Looks like DS9 will not get Blu Ray

[USS KG5]

CBS isn't a charity.

Sure, but there is a huge difference between making a fair profit, and making an obscenely unfair profit via ripping off customers. Viacom has a history of doing the latter with Trek products, and IMO this new streaming service ploy is merely the latest example of that.

The thing is, they aren't ripping you off. Because you're a grownup and can make the choice not to pay what they want for their product.

Additionally, you don't pay, you don't get Star Trek, old or new!

What people seem to want is other people to pay, including for some reason the shareholders of CBS.

Someone posted a great link to an article where someone with friends on the inside pointed out there are many who work at CBS who would really like to remaster DS9, they just don't have a business case.

Like it or not, the only thing that would ever have led to a DS9 remaster is excellent revenues beyond expectations for the more popular shows.

I'm still hoping it gets done, but sadly it looks like the team has disbanded, so looks less likely than ever.

 

[Mage]

It amazes me that people are amazed by this....

Normal tv is going the way of the dinosaur and dodo. Streaming is where it's at. And I'm not simply talking about Netflix and similar setups. Look at how many people are watching shows at a later time thanks to services provided by the channels.

We hardly ever watch normal tv. Doctor Who and GBBO, that's it. Other than that, it's Netflix and dvd/bluray. And I know plenty of people who only watch shows and movies like that.

 

[Admiral Bear]

I think the question CBS really needs to ask itself is how TNG Blu-ray would've sold if the season sets had been priced at say $40 instead of $60-70.

When the sets were vastly reduced, as they were on Amazon UK during a big Trek con in London 2 years ago, how much did sales increase?

As already said here, $60-70 per season was no more than corporate greed and stupidity on the part of CBS. I don't care what the project cost. At the end of the day, you have to sell the product, which means pricing it at a level which will incur the maximum level of sales.

US and UK retailers also need to take a long hard look at themselves. £50/$60 a season when the Italian sets were going for the £30, and the Scandanavian copies were selling for £25.

 

[Lance]

Yeah, the pricing was insane. I took the view that they were oodles cheaper than TNG was on its first DVD release ($120AUS for each season, versus just under half that for the Blu Ray seasons), so from my point of view it was a comparitive no-brainer. But when there were international versions out there selling for a cheaper price point, not to mention other TV shows on Blu Ray, then the 'first run' of TNG-R BDs were overpriced in the marketplace. Plus of course, there were some who were waiting it out for the value pack 'Complete Series' release, and the decision to release The Best Of Both Worlds, Redemption, Unification, Chain Of Command and All Good Things as seperate releases alongside the season sets was commercial suicide, because they're either marketed at the rabid Trekkie collector who'll buy everything (surely a minority audience?), or else they're aimed as casuals who aren't gonna pay out for full season sets anyway. In practice, they were only an added cost for the distributors, with a limited financial return. The 'seperate stories' releases were basically dead weight all along, they were almost fated to fail, and they *might* just have dragged the season sets with them...

Part of me thinks that CBS-Paramount's consumer model, based as it was on the old DVD model and the expected targets of what they anticipated the Blu Rays would sell for, was also out-of-date for a world where streaming is coming ahead in leaps and bounds. They clearly looked at how Trek used to sell on old media and factored that into the restoration costs, coming up with a figure that they then based the RRP on... but when consumers failed to buy up the new sets, those predicted sales targets went out the window, and the whole thing fell to pieces.

Another problem was the severe lack of publicity. I've heard rumors that Season One sold extremely well, and that one was heavily promoted for it's day-and-night restoration, but the following seasons gradually got less and less advertising, and sales dipped. By about the fifth or sixth seasons, it was hard to even find out the release dates of these things, and a grand total of ZERO of the local stores in my area ever stocked them (I had to buy them online). It was like the Blu Ray sets were being released into a vacuum.

I definitely think that mistakes were made. It was all a bit of a cock-up, in hindsight.

 

[Lance]

Gee...I wonder why they think they can get away with it...

That's brilliant!

 

[kkt]

I'll pay for new Star Trek if it's good, but it has to show it's good first. Not more Abrams stuff that sort of reminds one of Star Trek.

