DVDs without extras unlikely to save industry

The folks of 20th Century Fox are making a big mistake. It might be hard to believe that the… The folks of 20th Century Fox are making a big mistake. It might be hard to believe that the people behind recent hits like ‘Meet Dave’ and ‘Babylon A.D.’ could prove themselves so out of touch, but hey, they’re only human. According to a report in Video Business, Fox’s home-entertainment division plans to bolster faltering DVD sales by stripping rental DVDs of special features. So if you want access to behind-the-scenes featurettes, deleted scenes or cast and crew commentaries, you have to buy the movie. Consumers are predictably unhappy ‘mdash; after all, it seems unfair that the rental and retail versions of a DVD don’t share the same features. But this isn’t only a question of fairness ‘mdash; Fox might hurt its own sales with this impending transition. There is any number of reasons that DVD sales are plummeting, but the availability of special features on rentals isn’t one of them. The increasing popularity of digital distribution ‘mdash; both legal and otherwise ‘mdash; is a major threat, and special features are one of the few remaining deterrents. Downloading a movie on iTunes or Xbox Live is cheap and convenient, and peer-to-peer file-sharing programs like BitTorrent make piracy easier and more widespread than ever before. One of the only reasons someone opts to rent a DVD instead of downloading a movie is to see the special features that might not be available online ‘mdash; without them, the incentive to rent is gone, and Fox is pushing its luck if it thinks people are willing to buy its DVDs just for the features. The other reason is that DVDs are the most viable option for watching a movie on your TV, but Apple TV and Xbox Live are making strides in the availability of digital HD media for televisions ‘mdash; once it’s as popular as downloading for computers, both retail and rental outlets are in trouble. Which brings us back to the big question every cold-sweat-soaked suit at Fox is asking: Will people shell out extra money for the supplemental material? In all likelihood, no, they won’t ‘mdash; at least not to a significant extent. The average consumer doesn’t care about the features, and the consumers who do care would probably buy the movie anyway. In that regard, this affects them, too. Discounted prices make buying previously viewed DVDs at rental chains like Blockbuster popular, but if they’re only selling featureless discs, people will be reluctant to buy them. So with predictably fewer people renting DVDs, and fewer people buying the DVDs used, Fox will not only fail to sell its DVDs, but it won’t be able to rent them out, either. If Fox wants to stay relevant, the answer isn’t jerking around consumers by forcing them to buy instead of rent. Unfortunately, the best solution is also the most idealistic one: Make a better product, and people will buy it. Fox doesn’t have the consistent figures of a studio like Warner Bros, for example, because it doesn’t produce consistently high-quality films. For every success like ‘Slumdog Millionaire,’ there’s a ‘City of Ember’-esque failure ‘mdash; or often several. And people aren’t going to buy those, whether or not it’s the only way to see the blooper reel. With its numbers slipping, Fox is understandably desperate for a change in its game plan. This isn’t it though. Arguably, nothing about this plan makes sense at all. Hopefully the people at Fox can realize this before implementing it, because it’s likely to only speed up the rate at which the studio’s profits are sinking.