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Comment by tronje | Hacker News Reader

> according to Lionsgate’s President of Worldwide Television & Digital Distribution, Jim Packer, it’s just part of the company’s “commitment to remain at the cutting edge of innovation in delivering content to online audiences around the world.”

He says that, but renting a Lionsgate movie through Steam for 48 hours costs about half as much as a 1-month Netflix membership? I kind of don't think this was a particularly game-changing move on Steam's or Lionsgate's behalf.

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Alternatively, you can now rent a blockbuster film using money you have made while playing games. Trading cards, skin drops, crates/cases etc can all be acquired without putting money into the system but can be sold for credit on the steam marketplace.

Personally, I have used profits from selling trading cards and unwanted tf2 weapons to buy games, why not rent films?

Oh yeah, that's a good point I hadn't considered. I supposed it remains to be seen if enough people use it that (or another) way to make it a profitable endeavor.

> Alternatively, you can now rent a blockbuster film using money you have made while playing games. Trading cards, skin drops, crates/cases etc can all be acquired without putting money into the system but can be sold for credit on the steam marketplace.

But where you can earn enough money? The total value of all items I've earned on Steam probably doesn't even sum to 1 Euro...

You might be surprised, when I first discovered you could sell trading cards I listing all the ones I'd collected and made ~£30.

I had a similar experience, and over the years I've bought 3-4 games using trading cards that I'd gathered.

Well, I guess it depends on how you use steam. If I sold all my CS:GO skins, TF2 items, and trading cards, I'd have several hundred USD.

Yeah, with enough time and consistent playing you can make some money. I play CSGO pretty consistently and I've made enough to cover all the DLCs so far. Usually my strategy is: buy the DLC and play a lot right after it comes out. You're bound to get a few drops from the new set. Selling those immediately can easily make some money.

> The total value of all items I've earned on Steam probably doesn't even sum to 1 Euro...

You aren't idling Bad Rats then, if you just idle the game you'll earn $0.20 cards every so often. There's a really weird underground economy in steam around cards. I don't really understand the market, it seems akin to smokes in the joint. There are farmers (people idling games), scammers (people taking more value than they're getting), there are arbitration scripts always running for the various steam and third party market places.

A lot of the value I think comes from people who want to have a really nice Steam profile. With enough cards and xp you can get a nice background and a high level. I haven't really looked into it but some people take it really serious and are willing to pay for it.

Does idling Bad Rats produce more revenue than the cost of the power consumed by doing so?

My guess: nope

It does when you live in a dorm or your parent's house. Same as a pizza delivery driver using their parent's car. Or Uber drivers unable to do the math on their costs.

There a lots and lots of markets where the seller almost always loses. Look at art and music.

You didn't answer the parent's comment, though. The answer is that the cost of electricity is greater than running this game, even if it's run in the background.

It's irrelevant if you live in a dorm or your parent's house - you just pass on the cost to whomever is the responsible party. And you finish with a rather bizarre statement about markets where the seller loses. There are markets where a large number of sellers compete for a shrinking amount of market share with an undifferentiated product. But it's irrational for someone to sell something at a loss in the medium to long term, overall (unless they are a monopolist).

The seller doesn't realize they are losing because they are not correctly calculating their costs. With art and music and things like pizza delivery / Uber churn maintains the market as the unaccounted for costs(debt, depreciation etc) finally catch up to the current participants removing them.

>The answer is that the cost of electricity is greater than running this game, even if it's run in the background.

There's a 3rd party application that most serious card idlers use, it uses negligible processing power, just pings the SteamWorks API to say you're playing the game. So if you have steam open in the background, I doubt this adds more visible cost than having a pinned tab in chrome.

http://www.steamidlemaster.com/

Externalizing as many of your costs as you can is business 101.

Dota and CS go tend to be where the items at.

Netflix doesn't carry all movies, and rarely streams recent big budget ones. Typical rental of a recent (or obscure) release from the convenience of wherever you happen to be is typically about $5, the price you're complaining of.

Nice to see a major studio delivering their goods practically direct to viewers. About time! The licensing wars are irritating.

That's also a perspective I hadn't considered, but it doesn't explicitly say anywhere that they'll publish newer releases right away, and then there's the localization thing where UK gets a grand total of 11 movies. That's still in stark contrast to Mr. Packer's statement, which promised “commitment to remain at the cutting edge of innovation in delivering content to online audiences around the world.”

