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From the News Desk
Friday, 7. March 2008
Apple Falls Far in Its Own Target for Rental-Movies
Apple Inc. has fallen short of its target of having 1,000 movies available for rent on its Apple TV set-top box by the end of February.
According to a tally compiled by Macworld.com iTunes had a total of 770 titles, including movies for rent and for sale. In checking the list Macworld found 351 movies are available for rent on iTunes and 378 titles through an Apple TV or a computer, which is far from its 1,000-movie goal. Apple launched iTunes movie rentals in January at the Macworld conference in San Francisco. There in a press release it had given a two-fold promise, which was to offer 1,000 titles by the end of February, including over 100 titles in stunning high-definition video with 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound. Apple also fell short on the latter promise as Macworld found only 91 HD movies and of them not offering Dolby sound.
A menu option that showed all movies at once has been removed and some movies can be found only by searching for words in the title. Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs told shareholders at the annual meeting that he is not happy with the shortfall. Steve also added, that the company had signed all the major studios, including 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros., Disney, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios, and Sony Pictures. The DVD retailers, such as Wal-Mart, the studios even agreed to make new films available within 30 days after the DVD release. But movie studios have been slow to embrace the Web for movie distribution with a fear of piracy and cannibalizing the DVD business, which comprises the vast majority of sales and rentals. On the other side Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said that the company hopes to have 1,000 movies available soon.
When Apple launched the device last year, it did not connect directly to the Internet but could play movies and music from the user's computer. A software update in the middle of February gave users the ability to rent movies from Apple's iTunes Store without going through a computer. ITunes had a slow start in offering music as well. It started out with 200,000 songs in 2003 and now has reached 6 million.
According to a tally compiled by Macworld.com iTunes had a total of 770 titles, including movies for rent and for sale. In checking the list Macworld found 351 movies are available for rent on iTunes and 378 titles through an Apple TV or a computer, which is far from its 1,000-movie goal. Apple launched iTunes movie rentals in January at the Macworld conference in San Francisco. There in a press release it had given a two-fold promise, which was to offer 1,000 titles by the end of February, including over 100 titles in stunning high-definition video with 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound. Apple also fell short on the latter promise as Macworld found only 91 HD movies and of them not offering Dolby sound.
A menu option that showed all movies at once has been removed and some movies can be found only by searching for words in the title. Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs told shareholders at the annual meeting that he is not happy with the shortfall. Steve also added, that the company had signed all the major studios, including 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros., Disney, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios, and Sony Pictures. The DVD retailers, such as Wal-Mart, the studios even agreed to make new films available within 30 days after the DVD release. But movie studios have been slow to embrace the Web for movie distribution with a fear of piracy and cannibalizing the DVD business, which comprises the vast majority of sales and rentals. On the other side Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said that the company hopes to have 1,000 movies available soon.
When Apple launched the device last year, it did not connect directly to the Internet but could play movies and music from the user's computer. A software update in the middle of February gave users the ability to rent movies from Apple's iTunes Store without going through a computer. ITunes had a slow start in offering music as well. It started out with 200,000 songs in 2003 and now has reached 6 million.
