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HBO Joins iTunes with Two-tier Pricing

Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 at 9:35 AM - by

HBO made its first appearance at the iTunes Store on Tuesday, but instead of offering all of its programming for US$1.99 per episode, some shows will be priced at $2.99 each. Sex and the City, The Wire, and Flight of the Conchords can be purchased at the traditional $1.99 price, while The Sopranos, Deadwood, and Rome will all cost a dollar more.


HBO comes to iTunes

Multi-level pricing is new to U.S. iTunes Store and could be a sign of things to come. Should the new pricing scheme prove successful, Apple may find that other content providers start asking for similar deals.

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Tue May 13, 2008 1:38 pm

This is bad news. It is painfully obvious that physical markets and download markets aren't quite the same. In the real, physical world, we all had plenty of time to learn how to shop around, how much things are worth, how retailers work, etc. In the download world, nobody knows anything. Consumers are dipping their toes. It seems so far that Apple's strategy was working, and the obvious reasons behind that was to lure consumers into the unknowns of the digital download market by making it painfully simple. Any minor wrinkle or complication and they will step away. We don't need the added complication of variable pricing.

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algr said:

member since 07 Aug 2003 with 296 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue May 13, 2008 3:11 pm

This could get into weird fights about what shows should be what price. Might people claim that shows are being insulted if they sell for the lower price? And the higher price makes people less likely to try something new. Why do South Park and The Wire cost the same when one probably costs 10 times as much to make as the other?

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Sir Harry Flashman said:

member since 08 Feb 2007 with 792 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue May 13, 2008 5:52 pm

I would like to have seen a price for the entire season of a show like you when buying DVDs. You can buy a music album for less than the price of buying the individual track. Even still the cost of season 1 of HBO's Rome from the iTunes Store is $20 less than buying the collection from Amazon. Of course you probably get extras on the DVDs and the quality may be better.

I wonder if they edited any content. Rome and Deadwood when broadcast on HBO had some graphic sex and violence scenes.

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