> and then there's the localization thing where UK gets a grand total of 11 movies

My, my, the irony is jarring. The UK has localization problems? Then the rest of the world is screwed :p

I wouldn't be surprised if for lots of the content like this the UK is actually in the worst group.

The example that is currently annoying me: Sky has an exclusive deal with HBO for some of their shows, so I can't legally watch some of the best TV currently being made without paying for a mountain of other stuff I'll never watch.

Localization doesn't just refer to translation but more importantly to distribution rights. Even the publisher can't give away distribution rights in regions where they previously already promised exclusivity.

This is the anachronism that results in paradoxical situations like being able to only offer Lord of the Rings part 1 and 3 but not part 2 because some obscure TV channel has the exclusive rights in your country for the next five years.

Netflix DVD is still a useful option if you want to keep up with recent or obscure movies / TV series on the 'cheap'. Streaming, IMO is much more for killing time than watching a specific movie / series.

If you want to be really cheap you can add and drop the DVD section for a few months a year like say summer break.

I'd rather pay $8 a month for access to thousands of TV shows and movies I might want to watch versus paying $4 one time for a movie I know I want to watch. Especially when the movie I want to see will likely eventually show up on my $8 service at no additional cost.

I suppose it matters on whether you are willing to wait or not.

I thought it was for purchasing the movies and still thought "meh, overpriced".

If it's just renting for 48 hours, that's even worse.

I think the thing is I wouldn't rent games from steam. That isn't what I want it for. I want it as a repository of things I've bought and can access again at will without storing media. I'd almost certainly buy films in the steam sale when they're 60% off because I'm an idiot and can't help myself.

There's no way I'm going to consume media as rentals. I look forward to seeing whether this makes way for steam as a more general media platform though - it's super exciting.

They've got a lot of catching up to do to Google Play. Multi-device, convenient, big selection, etc.

It seems inconceivable that they could catch up. What do they have going for them that Google doesn't have multiple times over? It's certainly not audience, capital, or technology.

Well it may take time, but they will work their way up. I really hope they eventually allow you to "buy" movies. The convenience of Steam for me has always been that I can download things I own and not take up a ton of space with CD's that will eventually be scratched and possibly break.

What's their "in", though? It seems Google (and others!) have a stronger position on every front. It looks untenable.

They don't have to beat Google. They just have to sell movies to gamers, which is far easier.

By the way, gamers are often pirates too. Giving them a platform and price point would go a long way.

>> "Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2011/11/25/gabe-says-piracy-isnt...

I'm always reminded of this talk by Gabe Newell.

As a consumer, I trust valve more than Google to make decisions that are better for me. They could be doing a lot more to squeeze money out of me, but they won't do that. My stuff feels safe on steam even if it's under DRM.

I normally don't buy movies, but I might buy one in a sale. In fact, I don't actually know of any services that sell / stream them outside netflix (they exist, I'm sure). If valve can convince the movie industry to play by steam's rules, they can make money. Plus movies get access to advertising on the steam platform.

"around the world" and 11 titles in UK vs. 100 in US is a bit disappointing.

That too! I'm not located in either of those two countries, and I can only imagine how atrocious options over here will be, with a start like that.

I also prefer watching movies in original language, because even professional dubs are often terrible; it wouldn't surprise me if they offer limited language choices as well...

If you are watching 2-3 movies a month (a little more than once in two weeks), than you pay the same as for Netflix, but you can choose from all available PPV platforms. It works for me. I sometimes watch movies from Google Movies, because they have better selection of titles in my country than Netflix and are cheaper than watching at cinema (not same experience, but if you just want to watch a nice movie with your wife it's a bargain).

For me at this point Netflix is for TV series and some classics that I missed, because it's convenient.

I don't use Netflix, but my guess is that they don't carry the Lionsgate films.

Yeah, probably. But I think most people looking for some light entertainment will look for 'a movie', not 'this particular Lionsgate movie', and in any case, with Netflix being so wildly popular, and average Steam users probably being fairly well-versed in today's online entertainment options, I just can't believe that this is very significant at all.

That's my experience. Since dropping cable and going to 100% Netflix, my watching is very much "what's on Netflix this month?" And with full seasons of TV shows posted at once, I can binge watch one of those if I don't see an interesting movie.

It's £3.49. How much cheaper do you want it to be?

