Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, iTS, Rumors, Video, iTunes, Apple
Rumor: NBC and iTunes to make up, make money
We heard it from a guy (thanks, Jeff K!) who heard it from another guy who basically speculated from comments made by two other guys that, surprise surprise, NBC and iTunes are on the road to reconciliation. Ok, so it isn't really a surprise-- the odds are really good that as long as there is NBC and iTunes, they'll eventually end up together. There's been some posturing in their past, but really, both have way more to gain together than apart.Not to mention that the NBC Direct service never quite panned out correctly. Of course, neither NBC nor iTunes is clearly hurting for one another. But there's so much benefit for both to make a deal that it's not hard to expect them back together by the time new Office episodes get back on the air.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
MurphyMac said 2:47PM on 1-26-2008
Good, I want to get the first season of The Office. They don't seem to show those on tv much.
How was hulu doing? I don't see how nbc thought a service that wasn't ipod compatible would work.
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metric152 said 3:55PM on 1-26-2008
It's good to see Ross and Rachael made up.
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Jeremy said 4:19PM on 1-26-2008
I could care less about the TV shows and movies as we don't get any of that content in iTunes Canada at all. I would like to see iTunes and Apple media in general concentrate on getting the music issue solved first.
How many years has iTunes been around? And still when I go to the (Canada) iTunes store to buy music, at least 40 or 50 percent of what I search for is not even available. Out of what *is* available, probably another 60 percent is low quality DRM files. It's just not worth it to buy that crap.
I go to the iTunes store EVERY SINGLE DAY lately to look for things to buy, and I don't find anything. Why the media companies, and Apple as well, think that it's a good thing to turn away customers is beyond me. I know lots and lots of people that would switch to buying their media digitally tomorrow morning if only iTunes would actually offer something up.
It's especially ridiculous that some groups will have all their albums on the American site, but only half of them on the Canadian one. It's not like Canada is the third world or something, and the CD's are available up here in any case.
Finally, what's the deal with EMI? They went DRM free ages ago, but on iTunes *some* EMI albums are iTunes Plus and some are not, even within the catalogue for a single artist. Sure it takes time and manpower to convert al those tracks, but considering they are practically minting money when it's done, they can't hire a few college students to nurse the conversions on a few Macs?
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iPownce said 8:28PM on 1-26-2008
Hulu on iPod/iPhone would kick ass!
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trevor said 9:22PM on 1-26-2008
yeah! I'm with Jeremy, sort of. I want movies in the Canadian Store, and television, like House, Lost, Heroes. It's my take that Apple should get all the gaps filled, then work on quality of everything after that. And, while I'm at it, how about decent preamps in iPods? You can have the best quality mp3 in the universe, but if they continue to lower quality and increase quantity of the hardware, what's the use?
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Virtuous said 10:11PM on 1-26-2008
I hope Jobs forces Zucker to beg on his hands and knees to get back on iTunes!
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Paul said 12:03AM on 1-27-2008
Please make it so. This sould be excellent time to start just before the finale season of Galactica starts. And while they're at it, I hope they improve the quality. HD wouldn't hurt.
Do you guys at TUAW know whether they're going to start offering TV shows in HD? I'd pay extra for that, even though I can also just program my cable DVR to record HD. But this is one of the only TV shows (maybe the only) that I like to own for multiple viewing, and I'm constantly turning people on to it (may of whom can't get pasty the old visions of that 70s s**t excuse for entertainment).
Com on guys. Make is so and make it better!
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MCSOKO said 11:42AM on 1-27-2008
If I was Jobs or Zucker I would use Valenines day to announce the partnership again ;)
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BRH said 12:46AM on 1-28-2008
I just hope that NBC doesn't shut down Hulu when they go back to iTunes. I really enjoy Hulu and being able to stream shows for free whenever I want. I use it all the time, but I have no desire to pay for shows (even if I can take them with me). I guess I'm just a cheapskate, but Hulu suits me much better than buying TV content on iTunes. (I do love iTunes for music though).
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ishmael said 10:56AM on 1-28-2008
Given NBC's collaboration with Fox on Hulu, why would they want to go back to iTunes? And given Hulu is free and iTunes isn't, why would we want them back together?
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