With great anticipation, I waited for the July $7.88 deals and lo and behold, "Ender's Game" was on sale! A quick check on Amazon early today had the Blu-ray-DVD-Digital for $23, BUT - A quick check LATER today shows they have the combo for (drumroll) $7.88! Looks like Amazon cruises the Vudu site and adjusts their prices real time. Q - What motivation would I have to pay $7.88 for just the digital version, rather than order the Blu-Ray-DVD-Digital version from Amazon? I also get primo titles at Wally-World for $3.88 commonly. Vudu is going to have to get much better on pricing before I'll buy any additional movies.
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Re: High Prices
*sighs*
Once again...Generally speaking, studios set the prices for digital copies, not VUDU.
Further, pricing on physical media is likely way more flexible than digital, for many reasons, so it's pointless to compare the price of physical vs digital, ever. -
Re: High Prices
Walmart also sells Ender's Game blu-ray combo for $7.88. More than likely that is what Amazon is price matching.Comment
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Re: High Prices
That's never been confirmed, and if that were the case, that would be a form of price fixing. When the book publishers colluded with Apple to set their own prices, they got in major legal trouble. After the settlement, they were able to set wholesale prices, but not retail prices. I assume the same is true for the studios. If the prices were set by the studio's, then the prices for digital movies would be the same at other retailers, and a lot of times, they are not.Comment
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In your example you are comparing digital vs. digital. I think the other users were comparing digital vs. physical. Totally different case.Originally posted by echopulse View PostComment
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High prices indeed!
Breaking Bad has been in my Wishlist for ages. Even now it is "on sale" but the complete series totals over $150. How can this price be fair, when Walmart itself is selling the Blu Ray with Digital copy for $140?
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Breaking-B...creen/36753250Comment
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Re: High Prices
I'm sure you've heard the studio's control the prices. They still make significant revenue from DVD's and don't want to undercut those prices. Doesn't make sense to us, but it does to them.
Eventually digital will overtake DVD's, and the prices will rationalize a bit. Price will always be set where they believe they can make the most money.Comment
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Re: High Prices
What would make you think this? The cost of physical media not only includes the price of access to the intellectual property (the movie or TV show), but the additional expense of manufacturing the disk itself & its packaging as well as transport to whatever outlet offering the media for purchase. These costs are a tangible & finite expendature and not "flexible", thereby establishing a certain cost for compensation of such. If a Bluray disk goes "on sale", the only place that money can be cut is the amount to the studios or profit to the outlet. My thinking is that it's the former.Originally posted by BlakkMajik3000 View Post
On the other hand, there are none ot these overhead costs associated with a digital copy. There is only the cost of the intellectual property, and perhaps a small percentage that goes to upkeep of the media servers and bandwidth. In fact, when you buy a disk that includes a digital copy, you are in essence recieving 2 separate copies of the movie.
So, tell me why it is "pointless" to compare these two? I just did it in my post above about Breaking Bad, and I think I have a "point" here. The digital copy should ALWAYS be less expensive than physical, especially when the physical copy already includes the digital second copy.Comment
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Re: High Prices
Yes, but the studios see digital copies as cannibalizing their physical media sales. They're willing to give us a digital code WITH a disc because they're desperate to keep the physical media alive. They see a discounted disc OR digital copy as taking money out of their pockets, but pressure to discount digital media is much higher, obviously. Also, one reason they often discount discs is when they produce 100,000 and sell 95,000. They can discount those last 5,000 because otherwise the cost of manufacturing is lost, but whatever they can get for them will help. For digital copies, because there's no surplus, there's no incentive for them to discount.
BTW, I agree, I wish the prices were lower for both, really, but I understand that it will take a lot of change on the part of the studios, or maybe even a complete rebuilding of their business model or even their industry.Comment
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Re: High Prices
The price is not tied to the cost to produce, it's tied to their profit. As long DVD's make more for them, they'll protect that market. As digital sales become dominant, they'll be more price flexible. We know DVD's are slowly dying out, and we've already seen changes on Vudu. The sale prices are tempting now. It was not that way when Vudu started business.
You can also see early digital prices, where the movie is priced lower than the DVD. That eats into the DVD sales.
I wouldn't expect Disney movies to every get cheap though.Comment
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I was quite pleased seeing the $5.99 HDX sale. Too bad I had already purchased the majority on blu or I would have jumped easily. At that price point I'm on board and willing to pay for the digital copy only.Originally posted by tsken02 View PostComment
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Re: High Prices
It's not pointless. It's important. Digital Media will never take off the way physical media did if prices aren't reasonable.Originally posted by BlakkMajik3000 View PostComment
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