Fandango purchases Vudu! (1 Viewer)

[Mark-P]

So I finally had enough time to take a second look at FandangoNow App on my Apple TV4K. Like others have reported no HDR. I can only assume I'm getting 4K because there is nothing to indicate it in the swipe down. I also found where the 5.1 audio was hiding. When a movie is playing, If you swipe down go to audio you will see two options both labeled "unknown" Select the second "unknown" and you get 5.1 audio.

I will only use FandangoNow if they are the only option to have the correct specs of a given title.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

So you think Roku changing from a business model or selling hardware and advertising to one of wanting an actual cut of subscription fees was done at AT&T/Warner's insistence?

Are you saying that is a new thing w/ Roku? I don't think so -- at least not in general.

Reread what you yourself quoted from Variety. It very much suggests that AT&T/Warner is the one insisting on a change, not Roku. HBO streaming (and many other streaming services) had apparently been operating as a "channel" on Roku's (and Amazon Fire's) platform w/ the associated costs/stipulations for however long that's been Roku's business model, which isn't something new AFAIK.

Also, according to what you quoted, it's not even clear that ("cut of subscription fees") is a key obstacle issue for AT&T/Warner (and Roku) at all:

" A central sticking point: WarnerMedia wants to remove HBO from Amazon’s Prime Video Channels and the Roku Channel. That’s so the media conglomerate can keep customers within the HBO Max app experience, giving it the ability to gather data for recommendations and (down the road) ad targeting."

That indicates AT&T/Warner wants (and insists on) a change to allow HBO Max (the power and flexibility) to do (critically) more and not remain as just a "channel".


In any case, I'm not taking sides on the dispute -- just don't see it as Roku necessarily being the one imposing (problematic) changes. I think both sides need to work out some amicable solution to get HBO Max onto the Roku platform. It's just business for both of them, and they both stand to lose out if they can't work this out...

_Man_

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Before Roku made their money by selling Roku units, now they're trying to get a piece of the action and are using their clout to try and get it.

That can be partly explained by the fact that the market for Roku units is approaching saturation, and the company needs ongoing revenue to sustain it once saturation is reached.

In the case of HBO Max, accepting AT&T's terms would mean ceding ground versus their existing deal for HBO Now. I understand why Roku wouldn't want to do that.

In the case of Peacock, exempting Comcast from its ad inventory requirements would set a precedent that would be very counterproductive for all of its other deals for ad-supported services.

Either the lack of Roku availability is going to hamper subscriber growth enough that the streaming services are incentivized to make a deal, or the lack of service availability is going to hamper device sales enough that Roku is incentivized to make a deal.

 

[Cranston37+]

Are you saying that is a new thing w/ Roku? I don't think so -- at least not in general.

Reread what you yourself quoted from Variety. It very much suggests that AT&T/Warner is the one insisting on a change, not Roku. HBO streaming (and many other streaming services) had apparently been operating as a "channel" on Roku's (and Amazon Fire's) platform w/ the associated costs/stipulations for however long that's been Roku's business model, which isn't something new AFAIK.

All I said, and all I am saying now, is that Roku did recently switch from a business model of making money selling hardware to making money by getting cuts of subscriptions and ad sales. I am making zero arguments beyond that single point.


From Variety:

"According to Roku founder and CEO Anthony Wood, the strategy to make Roku’s platform business the centerpiece of its growth was in the cards when he started the company in 2002. 'We needed to first achieve scale by building up our installed base before we could focus on monetization, so our early focus as a company was solely on selling awesome streaming players to consumers,' he says. Once Roku hit 5 million active accounts in 2013, Wood says, 'we began focusing on how to monetize the platform.'

Then, in 2017, Roku bowed the free, ad-supported Roku Channel, which aggregates content from third parties. Because Roku's planned ask was 20% of subscription fees and 30% of ad revenue, 'they expected the company to encounter conflicts with content partners' says Colin Dixon, nScreen Media founder and chief analyst.

That successful shift, analysts say, is highly unusual in the industry.

'Roku did something you almost never see in tech: They executed a pivot from being a hardware company to a services business,' says Dixon. 'It’s incredibly hard to do. Even Apple’s struggling with it.'

'In the early days, hardware margins helped finance the company,' explains Wood. 'These days, our gross profit is dominated by our platform business.'”

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

All I said, and all I am saying now, is that Roku did recently switch from a business model of making money selling hardware to making money by getting cuts of subscriptions and ad sales. I am making zero arguments beyond that single point.


From Variety:

"According to Roku founder and CEO Anthony Wood, the strategy to make Roku’s platform business the centerpiece of its growth was in the cards when he started the company in 2002. 'We needed to first achieve scale by building up our installed base before we could focus on monetization, so our early focus as a company was solely on selling awesome streaming players to consumers,' he says. Once Roku hit 5 million active accounts in 2013, Wood says, 'we began focusing on how to monetize the platform.'

