Friday, March 24, 2006

Universal has officially gone insane

I've always thought that the movies studios offering downloads of their movies was a good idea. At a reasonable price of course. If a dvd is going to cost my $20 with it's nice, pretty packaging and new dvd smell, why not let me download it myself for $5-10 and I'll do all the work. I'll create whatever case I might need, I'll decorate the disc or something. Have different options and price points, like you could d/l JUST the movie for $5 and for $10 you could d/l the version with all the special features and commentaries. The studios would still make money, and I'd be able to get what I want the way I want.

But no, tis not to be. Universal has corrupted my brilliant idea. What they want to do is let you download the movie over the course of 45 min to an hour and then send you the actual DVD. Which wouldn't be so bad if they weren't going to charge 35 fucking dollars. For $35 that movie should come with some popcorn, a soda and a blowjob. They're out of their mind! The only movie I have EVER been compelled to pay over $30 for was the extended editions of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

Now, I may be off base, this is starting as a UK thing, and the $35 is because of the exchange rate, which says something about our money in this country. It just seems like an awfully high price if I can go to Best Buy and get the same movie for $17.99 the day it comes out. And it's not like I could download the movie really ahead of time. So what kind of service are you providing for that price? Convinience? It's better for the industry if I go buy the movie in a store. I rarely walk out with just the 1 movie that I went in for.


And I love that they're going to use some sort of DRM to make sure that you can't EMAIL the movie. Because that's what everyone does...emails movies. That's how those villianous pirates operate, through email.

Universal says that this could "completely revolutionize the way people watch movies". I can't imagine how. Unless for $35 I get the movie downloaded to my BRAIN. Mmm...direct feed...I'd be like Johnny fuckin Mnemonic. That would be awesome. That would be worth $35, even if I had to give up a chunk of my past.