Hasta La Gadget!

Movie lovers in the UK may struggle to find their title of choice to watch in the coming months, with news that Sky and Warner Bros. have signed an exclusive deal for new and back-catalog titles. The agreement covers both Sky’s on-demand and subscription Sky Movies services, and will see new Warner Bros. releases hit the broadcaster roughly six months after they finish showing in theaters. Other services will have to wait out a twelve month exclusivity period after that before they can offer titles like The Dark Knight Rises, and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

Meanwhile, older titles from Warner Bros. storerooms will also be exclusive to Sky Movies. That includes all of the Batman movies, The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, all Superman movies and Lethal Weapon 1, 2 and 3. Sky will offer them via its NOW TV IPTV service as well, though only to Sky customers.

It’s not the only Sky deal in recent weeks that has seen content become scarcer. Earlier this month, the broadcaster inked a deal for exclusive Bond film access, which saw the entire catalog of 007 films quietly yanked from the iTunes UK store. Instead, they’ll be shown on a dedicated on-demand channel on Sky.

HD and 3D versions of films will be shown, where available, though Sky is yet to confirm how much it will be asking for each title. Still, it’s a blow to rival services such as iTunes, Netflix, LOVEFILM, and other pay-per-view offerings, which will now face a sizable hole in their catalogs.

[via Engadget]

Sky and Warner Bros. ink exclusive movie deal: iTunes, Netflix left out in cold is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

It may not have quite the catalog of Netflix (or the same HD quality), but Sony Pictures’ Crackle streaming service does have one big thing going for it: it’s completely free. It’s also found its way onto plenty of different platforms (most recently Windows Phone), and that run has now continued with its expansion onto Barnes & Noble’s Nook Tablet (but not the Nook Color). What’s more, while there’s no release date confirmed just yet, Crackle says that the app is “coming soon” to the Kindle Fire as well. It’s also revealed that the app has now seen 11 million downloads across all mobile platforms — a figure that may now see a boost not only from the new Nook app, but from the just-updated Android and iOS apps, which each boast a redesigned interface and support for TV playback via AirPlay or HDMI.

Continue reading Crackle’s free movie streaming expands to the Nook Tablet, Android and iOS apps updated for TV playback

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Software

Crackle’s free movie streaming expands to the Nook Tablet, Android and iOS apps updated for TV playback originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 17 Aug 2012 23:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Research firm NPD Group has published its latest statistics looking at the movie rental industry for the first half of 2012. According to the statistics, the movie rental industry declined 10% overall during the first half of 2012. The 10% decline is compared to the first half of 2011. NPD says the decline is occurring even though consumers are switching from physical media to digital rentals.

I think one major item we should take into account what this is the quality of movies available to rent during the first half of 2012. It’s been a very bad year for movie rentals if you ask me because it hasn’t been a great year for movies. We didn’t have truly popular movies at the theater to watch, and anticipate on DVD, until the summer movie season kicked off and many of those films, such as The Avengers, are still not available on DVD.

According to NPD, physical discs are still the most common way people rent movies in the US making up 62% of all rentals. Digital rentals made up 38% of the movie rental industry. When you look more closely at physical DVD rentals, kiosk options such as Redbox were the most popular rental locations with 45% of physical disk rentals happening there.

Rentals of Blu-ray discs declined by 17% and the only gain in the movie rental business during the first half of 2012 came via video-on-demand. According to NPD’s numbers, video-on-demand outlets such as iTunes, Comcast, and Netflix grew 5% during the first half of the year. This is no surprise as more and more consumers turned to video-on-demand rather than having to drive to the kiosk or store to rent a film.

[via LA Times]

Movie rentals ditched 10% during in 1H 2012 is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Amazon has signed a deal with Warner Brothers Television that will see the online retailer gaining access to televisions shows such as Fringe, The West Wing, and Alcatraz for its Prime Instant Video service. Anyone who subscribes to Amazon Prime gains access to on-demand movies and TV shows that can be accessed via a multitude of devices, and now Warner’s TV catalogue will be added to the list of available content.

Amazon says that Fringe and The West Wing will be available this summer exclusively on Prime Instant Video, a subtle dig, perhaps, at Netflix and other streaming services. Customers will be able to watch video on a wide variety of devices like the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Roku streamers, plus various tablets. As of writing, Prime Instant Video has around 18,000 movies and TVs ready to stream.

The popular online retailer has been ramping up its content deal as of late. Earlier in the year it added shows from The Discovery Channel and Animal Planet, plus movies from Magnolia Pictures. The company is also hoping to produce original content for Prime Instant Video, a similar strategy to Netflix and Hulu. Amazon began accepting pitches for shows back in May, with successful writers getting a chance to earn $10,000 if the company options the idea.

Amazon Prime Instant Video adds Warner TV shows is written by Ben Kersey & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Government-helmed China Movie Channel’s site M1905 announced this week that it’s joining forces with Jiaflix — a consortium comprised of Hollywood-types like former Columbia exec Sid Ganis — to launch a movie streaming service in China. The still unnamed offering is set to stream both Chinese and international films, including a deal struck with Paramount that will bring the studio’s back catalog and future releases to the service. The fruits of the partnership are set to launch in the fourth quarter of this year, bringing streaming to a number of platforms, including smartphone and tablets. Jiaflix and China Movie Channel added that they’ll have a plan in place to combat potential piracy through the service, but have yet to spell out what such a plan of action would entail.

Continue reading Government-backed movie streaming service coming to China in Q4, bringing Paramount titles along

Government-backed movie streaming service coming to China in Q4, bringing Paramount titles along originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 29 Jun 2012 11:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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