Looks Like You'll Never Own Movies Again

[Anderton]

Disney has announced that it will stop selling DVDs, Blu-Ray, and 4K discs in Australia (this also covers 20th Century Fox product). Apparently, sales of physical media in Australia are dismal, so I get it. I see this as the canary in the coal mine, and the future deprecation of physical media is inevitable. But...

 

Streaming isn't all it's cracked up to be. The quality isn't always as good as what you get from physical media, some movies may or may not be available, and movies get cancelled, never to return to a particular platform. Also, what if you only want to watch Star Wars movies? Do you really need to subscribe to Disney+ just because you might want to see a Star Wars movie from time to time?

 

Deutsche Kinemathek estimates that 80-90% of all silent movies are gone forever. The Library of Congress estimates 75%. Lots of early television no longer exists because tapes were recorded over to save money. When streaming is all that's left, one good EMP or huge X-Class solar flare could mean the end of our cultural history. Oh well. At that point we'll have bigger things to worry about anyway.

 

I guess it doesn't matter that cultural history is vanishing. Who cares, right? I think it's all part of what Cory Doctorow put under the umbrella term of "enshittification," which is the phenomenon of online platforms degrading the quality of their services.

 

 

[ProfD]

Another example of the arc of technology and planned or unplanned obsolescence.

 

The handwriting has been on the wall ever since 8-bit digital audio became acceptable. 

 

The popularity of 128kbps mp3s on iPods was the nail in the coffin.

 

With the decline in CDs, it's inevitable that DVDs would be next. Some form of the Cloud will be the digital repository. 

 

For some of us dinosaurs, er, old folks, saving data in 2 places will be the equivalent of recording vinyl records to cassette tapes and CDs. 

 

Nowadays, we'll have to stock up rewritable CD, DVD, thumb drives and removable HD/SSD drives to archive music and movies.😁😎

[Anderton]

33 minutes ago, ProfD said:

Some form of the Cloud will be the digital repository. 

 

From a marketing perspective, isn't "cloud" kind of an unfortunate term to imply permanence? 🤣

[bill5]

I have a very nice collection of movies in MP4, AVI format, including all of the Disney classics and some modern great ones as well. So in your face Disney! 

[David Emm]

You'll gradually stop owning even things in old formats, unless you can maintain the necessary players yourself. My modest VHS collection became dust once repair shops couldn't get parts. Then again, I wasn't exactly grinding down the heads watching "Cocoon" repeatedly.

 

I'll probably be a cozy worm buffet before the cloud becomes insufferable, although it looks like a neck-in-neck race. I'll adapt, much like I did in converting my more precious albums and various errata into cloudettes on flash drives. On the plus side, though... I'll never have to dust a DVD of "Cocaine Bear" because I can't see foisting it on a friend.

[Notes_Norton]

5 hours ago, Anderton said:

Streaming isn't all it's cracked up to be. The quality isn't always as good as what you get from physical media,

It is more compressed than DVD or Blu-ray, so the quality is poorer.

 

It seems that big-business doesn't want us to own anything that we can rent. And it seems that the majority of people are willing to go along with that. That's why DVD/Blu-ray sales are down.

 

Streaming benefits the provider. They get money every month, whether you use it or not. Old-fashioned streaming like radio and network (non-cable) TV were free, advertiser paid for. Books that you bought, lasted for generations, and you could loan them to your friend if you wanted to. You could play records, tapes, and CDs whenever you wanted, and loan them out too. There are things I love about the 'new days', but there are things I really miss about the 'old days'.

 

Mrs. Notes and I have been a one-DVD-at-a-time renter from Netflix since they started. We watch movies only a couple of times per month. That's the only time our TV goes on. I am saddened that we are now going to have to stream the movies.

 

Plus, I'll miss the extra features on so many DVD/Blu-ray discs. Sure, some of the extras are lame, but a commentary by a film historian can be educational. Making-of features can be fascinating. I've even seen interviews with the composers, who gave terrific insights. It's my understanding that I won't be able to stream them.

 

Oh, well. Some things change for the better, other things change for the worse, and whether it is better or worse is a matter of personal opinion.

 

Insights and incites by Notes ♫

[bill5]

1 hour ago, Notes_Norton said:

 

Streaming benefits the provider. They get money every month, whether you use it or not. Old-fashioned streaming like radio and network (non-cable) TV were free, advertiser paid for. Books that you bought, lasted for generations, and you could loan them to your friend if you wanted to. You could play records, tapes, and CDs whenever you wanted, and loan them out too. There are things I love about the 'new days', but there are things I really miss about the 'old days'.

