Thursday, December 9, 2010

Premium VOD on the Way

Early next year, Warner Bros. will start offering films for cable video-on-demand services 30 to 60 days prior to their arrival on disk. Sony will shorten its window for cable VOD too, but will offer the same films at the same time through its own Qriocity streaming service. The idea there is to test, and the studios hope, to create a new premium VOD window offering access to new-release movies at about twice what it costs to watch those same movies in theaters.

Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros. and New Line essentially will be making movies available for cable premium VOD as soon as theatrical exhibition ends.

One suspects many consumers would be happy to pay some premium for "earlier than DVD" access to new-release movies. Whether they deem such access to be worth twice what a movie theater ticket costs is what remains to be seen.

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