Sony Cutting Back on UMD Sales

Karsten writes "An article in Variety claims that Sony is cutting back on UMD releases. While comedies are doing well, other genres simply aren't getting much traction." From the article: "Some have reasoned that sales may have slowed recently because of a shortage of new titles in the last month and because users may be illegally copying films from DVDs onto a memory chip the PSPs can read. Sony is hoping to combat online piracy starting in March when it begins selling movies online via its Connect digital media store. Users will be able to download a pic and watch it on PSP without a disc."

Illegally?

[Hammerikaner]

Ahemm, wouldn't copying your DVD to work on another device be a clear example of fair use? You can tell it's fair use because what the company would like you to do--buy a whole new copy of something you already own--would be completely unfair.

Re:Illegal

[pubjames]

I don't think we have the DMCA in Europe (yet!?) and so I'm not breaking the law.

Same old, same old

[Anonymous Coward]

"An article in [Periodical] claims that [Company] is cutting back on [Production]. Some have reasoned that sales may have slowed recently because of [Scapegoat(random)] and because [Scapegoat(piracy)]."

Just once I'd like to see the following claim:

"Our sales our down because our product just plain sucks. I wish we could blame the pirates, but that would be intellectually dishonest."

Widescale copyright infringement has been around for decades and has not had any noticeable negative effect on any media industry. Time to stop blaming others for your failures and start admitting that your products suck. Stop making everything proprietary!

Re:Your recommendation?

[Otis2222222]

That's a good point. I should clarify that what I was referring to, specifically, was that watching movies on the PSP is a waste. I have no problem with using UMDs to play games, most game systems use proprietary tech for their media which is understandable. But for Sony to think that people would be lining up in droves to buy movies on the thing is/was ludicrous.

What???

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Sony???
Is anybody still buying from them?

It's the price, dummies...

[CokoBWare]

The movie publishers just don't get it. Retailers will see a BIG boost in sales if the movies drop in price to about 50-75% the current price. I never bought 1 UMD for my PSP until about 2 weeks ago when Blockbuster had a sale and were selling selected UMD titles as "buy 2 for $20" CDN. You can't get any better than that. I picked up "Snatch" and "Cowboy Beebop: The Movie", and if they still have the sale on, I'm going to pick up a couple more. The lesson here is the that consumer may be willing to drop $20 US for a comedy title since a person can typically watch a comedy over and over again... the genre has a high replayability factory. But this isn't just a question of demographics and content, it's about the price too dummies.

Re:Illegal

[91degrees]

Fair use isn't an exhaustive list of allowed uses. It is possible that given the nature of the copy (single copy for personal use), and the effect on the market (is it reasonable that someone should have to pay twice for the same movie?).

The media cartels don't bother prosecuting over small scale issues like this, and without a court ruling on the matter, any statement that something is, or is not fair use is merely an opinion.

Re:Too expensive

[Lord_Dweomer]

Here's another idea...why not turn this problem they have into a revenue stream that is potentially more profitable than standard UMD sales...why not *gasp* SELL BLANK UMDs? Let people copy their movies over, and turn the UMD into a mass storage device similar to DVDRs. Of course...this is Sony we're talking about, so thats not even a remote possibility, but whatever.