Wonder why Apple keeps mentioning how much music and video they’ve sold? (1.3 million feature-length films as of Macworld.) It’s not to impress us consumers, it’s to pitch additional studios… And today Lionsgate joins in:
Lionsgate and Apple today announced that movies from Lionsgate will be available for purchase and download on the iTunes Store starting today. iTunes customers will be able to purchase blockbuster Lionsgate films like “Terminator 2,â€? “LA Story,â€? “Basic Instinct,â€? “The Blair Witch Projectâ€? and “Dirty Dancingâ€? and more than 150 titles coming to iTunes this month.
The initial Lionsgate selection is pretty weak, but it’s encouraging to see another studio on board. Should we place wagers on who’s next… and when iTunes will offer 720p content?
(via AppleInsider)
Interesting since it was announced at CES that Lionsgate movies would be available via XBox Live as well. Will we end up with two distinctly different services offering the exact same content?
I assume we’ll eventually end up with numerous movie delivery services and most studios providing content to each one. As long as they feel confident their content is being locked down, I think they’ll distribute to as many as possible (Amazon, TiVo, Xbox, iTunes, etc) to maximize sales.
Wouldn’t surprise me at all if Apple started offering higher-resolution content (again; it already got better once) soon after the AppleTV starts shipping for real.