When did DVD's become worthless?

if Amazon keeps this B&^s*&t up hopefully someone will come up with a better plan. NO BUSINESS is infallible.

 

too late!

 

Like I said, it's only been a couple so far- I'm just worried it might be a trend. The 1st was for China Beach season 1 at $9.99- that's gone now, the price has been raised $2 and it's available to anyone. The 2nd was for The Corner miniseries- but it appeared for prime only after I ordered it and now that too is back to available for anyone, w/ price raised. I'd imagine a Prime member could see it, so you'd know you're getting a special. Keep looking and I think you'll see something eventually.

 

Exactly! My wife and I own a bunch of DVDs becase we wanted to have a huge selection of movies at our instant command. Also, we're huge movie people, and we watch interviews and features and listen to commentaries, which are entirely absent from streaming. And, even with Google Fiber, the best net connection in the US, streaming quality is usually lower than disc quality. 480P without artifacts often beats 1080i with.

 

Read "The Everything Store". Amazon's business model has them offering different prices for the same thing to different people.


It's pretty sleazy.

 

we never have to wonder what movie to watch! always something on the shelf and we keeping buying them so there's always a backlog... even if there wasn't I can re-watch a movie and enjoy it just as much.

 

I don't think anyone bought them to make a profit- don't know where you got that from. I bought them to enjoy, just as I imagine we all did. But I never expected them to devalue so much. Glad it doesn't bother you, but it is depressing to me to an extent. Not that that will keep me from enjoying what I have or acquiring more.

 

it sucks, and they have no problem sticking it to those who don't pay the "membership" fee! pox on them!

 

I got that from ME...LOL.

 

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. It's an old, familiar story- get the power then sock it to the people.

 

To be fair, Amazon doesn't have an exclusive on The Corner on dvd . Sure, it's less expensive there than the few other places I checked, but it's also available on other websites. I'm not sure why Amazon should care whether their inventory of a particular title is sold to Prime members, but maybe they are trying to make Prime seem more appealing to those who aren't members yet by selectively offering items that are available at a significant discount only to Prime members. In other words, you can buy the dvd from Barnes and Nobel for $18.43 or Amazon for $9.95, meaning that you've "saved" nearly $8.50 of your annual Prime membership by purchasing this one item. It's sort of like what Costco or Sam's Club does: You have to pay to shop there, and then they offer a discount (on most items) beyond what's available elsewhere. If you shop a lot for those items, your membership pays for itself over the year; if not, then you'd be better off buying your stuff somewhere that doesn't charge a membership fee.

 

I see it as a little different than your Costco analogy, where you know going in you have to buy a membership and their policies are the same for everyone. And btw, so far these seem to be few and far between and not last long. It just seems to me like arm-twisting to get you to sign up. But as I said, what bothers me is that this might be the tip of the iceberg, now that Amazon is so powerful.

 

Well, I see the situation as more analogous than you: I am not a Costco member but I occasionally shop there with a coworker who is a member. They have things that are exclusive to them; they have things that aren't exclusive to them but that are packaged in a way that is exclusive to them; and they have many items that are the same as available elsewhere. Not everything is less expensive at Costco -- particularly if one shops around and/or waits for items to go on sale somewhere else -- but Costco is definitely the least expensive store for some items I regularly buy. And, guess what? If I want to take advantage of those good prices I either have to pay them an annual fee or shop with someone else who pays that fee -- the same situation as Amazon Prime. True, one HAS to be a Costco member to buy anything there (unlike Amazon), but apart from that the situation is very similar. If I want to buy Fage yogurt at the best price available, I have to buy it at Costco and that requires a membership fee.

 

In retail the business model is called a "category killer". A new competitor comes into a market and sells at an unsustainable margin until all their competition is driven out of business. Then, profit!

 

Yes- this is what I fear we are just seeing the beginnings of.

