02/12/2007, 8:55am, EST
Monday, February 12th
Apple adds Lionsgate films to iTunes catalog
Rumors of the distribution deal have been flying since last year, when company executives told analysts during a company conference call that it had digital delivery deals in place with several major players, including Cinema Now, MovieLink, and iTunes. Earlier this month, both Amazon and Wal-Mart also announced similar movie distributions with Lionsgate.
According to the release, Lionsgate's collection of movie titles available on iTunes in the coming weeks will include legendary action adventure films and thrillers such as "Total Recall" and "Rambo," indie classics such as "Monster's Ball" as well as perennial favorites such as "Chaplin" and "The Boys From Brazil."
"The iTunes Store is by far the most popular online movie store in the world," said Eddy Cue, Apple's vice president of iTunes. "We're thrilled to be adding this phenomenal collection of Lionsgate titles from Hollywood's leading independent studio, including such blockbusters as 'Terminator 2.'"
Apple's iTunes Store offers four million songs, 350 television shows and, now, over 400 movies. As noted in early January, the iTunes Store has sold over two billion songs, 50 million TV shows and over 1.3 million movies, making it the world's most popular online music, TV and movie store, the company claims.
Movies purchased and downloaded from the iTunes Store can be viewed on a computer, Apple TV or fifth generation iPods and most are priced at $9.99 each. Movies downloaded from the iTunes Store are downloaded in near-DVD quality at a resolution of 640x480 (up to 480, depending on the aspect ratio).
Filed under: industry
Other story tags: digital music/video
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BTW, at the itunes store's current video quality, will "The Blair Witch Project" look better then it did before, or even worse?
To those who continually protest that the picture quality is sub-standard I offer you this.
Apple is marketing to the masses here; not the high end video freak. I have a 32 Inch Sony Bravia LCD and the Madonna concert I bought last week looks great on it. I expect that the resolution will increase over time (as it already has once - remember the store used to sell music videos in a much lower quality.) It's only a matter of time.
Well, I haven't tried the new video resolutions yet, but the last one was weak. And, still, when you can buy a DVD for the same price as a much more restricted iTMS purchase, the lower picture quality really doesn't become a selling point for me.
Then again, since most movies that come out each year fall under the 'disappointing' to 'stupid' to 'OMG, I can't believe someone thought this was good!' categories, its not like there's much content worth forking $10 over for.
Maybe if they had a $2.50 rental price, that might be OK.
I expect that the resolution will increase over time (as it already has once - remember the store used to sell music videos in a much lower quality.) It's only a matter of time.
And until then, there's going to be many people just sitting and waiting.
If this is true (can this be true?), then it's amazing, even if the market is still small. With only Disney movies until last month, getting 90% of the market?
This is a test market, not for everyone (not really for very many people), but if Apple makes it a good experience and other companies don't, when the improvements come Apple will be in a great position. Of course, it still might turn out that for movies, rentals will be more of a factor than for music.
walks away shaking head.
If this is true (can this be true?), then it's amazing, even if the market is still small. With only Disney movies until last month, getting 90% of the market?
Apple has 90% of the total video market, which includes the TV shows and everything. The TV shows are where Apple's sales are all coming from (50 million of them), and they're basically the only ones doing TV shows on-line.
geez, you foreignors are getting cheeky.