Pajama Entrepreneur

Last night, as I watched Steve Jobs announce movie rentals on iTunes and re-launch the Apple TV, it dawned on me that Apple has just driven a stake into the heart of the cable TV industry. The speed of cable TV’s demise will depend on how fast Apple can get films and TV shows from all over the world on iTunes. Here’s what Apple is offering:

• $2.99 per movie ($3.99 for high-definition films)
• you have 30 days to watch it and if you start a film, you have 24 hours to finish it
• you can watch it anywhere: on your iPod Touch, iPhone, laptop, desktop or TV (via Apple TV). If you download it to your Apple TV, you can move it to any of your devices including an iPod to finish watching
• Apple TV: little white box that looks like the Apple Airport Extreme wireless router but allows you to watch all iTunes content on your TV, no need for a computer. This is basically a set top box.
• All the major movie studios are on board.
• Movies available within 30 days after they are released on DVD.
• Available now in the US; in other countries within a few months.

Using the Apple TV box hooked up to your flat screen TV monitor, you can watch any content from movies to TV shows to YouTube videos, Flickr photos, video podcasts, your own video clips, anything you want.

So why should anyone continue to pay money every month to a cable company (and rent a set top box) to watch the same movies and TV shows that are on iTunes? It does not give you access to YouTube, video podcasts and other content on the Internet. You can’t watch your cable company’s offerings on your iPod or laptop while you are in an airplane.

Apple’s offerings also just killed the video rental industry. At $2.99 a pop, I would not even go down to the video rental store in the middle of a stormy winter day to rent a DVD. I can just rent it on iTunes and download it to my devices at home.

What gets me really excited is that iTunes could be the repository of films and TV shows that we never see on cable, in the cinema, or in our video rental stores: older films, movies made by independent film makers in different countries, TV shows in other parts of the world, and documentaries. Just look at the video and audio podcast offerings on iTunes. They even have iTunes University where you can view physics and English literature lectures given in top universities in the US.

When I watched Steve Jobs give a demo on how easy it is to rent and download a film, I’d say people-friendly video on demand is here. Not the clunky, horrible BBC iPlayer (which works only on Windows), but a way to find and watch video that doesn’t make you pull your hair out.

So why continue paying a lot of money for cable TV service? All you need now is a fast Internet connection at home!