 

[Admiral Bear]

Yeah, the pricing was insane. I took the view that they were oodles cheaper than TNG was on its first DVD release ($120AUS for each season, versus just under half that for the Blu Ray seasons), so from my point of view it was a comparitive no-brainer. But when there were international versions out there selling for a cheaper price point, not to mention other TV shows on Blu Ray, then the 'first run' of TNG-R BDs were overpriced in the marketplace. Plus of course, there were some who were waiting it out for the value pack 'Complete Series' release, and the decision to release The Best Of Both Worlds, Redemption, Unification, Chain Of Command and All Good Things as seperate releases alongside the season sets was commercial suicide, because they're either marketed at the rabid Trekkie collector who'll buy everything (surely a minority audience?), or else they're aimed as casuals who aren't gonna pay out for full season sets anyway. In practice, they were only an added cost for the distributors, with a limited financial return. The 'seperate stories' releases were basically dead weight all along, they were almost fated to fail, and they *might* just have dragged the season sets with them...

Part of me thinks that CBS-Paramount's consumer model, based as it was on the old DVD model and the expected targets of what they anticipated the Blu Rays would sell for, was also out-of-date for a world where streaming is coming ahead in leaps and bounds. They clearly looked at how Trek used to sell on old media and factored that into the restoration costs, coming up with a figure that they then based the RRP on... but when consumers failed to buy up the new sets, those predicted sales targets went out the window, and the whole thing fell to pieces.

Another problem was the severe lack of publicity. I've heard rumors that Season One sold extremely well, and that one was heavily promoted for it's day-and-night restoration, but the following seasons gradually got less and less advertising, and sales dipped. By about the fifth or sixth seasons, it was hard to even find out the release dates of these things, and a grand total of ZERO of the local stores in my area ever stocked them (I had to buy them online). It was like the Blu Ray sets were being released into a vacuum.

I definitely think that mistakes were made. It was all a bit of a cock-up, in hindsight.

Agreed. I'll also say that from season 4 onwards, because of the soft focus filming that was bought in, there was even less of a reason to pony up $60 a season when you weren't getting the image quality of the first season.

And we all know how poor season 2 looks. I suspect that put a lot of people off. If CBS had any decency, it would've had the in house team redo season 2 before the project ended, and allow fans to exchange the crap that CBS put out.

Given how CBS must known that sales were tanking long before the end of the remaster, we should probably be happy that we got the entire series done. CBS could easily have canned the project after season three or four.

 

[USS KG5]

I think the question CBS really needs to ask itself is how TNG Blu-ray would've sold if the season sets had been priced at say $40 instead of $60-70.
...
As already said here, $60-70 per season was no more than corporate greed and stupidity on the part of CBS. I don't care what the project cost. At the end of the day, you have to sell the product, which means pricing it at a level which will incur the maximum level of sales.

Surely they need to incur the maximum level of profit, not sales?

If the price had been halved then the level of profit would probably have been a quarter of what it was, so they would have to sell four times as many copies to make the same amount of profit.

At the same time, market forces would dictate the sets would still drop to being £10 each or so in the same amount of time, so the people waiting for them to be £10 a season, would they really have been tempted to pay full whack if full whack was £25 instead of £50?

Corporate greed is a tautology, but stupidity is harder to prove. If we work on the assumption that the golden factor enabling a DS9 and VGR remaster was sales volume, then you are correct.

However if profits were the issue, I doubt even halving the initial price would have made much difference. Sure they were pricey compared to other shows, but their market is 30-somethings who still love TNG enough to buy a remastered physcial product they mostly already own on DVD because it looks sharper.

I'm not sure that market was ever that large, but it is generally well-heeled.

 

[Admiral Bear]

Sorry, quote button's not working.

Surely they need to incur the maximum level of profit, not sales?

If the cost of production makes sales viable, and you price at what the market can bear, then sales and profit go hand in hand. I'm very glad to have TNG on BR, but if the cost of the project was such that it demanded $60 a season just to cover costs, a mug of tea and some biscuits, then the project should never have been commissioned.

If the price had been halved then the level of profit would probably have been a quarter of what it was, so they would have to sell four times as many copies to make the same amount of profit.

You're assuming a total lack of non Trek fans and fair weather buyers who might have bought a few seasons had the price been at $35-$40. A lot more of the hard core Trek fanbase would also have bought in, as evidenced by people here rushing to Zavvi to get the boxset for £80. While I realise 7 x £25 is a lot more than £80, at 2/3 releases a year, the sets would've been a lot easier on the wallet than 2/3 at £60 each a year.

At the same time, market forces would dictate the sets would still drop to being £10 each or so in the same amount of time, so the people waiting for them to be £10 a season, would they really have been tempted to pay full whack if full whack was £25 instead of £50?

