From CNet: Fox to offer TV & Movie Downloads on MySpace

[Unspeaked]

"Fox, a division of News Corp., announced Monday that digital versions of TV shows such as "24" and "Prison Break," along with feature films, including "X-Men: The Last Stand," will eventually be available for download at Fox sites. Movies will go for $19.99, while TV episodes will cost $1.99."

Full story here: http://news.com.com/Fox+to+offer+TV+downloads+on+MySpace/2100-1025_3-6105025.html?tag=nefd.top

I usually don't care about these types of news stories, but I thought it was very interesting that they're offering full lenght movies, and have a pricing model of $19.99.

 

[spicyapple]

I think this spells the end for MySpace. And none too soon, if you ask me. All the cool kids will abandon MySpace in search of hipper pastures.

 

[benthewraith]

Oh gosh!!! Myspace is slow enough already because of all the idiots who make the crappiest sites (have you actually looked at a myspace site?), so now this will just make it slower, and then a little slower...

And this couldn't have been done on iTunes?

 

[Unspeaked]

And this couldn't have been done on iTunes?

Well, I think that's the key point: the TV shows are already available on iTunes.

By offering them again at a different venue, and also offering the addition of movie downloads - which isn't offered on iTunes (yet?) - it shows one of the first attempts by a current Apple/iTunes ally to circumvent the system.

Of course, it'll probably fail, but as such, it's still notable.

 

[MisterMe]

Well, I think that's the key point: the TV shows are already available on iTunes.

... it shows one of the first attempts by a current Apple/iTunes ally to circumvent the system.

...

This has virtually nothing to do with the iTunes Music Store and almost everything to do with Rupert Murdock's trying to render as much money as he can out of his MySpace.com website.

 

[thedude110]

While I agree that MySpace can't die soon enough, I hardly think this sounds its death-knell. It will provide content to many registered users in a (supposedly) convenient, Windows-centric way.

Such that:

The strategy seems suitably superficial ...

 

[Lollypop]

transfer the content to a single handheld device

How exactly will they do that? So instead of fairplay and access to a huge persentage of protable media players they will allow for more devices (asuming windows RDM ) with a smaller market share... brilliant!

 

[Unspeaked]

I think at this point, MySpace has fallen into what I like to refer to as the "eBay Zone" where regardless of how horrible the service gets or how much better the competition may be, registered users are so engrained in the system that it will take something AMAZING to overtake it (for example, what Google's doing to Yahoo at the moment).