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If it's available on disc. If you own it. If the disc is playable.

Lots of "ifs" for being in POWER.

I would hardly trust a random blue shirt who says copies are flying off the shelves. Who actually says that? Does Best Buy even control physical media, I thought they passed that off to another company to take care of.

The premature death of physical media? Not so fast, this excellent article has some insight into the movie market.

http://flavorwire.com/535883/the-pre...eping-it-alive

If it's on disc. I own it.
If it's been on any format. I own it.
If it's been on tv in past 33 years. I own it.
So far only shoddily manufactured discs have failed.

In practice, I've found that when a sales drone says something is really good, flying off the shelves, etc ... what they say should not be taken at face value.

On the other hand, if a sales drone is saying something is not selling very well, etc ... or anything which goes against making a sale altogether, then there's usually two possibilities.

1 - They really hate that particular item, and/or might be trying to pull a "bait and switch".

2 - They might be genuinely telling the truth. (Especially if they don't make any suggestions to buy something else).

Technically one only owns the physical disc.

One does not own any of the copyrights of the contents on that particular physical disc, unless one is also the copyright owner.

That's what I meant. The statement I replied to, "if you own" it, I inferred meant possessed a hardcopy.

Heh. (From the above article).

He’s got DVDs galore, and quite a few Blu-rays as well — even though he doesn’t have a Blu-ray player yet. “I know I’m going to want to watch them eventually,” he says, shrugging.

And yet retailers have reduced shelf space for physical media. Major studios have cut back on releasing catalog (bruceames has a list of release by studio I'll try and find it). Major studios have sold off catalog titles to smaller, unknown studios. Major studios now release the Digital HD version before the physical disc for some movies.

Not really sure how you can spin that.

$20 for Netflix? It's been $8 since it's been out (AFAIK). Where/why do you think this gigantic price increase will come? Hulu just raised rates by $4 for commercial free, but you think Netflix will go to $20?

Ok, so you don't own that much stuff. Period.

You don't own any and all movies presented and any and all formats.

Not sure why you feel the need to make up stuff.

Want to play a game? I'll name 5 Movies/TV Shows and you respond back with a picture of yourself holding it with your username written on a piece of paper. That way we will know for sure if you "own" it. 'll start with 'Super Mario Brothers" the Movie. Live Action. On VHS.

I tend to not believe what the blue shirts say either, but at that particular Best Buy they were sold out of the standard BD copy and I walked out with nothing. I'm willing to believe he was telling the truth. I did have him go in the back and check, because I have run into situations where the goofballs just never restocked the shelves. Another blue shirt came out with this guy and told me they put all the copies they had out and if it wasn't on the shelf, they didn't have it.

Movies is a hits-driven business. I wouldn't make industry-wide assumptions based on performance of a single title.

You mean like HD DVD combos?

Netflix isn't going to raise their rates by much in the future. They've already shown that they'll just ditch content instead and focus on exclusive content so they can be another HBO. And once they have nothing but exclusive content and z grade movies and crap, then they'll reduce the budgets for their TV shows if need be to keep prices low.

Also, while the average Mad Max fan will buy that movie, there is no way to gauge how a popular movie will do at the retail level. American Sniper, for example, a very successful movie theatrically, was a relative dud on home-video. So they basically don't know how many units to order since there's no real way to know how many units a movie is going to move, as it's theatrical success is not a very good barometer.

The retailer reducing shelf space was true pushing two years ago. Its been the same for quite a while now and 2 of the Best Buys I my area have added an aisle a few months ago. I'd agree if I saw Targets and Best Buys still phasing out, but it's just not happening. At least it hasn't for quite a while now. Then again, I mostly buy off Amazon and other online retailers. No lack of availability there.

I agree that it's hard to predict, but some successful movies just scream "rental" to me, like Gone Girl. I didn't see either Mad Max or American Sniper in theaters, but I'm pretty sure that the former would have more rewatch value for me so I'd be more inclined to buy than rent.

Yeah, but that's not a thing that can be quantified and converted into order numbers like box office can be.

Well, you need to figure out some kind of production quantities, and it's an inexact science based partly on numbers and partly on gut. You start with box office, factor in sales of similar titles, then push your retailers to give you estimates and orders before you actually start running copies. That could still wind up totally off in the end, but at least you're going on something, not just throwing up your hands and guessing.

I'm not saying they are going to raise it by $12 over night. But it's clear from their public statements they want to become the HBO of streaming services. I believe Netflix will be $12-15 per month within 18 months.

Or discs from Criterion which went bad?

I own everything I'll ever want to watch. Except brand new stuff not yet released. The stuff I don't own I have no interest in watching. There's still a few old shows I've never been able to track down.