3 movie studios to launch subscription based VOD web site
But here's where things get interesting. The three studios, which are working together under the name Studio 3 Networks, plan to launch a subscription based web site that will stream on-demand movies starting in May. At launch, movies including The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Iron Man, Pink Panther 2, The Spiderwick Chronicles, and Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail will be available.
In other words, the new epix web site will be a lot like Hulu, except the films will be more current and viewers will have to pay to watch them. So umm, it won't be that much like Hulu at all. But it does raise an interesting question - if Studio 3 Networks doesn't manage to sign a broadcast carriage, could the group still make money on a subscription based web site? Sure, people are used to getting online video for free, but personally I'd rather pay a nominal monthly fee to watch on-demand movies from a site like epix than pay an arm and a leg to subscribe to a cable channel on top of a monthly cable bill. Or at least, I would if epix had films from more than three studios.
In related news, while looking for any sort of publicity photos of epix, I discovered that epix.com, epix.net, and epix.tv among other web domains are already registered. So it's not clear exactly what the URL of the new page will be.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jenn said 12:25PM on 1-28-2009
I would subscribe, however it would need to offer a few things:
1) Once you pay to watch a movie, you should be able to watch it as many times as you want without having to pay
2) subscriptions should work on all computers
3) an option to download a copy (even for a small fee)
4) Hd
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Timothy said 1:41PM on 1-28-2009
The site is pretty weak right now - I hope that isn't the real version of the site...
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Thomas said 2:14PM on 1-28-2009
Price is a major consideration. DTV charges more for Pay per View than the local video stores and far more than Netflix. If they're trying to bite into torrent downloads they need to encourage usage by setting a fair price and allowing a decent quality download rather than streaming video. Netflix has streaming video and it sucks on limited broadband. Not asking to burn copies. They should be able to disable that possibility, should they not?
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