In an exclusive announced on Tuesday, The Wrap reported that YouTube will be launching a movie on demand service for mainstream Hollywood movies. The move touted as a challenge to the iTunes service includes Sony Pictures Entertainment, Warner Brothers and Universal, but so far Paramount, Fox and Disney have declined to join.
The news followed hot on the heels of a Next Web article on Monday about the emergence of full length pirated movies on the video sharing site. There is some speculation that these pirated copies are getting through due to some changes in the filters in anticipation of the new Hollywood deal.
Hollywood on demand services were announced on Tuesday, is this a move to reduce YouTube pirate content?
However, this isn’t the first time that YouTube has partnered with a major content producer, and if past results are anything to go by, the impact this could have on copyrighted material being available could be huge.
In October 2009 YouTube signed a deal with the UK’s Channel 4, to provide on demand services for new and old content. This restricted the availability of much of the content to only be available to UK viewers, while also effectively removing all videos of Channel 4 content that weren’t uploaded through the official channel. If this same effect is seen with the Hollywood studios already signed up for this deal, this could see them taking control over who sees their content and when it gets released in each country.