No one expected to get the sets for £10 each. Ever. The answer to your question is yes, assuming there was ever the demand in the first place. While it didn't help that TNG BR was being shown in the UK on SyFy 5 nights a week, at £25 a season, they would've been hoovered up in comparison to the sales that were achieved.

Corporate greed is a tautology, but stupidity is harder to prove. If we work on the assumption that the golden factor enabling a DS9 and VGR remaster was sales volume, then you are correct.

I'm always right.

However if profits were the issue, I doubt even halving the initial price would have made much difference. Sure they were pricey compared to other shows, but their market is 30-somethings who still love TNG enough to buy a remastered physcial product they mostly already own on DVD because it looks sharper.

I'm not sure that market was ever that large, but it is generally well-heeled.

I refer you to my first two responses.

If a 1/4 the people who paid to see Into Poopness at the cinema worldwide, had bought TNG on Bluray at £25 a season over 3 years, we'd be getting DS9 on Bluray.

 

[USS KG5]

If the cost of production makes sales viable, and you price at what the market can bear, then sales and profit go hand in hand...

My point was they would rather have 10,000 x 20 that 30,000 x 5 - which may have been the workings of their calculation, for example. We clearly don't know of course!

You're assuming a total lack of non Trek fans and fair weather buyers who might have bought a few seasons had the price been at $35-$40.

I'm 100% certain so few of those people exist its statistically unimportant. We all love TNG but to most of the world its a show that finished over 20 years ago for nerds. I think Trek fans are the only important audience.

Arguably fans attracted through curiousity after the new films, but if they picked up season one, they aren't coming back for season two, lets face it!

No one expected to get the sets for £10 each. Ever.

In sales? I often wait to get even box sets under a tenner in sales? I never meant to imply they would sell that price on release date.

at £25 a season, they would've been hoovered up in comparison to the sales that were achieved.

I cheerfully disagree.

If a 1/4 the people who paid to see Into Poopness at the cinema worldwide, had bought TNG on Bluray at £25 a season over 3 years, we'd be getting DS9 on Bluray.

[/quote]

Agreed, but I don't think that was ever likely. You wouldn't believe how many people I know who won't watch classic films (including Jaws, Quatermass and the Pit, The Birds etc) just because they are "old"!

 

[Admiral Bear]

Arguably fans attracted through curiousity after the new films, but if they picked up season one, they aren't coming back for season two, lets face it!

Ummm. . .yes. . . .OK. . .I'll give you that one.

I cheerfully disagree.

You seem to be erring on the side that the project should never have gone ahead, at least from the financial position. If you don't believe the TNG sets would have sold in meaningfully larger quantities at £25 as opposed to £50, do you believe TNG BR was financially doomed from the start ie cost of production was too high and the market too small, or is there a lower price point you'd have started at?

 

[USS KG5]

You seem to be erring on the side that the project should never have gone ahead, at least from the financial position.

Well, not as such. I think the project probably was originally sold as being paid for by the Blu sales and the future streaming revenues being gravy.

I'd take it as read that whatever financial predictions were made proved optimistic, as the remastering project was cancelled before we got to the more complex and undoubtedly less popular DS9.

Now, whether CBS would travel back in time and cancel it, I doubt it. Even if it lost a little bit of money to date its likely they will eventually get it back. We might still get DS9-HD, it just is very unlikely inded.

If you don't believe the TNG sets would have sold in meaningfully larger quantities at £25 as opposed to £50, do you believe TNG BR was financially doomed from the start ie cost of production was too high and the market too small, or is there a lower price point you'd have started at?

I don't believe a large market exists who would pay £25 but not £50. I believe it does exist, your good self being included, but I don't think it is big enough to offset the drop in margin by decreasing the price by 50%, let alone increase the overall profit. I'll try to explain why.

The fixed cost of the remaster of course remains constant, lets say the remaster overall cost £15 million and they want to sell 1.5 million units (so a tenner a box set to break even) and I suspect the marginal cost of making and distributing a box set is somewhere between 5 and 10 pounds. selling at £50 I suspect they sell to Amazon for about £25-30 per set. Therefore CBS would have about £5 to £10 profit per set, assuming they sell their 1.5 million sets (worldwide, I'm just using UK currency figures for simplicity).

However at £25 sale price, Amazon are going to be paying £15 for those box sets, so the profit margin for CBS is effectively bugger all.

