Video on demand or own collection?

[ppera2]

What you prefer - Video watching on demand, online, with big choice, pay per view or - building own movie collection?

Need to add some notes: real VOD not exist yet, but some people expect it, with relative low prices.
Making collection: you can't get all what you want, because choice is limited. Don't count here illegal copies.
Poll is little hypothetical, but we all are aware that major changes will happen in close future.

[unmei]

OK i voted i prefer my own collection. But maybe i should explain this a bit. I think VOD like online music stores are good ideas. For other people
My main reason for voting for my own collection is that i do not buy anything over the net. This paid services as well as ordering physical stuff over the net.
The only thing i could imagine in this direction is joining a service by my ISP allowing you to watch online for a fixed rate per month (my ISP is the swiss cable TV provider so this is not so unlikely in the future, actually they already offer online TV, but only limited channels and not with choice of what you watch). The idea here is that it were like a tuned internet service and i would not have to order it online.
But then again this would most likely have a rather limited choice of titles.

Now, in the current situation i don't i need anything like that even though it could be nice. I have my fansubs that keep my desire for non-animated movies relatively small. The bi-weekly to monthly normal movie i watch are most likely european or 'classic' movies. The 'classics' are almost all available at my videotheque and for the rest i buy them, which also gives me new fodder for encoding

You said "don't count illegal copies", so with only video on demand you would never again get to make an encode *shudder*

[ppera2]

Originally posted by unmei
You said "don't count illegal copies", so with only video on demand you would never again get to make an encode *shudder*

Explain that slang (?) 'shudder'. I make lot of encodes of amateur videos. I don't see that such material will ever vanish.

[unmei]

I tought it was approximately a synonym for 'to shiver', but english is not my native language

And yes you're right, of course you still had amateur video. I do not produce/encode these, or only that rarely that i did not think about it before.

[Doom9]

Making collection: you can't get all what you want, because choice is limited. Don't count here illegal copies.

You have to be fair and admit that this will never happen with online distribution as well. Look at todays music stores.. it's not about how much storage space you require, it's also not so much about how much bandwidth it takes, it starts with the very basic problem of getting all the required licenses. For many movies it will be extremely hard if not impossible to get a license for streaming - or make a DVD for that matter. IF you can't have it on DVD, it is extremely likely that you won't have it via streaming either.

[ppera2]

Originally posted by Doom9
... IF you can't have it on DVD, it is extremely likely that you won't have it via streaming either.

Yes, it's absolutely true. But relations can change with new technologies. In any case copyright owner, who will not publish it in any way will loose potential money. And I believe that most of people like money

I just can put here on situation with old video games (for consoles, old 8-16 bit computers) - most of them is now PD, legally, with permission, because they know that no potential for some big sale now.

Some firms, like Ultimate don't allowed their Spectrum games to be awailable now on the Web. What they have from that? Only disdain, by me.
Situation with movies is not same, at least not by any 'normal' movie, made for wide audience. Number of potential viewers is enormous. If they will not publish it, it's same for me as bunkering of some movies in Soviet-lager in recent past.

[Mug Funky]

In any case copyright owner, who will not publish it in any way will loose potential money.

actually, this is very much not the case in niche markets. an example - disney own the rights to Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke, but not enough americans like anime to make it worth disney's while to publish and distribute it. the larger the company, the more market interest needed to break even. this is why niche markets are filled better by smaller companies that have a smaller payroll and can get things done at far less of a cost.

in cases like these, a movie/series/whatever will only be released if the niche company can negotiate the rights from the big company, and the deal is such that the big company doesn't ask for more than the niche company's break-even requires for the rights.

rights negotiations are often quite tricky, but if the conditions are right these "limbo" films can be released. it doesn't happen enough unfortunately (although Princess Mononoke will shortly be coming out in Australia on DVD, i have it on good authority )

[Doom9]

Yes, it's absolutely true. But relations can change with new technologies. In any case copyright owner, who will not publish it in any way will loose potential money. And I believe that most of people like money

Mugfunky had a good riposte for that. In fact, especially for older movies, the intial investment is considerable, first the license, then you have to prepare the material, regardless of the format you plan to release it in. You have to at least digitize and clean the source material. DVD authoring can be rather cheap if you go for a no frills disc (that's what you'd get with streaming as well). I presume that the larger part of the investment would be completely unrelated of the end format, so it doesn't matter if an old film were to be released on DVD, VHS or via VOD.

