iTunes Bends Pricing For HBO

[admin]

What do Sex and the City, Sopranos and Rome have in common? They can all be downloaded now on iTunes! Apple has announced a deal with HBO that has revolutionized its pricing model. Content providers everywhere are saying: It’s about time!


Discuss "iTunes Bends Pricing For HBO" here. Read the article.

[smurphy522]

Well, Apple's not stupid but it blows me away that they think people will, and surely some do, pay $2-3 per episode. OK, some of those shows are great and even defined HBO as a challenger to the major networks; but come on $2-3 per episode? For the prices they charge for media they should give the Ipods away.

[aberkowitz]

At $2 per episode, you could go out and buy the entire series of Sex and the City on DVD (including all of the extras) for the same price that it would cost to download from iTunes. Makes more sense to just go out and buy the DVDs to me....

[Wayde Robson]

Excuse my iTunes ignorance because I don't use it myself but....

There is no HD download on iTunes yet is there? I suppose I could look it up but I always find it difficult to conclusively determine what isn't there rather than what is there. Not finding it doesn't mean it's not there!

So, even with the new Apple TV media streamer... all those iTunes shows and movies have yet to hit the HD realm?

[Jim Robbins]

$2 for a show hurts when you can often get a season of whatever when it's on sale for about $1 to $1.50 an episode. Plus, you have the physical media that you can do whatever with. You aren't locked into any DRM or special size or format. And, yes, I am getting spoiled by HD content, but still, a DVD is pretty decent quality, and probably much better than the average pay per download item. I am also not an itunes user, so I don't know for sure. But there's nothing compelling about downloading compressed audio or non HD video for me, so I don't see need.

I have downloaded stuff on my Xbox 360, and yes, it's DRM'd but I HAD to watch some missing episodes of a show, and I guess I'd rather pay for it than install some trojan filled torrent program on my computer. Oh well, someone got my money...

Btw, anyone try out Hulu.com? I caught an episode of Battlestar Galactica that I forgot to DVR. The quality sucked for my theater screen, but at least I didn't have to pay for it and I didn't have to pirate it either. Oh, but I did have to endure about 1 min of Crest Toothpaste commercials during the show. I can take that. Hey Hulu, where's the HD??

Yeah, I am spoiled now....

[moggi1964]

Buy the DVD's and rip them to iTunes if you really want to watch them on the train or at the gym. Cheaper in the long run!

Or get a Tivo and pay a few bucks for the software that allows you to save and convert Tivo content. I assume you can do that for HBO stuff (I am not a subscriber to HBO). You still enjoy the benefits of Tivo as well.

[Wayde Robson]

Buy the DVD's and rip them to iTunes if you really want to watch them on the train or at the gym. Cheaper in the long run!

Or get a Tivo and pay a few bucks for the software that allows you to save and convert Tivo content. I assume you can do that for HBO stuff (I am not a subscriber to HBO). You still enjoy the benefits of Tivo as well.

You're right Moggi, this is easy to do. They call it TiVo-Casting. You can output your TiVo files to a PC and convert them to mpeg4, I believe they already are mpg4 files when they come out of your TiVo if you have one with the TiVo2Go feature. They'll play on your PSP for instance as well as many cell phones.

You can back-up any DVD you own using DVD-Shrink, DVDFab Decrypter - there are many more. Remember, I only suggest backing up DVDs you own, we do not support piracy!

Tools like DVD Shrink allow you to edit your DVD video files and save. The .VOB files are just Mpeg4 files and the covnersion requires no transcoding, simply rename the extension.

If anyone is interested in complete tutorials on this stuff perhaps I can come up with something for Audioholics.

This is SSSOOOOooo much cheaper than buying the files from iTunes.