NBC’s recent decision to end selling television shows through the iTunes store, is a reminder that, unlike digital music, Apple isn’t the undisputed king of online video. In fact, far from it. Aside from the numerous ad-supported video sites, of which YouTube is the industry leader, there exists a plethora of paid-for video download stores — both rental and purchase-to-own — each of which is hoping to take a large slice of this emerging and potentially lucrative market.

In this post, we take a look at eleven paid-for video download stores, noting that while there appears to be much competition, many of the resulting services lack innovation, in terms of their technology choices and how they approach copy-protection.

Movielink

Originally a joint venture created by five of the major studios: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Studios and Warner Bros. Studios, the service was recently acquired by Blockbuster. The content on offer includes television shows and movies from those studios, along with Walt Disney Pictures, Miramax, Lionsgate and others.

Although you can browse and pay for content from the Movielink website (which requires Internet Explorer), to download and manage videos, users need to install the Movielink Manager software. From then on it’s a standard Windows Media DRM affair, whereby rentals can be stored for up to 30 days and expire 24 hours after the first viewing, and in some cases, downloads can be played back on up to three PCs (depending on the original content-owners’ wishes), while others are limited to one PC. Continue reading »

Update: Apple has issued a statement saying that its partnership with NBC has ended with immediate effect. “The move follows NBC’s decision to not renew its agreement with iTunes after Apple declined to pay more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode, which would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99.”

Our original coverage below

The New York Times is reporting that NBC Universal has decided not to renew its contract to sell television show downloads on iTunes. Although the current contract doesn’t expire till December, NBC — whose content accounts for 40% of TV downloads on iTunes — has opted to give Apple the required ninety days notice to end the partnership.

It’s a familiar story to anybody whose been following UMG’s recent standoff with Apple, whereby the major content owners want greater control and flexibility over iTunes pricing, as well as stricter copy protection controls, in contrast to Apple’s insistence on keeping the iTunes experience simple and competitive. Continue reading »

Television show downloads have finally made their way to the UK-version of the iTunes Music Store, two years after the service debuted in the U.S. (press release). A cause for celebration you might think? Especially for Mac users who are unable to use competing services from UK broadcasters, all of which employ Windows-only solutions.

Wrong.

As paidContent notes, Apple’s offering is devoid of home-produced content and shows are nearly double the price of their U.S. equivalents. Continue reading »

News Corp. and NBC Universal have revealed the name of their new online video venture — the so-called YouTube killer, which Google had already dubbed Clown Co., will officially be called “Hulu“.

A statement on the site’s holding page reads:

Why Hulu? Objectively, Hulu is short, easy to spell, easy to pronounce, and rhymes with itself. Subjectively, Hulu strikes us as an inherently fun name, one that captures the spirit of the service we’re building. Our hope is that Hulu will embody our (admittedly ambitious) never-ending mission, which is to help you find and enjoy the world’s premier content when, where and how you want it.

The announcement ends a five-month search for a name for the joint venture which is aimed squarely at competing with Google-owned YouTube — through licensing agreements with News Corp. and NBC Universal properties.

“Hulu” will launch as a private beta in October 2007, however, interested users are able to sign-up for invitation from today.