That might be a bit harsh (I suspect Amazon do sell at lower margins than high street retailers, so there probably would still be some small profit even at £25 a set) but there isn't much wiggle room. Pile-em-high, sell-em-cheap only really works when you have already paid off your fixed costs.

Hope that explains where I'm coming from.

 

[Admiral Bear]

Back in the early 2000s, I worked for a couple of days at a DVD wholesaler/distributor. The first few TNG DVD sets had been out for a while, and if memory serves, the company sold them to retailers for £15 each. The retailers them sold them for £60 minimum.

I'd imagine Amazon were probably making around £35 per set.

My earlier comment about UK retailers needing to take a look at their behaviour stands. How were Scandanavian retailers able to sell the TNG BR sets for £30 from the off? They must still have been able to make enough money to make selling the sets worthwhile. And in the meantime, Amazon UK, who of course pay zero tax in the UK, were charging £60, with almost the same $ equivelent in the US.

I think CBS should've charged more wholesale, and either got firm with the likes of Amazon over pricing, or sold directly to fans. If CBS had received £30/$40 directly for every TNG set they did sell, DS9 would be on the way.

 

[USS KG5]

My earlier comment about UK retailers needing to take a look at their behaviour stands. How were Scandanavian retailers able to sell the TNG BR sets for £30 from the off? They must still have been able to make enough money to make selling the sets worthwhile. And in the meantime, Amazon UK, who of course pay zero tax in the UK, were charging £60, with almost the same $ equivelent in the US.

Oh agreed - the retailers probably did just fine, but they would have just whacked their usual markup, anything between 100 and 300 percent, on the sets.

But then how much profit the remaster makes was not the retailers problem. Under that regime only very good sales indeed would have let to a DS9 remaster.

I think CBS should've charged more wholesale, and either got firm with the likes of Amazon over pricing, or sold directly to fans. If CBS had received £30/$40 directly for every TNG set they did sell, DS9 would be on the way.

Well selling directly is exactly what they are planning with their new show, and everyone is at it, HBO etc. as well, skipping past the middle-man and selling to you direct, albeit with greedy ISPs likely to charge for the bandwidth in the middle.

The new post-physical media age has already started to re-invent the /destroy the old music industry, maybe the same will happen with TV?

Hence Amazon's obsession with becoming the largest digital media company in the world!

 

[Admiral Bear]

For certain things, I still like to have physical media. Damn me for being old fashioned. For most things, I'll watch once or twice, I'm happy to have files on a hard drive.

CBS can stream all they like on their in house streaming channel. But anything they show on it won't be getting the advertising on mainstream free channels so that people know about it.

I can't see much take up for the channel just because it will have a likely poorly advertised new Trek show on it. The show will be on the Pirate Bay within 12 hours anyway. CBS will know this, but despite that, I'm assuming it thinks they can financially screw the fans when they know from TNG BR that the Trek well is already bone dry.

Some executives really have no brains.

 

[Joe_Atari]

I think the project probably was originally sold as being paid for by the Blu sales and the future streaming revenues being gravy.

No. The other way around. At best the prospect of getting some physical media sales out of the project might have added some urgency to getting TNG-R completed (hence the rushed release schedule) -- urgency that may not exist for DS9-R. Instead of capitalizing on the fast-fading physical media market, DS9-R and VOY-R would most likely be triggered by the new series and the push for All Access. How shiny new masters of DS9 and VOY would fit with CBS' service and marketing plans (including but not limited to All Access) is an open question.

Even if it lost a little bit of money to date its likely they will eventually get it back.

Again, the business does not work that way. They did not undertake the TNG-R project hoping flaky fans wouldn't find a reason not to buy the BDs. TNG-R was almost certainly presold to broadcast and streaming providers before the project was greenlit.

The new post-physical media age has already started to re-invent the /destroy the old music industry, maybe the same will happen with TV?

With all due respect... started? The music industry as it was was decimated at least a decade ago, if not 15 years ago with Napster, etc. Consumption patterns and bandwidth considerations primarily have bought the motion picture / television business additional time to adjust to the new paradigm, and so far they've done a far better job than the music industry. To be fair the music industry was the canary in the coal mine, and the motion picture / television biz has learned from previous mistakes (e.g. over-reliance on law enforcement and legislative measures to curb piracy, etc.).

