iTunes Movie Purchases - No Big Whoop

There's been a lot of press the past few days about Apple putting movies up for sale on iTunes that will be day and date with their DVD releases. I've been wanting to write something up about how this is all sound and fury, signifying abso-frigg'n-lutely noth'n, but as is usually the case, someone else has done it far better than I could have.

This time it's Windows guru, Paul Thurrot. And yeah, while Thurrot is primarily a Windows guy, I think he's very fair-minded about Apple. He gives them props where they're due and calls them out when they deserve it.

I also like (sarcasm in full force) the few pundits I've seen tie this announcement into the recent narrative of Blu-ray not doing very well since the demise of HD-DVD. Check out The Digital Bits for a nice rebuttal on that front. It's the "My Two Cents" post dated 5/2. Just scroll down to the paragraph that begins with, "There are also a couple of interesting stories in the mainstream press worth commenting on."

Keep in mind this isn't to say digital downloads don't have their place and that they won't eventually become a big part of the future. But that day is not today. And it's not next month or next year. Digital downloads are in their absolute infancy here. They're a convenient, but incredibly limited way to purchase and watch movies. And storage -despite becoming incredibly cheap over the years- is still a huge issue if you plan to amass a large movie collection in HD quality.

Thanks, but when it comes to movies, in both HD or standard def, I'll stick with something on a disc. (Not to mention, for the relatively techie, there are plenty of easy-to-use tools out there that'll let you rip your DVDs to your PC and portable media player.)