I think they keep the prices up so only rich, fortunate people with money to burn can afford them.
They say Christmas is the time of giving and helping the unfortunate. Why don't they give us, the average unfortunate joe, some stuff, like CD-Keys, free movie rentals, etc? We're not poor because we're cheap, and we're cheap because we're unfortunate.
cd prices are bad. I'll give you that. Not unapproachable, but they're not a good value compared to MPAA type dvds and anime.
HOWEVER
Anime dvds are VERY approachable. ~20 bucks (shop around, don't pay 30+ for these things, or you're stupid) for 2-2.5 hours of content. Decently edited subs, tolerable dubs, and often these days 5.1 audio tracks available. Not to mention the video quality, as a rule.
Movie DVDs are crazy good prices. Again, you can get most new releases for less than $20. Think about it ... if you've got 3 or 4 people watching a DVD, that's the cost of tickets to go see the movie in a theater once. Similarly, if you watch the movie twice, and a friend is with you. Or if you watch it and resell it. Not to mention stuff like netflix. Seriously, you can't honestly be complaining about that. You get typically great video, great audio, most movie releases are jam-packed with extras (commentaries, deleted scenes, interviews, etc). This is good value, and honestly if you have a goddamned job the cost of media is pretty accessible. And I mean ANY job.
All of this talk of high prices .... no offense, but what the fuck are you talking about?
And why SHOULD you get mass-produced entertainment work for free? Because you're an addict who can't live without it, now that you've convinced yourself that you need to see every movie out to survive.
If you're poor and unfortunate, whatever. Quit watching so goddamned many movies and get a fucking job. Seriously.
There's easy, legal ways to get movies and games essentially free now -- namely netflix and gamefly. You want movies? 18 bucks a month. That's like 4 hours a month at a minimum wage job. That's mowing 2 peoples' lawns, or shoveling 2 driveways. That's fucking panhandling for one day a month in the parking lot of some stripmall, for God's sake! With that, there's no justification other than convenience and sheer mindboggling laziness, not to have whatever movies you want, whatever games you want (except pc games). Gamefly is 21 bucks a month and has basically every modern console completely covered.
For 40 bucks a month. Yes ... 40 bucks a month. 10 hours a month at a minimum wage job after taxes. 4 lawns mowed at $10/lawn. 4 driveways shoveled at the same. 40 bucks a month, you have all the console games you can play, all the movies you can watch. It's as close to free as you can really expect, and completely legal.
Sometimes you have to "stick it to the man". But this isn't one of them. Maybe you should realize that "the man" has given you a LOT of good ways to get their drugs for essentially nothing.
I generally agree with what you said - except the paragraph I quoted which might be true in the US, but doesn't apply everywhere.Originally posted by: complich8
cd prices are bad. I'll give you that. Not unapproachable, but they're not a good value compared to MPAA type dvds and anime.
HOWEVER
Anime dvds are VERY approachable. ~20 bucks (shop around, don't pay 30+ for these things, or you're stupid) for 2-2.5 hours of content. Decently edited subs, tolerable dubs, and often these days 5.1 audio tracks available. Not to mention the video quality, as a rule.
$20 sounds relatively fair, but where I live (note how I mentioned I wouldn't go into it again in my last post...but here goes...) it costs the equivalent of $39 to buy an anime DVD from a UK shop (much cheaper online - at the equivalent of $30) with between 3 and 4 episodes on it. At my old full time job (to earn money to go to uni) that would have been quite a high percentage of my wage. And for series like .hack, where not much happens - that is simply not even remotely worth it considering it costs us the equivilent of $58 to get 24 episodes of the simpsons (which also has fuckloads of commentaries extras which the anime ones usually don't) or pretty much any other type of series besides anime!!! To buy 26 episodes of .hack//sign it'd cost £120 gbp which is around $234!!! Compare that to stuff like 24, simpsons, futurama, family guy or just about anything else and then it suddenly looks much more of a rip off - which is what I complained about. The only anime DVDs I've really bought as a result are either movies (which is different from series) and the odd short OVA, full series I either download or get those HK boxsets off ebay uk. Then again anime isn't that widespread over here - we don't even get any proper (not counting DBZ or kids shows) anime on TV here anymore as the Sci Fi Channel seems to have stopped their 5-6am anime showings...most series I download I don't particularly want to keep anyway - I just watch them the same way I'd watch some series on TV then discard them when I've finished with them. I used to watch Buffy on TV but that doesn't mean I'd want to buy it on DVD to rewatch etc. Here the only legal way you can watch anime - is to buy it on DVD.
