don’t have to mess around with ID3 tags or renaming MP3s, and because it’s way more convenient than going to the music shop to get a CD. Hell, it’s way more convenient to buy it and get it NOW on their phones than it is to even order the CD online. They converted because the service got so good, they were compelled to go legit.

These same friends I’ve tried to convert to using Netflix, or VUDU, or what have you and they always ask if so-and-so new movie is on it yet. And invariably, because of these idiotic windows, they are not. And you know what their response is?

“Oh well, I’ll just download it.”

These are people who have a track record of going from pirating media to purchasing it legit and Hollywood is stopping them from conducting a legit transaction. It’s crazy to me how Hollywood doesn’t see that their current business model is old and busted and that their policies are in fact pushing potential customers into the arms of the pirates. And with this new 56 day window, I foresee more and more potential customers turning into customers of the Pirate Bay.

parislemon:

Matt Drance on Warner Bros. idiotic new 56-day DVD rental window:

Also under this new deal, pirated movies remain free of charge, free of non-skippable ads, free of five-minute load times, and are now nearly three months ahead of the competition.

And:

iTunes changed the music industry because it was more convenient than stealing. Most people made the value judgment that ten bucks for a clean, legal digital album was worth the alternative of fishing around for files that may or may not be damaged or infected.

It’s really — honestly — surprising that Hollywood doesn’t understand such a simple concept. Even stranger is that they can look to the music industry as an example and learn from the mistakes there, but they refuse.

Hollywood isn’t going to die anytime soon — but it won’t be from lack of trying. The pain is coming. In a big way.

Source: parislemon