While Popcorn Time certainly hasn’t lacked attention in the news, most have been focusing on the controversy that surrounds it. And it’s true that the app managed to gather a lot of negative attention by various major companies in the entertainment industry, but on the other hand, it was also commended by various news editions for its ease of use and stable design. However, there is a more interesting question to be discussed here, and it’s strange to see that it’s not getting so much coverage in the news – what does Popcorn Time say about the future of online media distribution?
While the developers of the original app decided to stop their contribution and move on to other projects, the open source nature of the project meant that it was only a matter of time before it was picked up. There had already been various forks of the original Popcorn Time, adding new features and polishing the interface, and the app managed to establish an entire mini-community around itself.
This clearly says one thing – people want to see more of Popcorn Time. And at the same time, entertainment companies have been putting a lot of effort to erode the app’s popularity – unsuccessfully – and to convince people that they should stay away from such software. Why? If they wanted to entice people to use their legitimate services, the most sensible thing to do would be to give viewers a good enough alternative that they would feel right about paying for.
The gaming industry seems to have realized this a while ago, as cheap games inevitably tend to lead to huge sales, and lots of profits for the developers and publishers. Netflix has also been a very profitable service, and yet, instead of trying to take the idea and develop it into something of their own, media companies are moving in the direction of mergers which would potentially negatively impact the performance of Netflix.
However, according to experts in the industry, it’s only a matter of time before someone takes the idea of Popcorn Time, and puts the right twist on it. The app has a strong potential for earning money if it’s realized right, and it doesn’t have to take away from the satisfaction of its users for that either. There are several projects forked from the original Popcorn Time that have been showing promising progress so far, so it would be interesting to see which of those manages to develop the idea properly. The answer could also come from a completely new app that’s not yet released, but at this point, it’s not unlikely that this will be the next big thing in the online segment of the entertainment industry.