Apple Quietly Pulls iTunes TV Show Rentals

A quick entry for tonight.

Just under a year after Apple introduced the ability to rent TV episodes for 24 hours it has quietly shelved this offering from the iTunes store leaving the ability to buy individual episodes for a higher charge. According to AllThingsD, rentals have been removed due to relatively poor take up by consumers in favour of buying TV episodes. It might not be terribly surprising though given that the range of  TV episodes was limited to Disney (with Steve Jobs being on the board of directors) and Fox (partnering up with Apple for an iPad app).

I’ve never rented a TV episode personally from iTunes. Even as a kid we rarely rented videos from the video store. Even then, if I really liked a TV series that much, I would probably prefer to buy it rather than rent it if it had high rewatch value. I don’t know if I would be inclined to rent a TV episode or a series if it were of low quality though (as the cost does add up over time).

Is this really a big deal for people?

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