Store Pricing Feedback & Debate

[thrillcat]

I get your point, but the fact is there is an alternative to overpaying to own a K movie. It’s called Streaming. If prices are too high to purchase a movie for my collection at this time, but I really want to see it now I might sacrifice some marginal quality to stream it for “free.” When pricing is reasonable I’ll buy it.

I was of this mindset as well, until I realized that I was giving myself an inferior 'first-experience' with a film. So now I either don't watch it at all and hold out for the pricing to hit a reasonable point, or a sale (Secrets of Dumbledore - still waiting), rent it when available, or I bite the bullet and pay the premium.

I'd echo an earlier sentiment, though. At $24.99 or less, I'll blind buy any title that interests me. Above that and I'm on the fence and probably waiting.

 

[Hunter67]

Unfortunately, the studios don't care that some buyers won't buy above a certain price. Movies and Music are in a different class than other products. If you don't want to spend $5,000 for a 85" TV there are alternatives, and the TV manufacturer's know this and price accordingly, that's what competition does in the marketplace. Where's the alternative to a $30 "Top Gun?" You don't have the ability to say "I don't like X Studio's price for Top Gun, so I'll buy it from Z Studio instead." If you don't like the price of a movie, don't buy it, but understand that no one at the studios is sitting at their desk thinking they should lower the price of a movie because they read a comment somewhere that some potential buyers are not buying because a movie is priced too high. They already know that's the case.

That's not to say they don't factor expected demand into pricing, they obviously do, otherwise we'd be paying $100 for Top Gun, but they price movies knowing that some folks will not be buying at that l

Jim

I also get your point but we do still have some choice, we could buy the streaming version, those are normally cheaper then K. We could by the physical media, a lot of the time that's cheaper too, especially for the catalog titles.

Patriot Games 4k disc $17.99, on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider 4K disc $18.79 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Argo 4k disc $18.99 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $14.99

I could go on but you get the point, not to mention one of the selling points of purchasing a K system was the availability to catalog your existing discs and have them available for special D2D pricing and come to find out sometimes the "special" pricing is not so special.

 

[alexbeans]

I get your point, but the fact is there is an alternative to overpaying to own a K movie. It’s called Streaming. If prices are too high to purchase a movie for my collection at this time, but I really want to see it now I might sacrifice some marginal quality to stream it for “free.” When pricing is reasonable I’ll buy it.

I agree. Streaming just opened up so many options to the consumers that very few people buy movies anymore. The small movie buyers are broken down into two camps: (1) Those that buy physical media and perhaps rip into their server or (2) digital movie purchasers. There are some in-betweens that do both.

As a movie lover and collector, I stopped buying digital movies from iTunes, VUDU and Amazon Prime because the quality is just about the same as if you were to stream. I know that digital movie buyers would switch to K if the barriers to entry is more affordable. If it was just a one time purchase of $4000 to enter the ecosystem then it would be an easy pill to swallow if they appreciate quality. But then you factor in that the movie prices cost more than their competitors (which was priced high to begin with) and the high cost for Terra storage, I can see why they are reluctant to make the switch.

I know that people frown about the idea of a subscription model. But if that's a way to generate revenue for K so that they can hire more R&D to make improvements on their software, then I'm more than happy to pay. For those who don't want to pay the subscription, they can get the basic vanilla version just the way it is. Heck, if they leave the software the way it is and offer 10-15% off on movie purchases for subscribers, I would subscribe. But I really wish that they improve on the software. It's starting to be dated and it no longer have the cool-factor.

I just want to see if there's any way to get more people into K so that studios can start to take notice of K. I think studios offer special pricing for Apple, Amazon and VUDU because they have more people buying from their platforms and not from ours.

 

[cinelife]

I also get your point but we do still have some choice, we could buy the streaming version, those are normally cheaper then K. We could by the physical media, a lot of the time that's cheaper too, especially for the catalog titles.

Patriot Games 4k disc $17.99, on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider 4K disc $18.79 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Argo 4k disc $18.99 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $14.99

I could go on but you get the point, not to mention one of the selling points of purchasing a K system was the availability to catalog your existing discs and have them available for special D2D pricing and come to find out sometimes the "special" pricing is not so special.