For all I care it can be a million pounds, I probably won't use it either way. My point is that it's not a competitive price. For around £8 you can get a Netflix or Amazon Prime subscription (don't quote me on that, I'm not from the UK, but a few pounds don't weaken my argument, I believe).

These subscription-based services offer unlimited content for a month, whereas these £3.49 give you maybe 2h of entertainment. I'm just saying I don't believe it's a great business model in this day and age. I remember iTunes allowing you to rent movies for similar prices years ago, but that never became very popular, did it?

Amazon, Playstation Network also allow you to rent films at this price point, they seem to be doing OK. You're simply not in the target audience.

Netflix is not unlimited, it is a buffet where you might not like what's on offer.

I suspect more people watch specific films rather than just have them on as background anything-but-the-silence-of-my-brain fillers. If that's an accurate suspicion then the Lionsgate approach isn't so odd.

That logic hasn't worked out so well for Tidal. Why is film any different to music?

When I play music it's usually the background for another activity (coding, exercise, parties, etc.). When I play a movie, it is the activity - I actively minimize distractions so I can focus entirely on the movie. It's easier to use a substitute for something that isn't being focused on.

You should try making listening to music an activity.

It's good for code, but you don't notice a lot of the detail; it's a different experience.

Often it works out that there is a substitute though - and if there isn't, I'm not convinced most would seek out movies in the way you describe.

I wanted to watch a BBC drama the other night and was offered the choice between paying to 'rent' it from Xbox, or watch it on iPlayer for free.

Assuming I do want to watch the movie, by the time I've found it, found that it's available on x cloud platform and will cost me y to subscribe / buy / rent - odds are that foo discovery mechanism has surfaced something I'd be happy to watch on something that I already subscribe to.

There are still substitutes, and I will gladly admit that it's rare for me to say "I only want to watch movieName, no other movie will satisfy me". It's much more likely that I'll want to watch something in a certain category. However, my experience that last few times I've looked through a Netflix category was that the overwhelming majority of the results simply looked like bad movies to me (and I've already watched the handful that actually looked appealing). When I play a music station, it's usually "good enough".

What I was trying to communicate that I am much more choosey about the movies that I watch than the music I listen to. I think this is because the enjoyment I get out of an activity that involves music isn't completely defined by the music. If the music isn't good, the activity can still be very fun. If the movie isn't good, it's very unlikely that I will get any enjoyment out of watching it.

True. The pricing does seem a little off though compared to Netflix. The breakeven point there is like 3 movies per month. Thats not a lot...

Not a lot for you. I probably only watch a movie every couple of months.

> I probably only watch a movie every couple of months.

In which case you're an outlier and frankly entirely uninteresting as a customer to all these companies from a commercial poverty anyway.

They aren't competing with Netflix. They are competing with all the other movie on demand services.

Netflix streaming has a poor selection of movies. Netflix dvd in mail is great but there are days of delay in mailing them back and forth.

Netflix is like an all you can eat buffet and this lionsgate is like a streak house. You wouldn't tell the steakhouse that thier food is overpriced because the golden coral sells all you eat for 7.99.

>They aren't competing with Netflix.

It think in practice it will. I don't think that difference in type VoD vs streaming library is as well defined in most people's minds as it is in yours. Same for attaching (much) more value to the one per movie as you do.

You're not wrong about the steak thing, but cheap price plus "unlimited" goes very far in practice I think. And in fact has judging by Netflix performance

It's low enough that for a lot of people it doesn't really matter. I've got Prime and I've got a FireTV. Sometimes I just want to watch "something" and I'll pick from the "free" (included in my Prime subscription that I'd have anyway) selection. Sometimes I want to watch something a bit more specific, and it'll be a ~10 second impulse choice whether or not I think the rental price is worth it.

EDIT: Just browsed through my watchlist on Instant Video, and most of the titles on it are available for rental at GBP 3.49 or 4.49, but quite a few are not available to rent at all, and have purchase prices ranging from around 5 to 15 pounds. I'm going to assume that Amazon knows what pricing works for them, at least in aggregate.

Well, that is actually what a movie ticket costs here, and the obvious alternative has a way bigger selection for free. That is the competition. When I see the news how well blockbusters do in the movies, I think studios should just put up older titles for free. E.g for an upcoming Hunger Games you should just release the other parts and generate hype, turning home video from a direct money stream into pr.

Related films often show on cable prior to a new release. Don't know if one side or the other is driving that.