As for music - most of the bands I listen to I got into via piracy - if I really like the band then I will normally buy a fair amount of my stuff - most of these bands wouldn't have earned a penny out of me if I hadn't had the chance to try out their stuff first - then getting albums, dvds, going to concerts, buying merchendise etc. Of course I don't buy anything - but my spending has only increased via downloading stuff.
Some manga I buy, some I download - Tokyopop and Viz can thank the internet for my manga interest full stop, but I do spend a fair amount on that. For what boils down to 1-2 hours reading $11-18 I generally get the ones I like best.
I never said I should - most things I really like I will pay for...except anime series - which are just charged at ridiculous prices here. I totally acknowledge I download loads of stuff illegally but like I said, anime where I live is over priced. I wouldn't call myself an addict and I could totally live without it...but lets face it most of us here don't care that we are obtaining stuff illegally, as long as we can get it.And why SHOULD you get mass-produced entertainment work for free? Because you're an addict who can't live without it, now that you've convinced yourself that you need to see every movie out to survive.
What? Show me a place where one can buy a new, legal anime DVD in 5.1 for twenty dollars. Only used or bootlegged anime DVDs are that cheap.Originally posted by: complich8
cd prices are bad. I'll give you that. Not unapproachable, but they're not a good value compared to MPAA type dvds and anime.
HOWEVER
Anime dvds are VERY approachable. ~20 bucks (shop around, don't pay 30+ for these things, or you're stupid) for 2-2.5 hours of content. Decently edited subs, tolerable dubs, and often these days 5.1 audio tracks available. Not to mention the video quality, as a rule.
"Samsonlonghair - The Defender of the Oppressed And Shunned!" -Kraco
ive preordered anime for $24 and free shipping a few years backOriginally posted by: samsonlonghair
What? Show me a place where one can buy a new, legal anime DVD in 5.1 for twenty dollars. Only used or bootlegged anime DVDs are that cheap.Originally posted by: complich8
cd prices are bad. I'll give you that. Not unapproachable, but they're not a good value compared to MPAA type dvds and anime.
HOWEVER
Anime dvds are VERY approachable. ~20 bucks (shop around, don't pay 30+ for these things, or you're stupid) for 2-2.5 hours of content. Decently edited subs, tolerable dubs, and often these days 5.1 audio tracks available. Not to mention the video quality, as a rule.
10/4/04 - 8/20/07
yeah, this is not good, but oh well, there are other places.
but this is not one i wanted to go down.
well the irc servers are still up, i guess that's a good thing.
and forums.
wow...it was working yesterday...this is pretty depressing.
I tried my best...
I work in a store that sells new release CDs for like $10 the day they come out. DVDs can go for $15. Places such as Best Buy intentionally sell shit for that cheap to get you in there. Granted, it's where they want you to go to buy stuff they don't lose money on, but that's why they do it. Take advantage of it and don't whine. I still have to spend the oddball $20+ on anime from time to time to get a series DVD that I can't find cheap, and I live with it. You won't be able to get everything in your life for free, it defeats the purpose of working for stuff. I get the DVDs because I like the 5.1 surround and video, not to mention that I like how a shelf full of DVDs looks. Gives me a good sense of accomplishment, looking at 1,000 DVDs that I've worked for. As for music downloading, y'know... you can always stream stuff to check out, if that's why you download. Every MP3 I've downloaded, I've bought the CD for or deleted the MP3 (with exception to OOP stuff, because some CDs are nice but not $50+ nice). I'm rambling, the holidays do this to me.
*glances at cd collection*
*glances at dvd collection*
*glances at 1TB of data on hdds*
Ok, so I'm not as dilligent as you are about it [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]. But I know what ya mean.