Of course, those are the other options when we're willing to accept a streaming image, or playing with physical discs, but most of us got into K so we wouldn't have to deal with inferior copies, or physical discs. Buy from whatever service meets your needs, either visually or financially, I never made a comment about that, I'm only pointing out that the Studios don't really care about pricing comments and threats to not buy their titles, they know some folks won't be buying because of cost.

K created the ability to Catalog physical discs, but nowhere in their literature do they say every title you Catalog will be available at discounted pricing in the Store, nor to they state what those discounts will be, assuming there is a discount. That's all controlled by the Studios.

That said, I do understand your general disappointment, and perhaps whomever provided you with info on K products, and the Store in particular, didn't go far enough in explaining the limitations of Cataloging, and what you should expect. Unfortunately not having all the info can create expectations that prove to be unrealistic. Personally, with my clients, I go out of my way to explain what Cataloging is, and what it is not, including the fact not all disc based content will be available in the Store, and may never be, and even when they are available, the discounts vary, and there may not be any discount at all.

Jim

 

[alexbeans]

I also get your point but we do still have some choice, we could buy the streaming version, those are normally cheaper then K. We could by the physical media, a lot of the time that's cheaper too, especially for the catalog titles.

Patriot Games 4k disc $17.99, on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider 4K disc $18.79 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Argo 4k disc $18.99 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $14.99

I could go on but you get the point, not to mention one of the selling points of purchasing a K system was the availability to catalog your existing discs and have them available for special D2D pricing and come to find out sometimes the "special" pricing is not so special.

From your example, if I buy the Patriot Games 4k disk for $17.99. It comes with a 4k disc, a Blu-ray disk and a digital code to redeem at VUDU. Usually the physical disc and VUDU offers special features. K sometimes do.

I can rip the 4k movie 1:1 or rip the Blu-ray to conserve storage space. I can redeem the digital movie for the ability to watch anywhere or just sell the code to offset the costs. This is great because if VUDU goes out of business, I will have my movie in my server.

Why I got into K is because I am one server crash from losing all my entire collection. It happened before and I have spent many years re-ripping my movies and TV shows. I even back up my movies in several back up hard-drives in case this happens again. But it's just so much work.

I also noticed that VUDU prices are slightly cheaper than the physical media which makes sense. Each physical purchase will come with a redeemable code. I think pricing the K movie store to match what the physical media is pricing is ideal. But we don't live in an ideal world.

 

[HTRaleigh]

I haven’t bought a physical disc in over a year since I got my Strato/Terra 48 system even though there have been times where that would be cheaper. I’m all in. However, some of the pricing just doesn’t make sense. What is especially irritating is downloading an HD version.when that is the current best quality and then 7-10 days later a 4K shows up at a very high upgrade price. There have been several but a recent example was The Great Escape at $14.99 HD on sale. Less than a week later a 4K is released at $24.99 for purchase or $21.54 D2D or upgrade from HD quality. So I have 2 choices: 1) Get 4K for a total short term K investment of $36.53 or 2) wait on a sale or a D2D at a reasonable price such as $4.92.

If I had bought a physical disk in Bluray HD and a week later a 4K was released I would have returned the Bluray. HD and bought the 4K.

At some point unless things change the potential K owner base will hit a ceiling. It is in all of our interest for K to continue to grow so that criling doesn’t materialize soon. The fact is this is a wealthy owners toy. This is a big want, not a need. Some owners clearly don’t care about cost of equipment or media. Any cost is okay. Others have limits - either tangible based on a budget or intellectual ( when it just no longer makes sense independent of wealth status). The former group will eventually get hurt if the needs of the latter group go unaddressed. As non - K owners continue to build out large 4K disc collections it will be an even harder leap of faith for them to join the club. Especially when there is no current way to get credit for 4K ownership.

 

[alexbeans]

I'm in my late 40's and have spent my entire life saving and investing. I've now reach to the point where I am financially well off and can enjoy the luxury of life. I've always been smart with my money and being a K owner isn't exactly the smartest use of money as it will continue to put me in the hole. But that's ok. It's a lifestyle choice and sometimes it's ok to splurge a little.

