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New technologies may make the world more convenient for some of us, but others are threatened by them. Now tension is growing between video rental shop owners and Internet provider Hanaro Telecom as the shopkeepers fear a new service will curtail their business.
Hanaro Telecom on Thursday said it will offer movies through its Internet Protocol TV service Hana TV soon after they finish in theaters and sometimes even while the movies are still showing in theaters. The owners of video rental shops have been collectively complaining to Hanaro Telecom, accusing it of damaging their business.
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Subscribers pose next to a TV showing Hanaro Telecom’s latest Hana TV service, which screens the latest movies.
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Traditionally, movies are shown first in theaters and then released on DVD and video, with TV as the final stop. They bare rarely shown on TV until well after they appeared at the video rental shops.
Hanaro Telecom declared publicly that it was going to break with this tradition. With Hana TV, subscribers can see recently-released movies without having to go out to rental shops. It's a small convenience for consumers, but it's a matter of life and death for rental video shops. A video rental shop association has said it will no longer handle movies that are shown on Hana TV.
Hana TV has only 360,000 subscribers, which is a small number given the total population. But given that the figure was zero until last July and all those subscribers signed up in just eight months, it could have a massive future .
Meanwhile, satellite digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB) broadcaster TU Media has already started broadcasting movies that are showing in theaters, opening a new front in the battle between new and existing media.
Park Byung-moo, the head of Hanaro Telecom, said they are competing with videos after one year and they'll fight the theaters in another. New technology and the existing order are at war -- will new technology be able to satisfy everyone?
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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