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Star Trek Into Darkness on iTunes out today (1 Viewer)

Brett_B

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I usually don't post any thoughts in regards to whether I will buy a disc or not, but I will voice my opinion and say that I WILL INDEED skip this release.

I really enjoyed the movie, and had every intention of buying the blu ray (with 3D, DVD, and digital copy) the day of the release. After reading about this release on the Digital Bits website, I was convinced to just pass it up. I am sure that this release will hit the bargain bins in no time.
 

Tino

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Brett_B said:
I usually don't post any thoughts in regards to whether I will buy a disc or not, but I will voice my opinion and say that I WILL INDEED skip this release. I really enjoyed the movie, and had every intention of buying the blu ray (with 3D, DVD, and digital copy) the day of the release. After reading about this release on the Digital Bits website, I was convinced to just pass it up. I am sure that this release will hit the bargain bins in no time.
I wouldn't say it would hit the bargain bins in no time since it was a huge success and the general public doesn't care about these matters as we do. I say it may go on sale on Black Friday for $14.99. And hen stay at $19.99 for a long while.
 

Nelson Au

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It will be interesting to be a fly on the wall at both Paramount Home video offices and the Bad Robot offices. Are they worried about the bad press, do they care? What do they think of the reaction? On the one hand, bad publicity can be good to raise awareness. I'm sure some people at both companies will think the vast majority of the blu ray buyers won't care about the extras. They'll just buy based on price and the extras they want and from their favorite outlets. Some will take the time to pick and choose which extras they want and buy that version.And then there's the Star Trek fan base. Some will not care and some will be upset about the way the extras are handled. Same with the home theater crowd. These last two probably make up the smallest, yet most vocal group of potential buyers.Everyone at Bad Robot and Paramount knows the movie did well enough and the blu rays will sell fine is my guess. There's quite a few people who really liked the movie. I fall in both the Star Trek fan base and Home theater group. I'm not a fan of JJ Abrams Star Trek but I'll get the set for completeness and buy the set that has features I think I'll be happy enough with. Hopefully the codes works for the iTunes version with the commentary and extra features. I'll be curious what Bad Robot and Paramount think of the uproar and if they will comment.
 

Robert Crawford

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I seriously doubt it, as most sales will happen in the brick and mortar stores anyway. Even those that purchase it through Amazon, most won't even have a clue about the controversy as many folks don't even bother with the bonus material.
 

Ronald Epstein

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I have personally contacted the studio. The person at the top
should be aware of the situation.

I may get a reply. They are good people at Paramount. However,
not certain what I will be able to post and what I will not.

My goal was to make certain that Paramount is aware of the anger
from consumers on Internet forums like these. It may help stop this
kind of practice moving forward. Then again, it may have been
completely out of the studio's hands and a decision made by Bad Robot.

So much we don't know about this situation at this point.

....but the message has been delivered.
 

TravisR

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Nelson Au said:
It will be interesting to be a fly on the wall at both Paramount Home video offices and the Bad Robot offices. Are they worried about the bad press, do they care? What do they think of the reaction?
My guess is that it will basically be a non-issue in terms of sales. However, I think the hubbub was worth starting because I think it sent a message to studios that a chunk of consumers (even if it's a small one) don't want to see significant extras on one release and not on the Blu-ray. My hope is that it's like Disney and Oz where the studio does something moronic but at least learns not to do it again.
 

JeremyLG

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Ronald Epstein said:
I have personally contacted the studio. The person at the top
should be aware of the situation.

I may get a reply. They are good people at Paramount. However,
not certain what I will be able to post and what I will not.

My goal was to make certain that Paramount is aware of the anger
from consumers on Internet forums like these. It may help stop this
kind of practice moving forward. Then again, it may have been
completely out of the studio's hands and a decision made by Bad Robot.

So much we don't know about this situation at this point.

....but the message has been delivered.
Thanks for your article and thanks for this info. About to cancel my amazon preorder in 3, 2, 1...
 