 

Exactly. I'm glad I won't live in a "rent only" or "cloud only" world. It's not just about quality or the stupid pricing model, though there's that. There's the tactile thing of truly having that thing. Taking that away is somewhat dehumanizing IMO. Now get off my cloud lawn. Oh wait, it's not really a lawn, never mind.

[jazzpiano88]

Moot Point.   I already own all of their best movies on VCR and DVD, and most on Blue Ray.   We watched Mary Poppins on VCR at my parents home two weeks ago. 

 

The fact that they are changing their model is fine with me.   I have no desire to own anything produced by Hollywood going forward. 

 

Anything I do wish to capture is handled adequately by Audio and Video Hijack technology at the hardware level.

 

[KenElevenShadows]

I doubt it's a moot point if there are so many movies that are no longer accessible in any capacity to people. We have this rich history of film that is disappearing.

[jazzpiano88]

16 minutes ago, KenElevenShadows said:

I doubt it's a moot point if there are so many movies that are no longer accessible in any capacity to people. We have this rich history of film that is disappearing.

I have found the opposite.  More film is more accessible to more people than ever before.  

[bill5]

21 minutes ago, KenElevenShadows said:

I doubt it's a moot point if there are so many movies that are no longer accessible in any capacity to people. We have this rich history of film that is disappearing.

? Why do you think this means there are movies that are no longer accessible in any capacity to people?

[The Real MC]

Already own all the DVDs I would want, my shelves are full, they take up a lot of space, I don't want any mo'.  Hey I made a rhyme!

[The Real MC]

Not a fan of streaming.  I don't watch enough movies to justify the cost, and I never liked the idea of tethered entertainment.

I don't own many Disney DVDs.  They were always more expensive than other movies, seldom below $20.

I backed up most of my DVDs (personal backups are LEGAL, I do not distribute my backups) using DVD Decrypter which removes CSS and region coding.  Don't bother downloading that program unless you have a system with WIN2K, the author had to abandon the software and source code due to legal threats from Macrovision.  I make copies to play on my player and the originals are put away.  Due to newer forms of copy protection, DVD Decrypter can't copy some DVDs (esp Disney).

[KenElevenShadows]

 

1 hour ago, JazzPiano88 said:

I have found the opposite.  More film is more accessible to more people than ever before.  

 

1 hour ago, bill5 said:

? Why do you think this means there are movies that are no longer accessible in any capacity to people?

 

So are you two saying that what Craig quoted is wrong?

 

"Deutsche Kinemathek estimates that 80-90% of all silent movies are gone forever. The Library of Congress estimates 75%. Lots of early television no longer exists because tapes were recorded over to save money. When streaming is all that's left, one good EMP or huge X-Class solar flare could mean the end of our cultural history. Oh well. At that point we'll have bigger things to worry about anyway.

 

I guess it doesn't matter that cultural history is vanishing. Who cares, right? I think it's all part of what Cory Doctorow put under the umbrella term of "enshittification," which is the phenomenon of online platforms degrading the quality of their services."

[analogika]

My main issues are twofold: 

 

1) subscription cost adding up for services that aren’t providing value. Yes it’s our own fault, but we didn’t cancel Disney+ after we got done watching the series we subscribed for. Now it’s four services plus landline internet access, vs. one-time cost for a physical medium. For the POTENTIAL ABILITY to access something — not the actual access itself. 
 

2) we’re at the mercy of streaming providers. Want to listen to a particular album? Yeah, it got taken offline because the label wants to promote the latest work, or a distribution contract expired, or it just never got put online because there’s no estate that ever took on the task after the artist died. 

[ProfD]

5 hours ago, analogika said:

1) subscription cost adding up for services that aren’t providing value...For the POTENTIAL ABILITY to access something — not the actual access itself. 

Guilty as charged.😁

 

I know that I'm paying for services that I hardly ever use and/or not enough to justify keeping them. 

 

In my mind, I'm threatening to cut the cord as soon as....🤣😎

[Notes_Norton]

Warning (I think).

 

I've been a pro-musician for most of my life. I did take electronics in college.So when I was testing out what it is to be normal, I took a job as a Field Engineer (glorified systems technician) with a Cable TV manufacturing company (Jerrold, which was bought by General Instruments). Eventually I got tired of  being normal, and went back to my calling—a full-time musician.