 

OK- so we can agree it's not completely analogous, but pretty close. Regardless, I don't like Costco's model either, for that matter. I don't want to pay for the privilege of shopping somewhere. Doesn't keep me from getting a few things when I visit my mom and she takes me there though...

 

It is a calculation you have to make. In my case, my wife and I see a LOT of movies, and I just bought 4 pairs of AMC Gold movie passes. Each pair cost $16.95, bringing the cost of admission down to $8.50. This is a significant discount in Chicago where everyone else is paying $13.50 for the same movie. Saving $10 each admission (and we see a movie at least once a weekend) I recover the CostCo membership in a month and a half.

 

I'm not saying it's not a good deal for some- possibly even many/most. Me, I don't buy that much. Most of what I do buy is food (where they have some good prices, some not so good), music and movies (neither of which I've seen many good deals on, even if they had what I wanted, which they generally don't). I could foresee how it would be beneficial to me at some point- e.g. I needed a new TV and they had one of their killer deals where I could recoup the membership fee w/ that purchase alone. But in that case, I'd just make a trip over the mountains (and through the woods ), have my mother go with me and buy it using her membership. But even though it can be a good deal, I still dislike that model.

Ever see the Modern Family episode where Costco is featured? Claire had similar feelings to me, but when she actually went to one, was bowled over by the deals and went batsh!t crazy, buying up half the store. I love that show, though I rarely watch network TV; just discovered it recently in syndication.

Anyway, to steer back towards topic- do they sometimes have good deals on dvd's? I haven't seen any, though I haven't looked too hard on those rare occasions I go w/ Mom.

 

Costco (at least the stores near me) has drastically cut back on their DVD/Blu-ray selection compared to what it used to be like 10 years ago, but that's pretty much par for the course at almost every brick-and-mortar retailer that still sells physical media. They used to be particularly good when it came to stocking catalog releases of classic and older films - you could almost count on them to stock box sets of such titles at prices that were frequently cheaper than online retailers like Amazon. You can still occasionally find stuff like that, but it's more the exception now than the rule. They do carry a handful of recent Criterion Blu-ray releases, usually at roughly half of MSRP (the ones I've seen are $19.99).

I used to buy DVDs there almost every week, and my membership paid for itself with just the discounts I'd get on DVDs, but now we probably only go there maybe once every month or two. But it's still worthwhile for other items, as they really do their due diligence to make sure a product is high-quality and good value before they offer it in their stores. They also have outstanding customer service and a quite generous, no-hassle returns policy. And they are good corporate citizens that, among other things, pay their employees a lot better than comparable warehouse clubs do:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/19/reasons-love-costco_n_4275774.html

 

In favour of the dvd's, many music releases worldwide still come with a DVD, the format is pretty relevant still. I wouldn't buy a movie on DVD anymore though but i have no problem downloading a rip if that's the only source available.

 

Used media won't get you much nowadays ,but most of it don't cost a lot ,a lot of Blue Rays are ten dollars and under that ,this streaming fantasy world which people are always mentioning in threads like this ,is a dream world
One its very limited ,and Netflix doesn't even have shows like Perry Mason ,and its movie selection isn't great either ,Dvds might not get much in trade ins ,but that doesn't mean there isn't a whole bunch of them that aren't
streaming or on Blue Ray!! like endless music titles which weren't Hd or 16x9 ,titles that are even HD don't get streamed or Blue Rayed because of music rights ,or all those TV shows which Studios don't release on Blue Ray because
they haven't given up on DVD!!

 

Welcome to DreamWorld(TM), where video will be consumed on demand as a streaming subscription service and where physical media hoarders are a footnote in history...

 

If a TV series was shot on video in SD, there is no point at all to get it on BluRay - unless you simply want to have it on fewer discs.

 

they're smart as they know outside these walls DVD still sells...
and IMO no matter what removing component out from BR players hurt the BR sales...ppl that do not have WS TVs (and there are many) cannot watch a BR movie without upgrading to a WS TV.

 

More on DreamWorld(TM)...

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