Hollywood’s Movielink disaster
p2pnet news | Movies:-Way back in November, 2003, “Having already failed once with Movielink, Warner Bros, Paramount, Universal, Sony Pictures and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer are trying again, hoping to re-boot in collaboration with SBC Internet Services, which in turn wants to boost its broadband trade via an SBC Yahoo DSL offering,” p2pnet posted, going on:
Movielink – an early Hollywood attempt to thwart online p2p file sharing – went online at around this time last year. However, it was then, and is still was at the time of writing, Americocentric, not to coin a phrase. That’s to say, anyone outside of the US of A looking for one of the 170 titles such as ‘A Beautiful Mind,’ ‘Ocean’s Eleven ,’ or even ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ was out of luck.
So things must be better in 2007. Canadians, and others, aren’t treated as second-class citizens any more. Right?
“Greetings, Canadian friends!” – says the site today. “Thanks for your interest in Movielink, the leading video download service. Unfortunately, our service isn’t yet available outside the U.S.”
But who cares, really?
Like all the other cynical Hollywood efforts to milk the online crowd, Movielink has been a washout since day one but even worse, it’s been haemorrhaging money like you wouldn’t believe.
As Ars Technica points out, quoting an 8-K Blockbuster filing:
During the first half of 2007, the company lost $10.2 million on revenues of $1.9 million. That’s a slight improvement over the same period in 2006, when losses were $11.6 million on revenues of $1.9 million.
Looking back to 2005, the movie download service lost almost $31.2 million on revenues of $3.2 million for the whole year.
Movielink launched in 2002 with a paltry 200 movies), “insane restrictions (a 24-hour window to watch movies once started), and technological lock-in (Windows and Internet Explorer only),” says Ars Technica, adding:
“Unfortunately, little changed over the next few years.”
But wait! All is not lost for Canadians !
Thanks to a partnership deal with a firm called Zip.ca we can, after all, enjoy the fruits of Hollywood’s labours.
We can rent up to 11 movies per month for $25 with extra rentals at $2.50 per DVD.
Whoopee!
So where’s the download site?
Er, um, actually, deliveries are by snail-mail.
Oh.
Yes. Well ………
Also See:
p2pnet – Studios try again with Movielink, November 25, 2003
Ars Technica – SEC filings reveal Movielink was a bottomless money pit for studios, October 25, 2007
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October 26th, 2007 at 9:46 am
dvd by mail is still better than any download option i have seen.
October 26th, 2007 at 9:48 am
not if your supposed to be an online service
October 26th, 2007 at 10:12 am
The media companies are under the delusion that restrictions will be ok with the customers. Customers are voting with their wallets on what is acceptable. On line offers will continue to crater until they get it right. Offer what the customer doesn’t want and he will prove just how much the customer is still king.
They have only recently awaken to the idea that DRM in spite of all the sugar coated words about it’s benefits isn’t a restriction that the public is willing to accept. Preventing the playing of a purchase because you don’t have the right model player or software isn’t floating at all. Then the idea that less is more and jacking up the price because they don’t have to pay extra for the DRM license and trying to convence the public it’s worth more because of that isn’t floating any better than high digital prices for low quality lossy mp3s are. Rip offs are plainly seen for what they are.
These idiots can’t crater soon enough for my tastes.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:25 am
1-2 days wait vs 20 minutes wait, torrent owns them all.. if only movie makers and music makers set up “paypals” so one can legalize the “pirating” everything would be awesome.
piracy is the best money flow equalizer today! good artists/producers gets money, while the ones people are fed up with feels the pain, and the little guys can quickly become famous and start making serious income! But yet the “big” guys dont have a easy “donate” system, witch is the biggest problem after their greed and monopoly problem..
record companies are dead, they should reform and offer great donate systems and sites where we “pirates” can donate to the ones we like! thats the way to the future, and i expect to see a main donate site soon after record companies realize their war isnt working and costing them, their customers and their clients more then it pays off..
Copyright laws need change to support this, thats why there are “piracy” organisations trying to gain political power, thats why in protest more and more gets released and downloaded, copyright laws need a seperate law for virtual property to allow free distrubution yet stop real pirates reselling for profits and other organisations/artists etc copying the work, Intellectual property needs changing aswell.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:30 am
and no, record company and organisations will not be the ones to change laws, the people of the world will be the ones to change laws and the organisations will have to adapt to them. they should not force the world to adapt to them, the world should force them to adapt to itself, hence why “pirating” exists in the fist place and is becoming increasingly popular.
October 26th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Twenty minutes? Nobody’s getting a movie that fast via torrent, are they?
October 26th, 2007 at 12:18 pm
Oh well! 35 millions less to sue the customer.
Less lawsuits Good!
October 26th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Twenty minutes? Nobody’s getting a movie that fast via torrent, are they?
maybe not – but a couple of hours is pretty normal
October 26th, 2007 at 5:57 pm
THe fastest I got a movie was 50 minutes on a 3mbit line. People with 6 and 10 I would imagine would get it pretty darm fast.
October 27th, 2007 at 2:20 am
Hmm, lets go through the check list.
(1) Windows / IE only. Sorry, I use Gentoo Linux as my operating system, and Firefox / Elinks as my browser.
(2) 200 availability. I can get any film ever made, and for free!
(3) DRM crippled. I can get the same films without any DRM and for free!!
Dear MPAA / Hollywood,
It’s clear you have a collective IQ of 0.1. Which is fine for me, as i’m having a great time watching every movie ever made, for free!!!, without restriction, in high quality. Oh did i mention that i get them all for free!!! muhahaha.
MPAA / RIAA can kiss my arse.
October 27th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
we all knew this would happen sooner or later!
http://www.spymac.com/details/?2290046