Theatrical
Starting in vaudeville and nickolodeon theaters, motion pictures became the cultural past time with over a billion people going a week by the 1940s. As the founding force for movies, theatrical releasing still holds a prestigious release window for features, and can be the flagship for the economic projections of other release windows. Digital projection has enabled less dependency on the expensive production-side of filmmaking; nevertheless, digital releasing is still not a tremendous savings to traditional 35 mm releasing, and in some platform release strategies, 35mm may be more cost-effective. Services>>
DVD/Bluray
It took about five years for DVD to outperform VHS since its national release in 1997, and yet with its vastly improved picture quality and command options, the general public was hungry for adoption of this new technology. By the time over 90% of U.S. households owned DVD players, the industry was preparing for high-definition players. The inability for the studios to agree on one universal HD format, lead to a format war and consumer confusion. As Blu-ray reigned as the new format, online movie viewing exploded in popularity. Today, disc sales are still a significant part of the release cycle, but not for every title. Services>>
TV/VOD
Cable providers began offering video on demand services as part of their digital subscription package. The convenience and accessibility of watching programs when you like caught on quick. As internet bandwidth increased, and compression technologies improved, the popularity of online video boomed. Companies such as Netflix and Hulu began offering feature and TV content to their subscribers, and in almost no time, overshadowed the traditional DVD market. Today as a release window, VOD and other digital platforms (DTO, DTR, SVOD, etc.) are a viable economy for tv and features. Services>>
International
Aside from domestic releasing, programs have a "secondary" life in territories outside the US. In some respects, foreign sales can exceed domestic sales. In general, buyers of media content, represent a specific country, and look for specific content to license, and can be found at international markets such as Cannes and AFM. English language content is looked for in varying degrees across the globe, with some territories, such as Japan and Germany, that historically do quite well with licensing revenues. Regardless, there's a multitude of markets and territories to explore for any given content. Services>>