Osato

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Ronald Epstein said:
I have personally contacted the studio. The person at the top
should be aware of the situation.

I may get a reply. They are good people at Paramount. However,
not certain what I will be able to post and what I will not.

My goal was to make certain that Paramount is aware of the anger
from consumers on Internet forums like these. It may help stop this
kind of practice moving forward. Then again, it may have been
completely out of the studio's hands and a decision made by Bad Robot.

So much we don't know about this situation at this point.

....but the message has been delivered.
Much appreciated Ron!

Thank you!
 

Nelson Au

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TravisR

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Nelson Au said:
But it's a commentary made in such a way that branching would have been impossible, according to the article.http://trekcore.com/blog/2013/09/into-darkness-exclusives-part-ii-itunes-extras-enhanced-commentary/
When the nature of the commentary was brought up a few days ago, I thought that might be a reason but even if they couldn't fit the 'commentary version' on the disc, they should have put it another Blu-ray and dropped the DVD. I have to imagine that the average consumer would be happy with the DVD or Blu-ray/DVD release and the enthusiasts & Trek fans would be happy with a 3 disc Blu-ray set (containing the 3-D Blu-ray, 2-D Blu-ray and the commentary Blu-ray and no DVD).
 

Dick

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e-mail letter sent this morning to Paramount Home Video:
Well, I am going to add my voice to what I am guessing are innumerable complaints from others regarding your parceling of special features on this release. I am a HUGE collector (3,500 titles) of Blu-rays and DVD's, about 10% of which are yours, and now I thinking of writing off Paramount releases entirely unless they are released through Criterion or maybe Olive. The fact that you are asking me to lay out a pretty fair sum for the 3-D blu-ray of this, but are not including the commentary (iTunes only? Are you guys high?) or about 50% of the other bonus materials in defference to Target and Best Buy makes me want to scream. But, more pertinent to you, I will not be buying it.

If I was the only one to protest in this way, you would have nothing to worry about. I am just one movie geek.

However, if you check related threads on the largest of the online forums (HTF, DVD TALK, etc) you will see that you are losing a considerable base of potential buyers who are sick and tired of being treated this way by corporations who give not one damn about serious collectors and are only going for the lowest common denominator -- that is, the consumers who have no knowledge of film beyond what they thought was cool at the cinema and just want the Blu-ray, period. It is a crap-shoot whether they pick it up at Target or Best Buy or on iTunes or somewhere else. It's wherever they happen to be shopping when they run across this release, and they couldn't care less about what bonus materials are included. But serious collectors (and there are many of us, making up a sizable portion of your profits), interested in the bonus materials, are not falling for this exploitative b.s.

My suggestion is that you issue a Blu-ray release in a few months, after Target and Best Buy have had their run, that includes the 3-D edition with commentary, plus the 7 featurettes on the current 3-D disc, the trailer, and all store-specific exclusives. Make this like the 2009 STAR TREK Blu-ray release. That's what we want, and will wait to buy. You would be adding many thousands of sales to this title by so doing.

Please, in the future, be thinking of us, who have in large part been your bread and butter since the inception of home video. You would be remiss -- in fact, fiscally irresponsible -- to ignore us in this way for any of your upcoming releases. You have incurred the anger of a great many people with this new STAR TREK release, and we can only hope you learn from your mistake.


I am hoping many of us are sending them similar missives.
 

Tino

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Nice email Dick. The only part I would have left out is :"Are you guys high?)"Insults I believe aren't necessary and tend to defeat the purpose of a well written well meaning letter, however minor. Still, I hope they get the message.
 

Dick

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Tino said:
Nice email Dick. The only part I would have left out is :"Are you guys high?)"Insults I believe aren't necessary and tend to defeat the purpose of a well written well meaning letter, however minor.Still, I hope they get the message.
Yes, you are probably right. Still, I find it hard to believe that corporate lackeys who aren't high would have devised such a release platform.
 

