Current Events > Rumor is that Warner Bros is discontinuing physical media in 2022.

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://twitter.com/peng_says/status/1383990543986814980?s=21

Timeline:
AT&T buys Warner Bros and then shuts down FilmStruck which was a WB streaming service that had like every single Warner Bros movie made before 1960.

HBO Max is created and does not have those movies FilmStruck had.

It's announced that Warner Archive, the label that distributes Warner Bros' old titles, is having its shop closed and merging with Universal. The shop just closed a couple weeks ago and the exclusive place to purchase WA titles is now... Amazon.

Anyway, AT&T sucks. Glad our government, whether red or blue, ignores anti-trust laws and allowed monopolies to happen and erase our cultural memory!

Are you excited to pay for a streaming service in perpetuity without even having all of a studio's library at your fingertips? lol!

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what 4k blu rays should I buy?
can you compile a list?

i want to buy indie shit

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So stupid. Why give up a niche but extremely reliable audience?

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I can believe it. That sounds like an extremely bone-headed Warner Brothers move.

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NFTs are the future:

https://medium.com/ecomi/huge-international-licenses-announced-for-ve-ve-d84f747c96ce

https://youtu.be/bQJ9bwWTO_U

armandro posted...

what 4k blu rays should I buy?
can you compile a list?

i want to buy indie shit

stop posting in my threads

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Zithers posted...

stop posting in my threads

you're so tsundere



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you are psychotic

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I knew a guy who would rub himself in public to pictures of Lola bunny

Darmik posted...

So stupid. Why give up a niche but extremely reliable audience?

Apparently it's not cost effective.

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pogo_rabid posted...

Apparently it's not cost effective.

The tweet said it makes money it's just not a lot compared to HBO Max.

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Darmik posted...

The tweet said it makes money it's just not a lot compared to HBO Max.

makes money =/= makes enough money for it to be worthwhile

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Bump

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Of course physical media is slowly dying, that was obvious.

I'm a big fan of Warner Archives, and you are only telling part of the story. The truth is that the dedicated WB Shop website hasn't been run by Warner for many years. It was a third party company that managed their sales and shipping.

Warner choose to not renew that contract, which is why the shop closed and is now hosted primarily on Amazon. So yes, the site closed down. But it wasn't an actual Warner's site anyway.

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It seems like AT&T is systematically burning everything Warner Bros has to the ground in an attempt to make some money. They basically destroyed DC Comics now they are gunning for the dvd and blu ray market. WB Games is probably next especially if their new games as a service type games don't turn a profit.

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Kitt posted...

I can believe it. That sounds like an extremely bone-headed Warner Brothers move.

Nah, this has AT&T's stink all over it.

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That doesn't mean 3rd party vendors will not be able to obtain licensing rights to produce their physical media if they wanted to though right?

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If you asked me 10 years ago I would have cared a whole lot. I have a collection of hundreds of DVD's and blurays. Now, I haven't bought a movie in years. If there's anything I HAVE to see that isn't on the major streaming services it can usually be rented from Amazon for 3 or 4 bucks.

I get why people are upset by this but in another 10 years I'm very sure we won't be saying "I miss movies on a disc"

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16-BITTER posted...

In 10 years you can sell your hundreds of movies for a fabulous profit

Shit, I've been kicking around the idea of donating my whole collection to the local library. They just take up so much room.

Well, I would donate MOST of them. There's a few favorites I would keep.

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Jagr_68 posted...

That doesn't mean 3rd party vendors will not be able to obtain licensing rights to produce their physical media if they wanted to though right?

One hopes, but these small labels already have deals with a some of the big studios. There's no telling if they'll be able to license from Warner, or keep up with Warner Archive's rate of release. One label, The Criterion Collection, has had a deal with them for high on a decade, but they only release a couple of Warner licensed titles a year, because they average about five releases a month and have deals with countless other companies and independents worldwide.

Kino Lorber would be a good company to license titles from Warner. Their quality control department could be better, but the prices are decent (and they often have amazing sales), and the rate that they release things is amazing.

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Christ I hope not. Streaming is a fucking joke.

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Discontinuing physical media is an invitation to pirate things.

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I don't believe this. Video/sound quality drops so much streaming that there would have to be a way to buy physical media.

It makes sense, physical media is some of the worst e-waste

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it's fine. cinema is over anyway

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Kitt posted...

I can believe it. That sounds like an extremely bone-headed Warner Brothers move.

AT&T is calling that shot.

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I doubt it, but piracy is looking real good nowadays, just to preserve something on your own and not worry about when corporations decide to let you.

I finally started getting on board with digital a few years ago, but all these store closures slowly started eroding my trust. Then Walmart and/or Comcast pulled that shit with Vudu last summer and removed copies people had traded or sold on the secondary market and I just gave up on digital for the most part.

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slipknirvana posted...

I don't believe this. Video/sound quality drops so much streaming that there would have to be a way to buy physical media.

Sadly, the average person doesn't really give a shit about quality, just ease of access.

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Another problem with licensing to smaller labels is that the smaller labels have to region lock their releases, at least generally speaking. So if you're an American who wants to own a Bluray of, say, Howard Hawk's Twentieth Century (one of the greatest classic comedies), you have to import the British release (excellent disc, btw). If Sony had their own variety of this Archive Collection, like Warner, this problem might not be. The Warner archive collection is already fulfilling a really fine niche, and if they stop doing it it will be a loss one way or another.

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https://www.thevulcanreporter.com/exclusives/warner-bros-exit-home-video-production/

confirmed lol

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WrkHrdPlayHrdr posted...

If you asked me 10 years ago I would have cared a whole lot. I have a collection of hundreds of DVD's and blurays. Now, I haven't bought a movie in years. If there's anything I HAVE to see that isn't on the major streaming services it can usually be rented from Amazon for 3 or 4 bucks.

I get why people are upset by this but in another 10 years I'm very sure we won't be saying "I miss movies on a disc"

I have ~1200 DVDs and 300 blurays, the DVDs all the cases were thrown away unless it was a DVD only release, and the discs were put in one of those old binders. So like Death to Smoochy, The Abyss, True Lies, non-SE Star Wars, and maybe a dozen more still have cases. Now I just have 3 binders full of discs and a few book shelves of blu rays.

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Zithers posted...

https://www.thevulcanreporter.com/exclusives/warner-bros-exit-home-video-production/

confirmed lol

That's dumb some regions still do well with physical media because the infrastructure to stream isn't there.

Very sad day for fans of film, the first bluray I bought was a WB one.

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Zithers posted...

pay

fufufufufufu

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