I think the per viewer ad revenue of a lot of cable screenings is awful close to $0, but the content owners are more comfortable taking that $0 than they would be eroding the price point that they have established for short term rentals.

For £3.49 I'd expect to own a copy, like all the Steam games I've bought at about that price. Amazon.co.uk are offering me about 45,000 - not 11 - DVDs for less than that price.

One-shot viewing or 48h rental should probably be <£1.

While Amazon offers you a lot of DVDs for less than that price, it also offers you a substantial amount of rentals via Instant Video at well above that price.

I'm going to assume - not least because we've paid for those rentals more than once - that they have a good idea about how to set the prices.

Movies that are interchangeable light entertainment will go cheap. Movies people seek out or decide they really want will cost more.

Funny, this is about the same price DVDs are on Amazon for me. $.01+$3.99 shipping. For something I just want to watch once, I think I'd come out ahead with Steam (not have to find a space for the DVD or ripped copy, etc).

Steam has discovered the money-making magic that it's better to collect $.50 from many thousands of people than to collect $.00, and presumably, that it primarily supplements full-price purchases rather than displacing them [1]. I'd observe that even the other gaming platforms still took years to also discover that even with Steam lighting the way. Movie houses are still apparently completely clueless about this analysis, though I will concede in advance whether cheap movies would displace full-price movies may be different. (But I suspect the only way to find out is to just try it.)

[1]: Bear in mind that the only "full-price purchases" that matter are ones that actually occur. With my gaming habits, I'm perfectly happy to work in the indie space and years behind the mainstream, plus my laptop isn't even in the running to run the latest & greatest right now. I buy many cheap things from Steam, but it doesn't displace full-price purchases because I was never going to make them. If Steam was just a "full-price game service", I wouldn't even have an account. Instead, they've probably made at least $100 from me of profit.

Steam has figured it out because they're the rake; it's like being the house at a casino where you let people gamble against each other at poker. You don't care who wins or who loses, because you're taking a cut of everything. Meanwhile, the user experience on Steam is getting worse all the time, and developers aren't really happy with them either.

And yes, Valve profits off you. But if you were the only game consumer there was, Steam would cease to exist.

"Steam has figured it out because they're the rake"

While that is not literally false, it is incomplete and leads to false conclusions. I've seen indie game developers report that they also see revenue bumps from seeing their games go on sale that they would not otherwise see, so it's not just Steam profiting. I have no reason to believe that the movie studios would not also see non-trivial profits from scraping the long tail. Pretty much everybody seems to win on Steam with those prices, which is why they've been going on for so long.

I have also seen indie houses report that they discounted too far sometimes [1], but all in all what I can see is that the indie houses have found that time-based pricing works quite shockingly well. By "shockingly well" I do not merely mean a rhetorical flourish... I mean, I personally have been surprised at what they've reported.

[1]: http://www.carpefulgur.com/drakblog/?p=9

It's really hard to sell a physical game for 5$ and make any profit. Pre steam ~90% of games had approximately 0 sales within 2 years of release. Steam / GoG / etc are a great additional revenue source for an incredibly competitive market.

Remember, steam sales are approved by the publisher because they make them more money.

This is solid economic theory. This will be taught to future generations. This is one of the paradigm shifts that globalization brings.

There's an inventory cost to keeping DVDs on hand, so for older content that doesn't sell well, it can be worth it to sell a DVD for less than you bought it for wholesale, just to clear it out of your inventory. That's never going to be true of digital download.

If 3.49 is the to-own price, I don't think timed rentals have a place any more. Why complicate things? Louis CK's model has been $5 for DRM-free files, with a cap of 3 downloads and streams so the per-purchase bandwidth is capped. I kind of like that model.

Which is still much cheaper than renting a 48 hour movie from Apple iTunes which seems to still have a market. Sure this is not a game changer per say, but fits the criteria of "remaining" on the cutting edge in delivering content.

In some countries, Netflix is barely worth it / if at all. Limited and lousy selection.

Netflix streaming isn't really for movies unless your use case is along the lines of "I'll watch whatever is available." The primary value is TV shows. If the only thing on Netflix streaming were its movies, I'd drop it in a moment. I still use Netflix DVD for this reason.

If they really want to be at the cutting edge they would sell movies DRM free so you could watch them on ANY platform. The movie industry is taking way to long on this.

£3.49 is about standard for pay-per-view

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