‘The Office’ moves to Amazon’s Unbox

Wednesday, September 5th, 2007

From an NBC press release:

Amazon.com and NBC Universal today announced that a wealth of quality TV content from NBC Universal is now available on Amazon Unbox (http://unbox.amazon.com), Amazon.com’s digital video download service. Amazon Unbox and NBC Universal are offering customers a variety of content packages, including up to 30 percent off when purchasing full seasons of their favorite TV series.

Popular NBC shows now available on Amazon Unbox include the Emmy Award-winning series The Office …

Link: NBC UNIVERSAL TELEVISION CONTENT NOW AVAILABLE ON AMAZON UNBOX

Previously posted news about NBC/iTunes after the jump.

Aug. 31: NBC statement

From a statement by Cory Shields, EVP Communications of NBC Universal, regarding its iTunes contract:

We never asked to double the wholesale price for our TV shows. In fact, our negotiations were centered on our request for flexibility in wholesale pricing, including the ability to package shows together in ways that could make our content even more attractive for consumers … Furthermore, we want consumers to know that all our returning series, including new episodes, will be available on iTunes through the remainder of the contract, which expires in early December.

Link: Aug. 31: NBC ‘DISAPPOINTED’ IN NOT NEGOTIATING NEW ITUNES PACT

Aug. 31: Apple press release

Apple today announced that it will not be selling NBC television shows for the upcoming television season on its online iTunes Store (www.itunes.com). The move follows NBC’s decision to not renew its agreement with iTunes after Apple declined to pay more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode, which would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99.

Link: Aug. 31: iTunes Store to Stop Selling NBC Television Shows

Aug. 31: New York Times

NBC Universal, unable to come to an agreement with Apple on pricing, has decided not to renew its contract to sell digital downloads of television shows on iTunes.

Link: Aug. 31: NBC Will Not Renew ITunes Contract

Tipsters: Tyler, Jeremy, Alison, zurik

Posted in News

250 comments

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I sent this to NBC today: If you want to sell your product on amazon, so be it. I’ve read forum posts about it and it seems like it limits your sales by not being available to mac users and not being available outside the US. Why can’t you offer it on iTunes as well? You can have your loyal iTunes fans buy it at your old wholesale price and people who don’t like iTunes or don’t have iPods can buy it from amazon for your new wholesale price. It’s a win win. You’ve covered more markets and the customers get to buy from the platform they want. I tried to buy The Office as soon as it premiered and just found out why it wasn’t available last night. I will not download it or buy the DVD unless it’s put back on iTunes though. I’ll just have a friend tape it on her VCR for me and go watch it at her house and fast forward through the commercials. I will also share this work-around solution, so that people stop feeling trapped by this and remember that we have other options besides the few you are giving us.
250 | Disco Lemonade Wed. Oct. 17, 2007 at 4:38pm
Like one of the previous posters, I live in the Middle East and NBC does not allow me to download the episodes. I also own a Mac (my second strike) and Unbox does not work with Mac. What am I supposed to do?
249 | Shayna Mon. Sep. 24, 2007 at 12:05pm
[from tanster: 200-word limit]
248 | nowwhat? Sat. Sep. 15, 2007 at 4:26pm
I’m confused. Does this mean that the Office will still be available on itunes through December?
The NBC statement seems to confirm this, but the statement from Apple says the new season won’t be available at all. This is a matter of life and death for me. I just moved to Vietnam with the understanding that I could still catch TO on itunes. I even bought a $50 gift certificate b4 i left the states just so I could do this without any problems. I checked out umbox and it says that TO will only be available in the continental U.S. I’ll die if I can’t get any Office over here.
247 | Lauren Thu. Sep. 13, 2007 at 5:30am
I’m glad the episodes will be available from elsewhere. iTunes picture quality is so terrible you have to play episodes half-size so they appear clear.