Mark-P

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I really just find this whole thing so silly. It's now been confirmed that the Blu-ray includes the iTunes extras via code. The only thing you don't get is whatever is on the Best Buy exclusive disc. If you want that, buy it at Best Buy and you get EVERYTHING! And this is hardly the first time a retailer has had an "exclusive" bonus disc for a major release. What is it about enthusiasts/collectors that give them such a sense of entitlement? Go ahead, be pissed off and don't buy the release. I seriously doubt it will affect sales enough that Paramount will even notice.
 

Steve Tannehill

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Actually, the Target edition has the additional supplements on disc. The Best Buy version has the supplements as part of their CinemaNow service. Choose your pleasure, physical media or streaming.

Of course, I bought the iTunes version two weeks ago and started to watch the commentary version. It's quite good. I'm glad to hear that the iTunes code that comes with the blu-ray includes this version.
 

TravisR

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Mark-P said:
And this is hardly the first time a retailer has had an "exclusive" bonus disc for a major release.
No but as far as I know, this is the first time that a multi-hour commentary has been a retailer exclusive and I think it's fair to say that there's a big difference between that and the usual 20 minute EPK bonus disc puff piece. I'm not entitled to anything but if I don't like what a studio is doing with a product, I can tell them that.

And while I'm sure I'm in a minority, I don't have an iTunes account and I'm not going to bother to create one because a company isn't smart enough to drop a redundant DVD in favor of real special features.
 

Dick

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Mark-P said:
I really just find this whole thing so silly. It's now been confirmed that the Blu-ray includes the iTunes extras via code. The only thing you don't get is whatever is on the Best Buy exclusive disc. If you want that, buy it at Best Buy and you get EVERYTHING! And this is hardly the first time a retailer has had an "exclusive" bonus disc for a major release. What is it about enthusiasts/collectors that give them such a sense of entitlement? Go ahead, be pissed off and don't buy the release. I seriously doubt it will affect sales enough that Paramount will even notice.
It may not, but that is not the point. I would like the commentary track to be playable along with the disc via my Blu-ray player, without having to connect to Netflix, which I feel is another in the endless examples of invasion of private information. Why fix what wasn't broke? Corporate greed, purer and simple.
 

TonyD

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Dick said:
It may not, but that is not the point. I would like the commentary track to be playable along with the disc via my Blu-ray player, without having to connect to Netflix, which I feel is another in the endless examples of invasion of private information. Why fix what wasn't broke? Corporate greed, purer and simple.
Netflix?
 

Jason_V

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First, thank you Ron. The more voices we get here, the better for everyone.

Mark-P said:
I really just find this whole thing so silly. It's now been confirmed that the Blu-ray includes the iTunes extras via code. The only thing you don't get is whatever is on the Best Buy exclusive disc. If you want that, buy it at Best Buy and you get EVERYTHING! And this is hardly the first time a retailer has had an "exclusive" bonus disc for a major release. What is it about enthusiasts/collectors that give them such a sense of entitlement? Go ahead, be pissed off and don't buy the release. I seriously doubt it will affect sales enough that Paramount will even notice.
So, to reiterate: a consumer needs to go to one store, where you get codes to stream material from various websites. What's wrong with that? Any number of things I've mentioned in every STID thread on the HTF.

#1: those online services can go down. What do you do if you want to watch at that point?
#2: internet service can go down at any time.
#3: unless I've missed something, you stream this material. You don't download it to a computer. Therefore, it can be pulled at any time (at least with the BB streaming service).
#4: the commentary requires a computer, an iTunes account and the interest in watching a movie on your computer...or having the equipment to hook up the computer to your TV.

And one more: it may not matter for the STID BD release. It may not matter for the TNG BD's. It will matter down the road. Trek fans don't forget and THAT is the base Paramount needs to keep in mind. We have poured billions of dollars into this franchise. Alienate the fans and Paramount is SOL'ed.
 

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