I established a limit for myself of not spending more than $100 a week on movie content from K and I buy my Terra Storage used if I can from this Market Place. There's a misconception that if K owners can afford the equipment, cost isn't a factor for them. Many of us work hard for our money and didn't get to where we are by being stupid with how we spend it. But we occasionally make purchase decisions that isn't that smart. Take Top Gun for example.

Top Gun was released for $25 at K and $20 elsewhere? I went with K. The 4k blu-ray is to be released on Oct 31? I pre-ordered it because I'm building a collection of over 300 4k 1:1 rips in my Zappiti and I do a 1080p rip into my PLEX where I house over 3000 movies and 200 TV shows. Not the wisest use of my money, but I have a smile in my face when I watch a great movie with the absolute best sound and video in my home theater room.

Why do I buy both the physical and K versions? And why K at all if I am ripping the 4k version into Zappiti? The first I can answer. I have little confidence that K will survive as a business. At least with their current business model and high hardware costs. I spent thousands on HD DVDs when there was that format war and I had to trash the unit and movies I bought. At least if I rip the movies in my servers, I know that I will own them for life. The same can be said for K, but you will need to pay for Terra storage and download all your purchases before the movie store close down. If you have 88TB of movies, do you want to fork out another $25k?

The second, I don't have an answer. I get the same quality with my 4k rip in Zappiti. I guess since I already spent $9k to enter the ecosystem, I am trying to justify my purchase. I am banking on the eventuality that physical media will go away altogether and all movie enthusiasts will convert to K users because of the inferior quality of the alternatives (iTunes, VUDU, Prime).

 

[TrackZ]

I'd echo an earlier sentiment, though. At $24.99 or less, I'll blind buy any title that interests me. Above that and I'm on the fence and probably waiting.

$25 maximum title cost, ongoing bundles and sales, and $5 maximum 4K upgrade cost, and I'm with @thrillcat. I'll buy and upgrade everything with a smile on my face. This whole discussion probably goes away too.

 

[TrackZ]

I'm in my late 40's and have spent my entire life saving and investing. I've now reach to the point where I am financially well off and can enjoy the luxury of life. I've always been smart with my money and being a K owner isn't exactly the smartest use of money as it will continue to put me in the hole. But that's ok. It's a lifestyle choice and sometimes it's ok to splurge a little.

I established a limit for myself of not spending more than $100 a week on movie content from K and I buy my Terra Storage used if I can from this Market Place. There's a misconception that if K owners can afford the equipment, cost isn't a factor for them. Many of us work hard for our money and didn't get to where we are by being stupid with how we spend it. But we occasionally make purchase decisions that isn't that smart. Take Top Gun for example.

Top Gun was released for $25 at K and $20 elsewhere? I went with K. The 4k blu-ray is to be released on Oct 31? I pre-ordered it because I'm building a collection of over 300 4k 1:1 rips in my Zappiti and I do a 1080p rip into my PLEX where I house over 3000 movies and 200 TV shows. Not the wisest use of my money, but I have a smile in my face when I watch a great movie with the absolute best sound and video in my home theater room.

Why do I buy both the physical and K versions? And why K at all if I am ripping the 4k version into Zappiti? The first I can answer. I have little confidence that K will survive as a business. At least with their current business model and high hardware costs. I spent thousands on HD DVDs when there was that format war and I had to trash the unit and movies I bought. At least if I rip the movies in my servers, I know that I will own them for life. The same can be said for K, but you will need to pay for Terra storage and download all your purchases before the movie store close down. If you have 88TB of movies, do you want to fork out another $25k?

The second, I don't have an answer. I get the same quality with my 4k rip in Zappiti. I guess since I already spent $9k to enter the ecosystem, I am trying to justify my purchase. I am banking on the eventuality that physical media will go away altogether and all movie enthusiasts will convert to K users because of the inferior quality of the alternatives (iTunes, VUDU, Prime).

I like this post, especially the idea that folks with money don't just blow it, well unless you're in the uber uber category maybe. But still, my take and experience is that folks (myself included) achieved their net worth by generally being forward-thinking and making intentional/measured decisions along the way.