 

This was when Home Box Office started streaming movies. You had to wait, but every movie would come to HBO.

 

Then HBO decided to launch a second streaming channel, Cinemax. You still had to wait, but some movies were only available on HBO and others only on Cinemax. If you wanted to watch all the movies, you now had to subscribe to two services, and pay twice as much.

 

Then Showtime came along. Some movies were only released on HBO, others Cinemax, and others Showtime. Now you needed 3 streaming services and had to pay 3 times as much. … and so on …

 

I see the same thing starting to happen with streaming. Will all the movies that come to Disney get to Netflix, and all the other streaming services? If you want Oppenheimer you will need one streaming service, another for Barbie, another for anything Pixar, and so on. And in the end, you will own nothing, and once you decide that you are paying for too many streaming services, you will never be able to watch those movies again.

 

I own hundreds of LPs and CDs. If I streamed instead of purchased, if I wanted to hear Chicago Serenade by Jimmy Smith, Swedish Schnapps by Charlie Parker, Walkin' by Stanley Turrentine, Her by Stan Getz, Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony, Shostakovitch's Leningrad symphony, Crosseyed Cat by Muddy Waters, or so many others in full High Fidelity sound, I'd be S.O.L. I could probably find them overly compressed on YouTube, but it isn't the same experience.

 

Streaming media may be good for some, but if I like something a lot, I want to own it. I don't own jewelry, I don't own a large TV, I don't own designer fashions, I don't own many movies, but I do own a lot of music.

 

If I were into movies like I am into music, I would want to own my favorite flicks.

 

Insights and incites by Notes ♫

 

 

 

 

[RABid]

Movies on dvd took a big hit when they moved production overseas and quality went down. I bought the complete Star Trek Next Generation and the reflective coating was so thin you could see through the disks. Nine episodes in that collection would not play correctly because of disk errors. It was the same with several other collections purchased in that time period so I stopped buying.

 

Even though they are one of the leaders in subscriber count Disney claims to be loosing money, or at least not making as much as they expected. (I’m sure executives are trying to find a way to blame the Florida governor.) Their plan is to cut back on available shows. I assume that means non-Disney source material which must be leased. Too bad. Disney+ and HBO Max are my most subscribed channels. The leased content gives Disney some balance. Without it the overwhelming moral of most movies is “women are evil.” What’s up with that? Have you noticed how many Disney villains are women? Anyway, other streaming services also plan to cut back on original content to save money. This is only going to increase their problem of subscriber churning. Netflix has already cut back. So has Amazon.

[techristian]

How many times have you gotten nicely 1/2 way through a television series , only to have the streaming service pull it? It has happened to me a few times. That is why I still buy a few DVDs.

 

Disney is MORE than just the kids channel. They have almost all of the Fox TV library.

 

Recently, we have discovered some of the "free" services such as Tubi, Angel, Roku Channel, Pluto, Soap2day and yes YOUTUBE .But these channels routinely pull programs as well....but alas, they are "free"

 

We dropped Netflix early in the year when they started charging extra to "share" , which also included not being able to travel and watch on the road.

 

Dan

[bill5]

10 hours ago, KenElevenShadows said:

 

So are you two saying that what Craig quoted is wrong?

 

"Deutsche Kinemathek estimates that 80-90% of all silent movies are gone forever. The Library of Congress estimates 75%. Lots of early television no longer exists because tapes were recorded over to save money. When streaming is all that's left, one good EMP or huge X-Class solar flare could mean the end of our cultural history. Oh well. At that point we'll have bigger things to worry about anyway.

 

I guess it doesn't matter that cultural history is vanishing. Who cares, right? I think it's all part of what Cory Doctorow put under the umbrella term of "enshittification," which is the phenomenon of online platforms degrading the quality of their services."

Oh OK, so you're talking real early films/shows only; I thought you were speaking more broadly. I'm just saying I doubt streaming will ever be the only option. People can still own soft copies of things.

[bill5]

7 hours ago, analogika said:

we’re at the mercy of streaming providers. 

Speak for yourself.  I subscribe to nothing any more. Heck a lot of the movies I already own I may never watch again, but it's nice having them if I want to, and it costs me nothing and nobody can take it away. Same for music. And a few shows.

[analogika]

2 hours ago, bill5 said:

Speak for yourself.  I subscribe to nothing any more. Heck a lot of the movies I already own I may never watch again, but it's nice having them if I want to, and it costs me nothing and nobody can take it away. Same for music. And a few shows.

