I'm going to repost something I posted (somewhat off topic) to a different thread and hope for some discussion about it. The reason I think it's worth posting again is because I'm not the only one behind this. Time Magazine recently alluded to this exact distribution model in their cover page article about Steve Jobs, Apple and iTunes. They said that the future of digital media distribution is iTunes-style clients providing pay-per-download services. Think 99 cent song, 99 cent movie clip. The reference to this industry went something like "and perhaps other industries will follow suit as well (cough!) porn! (cough!)"
Here's what I wrote before:
I understand this discussion board is DVD-focused, but there's no reason DVDs shouldn't enjoy simultaneous distribution through both routes, like movies and CDs are already.
Don't many companies that don't produce their own porn already offer streaming videos and other downloads? Original content producers do to, I believe. Downloads already exist. Since there is no large company or consortium to force a standard, the free market will have to play itself out.
Also, porn moves less volume than the music industry. So prices will be higher. Porn is also only legal for those over 18, maybe 21 in some states. So your largest market for impulse buyers is gone. This is a large part of why pop music (that includes hip-hop) is so profitable. Lots of impulse buyers who don't have a mortage.
So there is some general movement for something similar, but no market forces to make it a reality now.
first of all, kiss 99cents goodbye if you've been paying attention. say hello to terribly inferior compressed, artifacted files and drm'ed content that's potentially unusable if you reformat your computer or want to play it back on your other television. the fact is, media and displays are getting better-take advantage of it if you're a smut-peddler. add value, don't piss people off with drm'ed files that are squashed and shitty compared to what their new toys are capable of displaying, add discs, bonus content, etc. don't fuck people who aren't going to have hdcp-compliant displays, because that's going get bypassed and make you enough of a villain to justify stealing your shit. itunes sucks, it's like whippets-you pay a buck, get something shitty that lasts three unsatisfying seconds. figure out how to make better shit on a physical level-a huge swath of the country can't physically get dsl, let alone fios-but they'll buy a blueray player at best buy and want to own what they pay for-give them a reason to pay instead of an impermanent product of lower quality.
btw, itunes essentially can double yearly and still not affect apple's bottom line more than a few percent. if i was apple, i'd be worried how i'm going to get flash memory now that samsung got caught price-fixing it to me and my already overpriced ipods that have already dropped to single-digit sequential growth are about to become more overpriced.
It's an interesting discussion, and the first part of jamesn's post explains perfectly why I'm not interested in porn downloads at all, as opposed to physical media. But james, periods and commas are your friends.
Anyway, this is more suited to Tech Talk, so I'm moving it there.
