MacDailyNews - Where Mac news comes first

This is nice and makes a lot of sense.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:10 pm Comment from: iWill

Very interesting... Practical for people needing more than 24 hours to watch a feature film, and good for Apple to track viewing habits of rental customers. Brilliant!

Jan 24, 08 - 02:11 pm Comment from: Petey

Very interesting.

I wish they would make it 48hrs though, and announce this in sort of press release.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:12 pm Comment from: Think

Very interesting. This needs to be tested by others and then when the AppleTV update is released, tested in all the various ways to see what happens.
Then a confirmation from Apple would be nice.

How long will it be before some hacker gets around the DRM on this puppy? My guess is 3 months.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:24 pm Comment from: Ampar

"I wish they would make it 48hrs though . . ."

Yeah, but then the whiners will beg for another 48 hours and that was a terrible sequel.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:25 pm Comment from: iWill

And this from another thread:

Thu Jan 24 09:40:45 PST 2000
macdandr says:

"Re: Extending iTunes rental times
Finally someone wrote about this feature. I too was amazed that Apple hasn't documented this feature. As long as you start the movie within the 24 hour period (even if you start it with one minute left) it will let you watch the entire movie. You can even start the movie over and watch it again as long as it never finishes the credits. This also works in iTunes the exact same way and I don't have an Apple TV to test but I would assume that it works the same way too."

As Elmer Fudd would say, "yes, vewy, vewy intewesting. . ."

Jan 24, 08 - 02:26 pm Comment from: mike_in_helsinki

Very interesting, because it is and this is the catch phrase of this string. It could even be snappier.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:27 pm Comment from: Tommy Boy

Yeah, but I truly fall asleep watching my TV. Whatever I'm watching on my DVR plays to the end and if I don't use my TV's Sleep function I'd wake up to a screen saver.

If I used an tv and a rental movie I'd end with a lot of expired stuff that my tv thought I'd really watched.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:35 pm Comment from: Think

@ Tommy Boy

What you need is a Snore Alarm TV shutoff device. It needs to be USB compliant. Set it up and when it detects snoring, it pauses the movie and shuts off the TV.

Some engineer out there can do this, I'm sure.

This may be a case of Apple, once again, exceeding expectations. The consensus is that the movie studios imposed the 24 hour time limit on Apple so that Apple rentals were in line with their existing rental options from other distributors. If Apple has really extended the 24 hour availability of movies, I doubt they will advertise it since that would probably violate their contract and raise a firestorm of protest from the other vendors. But if they can wangle their way around the time limit and still CALL it a 24 hour time limit then their competitors are screwed. Again.

Jan 24, 08 - 02:40 pm Comment from: Cubert

It will only be a matter of time until the movie companies make Apple fix this "bug". (wink, wink, Apple)

Jan 24, 08 - 02:42 pm Comment from: Ampar

"What you need is a Snore Alarm TV shutoff device."

That's like The Clapper. It senses if your date has an STD and then rings your cellphone so you have a believable excuse to end it and escape.

anaknipedro, above, predicts that hackers will get around Apple's DRM in about 3 months. I too am pretty sure that hackers will get around the DRM, but I'm not sure it will matter that much. Since Apple rentals are all ported in via iTunes and played on Apple products, Apple has the ability to quickly tweak their DRM in order to thwart the hackers. Of course DRM free movies could be played on non-Apple products but there are already a slew of black market movies and file-sharing options available today. Is it really worth your time to break Apple's DRM in order to provide the market with something that they already have?

Jan 24, 08 - 03:06 pm Comment from: Follower

Shhh... no one tell the cable companies...

At $4 ~ $5 per rental THIS IS THE LEAST THEY COULD DO! Redbox has NEW RELEASE rentals at $1/day.

I wonder if using Time Machine would work, also. Just go back to the time you rented the movie, and viola! Fresh rental. Hurry up with the software update for the AppleTV. I wanna play.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:18 pm Comment from: Ampar

"Just go back to the time you rented the movie, and viola!"

Only if the two are in concert.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:20 pm Comment from: DRM sucks

"Yeah, but then the whiners will beg for another 48 hours and that was a terrible sequel."

Oh god. You're one of those. Consumers asking for a feature is not whining, you dipshit. It is merely opinion.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:22 pm Comment from: Think

@ Mac_Atty

This is not to compete with the power users or the bargin stops. It competes with Payperview but with a soon to be huge selection. Also regular rentals are $3 - $4.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:30 pm Comment from: NCIceman

Pause makes sense, but I also agree that a rental should be 3 days minimum.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:44 pm Comment from: Logan

I still think there are too many problems with the rental service. Something like Netflix is still much better. You can get the movies a day or two after they come out, you can keep them for longer, watch them whenever you want, take them to a friend's house, etc.

Apple needs to lower the cost, make the movies come out as soon as they do on video, allow them to be kept for 30 days and watched for 30 days. That's the only way they are going to be able to compete with something like Netflix.

Jan 24, 08 - 03:58 pm Comment from: TheConfuzed1

@ DRM Sucks--

Do you hear that sound whooshing over your head? Don't worry, it's nothing harmless... Just another punch-line.

