1)Amazon sells books at cut throat pirces
That's what I'm saying. Amazon sells books. Lots of books, used and new...I buy lots of books from Amazon. News of the death of books at the hands of the DRM'd Kindle has been greatly exaggerated.
2)No it wasn't invented in the 90s but the market has been dieing ever since.
The recorded music industry has been dying for as long as it's been around? That's one heck of a long time scale! Here's a hint: If something has recently changed, look to something that happened recently as the cause. Used record sales have been around for as long as there have been records, i.e. ~75 years. The decline of the music industry began...oh, maybe 10 years ago? Hey, you know what else has been around for thirty years? Used game sales. The reason for the music industry's decline is the same as the reason for the game industry's decline: The product sucks. 30 years ago, you bought an album from a top band, and it was a solid 45 minutes of quality, whether you liked Thin Lizzy, the Bee Gees, the Who, Marvin Gaye, or Led Zeppelin. Now, you buy an album from a top band, and it's two good songs with eight tracks of pure, repetitive, uncreative filler, a cynical ploy to give you crap in exchange for cash.
3)The problem would most likely be piracy I'd assume. But it doesn't change the fact that even with physical media people are tired of buying new dvds that take up tons of room.
Lots of people don't even want to buy movies in the first place, which is why rental is such a huge business. But DD is perfect for rental, since that's exactly what DD is. Recorded media will only go away if the MPAA gets greedy, and they'll see their sales drop as a result. After all, it's not just DVD sales that are down--ticket sales are down, too. That's because modern movies are, for the most part, terrible and derivative, and the actors and actresses are largely forgettable. 50 years ago, people would go to a movie just to see Elizabeth Taylor own the screen. No one has that kind of star power anymore.
In fact if you look at all 3 of these things you will notice that first music made the move to DD
Music's attempt to move to DD as a way of screwing customers failed miserably. Apple introduced DD as a way to make customers' lives more convenient--only buy the songs you want, buy them cheaply, and carry them around wherever you want. And now they're removing DRM from itunes due to competition from Amazon (thus busting your theory that DRM is what makes DD music successful). In other words, rather than viewing DD as a way to punish customers and screw them out of more money, Apple actually approached DD from the standpoint of
not screwing customers out of $15 just to get one song on a CD.
The game industry can't imagine removing DRM from DD games, since for them, DRM is the
whole point of DD.
MOvies are still waiting for this. Even xbox live is having problems as they want $15 bucks for an hd movie on the service.
Almost like DRM'd DD subtracts value from movie purchases. But you know what
is successful with DD? Netflix. That's because for renting movies, physical media has literally zero positives and all negatives.
And yes DD should be cheaper but its the Gamestops of the world preventing that . They have way to much power on their hands
No one from Gamestop is holding a gun to Gabe Newell's head and preventing brand-new games from being sold for $30 on Steam.
Instead of asking, "What would benefit the
industry?" ask "What would benefit the
customer?" The only reason
any industry exists* is to serve customers. DD won't take off unless it's done in a customer-centric manner instead of an industry-centric manner. The problem is that most publishers despise their customers.
*The obvious exception government-run industries, which exist to transfer tax dollars to the employees.