I also feel a bit "on the fence" of late similar to @alexbeans. I feel like we are so close to major evolutions breaking with regards to the future of streaming-delivered content and/or physical media. I wish it would just happen already! In the meantime, I'm buying on K, buying on iTunes, and still moderately growing a ripped library on my NAS. Pulling myself in every direction hedging my bets and wasting time and money and not doing the smart things mentioned in the first paragraph.

 

[HighImpactAV]

I also get your point but we do still have some choice, we could buy the streaming version, those are normally cheaper then K. We could by the physical media, a lot of the time that's cheaper too, especially for the catalog titles.

Patriot Games 4k disc $17.99, on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider 4K disc $18.79 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $16.99
Argo 4k disc $18.99 on K it's $34.99 - Vudu price $14.99

I could go on but you get the point, not to mention one of the selling points of purchasing a K system was the availability to catalog your existing discs and have them available for special D2D pricing and come to find out sometimes the "special" pricing is not so special.

I just checked my Kaleidescape records and I bought Patriot Games 4K for $14.99 (June 9, 2022) and Argo 4K for $9.99 (March 22, 2022). I buy almost all my discs when they are on sale and they are usually much cheaper than buying the discs.

 

[Hunter67]

I just checked my Kaleidescape records and I bought Patriot Games 4K for $14.99 (June 9, 2022) and Argo 4K for $9.99 (March 22, 2022). I buy almost all my discs when they are on sale and they are usually much cheaper than buying the discs.

The sale price is fine, no complaints about that, of course the disc and Vudu versions also have sales, I guess my point is, these are catalog titles, not sure why they are priced so high. I'd expect the regular price to be close to the disc and streaming versions.

 

[Substance]

Game of Thrones 4K upgrade for $24.07. Hopefully another bundle sale soon.

 

[alexbeans]

Game of Thrones 4K upgrade for $24.07. Hopefully another bundle sale soon.

Whoohoo! I held out when they had the $14.99 per season sale. Since I already own the 4k season set, I didn't want to spend money on an HD version on K no matter how attractive the price was. Hoping for a super-bundle 4k so that I can click "buy".

 

[thrillcat]

FYI, Apple just announced the new AppleTV units this morning and they are removing the ethernet port from the base model. I know files are getting smaller but that doesn't sound like a move from a company considering streaming TrueHD and HD-MA in the future, unless it's a ploy to make it an upcharge and to sell more of the higher end box.

 

[TrackZ]

FYI, I started a new discussion thread in the "Other" section to talk Apple, Apple TV, etc. I tried to edit/delete my last few posts here, but I don't see the controls to do so.

@cinelife or @josh maybe want to move the last several posts over to that thread, please?

 

[dla26]

I noticed that Spider-Man No Way Home extended edition was just listed for $19.99. Is there really no discounted upgrade path for people who bought the regular version for $24.99 about 6 months ago?

 

[thrillcat]

FYI, I started a new discussion thread in the "Other" section to talk Apple, Apple TV, etc. I tried to edit/delete my last few posts here, but I don't see the controls to do so.

@cinelife or @josh maybe want to move the last several posts over to that thread, please?

I only added that comment here because I believe someone at some point said K was up against the wall on pricing and release timing because "it's only a matter of time before Apple decides to stream lossless audio".

I suppose this post should be over there, too.

 

[Transepoch]

I noticed that Spider-Man No Way Home extended edition was just listed for $19.99. Is there really no discounted upgrade path for people who bought the regular version for $24.99 about 6 months ago?

We just keep it in our back pocket for the next Marvel superbundle.

 

[TrackZ]

I only added that comment here because I believe someone at some point said K was up against the wall on pricing and release timing because "it's only a matter of time before Apple decides to stream lossless audio".

I suppose this post should be over there, too.

No worries. I’m the one that engaged the post with a reply and was taking the conversation more off topic.

 

[dla26]

We just keep it in our back pocket for the next Marvel superbundle.

I thought one of the benefits of Kscape is that I won't have to keep repurchasing every movie in my collection...