 

I'm not speaking for myself. I was speaking of the reality of relying upon streaming exclusively, which is where the world is headed. My daughter will probably never own a playback device for physical media. 

[bill5]

That's not a reality, it's an opinion, and one I seriously doubt happens. You daughter doesn't have a computer or device she can play MP3s or MP4s on? You make it sound like the choice is streaming or physical media and that's it, which isn't so. 

[analogika]

2 hours ago, bill5 said:

That's not a reality, it's an opinion, and one I seriously doubt happens. You daughter doesn't have a computer or device she can play MP3s or MP4s on? You make it sound like the choice is streaming or physical media and that's it, which isn't so. 

The idea of “owning” media is meaningless to her. 
 

That’s reality for an 11th-grader. 
 

She has a phone and an iPad. And her mom has a smart TV in the living room. No CD player, no DVD player, media consumption is the smart TV’s mediatheque apps, Netflix, TikTok, YouTube, and Spotify. 

[Anderton]

5 minutes ago, analogika said:

The idea of “owning” media is meaningless to her. 

 

I see that as well. It seems the more recent the generation, the less interested they are in ownership, and the more interested they are in experiences. It also relates to environmental concerns, because they'll have to live in the mess that the boomers created. Producing and shipping discs probably uses up more resources than hosting them on services. Maybe not, though...I don't know.

 

I think the solution is simple - download to own. You can pay to "own" movies that are streamed, or pay to "rent" them for a one-time view. But again, you're dependent on the streamer maintaining their business model, which is by no means certain. It would be great if you could buy a code to download a copy from a server somewhere that you could store locally, and would require no kind of verification or specific app from the streaming service.

[Anderton]

12 minutes ago, analogika said:

No CD player, no DVD player,

 

For anyone who doubts what Analogika is saying, go to a non-musician neighbor and say you want them to hear your music. Odds are you can't give them a CD because they won't know how to play it, or a USB stick because they won't be sure what to do with it. They can relate to a YouTube URL, though.

[Anderton]

8 hours ago, bill5 said:

Oh OK, so you're talking real early films/shows only; I thought you were speaking more broadly. 

 

Actually, you can speak more broadly about this. For example, shows with followings that Netflix cancels anyway are effectively gone. There's no way to access them, unless they're licensed elsewhere. But if the series was never completed, probably no one will want to license them.

 

Sometimes the reverse happens, though. Manifest had a significant but not mind-blowing following on NBC. It was cancelled before a concluding season could wrap up the loose ends. Netflix bought the rights, and produced the final season. It became a hit, and the final season had a remarkable 73% completion rate on Netflix (i.e., if someone watched the first episode, 73% watched all the way through to the end). So in this case, the streaming service actually kept something from disappearing.

[bill5]

18 minutes ago, Anderton said:

download a copy from a server somewhere that you could store locally, and would require no kind of verification or specific app from the streaming service.

You would require no streaming or even being online at all. That's all I'm talking about. 

 

If younger generations want to pay for something over and over vs buy once and you have it forever, that makes no sense to me, but to each their own! Happily the streamers won't be getting my money. 

[bill5]

45 minutes ago, Anderton said:

 

Actually, you can speak more broadly about this. For example, shows with followings that Netflix cancels anyway are effectively gone. There's no way to access them, unless they're licensed elsewhere.

Just what I needed, another reason to hate Netflix.  

[David Emm]

I "hate" to speak too well of Cramazon, but I definitely like being able to watch things ONCE that I'd be unlikely to buy anyway. Having been soaked in film for decades, I find it easy to mentally say "Get bent" if I can't simply rent a viewing. It eventually loosens up and appears for a few bucks less.

 

Many a vintage or fringe film can be had quite cheaply. Yes, all of the powers that be clearly try to force your hand to take up their stream, but that seems less frequent with the tastier things I've found lately. Its like a reverse secret weapon to me. That's how I got to see the powerful film, "The Song of Names," starring Tim Roth and Clive Owen. If you treat the database like old-school record bins, the gems will crop up.

 

If you are in the mood to lightly hate Mankind, I recommend the "Arts & Entertainment" network's lineup of shows such as "Neighborhood Wars" or "My Strange Arrest." You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll spit at the screen from time to time. Its somewhat like the rougher nature documentaries, brimming with lots of tooth and claw. Its a great motivator to return to looking for good films and working on my cockeyed compositions.