iTunes Movie Rents Won’t Work With Certain iPods
Despite what Steve Jobs said at the Macworld Keynote Speech, not all iPods are capable of playing back iTunes Video Rentals. At the same time Jobs unveiled the Macbook Air (you know how I feel about that product already), Apple Inc. also unveiled video rentals from the iTunes Music Store.
I decided to give the iTunes Music Store rentals a whirl. First, I observed that not all movies are available for rent, and certain rental titles aren’t available for purchase. Okay, no sweat. New library titles were priced at $3.99, while older movies were priced at $2.99. Seemed reasonable. I was told I’d have 30 days to hit “play”, then 24 hours to complete the movie after I started before the file expired—cool. Ninja Jim and I, after much debate, settled on the Robin Williams flick The Final Cut, priced at $2.99. Two hours later, I had my rental on my computer, ready to be thrown into the iPod.
Except the movie wouldn’t copy to the iPod. Turns out, only the 3rd Generation iPod Nano, 6th Generation iPod (”Classic”) and 1st Generation iPod Touch, along with the Apple iPhone, are capable of viewing rented movies through the iTunes Music Store. The reason is complex, but in a nutshell, it has to do with a piracy leak involving the 5th and 5.5th Generation iPod Videos. The newer iPods have anti-piracy chips installed in them to prevent duplication of videos—which means unless you have a new iPod from September of last year, or an iPhone from June 2007, you’re out of luck.
It’s hard to say “Apple told you so…” when there’s absolutely no warning (except for an Apple document online, which people likely won’t read until after discovering the error). While on hold, waiting to speak with an AppleCare representative, I began to wonder why there was no warning message asking me if I was sure I wanted to download the rental, and explaining in smaller font that the videos wouldn’t work with the 5G and 5.5G iPods. The AppleCare representative I reached told me I’d have to contact iTunes directly online by email.
I’ve since sent an email to the iTunes support section of Apple.com, respectfully requesting a credit of $2.99 for the video download I now can’t watch. It looks like Steve Jobs spoke too soon—not all iPods are created equal when it comes to video rentals. If you’re unsure if your iPod will work with video rentals, click here to see which model iPod you have.
In my past life, I was a tree or something. If not a tree, something that grew old and didn't move very much. I'm pretty convinced of this.