DVDs, Materialism, & the Concept of Ownership
 

At some point in the future, the films you watch will no longer have a physical form. You'll either order them as "Video on Demand" or you'll download them to your computer/entertaiment system's hard drive.

Once any film is available to watch at any time, will people still cherish their DVD collections? Or will they view DVDs as "old space wasting technology"?

And if the film just resides on your hard drive, do you still feel like you own it?

No, but they will likely still cherish their HD-DVD collections.

For me, the answer would be no, and I shudder at the idea of this likely future.

Definitely don't look forward to that (yes, likely) future... I like the concept of "it's in my hand", and I also enjoy artwork and other physical aspects of ownership.

I don't think that is gooing to be the case anythime soon, if it will happen at all. People will always enjoy owning somethink concrete, and i file on your computer won't be like that. They may be tiny as hell when we get to that point, but i still think there will be some kind of disc.

In my hand means no external prying eyes from various big brothers. I also have a guess that this service will come with a weighty price tag.....likely some sort of monthly fee. As for watching ANYTHING at ANYTIME, do you get the feeling that various companies will be vying for your dollars by having exclusive rights to some big name films? Yeah, I see that happening.

They could EASILY do this with books now - but the practise isn't popular, because people still prefer buying physical books. It'll be the same with movies, though maybe to a lesser extent - kinda like music is now...

That's because reading a physical book is very different than reading a screen; the reason it isn't popular is because people don't like trying to read long books from a screen. With movies, the screen is already the method of viewing.

DJ

Maybe on your planet...but not mine. Besides...with only about 40 years of life left, I need not worry. There will always be a physical something to collect and build libraries with. and VOD sounds boring as hell. I like having a library which I built...something to pick up and make love to, if I wish.:D

More worries for nothing.

well, i'll go against the majority in here and say that i wouldn't mind having my entire film library on a hard drive. i only have 350+ movies, but i'm running out of room. besides, a wall full of DVDs is kind of tacky, IMO. i'd rather use that space for some artwork or a plant or something.

ideally, i'd like it to be how my music library is set up -- iTunes/iBook/180gb FW drive/Onkyo TX-SR800 reciever. all that is needed is some serious media storage and an iTunes equivilant for movies with a built-in "store" to make purchases/downloads.

i don't think that will ever happen...if there is a market for it they will sell it.

there will always be video stores....

On the plus-side, you'd never have to deal with scratches, rot, or with people borrowing your stuff, since it's all in a hard-drive.

Lucky for you, people are no longer burned at the stake for heresy.

-wink-

Can't we make an exception just this once? -wink-

I think the REAL question is, "Do we still get an insert?" ;)

No, you'll just have to deal with hard-drive crashes.

there will always be something to cellect

Video-on-demand will never be as big as owning video on media. Just look at the fees for cable Pay-Per-View.

Movies are $4.95 for a single viewing and for some reason, stuff like Jerry Springer is $8.95. This is more expensive than renting a DVD for 5 days.

The gap between owning VHS and renting was large... so renting was a more popular option. The gap between owning DVDs and renting is far less... and that is one reason why owning DVDs is so popular.

In order for Video-on-demand to be successful, it would have to be FAR, FAR less expensive than owning the media. eg. less-than-$1 per movie....

:lol:

It's not like I live in a fucking box. I have plenty of room.

Figures it takes a dvd forum to provide such an anti-dvd statement. Crazy kids.

Have you seen the photos in the "show your home theatre" threads? 90% of them look like the inside of an DeepDiscount DVD warehouse. :lol:

rotfl

Yeah....but there is one major factor that keeps my home from becoming like that. My wife. It would be divorce time.-eek-

Thank God for the "Vault".:thumbsup:

I very much doubt it....the films that I own will become available...with a predominantly foreign films in my collection.....i dont see this happening.

Pro-B

I think it's exactly the opposite. Distribution will no longer be a problem. Currently, if you want to watch "Girl on a Bridge" or "Delicatessen", you have to purchase them on eBay or from some overseas site. With DRM (Digital Rights Management) you could own the film within seconds.

Isn't that assuming that the people who currently own the rights would think that distributing the film through DRM (which would require some preparation, though it probably wouldn't cost as much as making a DVD for distribution) would be financially worth pursuing, even though they didn't consider it worthwhile financially to release it on DVD? Would it be like Criterion where they charge more?

Also, would they charge more for extras? Would it something you *could* burn to DVD/something new?

Anyway, I had a friend once who swore up and down that within five years, we'd all be watching TV on our computers. It's been eight years since I responded to him with a paraphrase from 'Singles': People like their TVs. In this case, people like their DVDs. I would agree that materialism is part of it, but also, what if you want to watch it on a bigscreen TV instead of your computer? What if you want to bring it to your friend's and watch it there? I'm sure these are details which *could* be worked out -- maybe some of them even have, I don't know. I just don't see this impacting us any time soon.

That said, I could see it being a reasonable replacement for *renting* movies. The file could automatically disable after X amount of time.

And if the downloading is anything like mine is today, you could watch it within a week, and then I couldn't keep it because I wouldn't have enough hard drive space to devote to a single title.

There is something more "permanent" about owning a physical copy of something I can hold in my hands, but I could imagine getting used to a hard drive-based system as long as it was more convenient than the current one and didn't skimp on quality (after several decades, my cable company can't give me a consistently good signal. How long before I could get true DVD-quality... or the better standard of the time when this finally happens... from downloads?) and was a hard drive-based system that was entirely local to me (rather than residing on central servers somewhere since that would likely require a continued subscription just to access the movies I've already purchased).

One problem I could see, though, is the potential lack of portability. I can easily take a DVD with me to a friend's house or on the road, etc. and watch it in places other than my home. A hard drive-based system might not have that kind of ease-of-use depending on how it's configured (I mean, you could download to a laptop or something, but that takes time and you can run into the same space problems... if not worse).

I dont see a completely virtual movie collection being a big hit in the near future.
Can you imagine the size of downloading a high quality digital movie? im not sure how many gigs that would be (but im guessing more then dvdr)
Some people dont even have broadband yet.. and if they want to watvh a movie they have to wait 8 or so hours to download it?
Really doesnt sound like a good idea to me.

I like to own my dvds, to see the covers, and in some ways to show off my racks of dvds :)

Alot of people seem real paranoid about hd/blu ray and all that.. just chill out and enjoy what we have now.