Fox, Apple to sign iTunes deal
Service will make movies available for rent — Apple is set to break new ground with iTunes, offering movie rentals in a bid to rejuvenate that sluggish part of the otherwise boffo service. — Fox and Disney will be announced as partners in a major unveiling …
Context & Ripple Effects
The Variety report caps three days of build-up: the Financial Times first reported Apple's online film-rental talks with Fox on December 26, and the Wall Street Journal followed with the same story on December 27. What Variety adds is scale — Fox and Disney named as launch partners for a 'major unveiling,' widely expected at Macworld in January.
The deal matters because iTunes' movie business has been the weak spot of an otherwise dominant store: sales-only downloads have not moved the needle, and rentals are the format consumers actually use. Tech Trader Daily framed the stakes bluntly, asking whether Apple will blow past Netflix, Amazon, and Microsoft if the Fox deal lands.
First-order effects
- Fox becomes the first major studio whose films would be rentable through iTunes, giving Apple a rental catalog where it previously offered only purchases; Disney's rumored participation would double the launch slate.
- Apple gets a second chance at a movie business it has publicly struggled with, converting existing iPod and Apple TV owners into rental customers without new hardware.
Second-order effects
- Forbes' syndicated framing — 'Will the iPod kill Blockbuster?' — captures the immediate casualty risk: physical rental chains and corner video stores face the same download-driven displacement that already hit traditional music retail.
- Netflix, Amazon (Unbox), and Microsoft (Xbox Video Marketplace) are forced to defend their rental franchises against a storefront with hundreds of millions of billing relationships already in place.
Third-order effects
- If studios sign on one by one, Apple consolidates gatekeeper position over digital film distribution much as it did in music — with pricing and windowing power shifting toward the platform rather than the studio or the retailer.
- The rental-first model points toward a structural split in home video: ownership purchases shrinking to a niche while time-limited streaming-style rentals become the default consumption pattern, pressuring physical media economics across the industry.
The trend: iTunes is extending its category-killer playbook from music into video rentals, with each studio signature accelerating the shift of home-movie revenue from physical stores to platform-controlled downloads.