I will admit that I have found it to be convenient at times. I was on LIVE checking out the video marketplace and stumbled upon a movie I have loved since I was younger. "The ghost in the darkness", I had it free to view on Netflix but was too lazy to hook up the laptop to the TV. I was suprised at just how bad this supposed "HD version" was. It wound up costing me over $7 for the rental... yes... rental, the quality was poor for an HD movie and it was gone after 24 hours.

You see, as of right now... as these companies want it, 1 movie was equal to half my Netflix monthyl subscription... and we haven't even hit the download packages yet.

I guess I am fortunate I only have LIVE for the free 1 month subscription. It is gone afterwards. Total ripoff and total joke and unlike some, I will refuse to pay to show that I do not support some of the BS these people are trying to incorporate into our lives, trying to take over my damn paycheck.

Give me discs, I will always support solid goods I can see and hold myself, just the fact of knowing I physically own something is what I want. People have enjoyed it this way since... well... ever.

Give a guy a gold brick, then give the option of knowing he owns a gold brick although not physically. Which will he take?  Which brings me to another point.

What do you do if you do not like the movie? Or do not like the game you bought?

Don't ever think about returns... 

Now games and movies become no retun items. No resale value. No nothing. I can't see people trying to eBay something they can never deliver.

"But why can't I sell it? Don't I own it?"

The answer is simple.... You don't own it.

"Well, then why no returns like I can do with physical goods?"

Simple answer again... downloads do not have return policies. How do you send back a download? What do they do? Remove it from your machine? Damn... another problem... no Privacy.

I know you see it as a good "alternative" to those who would like to have it. As sometimes people might not want to leave the house and would like a "pay per view" like service, but with the ability to have it on a permanent basis. You won't see the movie industries giving us both options. These people want one or the other.

i cant picture this catching on with a lot of people,why would you pay 250 bucks so you can rent.....people want something physical for their money....this wont affect dvds or blu - ray at all

 Well, in some cases, even on LIVE you can purchase it permanantly, I think I saw one on there, although it will be stuck on just that machine and that machine only.

So now in the u.k. 70% of virgin media users that are part of the 55% of the country that can actually receive virgin media cable services will be able to receive hd movies if they own an xbox and are on the yet to be released 50mb broadband package. Though it is highly unlikely virgin media would actually let you download the whole movie at full speed since they implement bandwidth throttling if you go over a limit which is less than that of a decent quality hd movie.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Media

Blu-ray. Is. Dead

Euphoria, I don't really think it's my business, nor yours, to say what people can or cannot buy with their own money. Be it WoW gold or video rentals, people are and should be able to spend their money as they please. Clearly there are people more of it than you that don't have to worry about how they spend their money.

Exact opposite situation in America.  http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/17/time-warner-download-too-much-and-you-might-pay-30-a-movie/ 

First article I found.  But it won't surprise me one bit if all cable companies in the US change to pay per amount downloaded in the future.

I do not think it is wrong. God knows how much I spent on Diablo II goods online. To the point where I went as bad as making friends with D2 site owners so I could get some nifty discounts.

I just do not think it should be the standard, that would be forcing the option on us and not giving us the choice... like we have currently. It becomes standard and everyone will need to have internet, cable download price packages, Movie rental/purchase box (possible subscription for this too?), etc... all choices are taken away. All privacy is taken away. All my money and many others is gone as well if we ever want to game or watch movies on a consistent basis. The average consumer just doesn't make the kind of money to support their current habits. The lower class and mid class people exist too. I am considered Middle Class here in New York, but I can tell you, I could never afford to keep up if they went and made this standard.

As gamers this will affect us too later on, as our games may go this route as well.

I love Steam, the idea is great, but I still want the option of purchasing a game for my console or movie player, they are not the same as a PC. If you are fine without ever having physical goods, never actually owning something, having no control over it, etc... that is fine. That is your choice.

I am only giving my outlook on the matter. What else can someone expect me to give?

No, when I said "1 mbps" I meant, I can download 1 megabyte of data every seconds, tops. And yeah....I miffed it on the math, because I rushed my comment lol, but that's only cause I knew what gebx was trying to say was inflammatory at the least. But still, the fact is, in order to get that kind of internet speed would be damned expensive. You know that T1-T3 connections cost upwards of $1000/month, right?

And for the sake of me not sounding stupid with my original post, I never said it would take 5000 HOURS and I definately didn't equate that number to 3.5 days. 

What am I a fanboy for?