Then, in 2017, Roku bowed the free, ad-supported Roku Channel, which aggregates content from third parties. Because Roku's planned ask was 20% of subscription fees and 30% of ad revenue, 'they expected the company to encounter conflicts with content partners' says Colin Dixon, nScreen Media founder and chief analyst.

That successful shift, analysts say, is highly unusual in the industry.

'Roku did something you almost never see in tech: They executed a pivot from being a hardware company to a services business,' says Dixon. 'It’s incredibly hard to do. Even Apple’s struggling with it.'

'In the early days, hardware margins helped finance the company,' explains Wood. 'These days, our gross profit is dominated by our platform business.'”

I suppose it may be more a matter of semantics than anything in that case... but I'd say they haven't really changed their business model because the essential aspects of their business plan had always been what they ended up doing -- the exact details may not have all been worked out from the beginning, but they were always expecting and planning on this path... and it makes perfect sense they would, if they were any smart at the bizz (vs just lucky or the like).

Nobody should really expect to succeed indefinitely (especially at the kind of scale they were likely hoping for) on just selling streaming hardware and letting everybody else dictate (and make all the truly big $$$ on) the rest. The real big, profitable bizz in just about any tech has never really been the hardware itself in the long run -- and we're not even talking about hardware tech that has all that much potential for innovation on its own (as it's essentially just another pipe/funnel or door/window in the grand scheme) -- and Roku no doubt recognized that very early on (or all along).

And according to that Variety excerpt, the details of their monetization plan essentially solidified by 2017... well before HBO Max came on the scene, so it's not something Roku changed on AT&T/Warner.

I suppose some longtime users (from long before 2017) might feel a bit letdown or betrayed by Roku in the exact details of the direction they've taken, but IMHO, that may be rooted in at least somewhat unrealistic expectations of what they were buying into w/ Roku...

It may be that Roku's ask (from AT&T/Warner, et al) is a bit too much, but seems more likely a matter of degrees, not something out of "leftfield" and completely unreasonable me thinks...

_Man_

 

[Cranston37+]

Vudu just updated their tvOS app to include (and even create) your curated lists.

Time to create a list called "Not on iTunes"...

 

[Robert Crawford]

Vudu just updated their tvOS app to include (and even create) your curated lists.

Time to create a list called "Not on iTunes"...

Yes! I already created such a list and it along with my other 17 lists have propagated over to the Vudu app on my Apple devices.

 

[Cranston37+]

Yes! I already created such a list and it along with my other 17 lists have propagated over to the Vudu app on my Apple devices.

Oh this is gonna be handy

 

[TonyD]

You guys going on memory for that list?
I don’t have the patience to go through that to make a list like that one.

 

[Cranston37+]

You guys going on memory for that list?
I don’t have the patience to go through that to make a list like that one.

Naw, I mean if you just added your non-MA movies you'd get about 90% of it, but I just opened 2 windows side-by-side on my iPad, with my iTunes library on one and my Vudu library on the other, and scrolled through both at the same time. When I hit one not on iTunes I'd add it to the curated list on the Vudu ATV app.

Put some tunes on and got 'er done. Took some time but now that I have it, it will be very handy.

 

[Robert Crawford]

You guys going on memory for that list?
I don’t have the patience to go through that to make a list like that one.

Patience is something I developed more of, since, the start of this pandemic. With that said, the last 20 years of my managerial career was spent in supply chain management so I'm obsessive about inventories. I enjoy developing lists and logging my digital purchases with my DVD Profiler as well as separate log books I maintain on a daily basis. Hell, I even log the actual purchase price of each digital and even log those digital titles that came from redeeming digital codes. Granted, if I wasn't retired, I'm not so sure I would be this stringent in my digital inventory control.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Oh this is gonna be handy

View attachment 86674

I've been doing similarly, but in the other direction instead, ie. iTunes Only, 4K iTunes Only and (a very short list of) Amazon+Fandango Only, mainly because my family generally use the Vudu app first (probably because that's what they're used to first) plus I find that to be more useful if you're already in the Vudu app (to know what else you own outside of Vudu). And yeah, I do generally prefer streaming w/ the Vudu app instead of AppleTV app, except for 4K titles (since Apple's 4K streams are generally substantially higher bitrate).

Note that a title can be added to multiple lists, so some 4K titles can belong to both iTunes Only and 4K iTunes Only.

Unfortunately, these lists can't be complete given what they are since some titles (on iTunes) simply aren't listed on Vudu (and I do have a few such)... though they aren't anything the rest of my family would likely ever care about.

Wish the AppleTV app has the same feature so I can also keep a list for Vudu Only on there.

Also, like some, I do try to track digitals in my DVD Profiler to some extent. So far, I've decided to only have entries for digitals that are either higher video rez than whatever I own on discs or I don't own on discs at all. That's fairly consistent w/ how I've mainly handled the multiple disc formats in my DVD Profiler (in that I don't usually keep old discs and their entries in my collection after upgrading... w/ few exceptions). And now, I'm essentially just adding another format (although I haven't all that clearly distinguished between HD and 4K digitals on there so far)...

