Has it really been that long, have we really learned that little in the past 5 years or so that the movie industry once again has to show just how out of touch they are?  I stand before you today, once again in utter disbelief at what is happening yet again.  Now the world isn’t going to end, and in 100 years no one is going to care about this momentary blip of stupidity in the history of humanity.  But its because this kind of short sighted attitude seems so pervasive even after time and time again it has shown to be a bad idea, both in financial terms but also in long term goodwill that it infuriates me.

Warner Bros has made a deal with Netflix to delay the release of new movies to the rental company by 28 days (I’m sure it has no bearing on the zombie Apocalypse) in an effort to increase DVD sales.  In return they are going to provide a broader list of movies for Netflix to make available on its streaming service.  For its part, Netflix had little choice, as the future of movie rental is streaming, and I can only imagine that getting as large a catalog available as possible is critical to their current business strategy.  Warner Bros however is making the exact same kind of boneheaded decision that left the music industry scrambling for relevance a few short year ago.  How can they believe that limiting the ways in which I can give them money for a product is a good idea?

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It appears they hope that huge droves of mindless zombies (oh wait, maybe there is a reason for the 28 days) will not be able to contain their desire for Die Hardest with prejudice, or Transformers III Megatron goes to Band Camp.  So they will run huge expensive add campaigns but they try and get someone who pays $9-$18 per month to watch 4-5 movies to pay at least $16 to watch one???  Maybe my math is off, but if I consider it a value to pay $3  to rent a movie, just how do you intend on enticing me to pay FIVE TIMES that much?  Now I know that the American public is an instant gratification type of crowd, and I’m very well aware that a few people will fall for these shenanigans.  However, I can’t imagine this will help the bottom line for several  reasons.   Most people will just wait the 28 days, but a good number will have lost enthusiasm by the time it is available for rent and just never bother.  More importantly though, is that many people who really want to watch the movie will balk at the idea of having to buy the DVD, see it as corporate greed, and rightly or wrongly, they will get the movie online, and any revenue that may have been gotten from the rental are gone…more importantly, you will indoctrinate people into just how easy it is to steal movies online.

Creating a demand, then artificially limiting the supply of reasonably priced product is a recipe for disaster when it comes to infinitely copyable products.  Millions of people want to give the movie industry money to rent movies…how stupid do you have to be to say…no?

That and much more on this weeks Mike Thinks News

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When I want to rent a movie, its a little annoying if its out of stock, but it really toasts my crunchies if the place I fo to get it from doesn’t stock it at all.  Redbox, the automated DVD rental kiosk has entered the very competitive industry with an aggressive roll out of locations, but has been hampered by anti-competitive (some would say illegal) business practices, and now a new policy to only attempt to st0ck top tier new releases.  Universal, Warner and Fox have all put pressure on DVD suppliers not to sell new releases to RedBox in a misguided effort to protect a failing business model. Redbox responded quickly by using alternate means to obtain new releases so they could meet customer demand…so far so good.  But as of late there have been several new movies that just didn’t appear at your local Redbox, and a new analyst report has stated that this in an intentional omission.

Apparently, Redbox doesn’t think its profitable to stock new release titles that were not big box office hits.  While its certainly true that you can’t expect any physical location to stock every single title, to ignore significant releases is one sure way to lose customers in a hurry.  People (thats you and me) are not to tolerant of being disappointed.  If you stop by a Redbox, and they stock the movie you want…and it happens again, pretty soon your not going to even bother looking.  This type of negative reinforcement will quickly erode the customer base, and at a time when physical DVD rental is nearing decline in favor of streaming media, I just don’t think this bodes well for Redbox.

Attention Redbox, if you decide to not even attempt to stock mainstream new releases, I will stop even looking.  I don’t like disappointment, and when I heard 3 major movie studios were trying to prevent you from getting new releases, I felt like supporting you to show they my middle finger…but if you can’t be bothered to try and provide me with a good selection, sorry but that’s something entirely different.