Not content with being the content king where music and podcasts are concerned, Apple also wants to be the first place people turn to when they want to download TV shows and films. So, it is not surprising that it has been quietly working behind the scenes to secure deals that expand the range of local video content available on its regional iTuncs Stores.
TV on the iPhone
The headline TV shows available on Apple's iTunes Store will vary over time, but the extensive library contains a wide range of styles drawn from every vintage, from puppet-led retro classics like Thunderbirds and classic comedies like Bewitched to modern hits like Channel 4's The IT Crowd and Michael Palin's New Europe from the BBC. The BBC was the first UK broadcaster to sign up through its commercial arm BBC Worldwide, following deals it had made with YouTube to run its own channels on the Google-owned video service, and the success of BBC iPlayer. Pretty soon, though, other broadcasters followed suit, starting with Channel 4, and later ITV, which started selling classic content from its archive through the Store.
Prices vary according to programme and broadcaster, although most arc pegged at £1.89. This will buy you episodes of current and recent programmes, such as Doctor Who and Torchwood, as well as older modern releases, like Little Britain and Spooks. BBC programmes available for purchase on the Store appear around one week after their TV debut, allowing for 7 free days of playback on the iPlayer. Miami Vice, which is now approaching its silver jubilee, however, is slightly cheaper at £1.49, regardless of whether you arc buying a regular 48-minute episode or the hour-and-a-half-pilot. That makes the 14 minutes of Shaun The Sheep you can buy for £1.89 look comparatively expensive. Some shows will be offered free as an incentive to encourage you to buy further episodes.
As with music, you can gift TV programmes to other users, so long as they have an iTunes Store account. However, UK users do not get a discount for bulk-buying whole series as US users do, and at the time of writing there is no option to buy a series pass — again common on the US Store - that will allow you to download all episodes of a current series.
Movies on the iPhone
Movies came late to the UK iTunes Store. They had already been available for more than a year in the US when, in June 2008, they finally made the trans-Atlantic hop. When they did, though, it was in no way half-hearted. It launched in the UK with 700 movies to rent or purchase, with new titles added on the same day as their DVD release.
Prices vary depending on the age of the movie, with Apple making a distinction between new releases and so-called library titles from a few months or years back. Latest releases cost £10.99 to purchase outright, and £3.49 to rent. Library titles are sold for £6.99, and rented for £2.49. They can be viewed on a Mac or PC, iPod nano, classic or touch, and any iPhone of any vintage. Where high-definition versions of the movies arc also available, these cost an extra £1 each, but because of their extensive hardware requirements and stricter digital rights conditions, can only be downloaded to and played back by Apple TV with an HDMI connection.
Some movies can only be bought outright and some can only be rented, but with many you can take your pick and watch them either way. Depending on which you opt for, though, you will be subject to different terms and conditions. Movies you buy outright will be subject to DRM, so that while you can watch them as many times as you want for as long as you want, you can't pass them on to anyone else. Those movies that you rent, though, must be viewed within 30 days of you making the purchase, and will cease to work 48 hours after the point at which you first press play on them.
You can, however, watch them as many times as you choose during those 48 hours, and do so on a computer, an Apple TV, an iPod or an iPhone. The conditions for backing up your movie purchases also differ somewhat from those for music. While you can burn music playlists to CD up to seven times, you can't make copies of movies at all, except as backups that will only play within iTunes itself. This is to prevent copyright theft.
You should also be careful when you are deciding how you want to watch your rented movies. If you originally rented a movie using a Mac or PC, watched half of it and then chose to send it to your iPhone so you could finish it on the commute, but somehow got waylaid, you could not then transfer the film back to your Mac or PC to finish watching it in the evening: it is a one-way-only transfer. Unfortunately, high definition movies rented or purchased through Apple TV have to stay there, as neither the iPhone nor the iPod arc high definition-capable devices.
Playing back TV and movies
Shows and films are organised and played by the iPod application, which, in the iPhone's default set-up, appears on the dock at the bottom of the home scrccn. Open it and then tap the videos entry at the bottom of the screen and pick what you want to watch from the list that appears. Each show will be categorised showing basic details including, in the case of television programmes, the name, episode number and title. You can add and delete shows through iTunes whenever your iPhone is connected to your Mac or PC, but to delete shows on the move, slide your finger from left to right across its entry in the list and tap the Delete button that appears.
When watching shows, you can use the ringer control on the side of the iPhone to change the playback volume, or tap on the screen to bring up controls similar to the ones use by the YouTube application. This gives you a volume slider and transport controls at the bottom of the screen, a progress bar at the top and a Done button to take you back to the menu. The double-ended arrow button at the top right of the display switches between a programme's recorded aspect ratio, which will usually be 4:3 for older programmes and 16:9 for more recent programmes, and the iPod's native aspect ratio, which sits somewhere in between.
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