I just can put here on situation with old video games (for consoles, old 8-16 bit computers) - most of them is now PD,

Are they? Copyright protection (at least in the US) has been extended to up to 80 years after the death of the creator.. so unless the copyright owner is forfeiting their legally granted rights, they will sit on their IP for a long time to come.

It is my sincerest believe that VOD services will be just as mainstream as DVD, if not more even (because it's a new business it's more risky, and as outlined in a previous discussion, streaming hardware is expensive, and so is the infrastructure - until we have Internet-wide QOS, high quality streaming will only be possible from an ISP datacenter to the end customer, not from one server to the whole wide world.. which seriously limits the attractiveness for smaller companies to get into this business, then being asked for refunds all the time because the movie is interrupted every now and then). The laws of economy apply to every market.. you see music studios sitting on their old records and not releasing them to online sales services like iTunes.. even though in that case, their cost for distribution would be minimal.. rip a CD, add it to the catalogue and you're all set. And even with those minimal costs.. the selection hasn't suddenly gotten larger.. you still get most mainstream. So if the music biz is any indication on how the movie biz will go, you know what you can expect.

[wmansir]

Originally posted by ppera2
Explain that slang (?) 'shudder'.

Not Slang

Shudder: intr.v. shud·dered, shud·der·ing, shud·ders

1. To shiver convulsively, as from fear or revulsion.

@all:
I think if VOD was reasonably priced ($2.50 or less for 24 viewing window) it would be something I would use, but it wouldn't replace a personal library for my most watched titles.

I was just at the video store today and noticed several stupid comedies that I might want to check out, but I would never blind buy. It could fill that niche for me.

EDIT: this assumes I can watch VOD on my home theater, not just my comptuer, and I don't have to invest in expensive hardware.

[Joe Fenton]

Although I voted for my own collection, I don't see why people think it's one or the other. It should and will be BOTH. People have this need to possess things - this pushes the collection market. It will never go away. However, there are times the VOD will be much better, especially for hard to find items. So it will also exist and do well. People who push only one (like VOD only) WILL go out of business. People like choices, and this is just another.

[Neo Neko]

Originally posted by ppera2
What you prefer - Video watching on demand, online, with big choice, pay per view or - building own movie collection?

Your poll is flawed. My answer to your question is yes. But there is no option for it. That which I would watch alot or love of course would be added to my collection. But there is alot out there that I would like to watch if only once for a reasonable fee. So a hybrid method is of course preffered.

Originally posted by ppera2
Need to add some notes: real VOD not exist yet, but some people expect it, with relative low prices.

Need to add some notes: real VOD does indeed exist today. Not only that but is highly viable and even dare I say it profitable. Internet VOD on the other hand is still fledgling at best suffering from lack of transport reliability and and bandwidth. Many major cable and satelite operators offer VOD services and have for some time now. And we are not talking "beta testing". We are talking full product rollout. I use Time Warners VOD service on average at least 10 times a week. Comcast offers similar services. They offer a nice balance of free services (decent if somewhat lackluster on video fidelity) and pay services. (understandibly better quality) I have never actually used the pay services myself. Though I saw it in action at my brother-in-laws house on his nice high def tv. The cost of $3.95 USD for 24 hours unlimited viewing is a bit prohibitive for me yet. But not totally disagreable. The price needs to go down or the time frame needs to go up before I commit to something like that. Since I can go out and rent a video for the same price for 5 days the current cost still outweighs the convinience.

VOD is the new paradigm in video rental. So it is absurd at this point that it costs more for less. Seeing as there is no overhead, utilities to pay, or risk of running out of coppies since they can whip new ones off at will. Unfortuantly this is due in part to the limited subscriber base. As it inevitably increases the consumer cost will decrease. I only await that day. Because VOD is here now.

[Pyscrow]

Nup never - When I pay for it, I want it for ever, not view once. The price will never be cheap enough for "view once".
I.E. My kids must of viewed their DVD's / Videos hundreds of times each, With an original DVD price of 20 dollars, that works out at less than a cent "per view". That will never be matched!

