The august pink pages of London's Financial Times report that Apple is to devour Netflix and Blockbuster by renting out downloadable movies, via iTunes, with tolerable DRM. Priced at $3 for 30 days, the movies will augment Apple's current purchase-only offerings and allow the user to transfer the results to iPods, iPhones, and AppleTVs. The real hook, however, is that such relaxed time allowances will force rival offerings to play catch-up or look serious stingy.
Describing Apple as in "advanced talks" with the studios, the FT expects negotiations to reach fruition in the fall. The metric is simple: as long as the purchaser can't keep anything permanently, the studios will offer as much rope as is reasonably profitable to give. Why Apple? An anonymous movie exec explains their position with breathtaking honestly; they see a user base that can be relied upon to do what it's told.
Bravo! Does everyone in that business hate their customers this much?
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