Jan 24, 08 - 04:14 pm Comment from: Ampar

To DRM sucks:

Relax there, little buddy.

I know explaining things ruins the joke but:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Another_48_Hrs.

Dipshit?
Pot, let me introduce you to Mr. Kettle. He's serving decaf too.

Jan 24, 08 - 04:16 pm Comment from: John

My son and I discovered this on my computer the other day. We were watching the Simpsons movie as the time expired. We expected the movie to disappear, but a little dialogue popped up and asked if we wanted to finish watching the movie, which we did. When we stopped the movie (during credits) it then disappeared.

This is a very nice feature for Apple to have included: you don't suddenly have a movie you're watching vanish right during the climactic battle scene--that would kinda suck

Jan 24, 08 - 04:20 pm Comment from: NeonRed

Goes to show that apple really user tested the software.
Not done enough by many other houses these days… cough, cough Adobe... ahem..CS3 cough. It is the attention to the little frustrations that can be caused during real life use by software and addressing them that really makes GOOD software experience. 95% good is fine, but the 5% undocumented "features", odd behavior, ond/or just plane user interface unfriendliness make up the bulk of the user remembrance of the software.

Jan 24, 08 - 04:56 pm Comment from: Jim - TIV

@Ampar - like my High School shop teacher used to say when one of us completely missed the obvious.

"you can lead a horse to water.... but you can't make him think above third grade comprehension level."

ok, so say you started watching a movie, your half through, then you pause it and shut the system down, and dont use it for a week, or even a month (theoretically it should play again after this if you dont select another movie) and you kinda forgot what the movie was about... so my question is, (has anyone tried this...) can you rewind to the beginning and watch it again from a few seconds into the movie?

Yeah, Netflix is waaay better than Apple. If I want to watch a movie right this minute, I simply go to the Netflix site, put a movie in my queue, wait a few days for it to come, and voila! instant movie. Driving 5 minutes to Blockbuster, or downloading immediately from iTunes is so like, medieval on your ass.

Jan 24, 08 - 04:59 pm Comment from: Jim - TIV

I went and saw Cloverfield the other day with my son, I wish I would have had a expire button in the middle of that thing. I was one of the suckers that got motion sick watching it.

Jan 24, 08 - 05:07 pm Comment from: Ampar

"you can lead a horse to water.... but you can't make him think . . ."


I thought it was "you can lead a whore to Vassar but you can't make her think."


And I rented Transformers from the iTS. I'm glad I didn't pay the movie theater price. There were some very cool special effects but it had the dumbest dialogue and unbelievably bad acting.

And I rented Transformers from the iTS. I'm glad I didn't pay the movie theater price. There were some very cool special effects but it had the dumbest dialogue and unbelievably bad acting.

plus loose ends all over the place, made zero sense....BUT.... I assume it was for kids. (nice of them to throw in the "happy time" crap)

Jan 24, 08 - 06:47 pm Comment from: ken1w

> I wish they would make it 48hrs though, and announce this in sort of press release.

I'm sure Apple will do so as soon as it can renegotiate its contract with the studios. Apple's stated goal for the iTunes Store is to sell more Macs and iPods. Apple is motivated to make content as accessible and inexpensive as possible. But Apple is working against the content providers who want to sell it as expensively as possible. Apple has a big advantage for negotiating music terms. For movies, the studios currently have the advantage, but I'm sure that will change over time.

3.99-4.99 for 24 hours is too much.
Some of us do not wish to rent movies, especially at this price. For about 2x as much I can own it and watch it whenever I please.

No dice.

Jan 24, 08 - 08:27 pm Comment from: Think

@ Pricing

3.99-4.99 for 24 hours is too much.
Some of us do not wish to rent movies, especially at this price. For about 2x as much I can own it and watch it whenever I please.
-------------------

OK, that is the HD rental price. Are you telling me you can buy a Blu-ray movie for $10?

Just checked Amazon's top 10 Blu-ray movies. Seven of those were $20 or more. Please show me $10 HD movies for sale.

Jan 24, 08 - 08:29 pm Comment from: Think

The other 3 were sets and were more money.

Jan 24, 08 - 08:52 pm Comment from: appaulmac

As always it seems Apple is working with restrictions placed on it by the studios themselves. I'm sure if it was up to them they would not impose a 24-hour limit.

Until the studios treat honest people as just that, people that want to pay for the product and watch it within a more relaxed amount of time, there will always be these discussions of time-slots.

It's interesting to note that the European Commission has imposed on Apple the requirement to charge an identical price for music across all of Europe (I'm in the UK). I believe this was always something Apple wanted to do but was limited by the restrictions in different regions imposed by the studios.

Same old, same old..

OK, here's a thought. Why not allow us to rent the movies for a 24-hr viewing period? Meaning, if I watch a 2 hr film, then I've got 22 hrs. left to watch it again. If we only watch a movie on average one or two times, then this is the best of both worlds!

Jan 26, 08 - 04:18 pm Comment from: donnie

Just a thought. Would changing your computers date and time give you additional time to watch rental before time limit expires?