iTunes / Vudu Comparison:

[Zu Nim]

Re: iTunes / Vudu Comparison:

I guess I touched a nerve challenging your strongly held beliefs and triggered a defense mechinism.

Not even in the least. Making presumptions and attacking the person instead of the issues is a strong statement about an inability to defend one's position.

Microsoft Corp. has a triple A bond rating.

You are way out of your depth here and it's still irrelevant.

Now, for the walled garden comparison;

A walled garden refers to a closed system. UV is a closed system. Consumers cannot take UV content and move it to a platform of their choosing; companies cannot implement UV without restriction. A walled garden does not mean it's controlled by one company, although this is often the case.

I can't take VUDU-only extras and play them at Target Ticket. I can't take them and play them on a TiVo. You prefer the view of your walled garden. That's fine, but don't pretend it's not a walled garden.

MPAA = Motion Picture Association of America (nothing to do with music)
RIAA = Recording Industry Association of America

Yes, I misread the MPAA in that quote as RIAA, initialisms you referred to alternately throughout. Neither is a term that anyone would use in the context of markets or products. It's an attempt to mislead, and it worked in that case. You're not interested in being clear, you're interested in pounding the table regarding your preferred technology.

If this be the case,

Are you a pirate?

pls find me somewhere I can evaluate an objective set of market sales numbers concerning the iTunes sale of MPAA content to customers wishing playback in-home instead of on a mobile iOS device. The comparison I seek is iTunes sales for AppleTV playback vs. sales for playback via a UV vendor. Mid sixties is not realistic.

I don't need to find anything for you. If you find the facts laid before you as puzzling, that is not my problem to solve.

I told you the most recent numbers from the second half of 2013. iTunes has 64%. Another poster stated that iTunes had 65% in 2012. Single digits differences are not material. Unless you can find a report that says iTunes has dropped into the 50s (or worse), you've brought nothing to the table except your desperate desire to wish away the facts.

iTunes is a product from a for-profit company.

Irrelevant. DECE is not a noble grassroots pro-consumer group that volunteered a technology to benefit humanity. UV is a service from a consortium of for-profit companies, companies that want more profits, including VUDU. Specifically, they want the profits Apple is currently making. (Even more, if they can manage.)

The chances of iTunes becoming a digital delivery standard are about as close to zero as is statistically possible.

And yet, there it is, delivering the majority of the video EST market digitally. Currently, iTunes is the de facto digital delivery standard. It's not healthy, it's not what I would choose, but that's the world today. VUDU doesn't appear to be on the verge of becoming that digital delivery standard. (I know you were referring to UV but this is iTunes vs. VUDU.)

[useless speculation deleted]

The industry doesn't have a clue and neither do the market researchers. Armchair UV prognosticators don't even rank.

Your attempt to disguise cheerleading as sincere analysis and debate isn't working. Perhaps you should reconsider your strategy.

[Zu Nim]

Re: iTunes / Vudu Comparison:

This report from NPD states that iTunes had 65% of the EST market. In 2012. It is now 2014, and UltraViolet was just starting to grow in the second half of 2012. The marketshare for iTunes has shrunk, and the marketshare for UltraViolet has grown significantly in 2013. So it's useless to compare numbers that are two years old.

I used numbers from the second half of 2013, not 2012. iTunes holds 64% of the market. At that rate, iTunes would still be the majority of EST well into the 2020s. The lack of competition would be a sad state of affairs but it's not for me to decide.

For over a hundred million people, they don't have to buy a new device to stream UltraViolet content. In 2013 alone, 100 million SmartTV's or streaming boxes were sold. Apple has only sold 20 million Apple TV's since its debut.

First, VUDU is U.S. only (although I understand UV is easily conflated with VUDU). Second, there were less than 16 million smart TVs in the U.S. at the end of 2012. There are certainly more than that now, but the TV market has run into difficulties and the majority of TVs sold are not smart TVs. Third, not every smart TV has VUDU installed.

As far as Apple TV is concerned, every Apple TV has iTunes installed and it was probably purchased with the intent of using iTunes. Of course, AirPlay is a big reason as well now.

I am sure they want to get all the files created before they launch the new system, and there are 12,000 titles to get ready. Plus they have to get all the software updates ready for all the blu-ray players from at least 8 different hardware manufacturers.

I find it hard to believe that studios that can't even get the same streams to the different retailers are mysteriously waiting to get 12,000 titles all out the door at once.

The longer CFF is delayed, the less likely there will be software updates for CFF for those Blu-ray players. CE manufacturers have little interest in supporting products they no longer sell (and that are out of warranty) with free updates. They are interested in selling you a new product. Outside of Sony, which manufacturer might benefit from investing the time in updating a three-year-old Blu-ray player?

I never expected it would be ready before the fall.

You know more than UV insiders then!

[echopulse]

Re: iTunes / Vudu Comparison:

I used numbers from the second half of 2013, not 2012. iTunes holds 64% of the market. At that rate, iTunes would still be the majority of EST well into the 2020s. The lack of competition would be a sad state of affairs but it's not for me to decide.

I am skeptical that iTunes really had 64% of the market in 2013 with the huge growth of other providers. Where did IHS get it's numbers? They didn't cite them. Comcast just jumped in, and now has 15% of the market, so the market has surely grown. With new players, iTunes must have lost some marketshare.

First, VUDU is U.S. only (although I understand UV is easily conflated with VUDU). Second, there were less than 16 million smart TVs in the U.S. at the end of 2012. There are certainly more than that now, but the TV market has run into difficulties and the majority of TVs sold are not smart TVs. Third, not every smart TV has VUDU installed.

That report is meaningless. They didn't count the millions of gaming consoles, streaming boxes. and blu-ray players that are capable of streaming at least one or more UV providers.

This NPD report says that the US had 140 Million TV's that were connected to a streaming device. Some of those were Apple TV's, so we can subtract some of them from the UV total.

So, that's UV: 120 - 140 million vs. AppleTV: 20 million. And that was at the end of 2012.

Clearly, the momentum is on the side of UV.