CBS has this property called Star Trek, which includes all of its television product produced to date and now a new series in 2017. CBS has a responsibility to its shareholders to profitably monetize assets such as Star Trek by -- among other things -- optimizing future distribution of existing product (primarily streaming and broadcast now, but including physical media if it makes business sense, but certainly to a much lesser extent). This arguably includes updating DS9 and VOY (and these are really the only two series left that need it, aside from various ancillary programs -- TV specials, etc.) to contemporary technical standards so they can be presented alongside TOS-R, TNG-R, ENT, and Trek 2017. I'm sure they don't want blurry old SD masters of DS9 and VOY sullying their state-of-the-art streaming service; the question is how much will they want to spend to make the upgrade and how it will be done (upscaling vs. new scans and re-rendered VFX, OAR vs. 16x9, VAM or not, etc.).

I was glad to read that the demand for Trek content on existing SVOD services (Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu mainly) has been strong; this has already pushed CBS to greenlight Trek 2017 and can only help the prospects for remastered DS9 and VOY.

 

[Joe_Atari]

CBS can stream all they like on their in house streaming channel. But anything they show on it won't be getting the advertising on mainstream free channels so that people know about it.

I can't see much take up for the channel just because it will have a likely poorly advertised new Trek show on it.

Why are you assuming it will be poorly advertised? Aside from extensive mainstream media publicity and online advertising, I strongly suspect we'll see traditional advertising on linear CBS as well. Why not?

...I'm assuming it thinks they can financially screw the fans when they know from TNG BR that the Trek well is already bone dry.

I don't get the animosity toward CBS. They've certainly been far better stewards of the Trek property than Viacom / Paramount.

CBS is only adjusting for the new television environment; programming paid for by 30 second advertising spots is becoming a thing of the past. It was never free; 10 to (now) 20 minutes of commercials per hour paid for it (whether you watched them or not -- a pretty flawed business model to be sure). If anything they may underestimate just how stuck in the past many Trek fans truly are. There's a well-traveled meme protesting the VOD-based Trek 2017 that shows an attic full of (no-doubt costly but largely worthless) Trek product, but these same fans won't pay $1-2 on average per episode for a brand-new series? If it turns out to be lousy (certainly possible), stop paying; it's not like they're making us sign a contract or anything. Again, I don't get it.

Some executives really have no brains.

I agree, but there are a lot of smart ones as well. Let's hope those are the ones who work on getting us some quality new Star Trek on TV at last!

 

[USS KG5]

No. The other way around. At best the prospect of getting some physical media sales out of the project might have added some urgency to getting TNG-R completed (hence the rushed release schedule) -- urgency that may not exist for DS9-R.
...
Again, the business does not work that way. They did not undertake the TNG-R project hoping flaky fans wouldn't find a reason not to buy the BDs. TNG-R was almost certainly presold to broadcast and streaming providers before the project was greenlit.

Your opinion notwithstanding, the articles I have read (a good one is linked up-thread) where people have spoken to insiders suggest TNG-R was commissioned because of better than expect sales of the TOS Blus, and that DS9-R, which they would still like to do, was cancelled/ not commissioned because of poor sales of the TNG Blus

You would think as well if they had pre-sold all the streaming rights and were raking it in, they might have bothered to sell them in the UK, as it is there is no Trek currently streaming here.

With all due respect... started? The music industry as it was was decimated at least a decade ago,

Agreed, Napster decimated the music industry, as in reduced it by about 10%. It did not destroy CD sales overnight.

That said, at this point recorded music has become basically worthless, so the old model of sell CDs to make money has basically gone. The established labels still make a mint of "artists" like Katy Perry and Taylor Swift though.

I was glad to read that the demand for Trek content on existing SVOD services (Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu mainly) has been strong; this has already pushed CBS to greenlight Trek 2017 and can only help the prospects for remastered DS9 and VOY.

I'm hoping they will change their minds as well, only time will tell, ultimately.

 

[Squiggy]

CBS can stream all they like on their in house streaming channel. But anything they show on it won't be getting the advertising on mainstream free channels so that people know about it..

That's the same reason why House of Cards bombed so spectacularly.

 

[BillJ]

CBS can stream all they like on their in house streaming channel. But anything they show on it won't be getting the advertising on mainstream free channels so that people know about it..

That's the same reason why House of Cards bombed so spectacularly.

I can guarantee that CBS All-Access and its shows get promoted on CBS. Heck, the first episode of Trek is playing on the parent network. What is that, if not advertising?