Netflix announced earlier this week that it will begin allowing unlimited downloads of its extensive library for all customers (except those in the lowest payment tier of $4.99/mo).  Previously, downloads had been limited per tier.  However, Apple's announcement of a new iTunes deal with Fox has the other legal-download companies nervous.  Blockbuster has been dropping in stock price, while Netflix has been rolling out new features to entice consumers.  (The company also recently announced a deal with LG Electronics that will bring streamed video directly to viewers' televisions.)  Netflix says the streaming service, which rolled out last year, has provided over 10 million movies and episodes of TV series, mostly to younger viewers already used to gluing their eyes to a monitor.

 

The world of media consumption is changing rapidly, and for once it's the corporations rather than the consumers struggling to keep up.  Fox is using its new relationship with Apple to offer the pilot of The Sarah Connor Chronicles for free on iTunes, as yet more "promotional material."  This works great for consumers who want a chance to view an episode that they might have missed (or which might be in too early a timeslot and so they can't watch it while their kids are awake, not that I'm bitter) but once again it raises the big question at the heart of the WGA strike: what is fair compensation for work in the new media?

 

A free iTunes download can be considered promotional material because the company which created the product (Twentieth Century Fox in this case) is not receiving any revenue for the product release.  A free streaming episode (such as the episodes of CBS nightly dramas, available on CBS.

com) is surrounded by advertising, and many include unskippable ads in the middle of the stream.  These ads spots generate millions of dollars in revenue for the companies, and so any claims that the material is "promotional" are simply untrue.  The internet has been embraced as an advertiser's dream for years, and the Hollywood production companies are using that particular advantage.  What the writers (and the directors and the actors) want is to be reimbursed for their time and effort just as  the companies who continue to make money off the product continue to be reimbursed.

 

The strike is ending its second month and entering its third.  While rumors are circulating that the Directors Guild of America (DGA) may reach a settlement with the producers, nothing concrete has come of it.  Meanwhile, tensions are still brewing between both camps.  Last week, an angry driver working for the studio actually hit a striking writer at Fox.  We should be long past the days when strikers feared for their lives from the corporations they protested, but it seems the same old resentments spring up every time.

 

The video downloading issue is not going away.  Video downloading (legal and otherwise) is here as the new entertainment medium.  Netflix knows it.  Apple knows it.  The writers know it.  Can the AMPTP really be that far behind the curve?