And hopefully this NBC/iTunes rift means that there will be less annoying Apple product placement in future Office episodes.
246 | kt42 Mon. Sep. 10, 2007 at 11:14pm
hi everyone! I was just browsing through Amazon UnBox and discovered that NBC is offering the premieres of “Chuck”, “Bionic Woman”, “Life” and “Journeyman” for free download. I was harboring the faint hope that the premiere of “The Office” might also be available too, but alas, it seems the offer is only limited to new shows. Still, hope this news is helpful to fellow OT posters!
245 | _bales Mon. Sep. 10, 2007 at 12:10pm
I am still extrememly angry at NBC, but maybe this is why they left Apple:

Link
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117971505.html?categoryid=14&cs=1

I think 99 cents would be a wonderful price for a tv show, and I would totally still buy the dvds because I HAVE to have the extras.
244 | Alison Sat. Sep. 8, 2007 at 12:25pm
I’m just thinking during the negotiation for a new iTunes deal, the NBC negotiator was trying to pull a Wikipedia on Apple, but the Apple negotiator found out the NBC guy was wearing lady clothes.
243 | _bales Fri. Sep. 7, 2007 at 7:58pm
NBC has now shut out all Mac users too, as Unbox doesn’t work on a Mac. I’m hopeful NBC will rethink their decision and come back to iTunes.
242 | Shane Fri. Sep. 7, 2007 at 6:24am
NBC may be getting more of cut of each download through Unbox, but I sure hope they notice when their sales tank as the episodes for Season 4 start coming online.

So they decide to leave the most popular service that has the most devices attached to it. They’re certainly not making a statement by leaving - just ticking off a bunch of customers.
241 | Greg Thu. Sep. 6, 2007 at 5:47pm
Does anyone know if any other networks have decided not to sell programing on iTunes, or is it just NBC Universal?
240 | Sarah Thu. Sep. 6, 2007 at 10:23am
To Ashman:

Did you try the Amazon download or Hulu?
239 | Rayne Thu. Sep. 6, 2007 at 9:41am
At first I thought this was great news, that we would be able to download the show after all… then I tried it out. Ugh. It was a pain to set up and download and the video quality is inferior to that of the iTunes downloads, big time. NBC and Apple, kiss and make up already!
238 | Ashman Thu. Sep. 6, 2007 at 7:03am
I frankly don’t know why NBC is bitching about the price. iTunes literally gave The Office (and thus NBC) its much needed fan-base and regular viewers.
237 | Jane Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 10:21pm
As a die-hard Creative Zen (I own a Zen Micro identical to Pam’s Prism DuroSport) girl, I’m totally fine. Never have been a fan of the iPod, (I much prefer Creative,) but I understand people’s frustration since it is the big mp3 player out there.
I have a feeling that NBC and Apple’s relationship isn’t over, just sidetracked for a while. The contract isn’t up until December, so it’s still possible.
236 | kla Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 10:00pm
Maybe NBC wanted iTunes to pay more per episode, not neccessarily charge customers more per episode. Does that make sense?

Sure, Amazon is charging the same price as iTunes was at $1.99, but that doesn’t mean that NBC isn’t getting more money from Amazon than they got with their previous contract through iTunes. For example, say Apple was paying NBC 75 cents for every download, but now NBC is wanting Apple to give them $1.25 for every episode downloaded. Add that up, and that’s a lot of extra moola. Apple said no, and Amazon said “$1.25? No problem.”

Either way, though, I shun Unbox and NBC for this terrible decision. I will unshun when it’s undone. :)
235 | Big Turkey Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 8:14pm
[from tanster: please punctuate and re-post. thanks!]
234 | Fat Halbert Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 7:21pm
Deer Jerky made a good point… The heart of this issue is DRM. Apple has not licensed their DRM technology to other companies, meaning you must have an Apple product to play your purchased iTunes content. On the other end of the spectrum, Microsoft’s DRM technology is freely licensed and there are dozens of services (like Unbox) offering music and video in Windows Media format. With the exception of the Zune, which uses a new proprietory Zune-only DRM, almost all non-Apple devices support Windows Media. And the devices are NOT tied to a specific service provider. Unfortunately there is no universal DRM scheme, although several lawsuits in Europe (against Apple and others) seek to change this.
233 | zurik Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 7:17pm
[from tanster: please punctuate, spellcheck, and re-post. thanks!]
232 | awesomeblossom Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 7:02pm
I have to disagree with Dementia AL that Apple’s dominance of the MP3 market is due to a superior product. The reason for it’s dominance is because it’s a vertically integrated package… If you buy the iPod, you’re going to use iTunes. Apple knows this and it was a very smart move. But I would bet that many of the people buying iPods don’t even know there are other products out there — they know iPod and thats what they buy. That doesn’t mean it’s a better product.
231 | zurik Wed. Sep. 5, 2007 at 6:59pm