_Man_

 

[Robert Crawford]

The following lists are some of my 18 lists that I maintain on Vudu;

• UHD iTunes Only
• UHD Vudu Only
• UHD iTunes/Vudu
• SD Vudu/HD iTunes
• SD on iTunes & Vudu
• iTunes Only
• Vudu Only
• iTunes/Vudu (HD)
• John Wayne Films
• James Bond Films
• Star Wars Films

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I only have two lists on Vudu -- a Vudu-only list, and a Star Wars list. I think I just created the Star Wars one when Vudu first came out with lists and I was playing with the feature, as I really don't need that list.

I use DVD Profiler quite extensively for managing my library and keeping track of what we have watched. I created two custom media types -- Digital Copy and 4K Digital Copy, and place digital titles I purchase into a separate collection list tab labeled Digital Copies. So far, I have not been putting codes claimed from disc purchases into DVD Profiler -- unless I end up selling the disc and just keeping the digital copy. I think adding the claimed code titles would be beneficial when looking for content to watch while we are at our 2nd home in South Carolina, but it would mess up how I use some saved filters to find titles I have purchased but not yet watched. I will have to think about this.

One issue I have with the custom media types in DVD Profiler is that they do not show up properly in the mobile version for Android, which I use on my smart phone when we are not home in Michigan. I do not have access to the desktop version while away, as I do not own a Windows laptop -- I just have an inexpensive Chromebook for travel.

 

[Cranston37+]

a Star Wars list. I think I just created the Star Wars one when Vudu first came out with lists and I was playing with the feature, as I really don't need that list.

That might have been an auto generated list as I had it too and I don't remember making it

 

[Todd Erwin]

I have lists by franchise, a "family-approved" list, a "holiday" list, and a list of movies that need upgraded from SD (if the price is right).

 

[Cranston37+]

It looks like Vudu has begun streaming a much cleaner version of "The Thin Man," but to my eyes it's still not the WA transfer. It's definitely better than the iTunes version, though.

Look at the opening MGM lion. The iTunes version is scratched to hell, the HBO Max version is perfectly clean, and Vudu is somewhere in the middle.

Another point to compare - about 3:20 in when the daughter says "oh, he's alright" - on iTunes a giant scratch appears on the right, less so on Vudu, not at all on HBO.

What say you, @Robert Crawford?

 

[Robert Crawford]

@Cranston37+ "The Thin Man" is one of those HD digitals that I bought on iTunes, but, when it propagated to Vudu, it was in SD. Since then, the Vudu site says I own the HD digital, but, when I actually play the stream it is still in SD. I watched both streams just now and I can see what you're talking about, but, again it's in SD on Vudu so I suspect the lack of detail is contributing to those blemishes being less visual to me. Can you check to see if your Vudu stream is SD or HD, when it actually plays and the stream notes, for just a few seconds, the video and audio formats it's playing?

 

[Cranston37+]

@Cranston37+ "The Thin Man" is one of those HD digitals that I bought on iTunes, but, when it propagated to Vudu, it was in SD. Since then, the Vudu site says I own the HD digital, but, when I actually play the stream it is still in SD. I watched both streams just now and I can see what you're talking about, but, again it's in SD on Vudu so I suspect the lack of detail is contributing to those blemishes being less visual to me. Can you check to see if your Vudu stream is SD or HD, when it actually plays and the stream notes, for just a few seconds, the video and audio formats it's playing?

Interesting. I didn't realize my Vudu was playing SD (and yes, it is) because, like you, it does show I own the HDX.

I checked FandangoNow's stream and while it's also SD, look at that first shot with the MGM lion - clear as day with none of the scratches seen in the iTunes version - just like the HBO Max transfer.

I wonder if it's possible that Vudu/FandangoNow did in fact get the new WA transfer but are showing it in SD?

For anybody reading who might be wondering why I'm even bringing it up - up until now none of the new masters made by Warner Archive have made it to the digital copies (even if they are sold under the WA banner), so it would be good news to find out that is now happening.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Interesting. I didn't realize my Vudu was playing SD (and yes, it is) because, like you, it does show I own the HDX.

I checked FandangoNow's stream and while it's also SD, look at that first shot with the MGM lion - clear as day with none of the scratches seen in the iTunes version - just like the HBO Max transfer.

I wonder if it's possible that Vudu/FandangoNow did in fact get the new WA transfer but are showing it in SD?

For anybody reading who might be wondering why I'm even bringing it up - up until now none of the new masters made by Warner Archive have made it to the digital copies (even if they are sold under the WA banner), so it would be good news to find out that is now happening.

Hmmm... my iPhone's Vudu app (and also the mobile site) just says I have the SD version -- yes, I bought the HD on iTunes the last(?) time it was $5 several months ago...

_Man_