Is this have something to do with the lawsuit that they are going to file agaisnt the site who provide link for torrent download.
i dont download games or anything, just cd's and anime, and i downloaded photoshop so i can mess with it before going to school. with cd's, i listen to rap, when people like snoop and em were coming up they were buying bootleg cds and stealing cds, so when i see them on tv complaining all i have to say is thats karma. they have millions of dollars, they dont need my 10 bucks.
while its not realy fair to maon at the prices of cd's ect because its up to them how much they want to charge people, one thing i do hate is when music labels and game companys moan about pirating. sur eits taking profits away from them. but they have th eability and power to all but stop it in th eblink of an eye, this is especially more so the case with music. they COULD lower there prices increase sales and still make a profit. singles are sold at a profit they are essentialy the same as an albumbut often a quater of the price. sure production costs are higher on an album, but thats a one time hit, and im positive that any production costs for an album are more then likley ofset by a fairly well selling single. if music labels decieded to drop there price tomorrow from there RRP of 13.99 to say 5.99 i don tknow a lot of people that would buy a pirated copy for a fiver a piece. films are not as bad as you essential get more for a price comparable to a cd, but then they coudl still be dropped as well. i know for a fact that manufactures coudl undercut pirate prices if they desired, they woudl just rather make that bit extramoney and moan about somthign they have the power to stop.
we should also consider music as an artform. i cant speak for the US but i know in europe alot of bands are formed, have one song that doesnt make the top 5 then they are discarded by there labels. why is this so? in the film industry we have companys such as miramax that are set up to produce smaller films, with a big budget that are often deamed risky. we dont have this in the games industry but thanks to the internet and vibrant mod scenes people can pretty much do what they like and are capable of distributing it to millions.
yeah, admittedly outside the US, you guys get hosed.
It'd probably be cheaper to buy a region-unlocked player or a r1 player and import from the US, I bet
Thats probably true actually, I need to check if I can hack my downstairs DVD player to see if I can get it to play different regions (I had a multi-region disc for the PS2 but my brother 'borrowed' that, then moved to Tenerife (spanish island near africa!) [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img]Originally posted by: complich8
yeah, admittedly outside the US, you guys get hosed.
It'd probably be cheaper to buy a region-unlocked player or a r1 player and import from the US, I bet
I bet thats true, I was going to import a DS for Xmas (before I changed my mind cos theres not enough games for it yet) which would have worked out at about £100gbp with mario 64 plus international shipping, while its gonna be £130-150 WITHOUT a game when it gets released here.i think we can import a psp for 105 or somthting like that. all the websites here ae listeing it at around 179!!! are we really to believe that its that much more expensive oever here when we can even import them cheaper?
screw the music and movies
im more concerned about getting ahold of those $300-$1000+ programs that i like to use [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-sad.gif[/img]
10/4/04 - 8/20/07
worst is still to come. i think we can import a psp for 105 or somthting like that. all the websites here ae listeing it at around 179!!! are we really to believe that its that much more expensive oever here when we can even import them cheaper?
Well I'll flat out admit that pirating is wrong, but I do it so I can save *a lot* of money that I can spend on more useful items...such as bills. Maybe it's just me, but I like to save as much money as possible for my stuff.
It's not that the prices are statistically too high, it's just that I'm not willing to spend money on movies and software. I'm willing to spend money on a nice pair of shoes or curricular activities, just not stuff that is available for free. Hell, if something's free I'd get it in a second.
i agree, im cheap also, if i can get it for free i will, there are plenty of suckers who would rather pay for the cd.
im the same i spose, ill get it if its free.
however i always make sure to buy some cd's of bands i really like or a new band i like so they can get a cut, it just shows some support for them, like i wouldnt dream of downloading a foo fighters or nirvana cd. same with movies, i dont really download them or buy them, i just rent them, except for lord of the rings or a movie i thought was particularly special like fight club or the matrix (the 1st one not the others)
im cheap... i download everything... even my windows XP is pirated... infact i dont think I have any legal software on my pc... add to that all the anime and music ive downloaded....
well many of you are righteous... but not this guy over here... I'm a cheap bastard....
"Why pay for something when you can get it for free?"
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