Comcast vs. Apple - What’s The Answer In Video?

Today Comcast announced their plan for updating their broadband system allowing customers to download an HD movie in only 4 minutes. They’ll have servers all over the country loaded with movies you can access on demand. Cool stuff but I still don’t buy it.

Maybe it’s my preferences for buying things rather than renting them. Maybe it’s the outrageous prices Comcast charges for all of their services. Whatever it is I’m not buying it. I will say it’s a step in the right direction. Using the internet to transmit movies will be the way of the future but it’s going to be an interesting battle to see what delivery method would be preferred. As I see it we have Apple (selling videos you can store on your computer, and possibly renting as well) vs. Comcast and other on-demand services.

In this argument I’ll be projecting services and devices so you may need to use your imagination a little bit here.

Apple: So Apple comes out with a new and improved Apple TV and adds HD movies to iTunes. You download movies straight to your computer or Apple TV choosing whether you rent or buy. Maybe you could even rent with an option to buy (note to Steve Jobs, I’ll take a 1% cut for that idea). If you buy the movie you could then burn it to a DVD or just keep it on your computer. This basically takes buying or renting movies from a store to your living room.

Comcast: You rent movies on-demand straight from Comcast. These movies can be downloaded in as little as 4 minutes (who cares, isn’t a movie longer than 4 minutes, as long as I can play the movie while it’s downloading why does it matter if it takes an hour to download it, think YouTube). This is basically a better faster on-demand system to what they have now. This could be offered in a subscription or pay per view service.

So why would I want to get a movie from Comcast where I have no options once I download it. I can’t burn it to a DVD. I can only use it on my Comcast box. Unless Comcast suddenly comes up with a new box/DVD burner how is this useful to me. Why wouldn’t I just use iTunes? Because it’s faster? So?