macnews.net.tc
2006-03-14
Full-length movie on iTunes Music Store (US)
Apparently, there is/was a Disney TV-movie of 1:39 length at the US iTunes Music Store. It's a Disney flick called "High School Musical", and it costs 1.99 USD.
Now: We all know that there will be movies in iTMS one day, but there still are some issues.
First and foremost: There's still no bloody video content for anyone in Europe and other parts of the world. Bad.
Then, the video mentioned is 320*240 H.264, which wouldn't exactly look great on a higher resolution iPod video. Does this mean there will be no higher-res iPod video - or does it mean Apple will have to offer "different sizes"? Or will the 5G iPods be neglected after a while?
More importantly: Full-length movies, while fun on an iPod 5G or 6G, are really meant to be viewed on a big TV or rather a video beamer, if you really want to give the movie the size it wants. But for the big screen 640*360 is rather a minimum, not the maximum or optimum. They'd have to be 720 pixels wide, really, to match DVDs. Not really a technical problem, but I'd hate to have to buy a movie three times in order to watch it on a 5G, a 6G iPod as well as on the big screen. I guess Apple will have the perfect solution, though. And 640 pixels wide, while not the optimum, could be something one can live with. For one or two years.
So the thing to take home with probably is: Apple's on the verge of going into movies. And for us non-US citizens, the thing to take home with is patience. Apple did have a hard time bringing music to the masses, too.
Update 2006-03-15, 02:16: The movie has vanished from US' iTMS. Which only proves that Apple is up to something there. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 15:55 [article link]
Now: We all know that there will be movies in iTMS one day, but there still are some issues.
First and foremost: There's still no bloody video content for anyone in Europe and other parts of the world. Bad.
Then, the video mentioned is 320*240 H.264, which wouldn't exactly look great on a higher resolution iPod video. Does this mean there will be no higher-res iPod video - or does it mean Apple will have to offer "different sizes"? Or will the 5G iPods be neglected after a while?
More importantly: Full-length movies, while fun on an iPod 5G or 6G, are really meant to be viewed on a big TV or rather a video beamer, if you really want to give the movie the size it wants. But for the big screen 640*360 is rather a minimum, not the maximum or optimum. They'd have to be 720 pixels wide, really, to match DVDs. Not really a technical problem, but I'd hate to have to buy a movie three times in order to watch it on a 5G, a 6G iPod as well as on the big screen. I guess Apple will have the perfect solution, though. And 640 pixels wide, while not the optimum, could be something one can live with. For one or two years.
So the thing to take home with probably is: Apple's on the verge of going into movies. And for us non-US citizens, the thing to take home with is patience. Apple did have a hard time bringing music to the masses, too.
Update 2006-03-15, 02:16: The movie has vanished from US' iTMS. Which only proves that Apple is up to something there. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 15:55 [article link]