[ppera2]

When we say 'prefer' that doesn't exclude other option. Putting third choice in vote - 'I prefer both' would make it almost nonsense.
I'm sure that most of us is so: that some movies want to have in his collection. Maybe I should say 'building big collection'. And that's the point. Everybody complains about how wrong is to pay per view, but nobody talks how much costs buying thousand(s) of DVD's.

VOD - I should add Internet before VOD, to be more precise. Poll is for everybody, not for people which are connected to some limited network.

This poll is actually inspired with one discussion here, before year, or more, in hardware room, when someone talked about putting all of his DVD's (over 1000) to some hard disk cluster, to make watching easier. Imagine just costs and required work for that. Imagine how many times you can view all of that collection per year...
Some problems about required resources are discussed in thread 'Little futurology'.

[Neo Neko]

Originally posted by Pyscrow
Nup never - When I pay for it, I want it for ever, not view once. The price will never be cheap enough for "view once".
I.E. My kids must of viewed their DVD's / Videos hundreds of times each, With an original DVD price of 20 dollars, that works out at less than a cent "per view". That will never be matched!

You missunderstand. That would be a prime example of one you would buy to add to your collection. OTOH how many times would you watch C.H.O.M.P.S.? In all likely hood you have never watched it. And if you had chances are you would not watch it every day. It would be an example of something you might watch once just for the sake of having watched it. A better more timely and poniant example would be how many times would you want to watch buba-hotep? I watched it several but even though my man bruce campble is in it I don't think I will ever buy it. But I did want to watch it just the once.

[Neo Neko]

Originally posted by ppera2
When we say 'prefer' that doesn't exclude other option. Putting third choice in vote - 'I prefer both' would make it almost nonsense.

But not any more nonsense than it already is to me. That being one of my points. Of course we would preffer to have access to everything. But there are some things we would preffer to own and others we would preffer not to and rent instead. So talking about what we would preffer in this instance with such generality to me seems senseless. I think we would all preffer both.

Originally posted by ppera2
Maybe I should say 'building big collection'. And that's the point.

But big is entirely relative.

Originally posted by ppera2
Everybody complains about how wrong is to pay per view, but nobody talks how much costs buying thousand(s) of DVD's.

Naaaaah. There is nothing wrong with pay per view. Just don't view the same thing a 100 times over before you come to your senses and buy it. Pay per view, Rental, VOD. Different terms for roughly the same thing. And all of us have rented at one time or another and not thought it was wrong.

Originally posted by ppera2
VOD - I should add Internet before VOD, to be more precise. Poll is for everybody, not for people which are connected to some limited network.

Yes specifics are best. Because when you over generalize you run into missuinderstandings. But do we absolutely need internet VOD. Or would everyone be better off getting served by a local carrier for the most part? Geographically limited networks offer more reliability and stability than the internet will be able to offer. Not that we should not have VOD over the internet some day. But it should start with your local cable and satelite company. The internet is just not ready yet and will not be for some time yet.

[ppera2]

Originally posted by Neo Neko

...But do we absolutely need internet VOD... The internet is just not ready yet and will not be for some time yet.

Do we need... - it's my favored We need absolutely only air, water and food, plus some conditions to beeing live. All other is personal choice. So, better don't talk here what we need.
Much better is talk about what we can.
Of course that it's not ready, but I expect some progress in next 20 year, and maybe even later

[techz]

I would be so nice, if we could access our movie collection all over the world and anytime we want for a fixed fee, why not. U dont have to worry about spilling sauce on the dvd or lending it out to one of those friends who never give it back. We desperately need fast broadband and cheap rate to use it though. We pay US$ 110 per month for a no cap 256k connection.

[Mug Funky]

$110 per month!!??! even in australian dollars (~ $0.70 USD) that's a horrid deal!

change yer ISP man...

[Neo Neko]

OUCH! $110? Not USD I hope. We pay $40 a month for uncapped 3000/512 Cable DSL. I suppose if you did some bad math/accounting you could say we pay $80 a month when you throw in the other $40 for digital cable. But that is not correct.

[techz]

We have a monopoly here, the market has now opened up and we wont have to pay US $ 110 anymore.