Apple fans and movie lovers have a lot to cheer about. Along with an updated, full-HD Apple TV set-top device, Apple today unveiled its iCloud movie service. Customers who purchase titles from five major studios will now be able to access their purchases on their Apple TVs, iPads and iPhones.
Notable holdouts to the iCloud service include Fox and Universal, but both studios seem likely to add their films to iCloud in the near future.
Besides new purchases, the iCloud movie service will also store users’ previously purchased iTunes movies. Philip Schiller, Apple’s SVP of worldwide marketing, said the following about the revisions to Apple’s content ecosystem:
“People are going to love streaming movies and TV shows in 1080p with the new Apple TV, and photos look beautiful displayed at the maximum resolution of your TV . . . Apple TV is easier than ever to use with its new icon-based interface and the ability to access your purchased movies, TV shows and music right from iCloud.”
Netflix also announced today that consumers could sign up directly on the Apple TV and pay for their subscriptions through their iTunes accounts.
What do you think of Apple’s carefully crafted approach to hardware and content: is it intuitive and beautifully simple, or confining and constricting?
[via The L.A. Times and Home Media Magazine]
Interesting,
We have been hearing about Apple and Google TV for over a year now, but the question remains, how much? We know cloud is the future, just look at UltraViolet, but still, seeing 800K+ leave NetFlix over price increase, and 12% drop in cable and satellite movie rentals, one has to wonder if low price rules in the movie rental industry due to this severe recession, not just convenience. With gas prices rising, one has to wonder if Kiosk sales will also decline in coming year while these prices also rise. Will cloud be competitive?
Don’t look at UltraViolet.
Why, is Apple better, or how about Google TV, streaming video appears to be the future for those with high speed internet connections, but it will be a long time before everyone has such access, never mind will be able to afford it. We have already heard about how the new Apple iPad is a data whore, sucking peoples limited data programs and getting nailed with data overage costs. With AT&T also limiting data plans, and with all the Iphones out there, I have to say, this may be the killer of cloud streaming services.
Interesting,
Cloud technology is banking on bandwidth issues being resoloved, and I don’t see that happening anytime soon, so DVD movies will dominate the industry for years to come as I see it.